A Theory of Citizenship Rights

The aim of this paper is to redefine citizenship for immigrants to avoid unjust political exclusions from political agency. It will be argued that residence is not a good ground for excluding immigrants from or granting them with citizenship. The evaluation of someone's citizenship is closely related to political participation and reciprocity. Indeed, political participation is a right and as such its acquisition should not be considered differently from the acquisition of other rights. The contributory principle is a sufficient principle from which to evaluate both immigrants' entitlement to civil liberties and citizenship. It will be suggested that grounding citizenship on that principle would reduce the number of denizens and grant some of them with citizenship.