Legitimate Citizens Research Articles

The punitive gap: NRC, due process and denationalisation politics in India’s Assam

The creation of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) in Assam is indicative of the sharpening tensions surrounding citizenship, belonging and integration in India. Officially aimed at demarcating the “legitimate citizens”, its implementation is believed to have resulted in the partial exclusion of the so-called “Doubtful Voters” and denationalisation of the “illegitimate residents”. These frictions associated with citizenship identity and rights are nowhere as acute as in the northeastern Indian state of Assam, where measures of retroactive revocation, administrative erasure and withdrawal of citizenship rights have been systematically deployed against religious and linguistic minorities. Using new research with some NRC rejected applicants in western Assam and other materials, this article identifies the central aspects of the implementation gap in the crucial, albeit problematic task of locating the rightful “Assamese-Indian” citizens. Linking our work to the idea of the ‘process is the punishment’, we conceptualise these conspicuous inconsistencies in the NRC citizenship determination processes and their results as the “punitive gap”. We have identified the distinctive contours of this gap in terms of the massive economic costs, intensification of social (including gender and religion-based) inequalities, increased control through social suspicion and unpredictable outcomes for the marginal Miya Muslim community. The article highlights how this punitive gap has constantly eroded key components of due process, of procedural and substantive protections of the rights of individuals, during the NRC determination exercise and after the release of the final draft list.

Divergent citizenships: Social urbanism and hip hop collectives in Comuna 13 (Medellin - Colombia)

The bombing attacks against the civilian population promoted by the Colombian State in alliance with paramilitary groups (2001–2002) marked the history of the Comuna 13, a popular territory located on the slopes of Medellin. It has faced processes of structural, political and criminal violence for nearly 50 years. Its stigmatization as a space in conflict has justified military incursions as anti-subversive strategies. More recently, urban interventions based on the “social urbanism” model promoted by the municipal government have sought to pacify the population by means of sophisticated infrastructures. This paper aims to analyze the forces and folds of power present in citizen practices. Based on a scalar methodology that articulates ethnographic work with microhistory, the research reveals the configuration of divergent citizenships in hip hop collectives. The paper shows how they have been shaped by factors such as disputes over public spaces as settings of political life, interpellations to images of legitimate citizens, claims of rights anchored to territorial history, experiences of citizenship linked to body and emotions, citizen experiences connected to collective work, and the defense of universal claims based on the experience of young hoppers in different cities around the world. This research opens questions for legal geography to think about the relationship between citizenship and territoriality.

New citizenship and the negotiation of the global/local interface: reflexivity, emotions, and metapragmatics

Abstract New citizens are typically characterized as people who occupy an estuarial position between the global and the local: to simultaneously become authentic to their global provenience and rooted in their new local societies, they are expected to cautiously partake in processes of differentiation as they construct their identities. This article investigates how new citizens negotiate this seemingly untenable position to present themselves as new citizens of Singapore who have negotiated the global/local dichotomy, rendering themselves as legitimate citizens. By adopting a metapragmatic approach, the article focuses on two object-signs that new citizens commonly deploy: familial relations and passports. The analysis traces how the semiotic potential of these object-signs is mediated by accounts of emotions, which are indispensable considerations of how signs realize their semiotic potential. Through situated reflexive practices, new citizens use these object-signs to equivocally and strategically manage supposed markers of difference, which consequently enables them to claim legitimacy as Singaporeans. These identities challenge regimented views about the global and local affordances of the notion of citizenship. This expands the semiotic range of good/new citizenship, which may prove instructive in understanding variegated understandings of citizenship not just in Singapore but also in other contemporary multicultural societies.

Ephesis against Eubulides (Dem. 57): Legal Arguments against the Sykophant’s Game

This paper analyses Euxitheus’ legal arguments in the trial against Eubulides (Dem. 57) and proposes a new analysis of the ephesis procedure. Within this framework it argues that Euxitheus’ forensic strategy is not only relevant to the question at issue – to prove his status as a legitimate citizen (gnesios polites), as someone born from two citizen parents – but is also characterised by a strict adherence to the laws and procedure involving his case. The relation between rhetoric and law emerging in Euxitheus’ speech reveals a rhetorical strategy grounded on legal evidence and documents. This essay will especially focus on two important arguments in the speech, that is, the use of religious arguments and the theme of the plot against Euxitheus, which prove extremely enlightening in showing the how the relevant procedure shaped Euxitheus’ arguments. To this aim section II compares Dem. 57and other probable cases of ephesis in order to reassess how the ephesis procedure worked when it arose from a diapsephisis. Section III shows that the arguments used by Euxitheus are to be considered relevant to winning an ephesis case in court.The entire speech is effectively constructed to demonstrate ‘what is true’ against Eubulides’ ‘false accusations’ and ‘defamatory statements’ (57.1), that is, to use legal arguments against ‘the sykophant’s game’: to allege everything but prove nothing’.

Belonging to the nation: Negotiating narratives of national identity in Aotearoa New Zealand

One of the most important yet complex contemporary political projects of belonging relate to rapidly diversifying societies. While prior research has tended to focus on how young people work to fit into the nation, this study sought to examine the processes by which ethnic minority young people (re)produced, reimagined and challenged narratives of national belonging. Underpinned by feminist theoretical understandings of citizenship and everyday nation, the study examined how young people (n = 180) attending four superdiverse high schools in Aotearoa New Zealand deliberated and negotiated the parameters of who belonged to the nation. The use of a qualitative participatory strategy – self-directed peer focus groups – opened up opportunities for young people to debate and contest complex ideas about belonging and national identity. Ethnic minority participants expressed widespread dissatisfaction with traditional narrow, monocultural narratives of national identity and drew on illustrations from their own everyday encounters with diverse others to offer more inclusive alternatives. Many employed affective notions of national belonging that centred on ‘feeling’ like, or choosing to be a ‘Kiwi’, rather than being chosen. Their deliberations and dialogue demonstrated agentic ways in which ethnic minority young people were ‘rewriting’ the narratives of national belonging to ensure that they and their peers were located as legitimate citizens of the nation, and in doing so, revealed the formation of their citizenship subjectivities.

식민지조선의 징병제 실시와 종이연극

This paper discusses the use of kamishibai for propaganda and the introduction of the family register to facilitate the draft of Koreans after the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War. The examinations is based in particular on the narratives and paintings of the newly discovered 1943 works from the Joseon Development Association, Revolutionary of My Brother and Return of Father. First, these works emphasize the relationship with real life. Although the family register was introduced for the purpose of the draft, the Japanese government encouraged Koreans to register, citing that the register was closely related to economic interests such as education, property inheritance, and distribution of daily necessity. Actually, considering that there were Koreans who reported increases in the number of family members, regarding the register as a basic survey for the distribution of wartime daily necessities at the time, profits from property would have been an advantage that cannot be ignored. Second, the role of the father is emphasized in both examples of Kamishibai. It can be said that, in Japan's family system, the head of the family is given the authority to control the family members. In these works, the father, the head of family, plays the most important role in determining the future of his son and daughter. It can be said that this ensured the legitimacy of the draft and facilitated physically mobilizing the people by guaranteeing rather than limiting the authority of the head of the family. Third, the kamishibai works emphasizes that the draft is the way to become a legitimate citizen and be protected by the state. For Koreans, the draft was an exploitation they want to avoid, but the Japanese imperialisrs stated that by becoming a soldier, a person could become a true Japanese and a man, and that people would be protected by the state when performing military duties. Both works feature a soldier, or a son who wants to become a soldier, who demonstrates the duty of Koreans to serve in the military by demonstrating the attitude that the family of the soldier and the family of the son should have towards state policy, such as registering themselves in the family register. The appearance of a Korean protagonist who is based on a true story, or based in reality, was a very necessary storyline for Japan at the time and was also a role model requested by Koreans. These kamishibai works can be said to have standardized the life of individuals, who are not categorized as a “subjects” of imperial Japan but specifically embody and present the appearance of the subjects in life.

The discursive construction of new citizen identities in Singapore

AbstractThis article investigates how new citizens reconfigure dominant indexes of citizenship to claim status as legitimate new citizens of Singapore. New citizens are expected to resolve a tension that underpins public discourses in Singapore society: while the statal narrative of multiculturalism countenances new citizens to have perceivable markers of difference, everyday discourses expect new citizens to assimilate into the ‘Singapore core’—a term used in Singapore that denotes a homogeneous understanding of what it means to be Singaporean. By adopting a metapragmatic approach, this article identifies three common indexes of citizenship that new citizens negotiate to resolve this contradiction: language, loyalty, and legacy. By reconfiguring common markers of citizenship in Singapore, new citizens are able to discursively construct a type of citizenship that they can legitimately claim and contribute to. This expands common understandings of the notion of citizenship in Singapore society. (Citizenship, language ideologies, multiculturalism, metapragmatics, Singapore)*

Perceived Legitimacy of CVE Policies and the Willingness to Report Concerns of Radicalization to Authorities in the Nordic Countries

ABSTRACT Approaches to countering violent extremism (CVE) increasingly call upon ordinary citizens to report concerns regarding radicalization to authorities. However, knowledge about the factors determining their willingness to report remains limited. This paper addresses this void by asking under what circumstances members of the public are willing to report concerns of radicalization to authorities. The paper reports findings from a large-scale, comparative survey experiment fielded to nationally representative samples in Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland (n = 7,389) as well as eight city representative samples (two in each country, n = 6,603). We investigate how perceptions of the appropriateness, inclusiveness, implementation and outcome of CVE policies combine in forming perceptions of the legitimacy of CVE policy, and how manipulations of perceived legitimacy shape willingness to collaborate with authorities. Both cross-country and cross-city differences in willingness to report concerns of radicalization are explored. The results show that the more legitimate citizens perceive CVE policies to be, the more willing they are to contact authorities to report concerns of radicalization, while perceptions of CVE policies as illegitimate lead to a preference for reactions involving “intimates” of the individual in question and short of reporting to authorities. The implications of the findings for CVE practices are discussed.

Politics of Accommodation and Governmentality: State, Welfare and Denotified, Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Tribes in India

The denotified, nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes (DTNT and SNT’s) are one of the most subjugated groups in Indian society. Due to the historic injustice they continue to remain at the periphery of development and struggling for their constitutional right to justice, equality and freedom. This paper attempts to explore few intricate questions for instance: Why they are not accommodated and represented adequately as legitimate citizens of democracy? and Are they victims of the politics of accommodation and the targets of developmental governmentality? To investigate the research problem under investigation the paper applies critical discourse method and “politics of accommodation and governmentatility” as prime theoretical foundations. The paper concludes that (DTNT and SNT’s) have become the hapless victims of the politics of accommodation since colonial period and the post-colonial state also failed to decolonise this false construction tactically. The paper suggest that the meaningful accommodation of (DTNT and SNT’s) in the democratic structures is centred on i) how state and the larger society build necessary and sufficient conditions and ii) time bound strategic action framework for the legitimate dialog with democratic and political institution for the welfare of historically vulnerable masses.

PELAYANAN PEMBAHARUAN E-KTP PADA DINAS KEPENDUDUKAN DAN PENCATATAN SIPIL KOTA BANJARMASIN

In an effort to fulfill the obligation as a good Indonesian citizen of the city of Banjarmasin trying to obtain a personal identity in this case is a resident ID card (KTP), as a legitimate citizen in the Indonesian law. Therefore, if the identity card (KTP) is damaged/lost/change in identities or resident data, the community of Banjarmasin is trying to get the service from the population Office and civil registration of Banjarmasin City to the community. The goal that is to be achieved in this research is to find out what are the changes in the renewal service in the city of population and civil registration services of Banjarmasin and the renewal factors of resident identity card (KTP) and civil registration service of Banjarmasin City. This research is done with a qualitative approach with the type of research used is deskritif, the location of research in the Department of Population and Civil registration of Banjaramasin City. The technique of collecting data on this research is observation and interviews. The results of the renewal service of E-KTP of population and civil registration services Banjarmasin City can be concluded that in general, the renewal of E-KTP service in the population Office and civil registration of Banjarmasin City is not maximally well. The inhibitory factor in the renewal of E-KTP service in the population Office and civil registration of the city of Banjarmasin is from service. Suggestion submitted to the Ministry of Occupation and civil registration of the city of Banjarmasin based on the conclusion, researchers suggested to the population service and civil registration of Banjarmasin City to fix indicators that are considered still less successful so that the renewal service E-KTP in the population office and civil registration of the city of Banjarmasin can be categorized well.

Do attainment discrepancy and slacks moderate the relationship between board characteristics and level of sustainability disclosure?

Disclosure of sustainability practices has become vital for organizations to secure their image as legitimate corporate citizens in society (Panjaitan, 2017). It might be influenced by the board of directors subject to the performance and resource availability. The prime objective of the paper is to investigate the association between board characteristics and a level of sustainability disclosure with the moderating role of performance gap and resources. Secondary data was obtained from 174 non-finance firms representing 16 sectors of the Colombo Stock Exchange (CSE) over 2016–2020. The study used 13 board characteristics and 7 controlling variables. According to the results of ordered logistic regression, board size and audit committee size have a significant impact on the degree of sustainability disclosures. At the same time, female directors displayed a significant adverse effect on such disclosures. It was found that resource availability significantly impacts the relationship between board characteristics and sustainability reporting. The study contributes to the extant literature by filling an empirical gap in the area by encapsulating a more comprehensive sample, using a broader theoretical perspective and a wide measurement to capture sustainability disclosure. The study findings are predicted to have extensive managerial ramifications in strengthening corporate governance mechanisms to elevate sustainability disclosure

Adivasi Identity, Kingly-citizenship and Ethno-cultural Politics in the Jungle Kingdoms of Odisha

The paper sheds light on the socio-cultural and political identity of the adivasis in relationship to their king(s), in the past as well as nowadays. Based on long time field observations (Nayak, 1972-2005), enforced by theoretical remarks and viewpoints, the research emphasizes that the adivasis in the former “Jungle Kingdoms” of Odisha organize community-based rituals and festivals as politically more organized groups than mere social groups, lineage groups or clan groups with the ultimate purpose of upholding and renewing legitimacy over their land and territory. The use of certain royal symbols and insignia in ritual rites makes explicit how the authority of the king assumes prime- most importance from the point of view of their identity and status as legitimate citizens or, at least as state-owned denizens. The paper intends to discuss these kingly religious rites in their varied manifestations drawing examples from tribal people inhabiting Odisha as a regional variation of the middle Indian tribes.

Drawing a line in the sand: the social impacts of an LGBTQI+ event in an Australian rural community

ABSTRACT As a form of leisure, Pride events offer LGBTQI+ people a chance to gain visibility, advocate for their rights, and construct and express their identity. The benefits such events offer are particularly crucial within rural communities, often perceived to be heteronormative spaces that may exhibit greater levels of prejudice against sexually and gender-diverse individuals. This paper examines the perceived social impacts Pride events can have within a rural community by studying an inaugural Pride event hosted in the Australian township of Wagga Wagga. Informed by an interpretivist approach and using a mix of participant observation and semi-structured interviews, the study found the event had three key outcomes. First, the event challenged assumptions about how acceptance of diverse sexualities and gender identities were in the town. Second, it appeared to help build community acceptance by providing a public space/time for LGBTQI+ individuals to be acknowledged as legitimate citizens. Finally, it contributed to identity construction and created opportunities for connection with other LGBTQI+ residents and the rural community more broadly.

El modelo argumentativo de Toulmin como elemento epistémico para la participación ciudadana: una aproximación en tiempos de pandemia

This work proposes a series of philosophical and epistemic arguments that encourage citizen participation based on epistemic practices and the argumentative model proposed by Stephen Toulmin. In the first part, the notion of knowledge is elucidated and how it is based on objectively sufficient reasons from the epistemic communities. Later, the concept of practice is developed as an epistemic argument to strengthen citizen participation. Finally, relying on the context of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic and the COVID-19 disease, we return to elements of Toulmin’s argumentative model to demonstrate that an epistemological and philosophical basis is essential to establish legitimate citizen participation for the development of societies. based on knowledge.

The Two Subalterns: Perceived Status and Violent Punitiveness

From the mid-twentieth century, state and public conceptions of deviance and crime control have turned increasingly punitive (Hallett 115; Hutchinson 138). In a Western context, criminal justice has long been retributive, prioritising punishment over rehabilitation (Wenzel et al. 26). Within that context, there has been an increase in punitiveness—understood here as a measure of a punishment’s severity—the intention of which has been to help restore the moral imbalance created by offending while also deterring future crime (Wenzel et al. 26). Entangled with the global spread of neoliberal capitalism, punitiveness has become internationally pervasive to a near-hegemonic degree (Sparks qtd. in Jennings et al. 463; Unnever and Cullen 100). The punitive turn has troubling characteristics. Punitive policies can be expensive, and increased incarceration stresses the criminal justice system and leads to prison overcrowding (Hutchinson 135). Further, punitiveness is not only applied unequally across categories such as class, race, and age (Unnever and Cullen 105-06; Wacquant 212) but the effectiveness of punitive policy relative to its costs is contested (Bouffard et al. 466, 477; Hutchinson 139). Despite this, evidence suggests public demand is driving punitive policymaking, but that demand is only weakly related to crime rates (Jennings et al. 463). While discussion of punitiveness in the public sphere often focuses on measures such as boot camps for young offenders, increased incarceration, and longer prison sentences, punitiveness also has a darker side. Our research analysing discussion taking place on a large, regional, crime-focused online forum reveals a startling degree and intensity of violence directed at offenders and related groups. Members of the discussion forum do propose unsurprising measures such as incarceration and boot camps, but also an array of violent alternatives, including beating, shooting, dismemberment, and conversion into animal food. This article draws on our research to explore why discussion of punitiveness can be so intensely violent.

Violence

Violence

Welfare Frontiers? Resource Practices in the Nordic Arctic Anthropocene

This article outlines the thematic section’s main anthropological interventions and introduces the inherently ambiguous notion of welfare frontiers, implying allegedly benign practices of resource development. Through ethnographic analyses from Iceland, Norway, and Greenland, it shows that Nordic Arctic landscapes become resourceful through careful crafting, entangled with practices and ideals of nation-building, egalitarianism, sustainability, good governance, and a concern for liveability for legitimate citizens. Further, the authors suggest that seeing natural resource development as linked to specific welfare state projects, with attention to the sometimes colonizing aspects of such practices, specifies and captures the current era, bringing the Anthropocene back home.

Managing paper trails after Windrush

Stories of those who were victims of the Windrush scandal are characterised by tales of long-lost documents and urgent quests to procure paperwork – maternity certificates, payslips, dental records, school reports – that would attest to a lifetime spent in the United Kingdom. The so-called Windrush generation came to need this paperwork because, although unbeknown to most, the 1971 Immigration Act demanded that from 1973, all migrants must document their ‘legal’ presence in the UK. It was, however, only from 2014 – because of changes in legislation – that now retirement-age Commonwealth citizens, most of whom had migrated to the United Kingdom as children, found themselves facing deportation back to countries that many had not visited for decades (for a historical account of the legislation and politics that led to the Windrush scandal, see Olusoga 2019). The 2014 Immigration Act deleted a key clause of the 1999 legislation that had provided long-standing Commonwealth residents with protection from enforced removal (Taylor 2018). Some of those affected by this updated legislation report that they believed themselves to be legitimate citizens of the British state and therefore did not need to prove their right to be resident through such documentation (for case studies, see Gentleman 2019). In this case, as well as in common-sense thought more generally, documents and paperwork are understood to hold the ‘truth’. Uncover it and their holder’s rightful status will be triumphantly revealed. As such, documents are imagined to act as unambiguous mechanisms of inclusion, their absence therefore denoting the exact opposite.

Contesting categories: cross-border marriages from the perspectives of the state, spouses and researchers

ABSTRACT Marriages that involve the migration of at least one of the spouses challenge two intersecting facets of the politics of belonging: the making of the ‘good and legitimate citizens’ and the ‘acceptable family’. In Europe, cross-border marriages have been the target of increasing state controls, an issue of public concern and the object of scholarly research. The study of cross-border marriages and the ways these marriages are framed is inevitably affected by states’ concerns and priorities. There is a need for a reflexive assessment of how the categories employed by state institutions and agents have impacted the study of cross-border marriages. The introduction to this Special Issue analyses what is at stake in the regulation of cross-border marriages and how European states use particular categories (e.g. ‘sham’, ‘forced’ and ‘mixed’ marriages) to differentiate between acceptable and non-acceptable marriages. When researchers use these categories unreflexively, they risk reproducing nation-centred epistemologies and reinforcing state-informed hierarchies and forms of exclusion. We suggest ways to avoid these pitfalls: differentiating between categories of analysis and categories of practice, adopting methodologies that do not mirror nation-states’ logic and engaging with general social theory outside migration studies. The empirical contributions of the Special Issue offer new insights into a timely topic.

Black French Women and the Struggle for Equality, 1848–2016 ed. by Félix Germain, and Silyane Larcher

Reviewed by: Black French Women and the Struggle for Equality, 1848–2016 ed. by Félix Germain, and Silyane Larcher Severine Bates Germain, Félix, and Silyane Larcher, eds. Black French Women and the Struggle for Equality, 1848–2016. UP of Nebraska, 2018. ISBN 978-1-4962-0127-0. Pp. 294. Can Marianne be black? The debate remains open. Although France is a multicultural and multiethnic nation, Marianne—the national symbol of citizenry and of [End Page 214] a Republic promising liberty, equality, and fraternity for all, regardless of sex, gender, race, and religion—remains stubbornly white in the French collective imagination. Yet, as shown in Germain and Larcher's edited volume, since the abolition of slavery in 1848, people of color, in particular black French women, have continuously struggled against this hegemonic and racialized way of thinking in order to position themselves as legitimate citizens and a potent political force in (post)colonial France and its overseas territories. Showcasing the works of scholars from the African and Caribbean diasporas, this interdisciplinary and well-researched volume contributes to the field of French Black studies by shedding light on the multidimensional and complex nature of black women's experiences and their fight for justice and equality. Situating their analysis at the intersection of race, gender, sex, culture, nationality, and class, the contributors seek to make black French women an "objet de pensée"—as opposed to their historical discursive designation as a"non-objet de pensée" (xiv). Their goal is to dismantle "imagined notions of black female identity" (xvii) by examining the tensions, challenges, and ambiguities faced by black female activists over the span of three centuries. Divided into five parts, each focusing on a theme such as politics, black French feminism, representation, or respectability, this anthology brings attention to the often forgotten but profound historical, political, social, and cultural impact of black women's activism on a French polity faced with its own identity crisis. With essays on the groundbreaking work of famous figures such as the Martinican Nardal sisters, known for their role in the Negritude movement, this volume also examines less prominent but equally influential figures of black women's fight for justice, equality, and for improved political and aesthetic representation, such as Guadeloupean deputy Gerty Archimède, an architect, along with Aimé Césaire, of the 1946 "law of departmentalization." What these women share to varying degrees is a desire to assert their agency in order to redefine the gender, racial, and social status quo of their societies within a nation and empire which, for centuries, silenced them and treated them as inferiors under the objectifying gaze of racist, sexist, colonialist paternalism. Nevertheless, despite shared experiences and a common desire to challenge racism and sexism, the women, according to Jacqueline Couti, differ(ed) in their ideas and approaches to the fight for equality, especially in their unique understanding of blackness, womanhood, and "proper femininity" (144). Hence, the contributors to this volume call attention to the diverse ways in which class, gender, religion, culture, racial discrimination, and migration have contributed to a pluralistic formulation of blackness, femininity, and Frenchness that defies uniformity and fixation into a single category of thought. [End Page 215] Severine Bates University of Evansville (IN) Copyright © 2019 American Association of Teachers of French