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SECURE, GENDERED POLITICS OF BELONGING 31

These boundaries and borders can be con- 1999) I have followed a wider definition of
tested not only between those who are inter- the concept. Using T. H. Marshall’s definition
nal or external to them, but also between of citizenship (1950, 1975) as ‘full member-
people who see themselves, and are seen, as ship of the community with rights and
belonging to the same collectivity, or even by responsibilities’, I have argued that the con-
the same people at different times and in dif- cept can also be used in relation to other poli-
ferent situations because of their different ties than the ‘nation-state’, to the extent that
social locations and different social values. membership in other collectivities endows
The contested and shifting nature of these citizens with rights and obligations in a similar
boundaries and borders may reflect not only manner.
dynamic power relations between individu- Historically, citizenship emerged as active
als, collectivities, and institutions but also participation in political communities that
subjective and situational processes. evolved in cities (the Greek polis) and then
One of the crucial intervening factors in developed as a legal status in empires (such
these dynamics is the fact that people tend to as the Roman Empire). Jean Cohen (1999)
belong – in different ways and with different argues that in the nation-state these two ele-
intensities – to more than one collectivity and ments of citizenship have come together.
polity. Local, ethnic, national, inter- and However, as Yasemin Soysal (1994), David
supra-national political communities are Held (1995), and others have argued, new
just some of the ‘imagined communities’ trans-national and supra-national forms of
(Anderson, 1991 [1983]) with which people citizenship are developing, forms that Bryan
may identify, in which they are active, at Turner has called (1998) post-Fordist citizen-
least to a certain degree, and to which they ship. As I have argued elsewhere (1999),
may feel a certain sense of attachment. One international legislation on human rights can
level of exploration, following Anne-Marie be seen, from such a perspective, as just
Fortier (2000), is that of the ways in which another layer of citizenship. At the same
common histories, experiences, and places time, I have also pointed out that in terms of
are created, imagined, and sustained in what affecting personal lives and constructing
Vikki Bell (1999) calls ‘the performativity of rights and obligations, sub-national and
belonging’. Another level, however (although cross-national communities can also become
interwoven with the first), is the examination bearers of significant citizenships, in specific
of the hierarchy and dynamics of power that local, religious, and ethnic contexts.
are exercised between these collectivities and As mentioned above, however, the notion
the degree of cooperation or conflict between of citizenship needs to be differentiated from
them. In other words, the relationship that of belonging, which encompasses not
between the society and the polity is crucial only the participatory dimension of citizen-
to the understanding of the multi-layered and ship but also the cognitive and emotional
multiplex constructions of belongings of dimensions of identification and attachment
both individuals and groupings. (Yuval-Davis, 2006a). Identities are the indi-
Following a terminology first used by vidual and collective narratives people tell
Michael Walzer (1997), Crowley argues themselves and others about who they are
(1999: 22) that the idea of ‘belonging’ is an and who they are not. However, belonging is
attempt to give a ‘thicker’ account of the not only about cognitions and perceptions.
political and social dynamics of integration Feeling that one is (or is not) part of a
in relation to the concept of citizenship, collectivity, a community, a social category,
which he defines as formal membership in a or yearning to be so, is central to a sense of
nation-state. belonging, and is not the same as actually
In my own work on citizenship (1994, taking part (or not) in a political community
1997a, 1999; Yuval-Davis and Werbner, with all the rights and responsibilities involved.