A misconception in relation to citizenship, I think, is this idea of citizenship as a closed status that divides people, in terms of status in increasingly cosmopolitan societies.
About Ana Aliverti
I am a Professor of criminal law and criminal justice. My research work looks at the intersections between criminal law and criminal justice, on the one hand, and border regimes, on the other, and explores the impact of such intertwining on the national criminal justice institutions and on those subject to the resulting set of controls. I am a 2017 Philip Leverhulme Prize Winner.
My research examines questions of citizenship and belonging in criminal justice, and law's instrumental and symbolic power for boundary drawing, as well as the place of morality and affects in state power. I concluded a project on the policing of migration which investigated the growing cooperation between immigration enforcement and the police, and explores the new contours of law enforcement in the context of globalization
Key Points
• State power isn't just punitive; it also involves humanitarian impulses that shape law and policy.
• Migration controls today originate in colonial practices aimed at restricting black and brown populations, embedding race into modern migration policies.
• Citizenship increasingly functions as a privilege rather than a right, marked by restrictive criteria that reinforce racial and social boundaries.
• Communities globally, especially in the Global South, demonstrate ways of including migrants without relying on formal citizenship, emphasizing coexistence and local inclusion strategies.
