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German History 2009 27(4):583-599; doi:10.1093/gerhis/ghp075
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© The Author 2009. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the German History Society. All rights reserved.

After Brubaker: Citizenship in Modern Germany, 1848 to Today

Annemarie Sammartino

Oberlin College

asammart@oberlin.edu

Citizens and Aliens: Foreigners and the Law in Britain and the German States, 1789–1870. By Andreas Fahrmeir. ‘Monographs in German History’, 5. New York: Berghahn Books. 2000. 258 pp. $90/£50 (hardback).

Einbürgern und Ausschließen: Die Nationalisierung der Staatsangehörigkeit vom Deutschen Bund bis zur Bundesrepublik Deutschland. By Dieter Gosewinkel. ‘Kritische Studien zur Geschichtswissenschaft’, 150. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. 2001. 472 pp. {euro}48.90 (hardback).

The Changing Faces of Citizenship: Integration and Mobilization among Ethnic Minorities in Germany. By Joyce Marie Mushaben. New York: Berghahn Books. 2008. 345 pp. $100/£50 (hardback).

The Politics of Citizenship in Germany: Ethnicity, Utility and Nationalism. By Eli Nathans. New York: Berg. 2004. 294 pp. $105/£50 (hardback); $36.95/£17.99 (paperback).

Die Einbürgerungspraxis im Deutschen Reich, 1871–1945. By Oliver Trevisiol. ‘Studien zur historischen Migrationsforschung’, 18. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. 2007. 237 pp. {euro}38.90 (hardback).

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

In 1992, Rogers Brubaker laid out a simple but elegant summary of the differences between citizenship in Germany and France. While French citizenship was based on ius soli, or the law of residence at birth, German citizenship had a very different foundation, ius sanguinis, or blood. Brubaker's account traces this dichotomy from the French Revolution and the Napoleonic wars to the present day, reading the distinction between ius soli and ius sanguinis as indicative of larger differences in the ways that the French and Germans conceptualized national belonging.1 Since this seminal study was published, historians have challenged Brubaker's narrative from both the German and French side. While Patrick Weil, Gérard Noiriel and Peter Sahlins have taught us that the French could be just as xenophobic and racist as their German neighbours, German historians have had the heavier burden of proving that Germany's restrictive citizenship laws belie a more . . . [Full Text of this Article]


   I. Criteria for Citizenship
 

   II. Localism
 

   III. Teleology and Turning Points
 

   IV. Citizenship in a Reunified Germany
 

   V. The Limits of Legal History
 

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