Globalizing Citizenship

by Kim Rygiel

This book will be of interest to scholars and students of international relations, political science, globalization, citizenship, sociology, and law and anyone who wants to understand the implications of post-9/11 border controls and travel policies.

Since 9/11, national governments in the global North have struggled to govern populations and manage cross-border traffic without building new barriers to trade. What does citizenship mean in an era of heightened tension between global capitalism and the nation-state? Building on Foucault’s concept of biopolitics and an examination of national border and detention policies, Rygiel’s book Globalizing Citizenship argues that citizenship is becoming a globalizing regime to govern mobility. The new regime is deepening boundaries based on race, class, and gender, and causing Western nations to embrace a more technocratic, depoliticized understanding of citizenship.

The events of 9/11 and its aftermath exposed and enhanced tensions between the global capitalist system and the territorial nation-state. Governments and policy-makers more than ever struggle to govern populations and manage cross-border traffic without building new barriers to trade and commerce. What does citizenship mean in an era of heightened globalization and enhanced security? Is it in crisis?

In Globalizing Citizenship, Kim Rygiel explores these questions by examining border and detention policies in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia as part of a larger politics of citizenship, one that preceded 9/11. Building on Foucault’s concept of biopolitics, she argues that citizenship is becoming a globalizing regime to govern mobility and access to rights and resources as nations in the global North harmonize border and detention policies, outsource state functions and power to international organizations and private companies, and rely on technologies to discipline the individual biological body.

This theoretically sophisticated and empirically grounded study of border controls and detention practices reveals that the new mobility regime is not only deepening boundaries based on race, class, and gender, it is causing Western nations to embrace a more technocratic, depoliticized understanding of citizenship.

AWARDS

• 2011, Joint winner – ENMISA Distinguished Book Award, International Studies Association
• 2011, Short-listed – International Prize, Canadian Political Science Association