Globalizing Citizenship

The events of 9/11 and its aftermath exposed and enhanced tensionsbetween the global capitalist system and the territorial nation-state.Governments and policy-makers more than ever struggle to governpopulations and manage cross-border traffic without building newbarriers to trade and commerce. What does citizenship mean in an era ofheightened globalization and enhanced security? Is it in crisis?

In Globalizing Citizenship, Kim Rygiel explores thesequestions by examining border and detention policies in the UnitedStates, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia as part of a largerpolitics of citizenship, one that preceded 9/11. Building onFoucault’s concept of biopolitics, she argues that citizenship isbecoming a globalizing regime to govern mobility and access to rightsand resources as nations in the global North harmonize border anddetention policies, outsource state functions and power tointernational organizations and private companies, and rely ontechnologies to discipline the individual biological body.

This theoretically sophisticated and empirically grounded study ofborder controls and detention practices reveals that the new mobilityregime is not only deepening boundaries based on race, class, andgender, it is causing Western nations to embrace a more technocratic,depoliticized understanding of citizenship.