Imagining and Practising Citizenship in Austere Times

Authors

  • John Clarke The Open University

Keywords:

Citizenship, Rights and Responsibilities, Remaking of welfare, Workfare

Abstract

A central issue in the reform of welfare systems concerns the citizenship relationship. Citizenship is critical in three ways:

  1. It has been the focus of political struggles to redraw the boundaries of citizenship: who counts as a citizen?
  2. It has been the focus of reforms seeking to redraw the balance of ‘rights and responsibilities’ between the state and the citizen, making citizenship more conditional; and
  3. It remains the focus of desires and demands for support and solidarity.

Drawing on recent collaborative research with advice agencies (Citizens Advice in the UK), I explore how citizenship is imagined and practiced in different settings – from the policing of nationality to state welfare – contrasting the growing conditionality and exclusiveness of state-centric definitions with alternative imaginaries that celebrate expansive and horizontal forms of identification.

Author Biography

John Clarke, The Open University

Central European University in Budapest, Hungary
Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences; Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology