“Syria for everyone”, picture taken in Raqqa in April 2013. Picture by Beshr Abdulhadi. Flickr.com (CC BY 2.0). Some rights reserved.The war in Syria has had important consequences in the country in terms of rising sectarianism and racism. In this in-depth article, I demonstrate the importance of a dynamic and open understanding of citizenship.
Citizenship between theory and practice
Firstly, the concept of citizenship should not be understood as a fixed concept, but as constantly in flux. Citizenship is not a universally accepted concept, but differs from one country to another. Some people limit the concept of citizenship to nationality, some to political rights, while others go further to include socio-economic, education, national and cultural rights. "Liberal" systems for example have always resisted giving legal (and constitutional) expression to the inclusion of social rights, such as health care for all, thereby limiting their understanding of citizenship to the right to vote and respect for private property.
At the same time, there is conflict between theory, and practice. For example, the French Revolution greeted women as "citizens" (citoyennes), but they had to wait until 1945 (in France) before their complete political rights were recognized. Similarly, France, and other western countries, continued the process of colonization and denied the rights to people in their colonies. Also today, stateless people and refugees are most often denied any rights pertaining to citizenships, and are not even treated as human beings.
