Ethnic Citizenship Regimes

Abstract

National citizenship is still the last bastion of states' sovereignty, meaning that EU institutions cannot exercise any direct influence on national citizenship legislation in the EU member states. On the other hand, the process of political integration in the EU, international human rights' development and globalization are claimed to have indirectly challenged states' exclusive competences in that legal area. As a consequence of these processes a number of questions arise: what kind of national citizenship has developed in the member states of the European Union? Which principles have informed it? Which factors have triggered the legislative reforms? This book sheds light on the processes that have transformed national citizenship of the European Union's member states and explains the legislative changes that€have taken€place since the mid-1980s in Germany, Hungary and Poland.