Cittadinanze variabili

The citizenship feels effects of the influence of political and social needs of the nation state. Nowadays the crisis of the state and its sovereignty is producing the transformation of the citizenship and the political question related to the definition of its concept is reopened. We lost the perspective of citizen as ‘person’ for the advantage of the administrative notion of ‘registry office’. Deep transformations in economy, society and human relationship – at national and global level – played a role in this meaning shift and the massive migration phenomenon made situation worse. The paper focus on the lack of balance between the formal and administrative notion of citizenship and that one of juridical-political instrument favouring people participate to the community life. Three changes affect the nature and the role of citizenship. The economic and media globalization imposed market economy as only regulator of social relationships. Secondly, the growing importance of human rights in constitutional law, since the years after Second World War to the recent European constitutions, made person prevail in front of citizen, therefore that debased the national citizenship. Thirdly, the increasing weight of international institutions in the juridical life of single nation-states, as in case of ECHR. Can studying, understanding and correcting these structural changes allow citizenship to resume the mediation role between liberal individualism and community conception of society? That is, could citizenship again become a useful tool to overcome social conflicts?