Liberalism, Patriotism, and Cosmopolitanism in Local Citizenship in a Global Age

This Essay contributed to a symposium hosted by the Texas A&M School of Law’s Journal of Property Law in fall 2020, on Kenneth Stahl’s new book Local Citizenship in a Global Age. Local Citizenship in a Global Age reports thoroughly and insightfully on some developments that have been overlooked to date: Some American towns and cities are actively resisting immigration policies of the U.S. government, and they are conferring on residents who are not U.S. citizens perquisites often associated with citizenship. But Local Citizenship in a Global Age is too enthusiastic about those developments, and it does not consider some serious counter-arguments. The book assumes that all so-called “liberal” theories of justice require easy paths to citizenship. But some liberal theories justify restricting citizenship, to prospective citizens who seem likely to be patriotic and to embrace fully tenets fundamental in a liberal regime. The book also suggests that people who want to limit citizenship are motivated by what it calls “ethno-nationalist” tendencies. But if that suggestion is legitimate, it seems just as legitimate to suggest that people who support easy paths to citizenship are motivated by what might be called “cosmopolitan” tendencies