The Political Challenges of Bounded, Unequal Citizenships

Abstract

The Citizen and the Alien and The Birthright Lottery are outstanding works by scholars well informed on both law and moral philosophy. Their enterprises can be constructively carried further by increased engagement with the politics shaping modern nation-state citizenships. Bosniak’s seminal analysis of the inconsistencies in immigration and citizenship policies can be extended by further engagement with the range of arguments used to defend restrictively bounded national citizenships. Shachar’s bold and original recommendations for lessening the trans-national inequalities of the modern nation-state system might be furthered by building also on obligations stemming from the mutually constitutive past and present relationships between particular richer and poorer states.