The UK Citizenship Process: Political Integration or Marginalization?

Abstract

The UK ‘citizenship process’ subjects immigrants to requirements ostensibly intended to enhance their identification with ‘British values’. Policy-makers suggest the policy will facilitate immigrants’ integration: as they learn about ‘life in the UK’, they will become better able to understand and navigate core institutions. Many external observers, by contrast, believe that the requirements exacerbate immigrants’ marginalization. I use panel data from ‘Understanding Society’ to investigate political participation among non-citizen immigrants at Wave 1, comparing those who became citizens by Wave 6 to those who remained non-citizens. Those who became citizens subsequently reported lower interest in politics, relative to those who remained non-citizens; in addition, they were not more likely to be active in organizations (e.g. political parties and trade unions). These findings reinforce the concerns of critics: the UK citizenship policy appears to do more to alienate new citizens than it does to facilitate their integration in the political sphere.

Does the UK ‘citizenship process’ lead immigrants to reject British identity? A panel data analysis

“…That idea is plausible when one considers that the citizenship process has a negative impact on other aspects of immigrant integration (e.g. in the political sphere) in the UK: immigrants who become citizens report being less interested in politics, relative to those who remain non-citizens (Bartram, 2019). Knowing about the specific contribution (if any) of the tests and ceremonies in connection with national identity would require getting to grips with another unobservable quantity: what would have happened to new citizens' attachment to British identity if they had become citizens in a context that did not include these requirements (but was nonetheless equivalent in other ways)?…”

“…That idea is plausible when one considers that the citizenship process has a negative impact on other aspects of immigrant integration (e.g. in the political sphere) in the UK: immigrants who become citizens report being less interested in politics, relative to those who remain non-citizens (Bartram, 2019).…”

Naturalization policies, citizenship regimes, and the regulation of belonging in anxious societies

“…From a comparative perspective, Hunger (2018) shows how naturalisation can have a positive effect on migrants' political participation, in particular in 'restrictive citizenship regimes' (see also Goodman and Wright, 2015). However, looking at the effects of the citizenship test in the British context, Bartram (2019) shows that this requirement tends to have a negative effect on migrants' political participation as it leads to alienate new citizens (see also Osler, 2009). These ambivalences show that the way migrants experience naturalisation policies remains difficult to measure.…”

Becoming an active citizen: The UK Citizenship Test

“…We conceive of the naturalization process as a tool of institutional ‘filtering’ (Kostakopoulou, 2010), reinforcing external borders while transforming and improving those allowed to apply to naturalise. The requirement to be an active citizen invokes ‘transformative intent’ (Menjívar and Lakhani, 2016), that seeks to ‘nudge’ (Room, 2016; Thaler and Sunstein, 2009) or change behavior (Bartram, 2019; Perri et al., 2010). Migrants are one group among many who are required to be active citizens (see Clarke et al., 2014, Ch 4, for a broader discussion).…”

“…The notion of active citizenship has been disputed yet shared as a policy project by different political parties in Britain 8 , particularly from 1980s onwards (Marinetto, 2003: 107). Multiple aims have included combatting perceived apathy and social fragmentation as well as promoting self-reliance and responsibilised citizens, and loyalty to the nation (Bartram, 2019; Turner, 2014). The idea of active citizenship can serve as a vehicle for neoliberal and nationalist demands (Mustafa, 2016), express a logic of voluntarism (Fuller et al., 2008), and act as an antidote to what is perceived to be a decline and weakening of citizenship and political engagement (Turner, 2016).…”