Citizenship across spaces, places, and intersections of identities

Democratic systems around the world are increasingly affected by intersecting crises (Moore et al., 2021), i.e. the overlapping of multiple crises such as climate change, inequities, conflict, insecurity, polarization and misinformation. New technologies have fundamentally altered the ways citizens interact with and participate in democratic processes. While these crises and innovations impact democratic systems around the globe, citizens experience them in unique ways, in connection to their individual identities, in places they inhabit, and in spaces where they practice citizenship. This Section builds on the assertion that there is a need for more work that situates citizenship as a socio-cultural construct, embedded in citizens’ complex social worlds, thereby challenging prevailing assumptions that citizenship experiences are universal (Akar, 2017). Moreover, the imposition of Global North frameworks on citizens from the Global South, whose social realities diverge significantly, underscores the need for a more nuanced understanding of citizenship (Swartz et al., 2021). Thus, we particularly encourage papers that re-contextualise citizenship by situating citizenship in sub-national localities, in digital and virtual spaces, and at points of intersectionality, such as gender, age or ethnicity. These distinct perspectives will contribute to a more refined and comprehensive understanding of citizenship and its relations to contemporary global crises. Place has a significant impact on citizens’ vision for democratic societies and accepted citizen norms. Citizenship practices differ considerably in relation to place, because the local context not only shapes citizens’ interest in and experience of issues, but also influences the types of actions citizens can engage in. Thus, place regulates access to and restriction from citizen actions (Panelli et al., 2007). Rural citizens, for instance, may develop different citizen ideals than urban citizens due to personal exposure to unique rural issues, unique access to rural-specific activities and restrictions from some urban-centric citizenship activities such as protests. Technological developments are transforming the political and social spaces for citizenship engagement. Online social networks and other digital spaces, coupled with exponential developments in artificial intelligence (AI), simultaneously create opportunities for and barriers and threats to citizenship action. On the one hand, new digital spaces enhance opportunities for citizen participation and enable greater transparency in state-citizen relations. Yet, new technologies have also prompted political polarization and misinformation. As these new technologies mediate the relationship between the citizen and the state, we may expect citizens to take on new roles, develop new citizenship norms, and alter their engagement with public institutions. Gender and intersectional perspectives contribute to re-contextualizing citizenship, enrich our understanding of citizenship, and provide knowledge needed to strengthen democracies. How do gender, race, age, class, sexual orientation, and other identity factors intersect to shape citizenship norms, engagement, experiences, and practices? What knowledge is being created using gendered perspectives? What data gaps should future research focus on? Various theories inform activism, civic initiatives and practices fostering inclusion, equality, democracy and sustainability. Feminism, among other lenses, provides critical frameworks for identifying and addressing gender and intersectional disparities in power, rights, access, participation, and other core citizenship issues. Activists and social movements in various places around the globe challenge and shape citizenship laws, policies and norms related to gender or intersectional equality. What are the potential tensions or conflicts between theoretical lenses, local citizenship ideals and cultural or religious traditions, and how can these be navigated? The intersecting crises, changing norms and repertoires of citizenship action may necessitate key transformations to civic education in schools and across the lifespan. How do innovations in citizenship education address the need to deliver context responsive, gender sensitive and learner cantered programs in schools and lifelong learning? How intersectionally inclusive and empowering is citizenship education? This section seeks to engage with a range of theoretical and empirical perspectives on and beyond: ▪️ Citizenship in times of intersecting crises (i.e. co-occurrence or overlapping of multiple crises such as conflict, climate change, migration, polarization, misinformation,, …) ▪️ Comparative analyses of citizenship as practiced in distinct spaces (digital platforms, social media), places (local, urban, rural) and at points of intersectionality (gender, race, ethnicity, sexual identity, migration) ▪️ Changing roles and spaces of civic education in response to citizenship repertoires in distinct spaces, places, and at points of intersectionality ▪️ Evolving definitions, meanings and narratives of citizenship ▪️ Novelties and challenges to citizenship theories and norms ▪️ Citizenship in times of democratic demise and reawakening ▪️ Public opinion towards citizenship ▪️ Citizenship and sustainability ▪️ Civics and citizenship in conflict, polarized societies and peace building process. ▪️ Civic education in schools and across the lifespan ▪️ Pedagogies for inclusive, equitable and empowering citizenship education programs and lifelong learning ▪️ Gender and intersectionality in civic education and lifelong learning ▪️ Outputs of political research as inputs of citizenship research and education