1.Discuss whether it can be argued that we all enjoy equal citizenship Essay

1.Discuss whether it can be argued that we all enjoy equal citizenship rights in the UK - Essay Example Citizenship cannot be understood without an active theory of gender relations, and that political citizenship for women destabilizes private male oriented society and the family. Citizenship is about a transition from private to public patriarchy, not only the civilizing of  capitalism. ‘Citizenship’ has become a very popular subject of debate in the last few years, suitable nationally and internationally, by both Left and Right, as well as by feminists. The interest in citizenship is not just in the narrow formalistic meaning of having the right to carry a specific passport. It addresses an overall concept summarizes the relationship between the individual, state and society. [1] In the liberal tradition individual citizens are supposed to have equal status, equal rights and duties, etc., so that principles of inequality deriving from gender, ethnic, class or other contexts are not supposed to be of relevance to the status of citizenship as such. The citizens are therefore constructed not as ‘members of the community’ but as strangers to each other, although they are sharing a complex set of assumptions about and expectations of each other which, when not fulfilled, can be enforced by the state. [1] This self of one has been criticized, however, by the ‘communitarians’ who claim that notions of rights and duties, as well as those of equality and privacy, have no meaning outside the context of particular communities are there with their views. On different grounds, the proponents of republicanism and the individualistic construction of citizenship is highly disappointing. They argue that such a construction of citizenship denies the possibility of citizenship as constituting a membership in a moral community in which the notion of the common good is antecedent to the individual citizenship choice. Liberal construction of citizenship assumes the priority of right over good. Republicanism, on the