Historical Development of Citizenship: From Ancient Greece to Modernity
Historical Genesis of Citizenship
Citizenship, in its classic sense, corresponds to a legal and political status through which citizens acquire, within a political group, certain rights as individuals: civil, political, and social. It also entails certain duties, such as paying taxes. In its modern sense, it corresponds to the right and duty to participate in community life and a democratic state.
Citizenship in Greece and Rome
The concept of citizenship began to develop in ancient Greece, mainly in the theories of Plato and Aristotle. It is one where the active citizen (that is, one who knows their rights and obligations, can express their views, and participate actively in society) is involved in building a just society. Education is an essential tool to become a good citizen. According to Plato, its function in a just society is to form, primarily, future leaders, educating them in the love of truth and goodness, and in the mastery of passions. Upon it depend the citizens and the order and justice of the state. Aristotle defines the educational contents at different stages of citizens’ lives and emphasizes intellectual and artistic training, primarily through music and gymnastics.
If we compare current democracy with Greek democracy, and with it the idea of citizen participation, it has several limitations:
- It is exclusionary: Only free males over 30 had the right to vote.
- It is local: Only Athenian men were considered free and equal.
- It is restricted: Freedom was limited only to the role of participating.
- It is earthy: Government of the people through referendums; the people have the right to approve or vote on legislation.
Unlike the model of direct democracy of ancient Greece, in Rome, citizenship meant “representative democracy”: The people gave up sovereignty through free elections.
Modern Citizenship
In the Renaissance, power was in the hands of the monarch, and the national state was born.
Citizenship in the Context of the Absolute State
After the Renaissance, the dominant political model in Western Europe was an absolute monarchy. The public almost disappeared. The new type of state was characterized by the concentration of power in the hands of the prince and the development of the theory of sovereignty. The citizen was equated with the subject. The concept of citizen that Bodin transmits is: “The mark of the citizen is obedience and recognition of the free subject to his sovereign prince, and guardianship, justice, and defense of the prince to his subjects.” Citizenship confers rights of protection.
A New Inclusive Citizenship
From the notion of the state of nature and social contract, the idea of a state system designed to ensure the rights and freedoms of individuals is built. Citizenship, in Anglo-Saxon and French thought, played the role of civic virtue. The citizen began to be identified as an individual member of the nation or people. Several authors link the idea of citizenship with the notion of contract. Contractualism originated in the 17th century with authors such as Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau.
Hobbes
Starting from a natural and wild state, man is at war against man, and in this situation, man decides to make a deal in which he yields his rights to the will of the sovereign, who will act according to the general welfare of the state. Hobbes sees the citizen as a subject of political power.
Locke
His contractarian theory gives rise to democratic liberalism. In his Second Treatise on Civil Government, he introduced the “natural state.” This state is a pre-democratic state, and in this type of state, human beings have certain natural rights, such as life, liberty, and property. There is an impossible existence of an authority to protect those rights. The individual has natural rights prior to entering society. The government is subject to the judgment of citizens, and its decisions and projects must be approved by the public.
Rousseau
His theory was that of civic participation. Human beings live in society, so they must establish a new social contract that approaches their natural state. This social contract is a covenant of the community with the individual and vice versa. In a city constituted on the basis of the social contract, every citizen participates in the enactment of the law and is subject to their general self-will. The social contract replaces person-to-person relationships with the relationship between the citizen and the law.
Cosmopolitan Citizenship in Kant
Kant says that to achieve peace, citizens must be loyal to their own state’s laws (nationally). In the internal affairs of other states, agreement and non-intervention should govern (international level). Kant makes a society depend on legislation called a constitution. The social compact is the set of people who unite to form a society, and a contract between them leads to a civil union pact. In this constitution, there are three key areas: free men, dependence, and equality between citizen subjects. These three ideals are fostered in his book Pedagogy. According to Kant, public education is the most appropriate way to shape character and the public. This education must be characterized by a cosmopolitan sense. Education through prudence, which makes the individual become a citizen, becomes a public value.
Contemporary Citizenship
Citizenship is a political ideal in which the most important elements are participation, rights, and belonging. A good citizen is one who has rights and is involved in the construction of the city.
Citizenship as a Political Ideal
According to economist Marshall, full membership in a community was sufficient to justify citizenship. He justified the inequalities arising from social class. The sociologist Marshall develops a concept of citizenship as a condition of those belonging to a community. He distinguishes three elements in citizenship:
- Civil element: Includes rights that affect the person as having freedom.
- Political element: Corresponds to the right to participate in political power as a community member or as a reader of its members.
- Social element: Comprises, on the one hand, the right to security and economic well-being, in addition to sharing the social heritage and living a civilized life.
Marshall defines citizenship as a status accorded to full members of a community. Citizenship is legitimized by including the unequal. Durkheim recognized that during the 20th century, an egalitarian distribution of citizenship was achieved in capitalist states, regardless of differences in class or gender.
The Public and the Theory of Justice
Rawls defends the priority of justice over the good, saying that natural duty involves the relationship of the individual citizen to the institutional elements of the social system. He considers that the most important natural duty is to promote just institutions. This duty entails two duties:
- In just institutions, to obey and fulfill our mission or our role.
- When institutions do not exist, to facilitate the establishment of fair agreements.
On the Theory of Justice, Rawls says the citizen must make three types of judgments:
- Judge the justice of the law.
- Decide which constitutional provisions are valid.
- Determine the limits of their duties and policy responsibilities.
Walzer understands that citizenship is an asset to be distributed with justice and demands an egalitarian distribution. When administering justice, the world should be divided into political communities.
Citizenship in the Era of Globalization
For Habermas, we are witnessing globalization in the fields of economics, communications, weapons, technology, the military, and environmental risks. Globalization is a fundamentally financial phenomenon that has taken place in the world due to technological advances and the opening of capital markets. It consolidates inequalities among people.
Citizenship as a System of Rights
In the second half of the 20th century, there was an intention to install in Europe a state model that recognizes the social rights of citizens: the welfare state. This is a legal state that ensures social rights (rights to health, housing, pensions, etc.). Habermas points out that in Europe, citizenship is the product of migrations, wars, and unemployment. Habermas advocates the formation of a European public sphere and sees the need for a European constitution that recognizes the rights of citizenship. The cosmopolitan state is an increasingly achievable ideal.
Citizenship Today
According to Adela Cortina, a citizen is a human being who lives with autonomous peers in a community and builds their autonomy in solidarity with others; they are not a subject or a servant. The concept of citizenship implies freedom, dignity, respect, etc. The relationship between the citizen and the state carries some moral duties for the members of the community.
Citizenship and Human Rights
Human rights are the basic rights and freedoms of individuals. Human beings, by their human condition, have these rights. They are a struggle for a decent life for all and are a means to ensure the relationship between the individual and society. Other fees can be included, such as political, sociocultural, and socioeconomic status and duties:
- Political Rights: Right to participate in government directly or through representatives, right to an international order that respects human rights.
- Sociocultural Rights: Right to marriage, education, culture, and scientific progress.
- Socioeconomic Rights: Right to individual or corporate ownership, right to social security, employment, and fair compensation, right to an adequate standard of living.
- Duties and Mandates: Duties of the individual to the community and the norm that the statement cannot be interpreted against the rights proclaimed.
Different Classes of Citizenship
- Global Citizenship: Refers to the exercise of citizenship from a perspective that fosters respect and appreciation of diversity, appreciation for the environment, responsible consumption, and respect for human rights.
- Economic Citizenship: The corporate citizen must be a space where citizens can form and pursue citizenship. It must promote a harmonious work climate.
- Cosmopolitan Citizenship: Refers to people of all cultures and to a conception of citizenship that goes beyond the territorial limits of states.
Citizenship Education
Education is an essential tool that contributes to the formation of responsible citizens in a democracy. It must be taught from participation, dialogue, and the elaboration of joint projects. The transmission of values must be one of the principles that govern the educational system. The council believes that education for citizenship must be a priority objective of educational policy. At the World Conference on Human Rights (UN, 1993), it was remembered that education and information on human rights are key to ensuring harmonious relations among communities. UNESCO says that citizenship education should provide youth with opportunities to develop their rights in school life. The Alliance of Civilizations speaks of civic education, offering ways to address issues of identity and promote respect for diversity.