From modern versions of citizenship to the citizenship of post-modern social autonomies

Abstract

Modern citizenship is in crisis. The reasons are complex. It is faced with problems that are both internal (such as political and cultural legitimacy, social regulation, resources and costs) and external (such as economic impulse, problems arising from the intermediate social formations, demographic changes, difficulty in managing social groups and social strata that are not connected with the State) to the political system. In this paper, the objective is to observe and bring to light the fact that all these problems focus on issues relating to the culture, specifically political, of a community. The cultural environment of  citizens no longer generates motivations, values and rules that harmonize with the institutions of the modern, democratic nation-State. What are the alternatives? Is it possible to re-launch citizenship as a basis for democracy? In what sense? What are the conditions and possible developments? After reviewing the Marxist and Liberal visions of citizenship, the following conclusion can be offered: a new phase is beginning or, in sociological terms, a societary semantic in which citizenship takes the shape of a complex of rights-duties of the people and the associative formations which articulates the civic life in «universal autonomies» which are able to integrate the generality of the aims and self-management practices. This is the challenge that the complex society imposes on itself. This challenge is called «societary citizenship», or citizenship of the social autonomies, in a post-modern democratic State.