Is it possible not to be a citizen? On the framework of a roundtable organized by ICS, Trevor Stack, director of the Centre for Citizenship, Civil Society and the Rule of Law, and professor at the University of Aberdeen; and David Thunder, researcher of project 'Religion and Civil Society' of Institute for Culture and Society (ICS) and professor at department of Philosophy, discussed this question and analyzed what it means to be a citizen beyond the State.

First, Trevor Stack presented the paper 'You can't not be a citizen: comparing citizen personae in West Mexico and Anglo California', in which he presented the results of a research conducted between 2007 and 2010 with citizens from Mexico and California.

In response to Stack's question 'Is it sometimes easier not to be a citizen', citizens from both regions answered differently, with the answer of Mexicans being more striking and even unexpected. They consider that it is impossible not to be a citizen because the condition of citizenship is linked to living in society, something inherent to man's human nature.

Professor Stack clarified that "when they said that it was not possible not to be a citizen, they were using the word citizen in a different sense than the legally defined member of a nation-state."  

Citizen indifference

On the other hand, David Thunder presented the work 'Between tribe and cosmopolis: recovering civic spirit form the ashes of thenation-state '.

He stated that the internship of citizenship in the modern nation-state is framed by six fundamental ideas: individualism, democratic representation, national sovereignty, public projects financed by debt and taxes, the rule of bureaucracy and the rule of law. Thunder delved into some of the detrimental effects of this framework on human relations.

He also raised the issue of discussion about the impoverishment of values such as solidarity, trust and cooperation that can lead to indifference and that, in his opinion, is caused by a set of cultural and social factors, including the spread of individualistic attitudes and the lack of participatory governance in modern democracies. The researcher proposed reformulating citizenship through local Structures capable of recreating these lost habits.

More information: http://www.unav.edu/documents/2832169/3317989/Citizenship+beyond+the+State.pdf