The possibilities and constraints of engaging solidarity in citizenship: pages: 373-386

Jelena Vasiljević

doi:10.2298/FID1602373V

Authors

Jelena Vasiljević Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory, University of Belgrade

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.2298/FID1602373V

Abstract

In a broader sense, this article is interested in solidarity as a politically operational concept. To be able to answer more general questions - like What does it mean to base a political community on the principles of solidarity? Can acts of solidarity be used not only to help (support) others, but with the aim to change power relations and constitute new political orders as well? - we must first situate solidarity in relation to some already established frameworks of thinking about the political community. It is within theories and models of citizenship that I want to situate my exploration of the political value of solidarity in this paper. Firstly, if we want to go beyond isolated gestures and actions of solidarity, to question its general capacities for political reordering, we need to firmly anchor it in broad concepts that capture the ideals and visions of political community. Without a doubt, citizenship is one such concept. Secondly, there is hardly a theory or approach to citizenship that does not presuppose some aspects of solidarity as foundational. Finally, and closely related to the previous point, citizenship and solidarity, although often conceptually intertwined, form a paradoxical duo, reflecting further potential paradoxes that may arise from endeavours to engage solidarity as a political principle. In short, citizenship is a simultaneously inclusive and exclusive notion, incorporating the idea that some sort of boundary encircles a body of citizens (most often, but not exclusively, nation-state boundaries), despite the fact that solidarity loses much of its meaning when expected to operate and be exercised within certain imposed limits. Keywords: solidarity, citizenship, citizenship rights, equality, justice, global citizenship

References

Arendt, Hannah (1951), The Origins of Totalitarianism, New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co.
Arendt, Hannah (1990), On Revolution, London: Penguin Books.
Arnspenger, Christian and Yanis Varoufakis (2003), “Toward a Theory of Solidarity”, Erkenntnis 59 (2): 157–188.
Balibar, Etienne (1988), “Propositions on citizenship”, Ethics 98 (4): 723–730.
Barry, Brian (2001), Culture and Equality. An Egalitarian Critique of Multiculturalism, Cambridge: Polity Press.
Bauman, Zygmunt (2013), “Solidarity: A Word in Search of Flesh”, Eurozine, online magazine: http://www.eurozine.com/articles/2013-05-08-bauman-en.html
(last accessed Feb 1 2016).
Bayertz, Kurt (ed.) (1999), Solidarity, New York: Springer.
Bosniak, Linda (2000), “Citizenship Denationalized”, Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies 7: 447–509.
Brubaker, Rogers (1992), Citizenship and nationhood in France and Germany, Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Carens, Joseph (2000), Culture, Citizenship, and Community. A Contextual Exploration of Justice as Evenhandedness, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Dedić Jasminka, Vlasta Jalušić and Jelka Zorn (2003), The Erased: Organized Innocence and the Politics of Exclusion, Ljubljana: Mirovni Inštitut.
Dobson, Andrew (1995), Green political thought, London: Routledge.
Dobson, Andrew (2004), “Ecological citizenship”, Paper presented at the annual meeting of the Western Political Science Association, Portland, Oregon, USA, March 11 2004.
Durkheim, Émile (1991), The Division of Labour in Society, London: Macmillan.
Featherstone, David (2012), Solidarity. Hidden Histories and Geographies of Internationalism, London: Zed Books.
Fraser, Nancy (1995), “From Redistribution to Recognition? Dilemmas of Justice in a ‘Post-Socialist’ Age”, New Left Review 212 (1): 68–93.
Fraser, Nancy (1997), Justice Interruptus: Critical Reflections on the ‘Postsocialist’ Condition, New York and London: Routledge.
Hechter, Michael (1988), Principles of Group Solidarity, Oakland: University of California Press.
Isin, Engin F. and Bryan S. Turner (2007), “Investigating Citizenship: An Agenda for Citizenship Studies”, Citizenship Studies 11 (1): 5–17.
Joppke, Christian (2007), “Transformation of Citizenship: Status, Rights, Identity”, Citizenship Studies, 11 (1): 37–48.
Joseph, Jonathan (2013), “Resilience as embedded neoliberalism: a governmentality approach”, Resilience: International Policies, Practices and Discourses 1 (1): 38–52.
Kymlicka, Will (1995), Multiculturalism: A liberal theory of minority rights, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Kymlicka, Will and Wayne Norman (1995), “Return of the Citizen: A Survey of Recent Work on Citizenship Theory”, in Ronald Beiner (ed.), Theorizing Citizenship, Albany: State University of New York, p. 283–322.
Kymlicka, Will (2009) “The Multicultural Welfare State?”, in Peter A. Hall and Michele Lamont (eds.), Successful Societies: How Institutions and Culture Affect Health, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 226–253.
Marion Young, Iris (1989), “Polity and group difference: A critique of the Ideal of Universal Citizenship”, Ethics 99 (2): 250–274.
Marshall, T. H. (1998), “Citizenship and social class”, in Gershon Shafir (ed.), The citizenship debates, Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, p. 93–111.
Nash, Kate (2000), Contemporary political sociology. Globalization, politics, and power, Oxford: Blackwell.
Oommen, Tharailath K. (1997), Citizenship, Nationality and Ethnicity. Reconciling Competing Identites, Cambridge: Polity Press.
Phillips, Anne (1991), Engendering democracy, Cambridge: Polity Press.
Pocock, J. G. A. (1998), “The ideal of citizenship since classical times”, in Gershon Shafir (ed.), The citizenship debates, Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, p. 31–41.
Rorty, Richard (1989), Contingency, Irony and Solidarity, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Scholz, Sally J. (2008), Political Solidarity, University Park: Penn State University Press.
Sennett, Richard (2013), Together. The Rituals, Pleasures & Politics of Cooperation, London: Penguin Books.
Shafir, Gershon (1998), “Introduction: The Evolvong Tradition of Citizenship”, in Gershon Shafir (ed.), The citizenship debates, Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, p. 1–28.
Shaw, Jo and Igor Štiks (2012), “Citizenship in the new states of South Eastern Europe”, Citizenship studies 16 (3-4): 309–321.
Soysal, Yasemin Nuhoğlu (1998), “Toward a Postnational Model of Membership”, in Gershon Shafir (ed.), The citizenship debates, Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, p. 189–217.
Wiener, Antje (1999), “From Special to Specialized Rights: The Politics of Citizenship and Identity in the European Union”, in Michael Hanagan and Charles Tilly (eds.), Extending citizenship, reconfiguring states, Lanham, Meryland: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc, p. 195–227.