Beyond Citizenship: American Identity After Globalization.

• Author: Weinberg, Jonathan
• Position: Book review

BEYOND CITIZENSHIP: AMERICAN IDENTITY AFTER GLOBALIZATION. By Peter J. Spiro. New York: Oxford University Press. 2008. Pp. 194. $29.95.

INTRODUCTION

In Beyond Citizenship: American Identity After Globalization, Peter J. Spiro (1) surveys "the lines that mark the boundaries of the human community, the lines that divide Americans from others" (p. 3). Spiro conducts this inquiry through the lens of citizenship law: Who is born an American citizen? Who can become one? To what extent can one be a citizen both of the United States and of another country? What legal benefits does American citizenship actually confer, and what obligations does it impose? The answers to these questions, he urges, will tell us who is an American, and armed with that understanding, we can better answer the question of "what it means to be an American" (p. 4; emphasis added).

Spiro's answers are sobering. Because of the pressures of globalization, he concludes, the rules governing who is an American citizen have become hopelessly disconnected from any reasonable conception of who ought to be one. What's more, they are necessarily disconnected: there is no way to recast American citizenship law so that it corresponds to any meaningful understanding of the bounds of American community.

The costs of this disjunction, Spiro continues, are high. The absence of any sensible borders to the American community means that we are less likely to feel bonds of loyalty to other citizens simply by virtue of their being citizens. This undercuts our sense that we are all organically connected, part of a shared community. The result is that we are less willing to sacrifice on behalf of our fellow citizens and the community at large.

At the heart of Spiro's book is a claim that American citizenship is losing its worth and indeed its meaning in a globalizing world. As the boundaries of the national community have blurred, Spiro tells us, citizenship itself has become less valuable. Fewer aliens living in the United States are electing to become U.S. citizens (pp. 56-58). And, he continues, why should they? Citizenship offers little in the way of tangible benefits, just as it demands little in the way of civic responsibility (Chapter Four). Changes in the law of plural citizenship, making it easy for a person to be a citizen of several countries at once, have undercut citizenship's significance (Chapter Three).

Moreover, Spirt writes, in a world in which most of the global population shares American values and culture, there is little to distinguish members of the American community from outsiders. It is becoming increasingly incoherent to think of the United States as a "self-contained nation"--an entity with a sharp distinction between members and nonmembers, essentially different from other organizations, with a unique claim to its members' allegiance. Rather, we are moving toward a post-globalization world in which the state will only be one membership organization among many (Chapters Five and Six). Citizenship, he concludes, is in irreversible decline.

This is an important book, essential reading for anyone seriously concerned with the nature of citizenship: Spirt raises crucial questions about the nature of American identity in the modern age. Historically, it was American civic culture--incorporating such elements as commitments to liberty, equality, individualism, and tolerance of diversity--that was said to set Americans apart from the rest of the world and form the basis of American national identity. (2) When that civic creed has become so successful as to be adopted across the globe, though, what differentiates those of us inside the American citizenship wall from those without?

Spiro, I think, draws too sharp a line between modern globalization and the world of the past. Part I of this Review challenges his view that the value of American citizenship is in decline. Part II critiques his discussion of the lines drawn by citizenship law--who is or can become a citizen--and what those lines mean for the nature of citizenship in the modern age. This Part urges that the lack of fit between our citizenship rules and the goal of organic community is hardly new; it was a feature of our citizenship law long before current globalization trends. Part III discusses the meaning of citizenship, and the basis for citizenship and immigration exclusions, in the context of contemporary thinking about citizenship and nationhood. It urges that the theoretical incoherence Spiro sees in the foundations of modern citizenship was also present before globalization and suggests that we can best address citizenship's challenges by opening our borders broadly to people who want to become part of the American experiment.

1. THE VALUE OF CITIZENSHIP

   In support of his thesis that U.S. citizenship is in decline, Spirt puts forward the argument that as a practical matter being a U.S. citizen is not very meaningful. Citizenship gets you little in the way of rights and demands little in the way of obligations. Aliens living legally in the United States, in increasing numbers, are not bothering to become citizens. U.S. law over the years has relaxed the requirements for naturalization; that, Spirt urges, reflects the fact that "[c]itizenship no longer presents a seller's market" (p. 36). On the contrary, "the long-term value added in citizenship is relatively insignificant" (p. 91).

   At first glance, this argument seems odd. Across the world, there are millions of people who want to come to the United States to live and can't do so because U.S. immigration rules forbid it. Those who live in Mexico, say, may be able to cross the land border in secret and live here illegally. Those who live in the Philippines, on the other hand, will not even be able to do that; the typical poor Filipino cannot get even a tourist visa to visit the United States. (3) If these people were U.S. citizens, their right to live here would be unchallengeable. The ability to enter and live in the United States is a hugely important perk of citizenship that many people would give a great deal for.

   Spiro, of course, doesn't deny this. Rather, he explains, the right to enter and live in the United States can be separated from U.S. citizenship (Chapter Four). U.S. law recognizes the status of lawful permanent resident (or "green card" holder); such a person has the legal right to live in the United States but doesn't have the status of citizen. Spiro is willing to concede that green cards are valuable: "[i]f there were a global auction for immigrant visas, they would command a substantial price" (p. 91). But, he continues, "citizenship is another story. As a product, it has almost gone begging for customers." (4)

   1. The Illusion of Declining Naturalization Rates

      Unlike Spiro, I am not sure that we can so easily separate lawful permanent resident status from citizenship for the simple reason that American law has not much separated them. In order to become a U.S. citizen, one must first become a lawful permanent resident; once one becomes a lawful permanent resident, the road to citizenship is straightforward. (5) U.S. law historically viewed lawful permanent residents as what Hiroshi Motomura has called "Americans in waiting." (6) There is no such thing as a U.S. immigrant visa that does not carry with it the promise of citizenship, and there is no prospect that U.S. law will create one. (7)

      At the same time, Spirt is correct that it would tell us something important if lawful immigrants to the United States increasingly chose to live out their lives as noncitizens. That would indicate that people in a position to make the choice today do not especially value membership in the U.S. citizenry--that they want to live in America but not to become Americans.

      But is it true? The facts don't bear it out. There is no reason to believe that immigrants today value citizenship less than participants in past waves of immigration did, and there is substantial reason to believe they value it more.

      Here's a starting point: Every year since 1993 has seen a larger number of petitions for naturalization filed than any year before 1993. In all of U.S. history from 1789 through 1992, no more that 342,000 petitions for naturalization were filed in a given year. In the fourteen years from 1993 through 2006, the number of naturalization petitions filed each year has ranged between 461,000 and 1,413,000. (8)

      That statistic doesn't resolve the issue. Numbers of naturalization petitions don't tell us too much about the rate at which aliens are applying for citizenship; presumably there are more applications now because there are more aliens living in the United States who are in a position to apply. Spirt writes that "the proportion of foreign-born residents who naturalize has been steadily decreasing, from 63.6 percent in 1970 to 37.4 percent in 2000" (p. 58). Adjusting Spiro's figures to exclude from the calculation aliens who are here illegally or otherwise are not legally eligible to naturalize, 59% of eligible aliens today are citizens. (9) That figure does seem somewhat low; it has been higher at various points in U.S. history. Does it show that citizenship in the United States is currently going begging? Actually, it does not.

      Immigrants are more likely to have naturalized the longer they have lived here. The citizen component of the immigrant population is highest in times of low immigration, when much of the nation's immigrant population entered long before; it is lowest after immigration surges, when more immigrants have recently arrived. (10) In 1920, thus, the country had just seen a major wave of immigration; moreover, the newest immigrants were poorer, less educated, and slower to naturalize than those who had come before. (11) The result: only 49% of the country's legal immigrants were naturalized in 1920. (12) After several decades of sharp restrictions on immigration, with assimilation of long-term...