Ido Aharoni & Yossi Harpaz: Can Citizenship become a Commodity?

Dr. Yossi Harpaz is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Sociology at Tel-Aviv University. He obtained his PhD in Sociology from Princeton University and conducted his postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University's Weatherhead Center. His research focuses on citizenship, national identity, international migration and elites. His first book, "Citizenship 2.0: Dual Nationality as a Global Asset” (2019) looks at three study cases of dual citizenship: Israelis who acquire citizenship from European-origin countries such as Germany or Poland; Hungarian-speaking citizens of Serbia who obtain a second citizenship from Hungary (and, through it, EU citizenship); and Mexicans who give birth in the United States to secure American citizenship for their children. The book sheds new light on the global trend of instrumental and commodified citizenship, and explores its implications for ethnic and national identities, immigration and inequality.

Harpaz said: “some of the questions I engaged with include: What drives millionaires to seek expensive investor visas? What are the status implications of the global hierarchy of passports? How do national minorities deal with being misrecognized with traveling internationally? What conditions drive individuals to emigrate? What are the social mechanisms that produce cohesion and cooperation. As part of this line of inquiry, I study the community factors associated with tax avoidance, and the cohesive effect of national rituals and ceremonies.”

In this new episode of TAU Unbound Dr. Harpaz shares with host Ido Aharoni how and when citizenship became a “commodity” and why we should not make the immediate assumption that citizenship is directly correlated to migration.