Ruth Lister

Citizenship : feminist perspectives

Preface - List of Abbreviations - Introduction: Why Citizenship? - PART 1: A THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK - What is Citizenship? - Inclusion or Exclusion? - Differentiated Universalism - Beyond Dichotomy - PART 2: ACROSS THE PUBLIC-PRIVATE DIVIDE: POLICY, PRACTICE AND POLITICS - Private/Public: The Barriers to Citizenship - Womens Political Citizenship: Different and Equal - Womens Social Citizenship: Earning and Caring - Conclusion: Towards a Feminist Theory and Praxis of Citizenship - References - Index

What is Citizenship

The question ‘what is citizenship?’ is not an easy one to answer in any definitive way. This is partly because it incorporates a number of different elements, reflecting competing political traditions, and partly because of both its contextualised and contested nature. It therefore runs the danger of meaning what people choose it to mean, and the question then is ‘which is to be master’, as Humpty Dumpty told Alice when she queried whether ‘you can make words mean different things’, (Carroll, 1947). The answers to both these questions are of considerable significance, for ‘the way we define citizenship is intimately linked to the kind of society and political community we want’ (Mouffe, 1992a, p. 25). It would be easy enough to proffer a bland definition, but to do so risks suppressing citizenship’s contested nature. Instead, this chapter attempts to answer the question ‘what is citizenship?’ in two ways. First, it reviews the main elements that constitute the language of citizenship and that, in different combinations, provide the ingredients of the various definitions attempted in the literature — academic and political. Second, it discusses the main ways in which the concept is contested, leaving until later chapters the challenge from those who most certainly have not been ‘master’ when it comes to the articulation and practice of citizenship.

Inclusive Citizenship: Realizing the Potential1

Citizenship has been described as a “momentum concept”. One important development over the past decade has been the various ways in which scholars and activists have developed citizenships inclusionary potential. The first part of the article explores these developments in general terms with regard to the values underpinning inclusive citizenship; the implications of the notion of cultural citizenship; and the theorization of differentiated forms of citizenship, which nevertheless appeal to universalist principles. These principles provide the basis for the citizenship claims of people living in poverty, a group largely ignored in citizenship studies. Other lacunae have been disability and, until recently, childhood. The second part of the article discusses how citizenship studies has reworked the concept in a more inclusionary direction through the development of a multi-tiered analysis, which pays attention to the spaces and places in which lived citizenship is practised. It focuses in particular on the intimate and domestic sphere, with particular reference to debates around care and citizenship, and on the interconnections between the intimate/domestic and the global, using “global care chains” and ecological citizenship as examples.

Children (but not women) first: New Labour, child welfare and gender

The paper’s starting point is an analysis of New Labour’s agenda for children in an emergent ‘social investment state’. It provides an overview of policies for children, which simultaneously invest in children and regulate them and their parents/mothers. Although children have moved to the heart of social policy, there is some disquiet about the way they are being positioned in this brave new world of social investment. This disquiet focuses in particular on: the construction of children as ‘becomings’ rather than ‘beings’; the paid-work-focused and future-oriented model of citizenship; the relative neglect of groups of children who are not seen to represent such a good investment; and the eclipse of parents’, and in particular, mothers’ welfare. The final section sketches out how the social investment approach might be modified in the interests of children’s well-being and flourishing and with reference to principles of (gendered) social justice.

Citizenship: Towards a feminist synthesis

A synthesis of rights and participatory approaches to citizenship, linked through the notion of human agency, is proposed as the basis for a feminist theory of citizenship. Such a theory has to address citizenships exclusionary power in relation to both nation-state ‘outsiders’ and ‘insiders’. With regard to the former, the article argues that a feminist theory and politics of citizenship must embrace an internationalist agenda. With regard to the latter, it offers the concept of a ‘differentiated universalism’ as an attempt to reconcile the universalism which lies at the heart of citizenship with the demands of a politics of difference. Embracing also the reconstruction of the public-private dichotomy, citizenship, reconceptualized in this way, can, it is argued, provide us with an important theoretical and political tool.

From equality to social inclusion: New Labour and the welfare state

This article discusses developments in New Labours thinking on the welfare state. It argues that there has been something of a paradigm shift from a concern with equality to a focus on social inclusion and equality of opportunity, together with an emphasis on social obligations rather than social rights. It speculates briefly about the likely direction of social security reforms.

Young People as Real Citizens: Towards an Inclusionary Understanding of Citizenship

Based on a major qualitative study, this article examines young peoples status as citizens. It argues that UK social policy assumes that young people lack citizenship—and so need interventions to develop their citizenship—but that this assumption is not based on concepts of citizenship, but on how youth is (mis)perceived. The research found that the young people prescribed to a number of different interpretations of citizenship, often simultaneously. It found that certain narrow conceptions—such as the employment-oriented model—can serve to exclude young people. Other models—such as that relating to socially constructive participation—better highlight young peoples citizenship. The paper concludes by calling for a more conceptually comprehensive and inclusive view of citizenship, so that young peoples status as citizens can be better appreciated.

Women, Economic Dependency and Citizenship *

Citizenship is, once again, on the political and academic agenda. This article explores some of its meanings for women. It examines some of the contradictions raised by notions of dependence and independence and the relationship between ‘private’ and ‘public’ forms of dependence. It then considers the implications of financial dependence and of the sexual division of labour and of time for womens rights and obligations as social, political and ‘active’ citizens. It concludes by drawing out briefly some policy implications, arguing that radical changes are needed in domestic life and in the organisation of paid employment and state provisions, if women are to be full citizens. This will require changing both our conceptions of Citizenship and the structures which fashion citizenship rights. Ultimately, neither the question of dependency nor of citizenship can be divorced from that of power.

Dilemmas in engendering Citizenship

The ungendered nature of much of mainstream literature on citizenship is, by now, well established. The articla review some of the mai dilemmas associated with development of a feminist conception of citizenship in relation to both republic an and social rights formulations. Among the questions it poses are: how useful is a concept associatedwith the nation-state as a time when the nation-state is becoming less pivotal economically and politically and when migration and asylum-seeking are on the increase? Can a concept based on the ideal of universality adequately take a account of difference and diversity? Can women - and different groups of women - be successfully incorporated into a status originally predicated on thie exclusion? Is the aim a gender-neutral or a gender-differentiated notion of citizenship,or does te answer lie in a gdndered, woman-friendly conception of citizenship which represents a synthesis of the two? The process of synthesis is seen as key in resolving these dilemmas.Nevertheless,...

New Labour: a study in ambiguity from a position of ambivalence

This article represents an attempt to make sense of the contradictions and tensions in the New Labour welfare project. It argues that these can be understood as the product of two characteristics of New Labour, which at best inhibit or even undermine its more progressive policies and at worst result in a more reactionary stance. These are: a populist tendency to woo rather than to lead the electorate and a pragmatic ‘what works’ approach, which avoids a direct assault on structural inequalities. Together these help to explain, in particular, New Labours ambiguous stance towards redistribution. The final section looks forward, offering a compass to guide New Labour towards a more progressive second term.