International Migration Is Changing Perceptions of Citizenship_Vol. 3 No. 4 (JMSD 2026)_Journal of Management and Social Development (ISSN: 3005-5741)

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International Migration Is Changing Perceptions of Citizenship

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.62517/jmsd.202612414

Author(s)

Liyu Chen

Affiliation(s)

King's College London, London, UK

Abstract

International migration, read through the terms of transnationalism, is undoing the tight fit between legal citizenship and felt belonging that the nation-state model once presumed. Cross-border ties — sustained by capital flows, selective migration policies, and widening economic stratification — rearrange the terms on which citizenship is claimed, granted, and withheld rather than simply layering new identities onto old ones. The children of transnational migrants often construct identities that straddle national lines, but this hybridity carries its own frictions: split loyalties, ambiguous legal standing, and the everyday strain of being read as not quite belonging anywhere. Citizenship, on this reading, operates less as a fixed legal status than as a field of shifting power — shaped by the movement of money, labor, and the administrative reflexes of states. Any migration policy that treats economic growth and social inclusion as separate problems to be traded off will misread what is happening on the ground.

Keywords

Transnationalism; Citizenship and Belonging; Hybrid Identity; Commodification of Citizenship

References

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