What is citizenship?

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Citizenship has different meanings. It means voting, and participating in the political and the public sphere. In international law, it also means the link almost every human being has to a nation state. This link has been developed and created differently, depending on different stages of history.

Before the French Revolution, the human being’s link to the State was their place of residence. People living in the territory of a king had allegiance to him, and that determined the link to nationality or citizenship. The French Revolution transformed this link because the nation became the body to which a human being was associated. But it went further. Before the French Revolution, in the whole of Europe, the main feature that associated a human being to a State was place of birth. If you were born on the territory of a king and still resided on this territory, you had allegiance to the king and you could be defined as a subject of the kingdom.

From jus soli to jus sanguinis

After the French Revolution and due to a lawyer named François Tronchet, who resisted Napoleon and wanted to keep the old system, the French civil code decided that to be French, you needed to be born to a French father – where you were born on French territory, or abroad. It was an incredible break with the tradition of what we call jus soli – the law of the land, being born on the territory of the land. This revolution was adopted by force during the Napoleon conquest – when some territories of Europe adopted the same rule – or by free adhesion by many European States like Prussia and Russia, which adopted the same system that, in international law today, is sometimes called jus sanguinis: nationality attributed to birth, to fatherhood, like the family name. It was a will to create a means of national citizenship independent from the control of the State because you could travel and still transmit your nationality or your citizenship to your children.

The consequence of the impact of the French Revolution was that the world was divided between the countries that kept the old European tradition of jus soli, which was mainly the dominion of the British Empire: South Africa, America, Australia, Ireland, etc. In all these countries, citizenship or nationality was attributed by birth on the territory. Then you had the French impact that started in France and moved to Germany, Russia and Asia. So, you had two trends that co-existed in the middle or at the end of the 19th century.

Migration and nationality law

When the phenomenon of migration developed, it had a major impact on nationality law. If everybody was living on the territory of their nationality and no foreigner would live in a foreign land, it would not matter if you had your citizenship by birth on the territory or by being born to a parent with citizenship.

But imagine you were born to an immigrant who had just moved to a new country, and in that country, citizenship is attributed to jus sanguinis, so you remain a citizen of the country of your parents. If you are born in a country where citizenship is attributed to birth on the territory, you immediately become a citizen of your country of birth. The country of emigration loses citizens because they move abroad. If this country attributes citizenship to birth on the territory, all the children of the citizens abroad are not citizens anymore, but if this country attributes citizenship to descent, the children of their citizens abroad keep the citizenship of the country of origin. Immigration has therefore had an impact on the citizenship of the children of immigrants.

Modern citizenship laws

And so, paradoxically, the first country in the world that had to confront the impact of its citizenship law because of immigration was France. France was the first country of immigration in Europe, but its new law, based on descent, made the children born to immigrants in France foreigners. And because they were foreigners, they did not have to perform military service, which was four to ten years for the young French male who had to obey French law and join the Army. Because of this inequality of duties, the French reinstalled a provision in addition to jus sanguinis that imposed citizenship at birth for people born in the country to parents already born in the country. For those not born in the country, citizenship would come at the age of majority. That was a mixture created in French law that became a trend all over the world.

The United States inherited the British tradition. So, if you were born in the US, you are American. But you also had Americans who went to live abroad. What happened to their children? The US Congress passed bills saying that if you are born to Americans abroad, you still have the nationality of your parents. That transmission stopped after two generations under US and British law. Yet, you also have a mixture, so the two traditions that created very different means of access to citizenship at the end of the 19th century have converged.

Today, I would say all nationality laws, even if they were created from different paths, have converged, mixing the attribution of citizenship to birth on the territory and birth to a parent – and not only to a father, because through the 20th century, women have acquired equality in the matter of nationality and they, too, transmit their citizenship to their children.

Women’s rights and citizenship

Photo by Sergey Kohl

The impact of the progress of women’s equal rights in nationality is huge. Until the end of the 19th century, a woman marrying a husband of another nationality would often be forced to take his nationality. The purpose of this rule was to preserve family unity in terms of nationality for the children.

For example, in the United States, from 1907, an American woman marrying a foreigner would become a foreigner. At the same time, there was a movement of American women to become full citizens and to have the right to vote. This movement was victorious in 1920, and starting that year, American women were able to vote. The consequence was that foreign women who had become American by marrying an American man would suddenly be able to vote in American elections. However, American women who had married a foreigner, would suddenly lose their right to vote because they had become foreigners. The Conservatives in Congress thought it was less a problem to keep American-born women with their citizenship and with the right to vote than to have all these foreigners, these foreign women, suddenly becoming voters. So, in 1922, via the Cable Act, American women marrying foreigners gained the right to keep their American citizenship.

The case of women in France

French women did not gain the right to vote until the end of the Second World War. There was also a feminist movement to gain this right to vote, to gain this independence of women’s citizenship, but they only won when the Conservatives noticed that so many immigrants were foreign males and they were marrying French women. These French women were becoming foreigners and their kids would become foreign kids. They were born to French mothers. That was very bad for the French population, and they were losing citizens, women and babies, who could have become French. So, the law of 1927 permitted French women to keep their citizenship, even if they had married foreigners, and to transmit citizenship to their children.

This movement developed all over the world. And today, in the majority of citizenship law, women have the same right to transmit their citizenship to their children. There is one big consequence: the development of dual and multiple citizenship. In the same couple, if the parents have different nationalities, they transmit at least two nationalities to their kids. If they themselves have inherited multiple citizenship, then they also transmit this multiple citizenship to their kids. So, more than the process of naturalisation – which is how an immigrant can become a citizen when he or she moves to a foreign country, applies for citizenship and the State makes a decision – marriage across the boundary of nation states, marriage with foreigners, has led to the important international phenomenon of dual and multiple citizenship.

Have jus soli and jus sanguinis converged?

Photo by Sergey Shik

For the common citizen, the background of his or her nationality law doesn’t matter much. What matters is the practical issue involved by nationality; for example, how do you get your passport when you want to travel abroad? To get your passport, you often have to bring some proof of your nationality. If the citizenship law is based on the place of birth, a simple birth certificate would be the evidence that would permit you to get the passport. If the rule is based on descent, then you have to prove that one of your parents has the citizenship of the country. How do you prove that? You have to get documents from your parents, or you have to get documents from the State. Sometimes the State keeps a register of who is a citizen, but technically, it’s more difficult to prove citizenship by descent than to prove it by birth.

Discover more about

The history of citizenship law

Hansen, R., & Weil, P. (Eds.). (2002). Dual Nationality, Social Rights and Federal Citizenship in the U.S. and Europe: The Reinvention of Citizenship. Berghahn Books.

Weil, P. (2008). How to be French? Nationality in the Making since 1789. Duke University Press.

A brief history of citizenship laws