From nation-state citizenship to global citizenship the citizenship issue in Turkey

This study is about the evolution of the citizenship concept starting from the nation-state citizenship to global citizenship. In the study issues like the ways how the citizenship concept has been defined in the historical span, what the measures that determine the citizenship are, the changes that the concept has been exposed to up to now, are discussed. As the foundation of the nation and the nationalization period progressed together in Turkey, the basic philosophy and the principles about the formation of the Turkish national citizenship form the basis for the understanding of citizenship concept. In this sense, the level, which the Turkish Republic Citizenship has reached today, has been examined by considering the social, economical and cultural effects of the globalization process on the nation-state.Nowadays the problems that nation-state citizenship faces cannot be isolated from the problems that the world faces. The social, political and economical crisis which capitalism, so called as globalization process, has made the existence of the nation-state questionable. Citizenship concept must be handled within this new world order.Along with the globalization process, nation-state citizenship loses its meaning. The citizenship concept has gained its modern content with the existence of the nation-state. As the social, political, economical and cultural changes and transitions in our world formed the conditions for the nation-state, the conditions for citizenship were being formed.The latest state model of the modern world is nation-state. The effects of the globalization process on nation-state?s national sovereignty and national identity question the existence of the states. The basic principles of each nation-state, like independence and sovereignty, have lost their value with the effect of the globalization process.As a matter of course, Turkish Republic is affected with this process as well. The basic philosophy and the principles of the Republic are under threat. The changes in our social structure beginning from the Ottoman Empire to Republic, from the foundation of the Republic up to now also involve the existence of a new state and the understanding of the formation and bringing up `new citizen?.This study discusses the struggle of the Turkish people during their transition from villainage to vassalage and then to citizenship and the effects of the global citizenship project on national citizenship in the context of the effects of globalism in the 21st century. The study considers the theoretical approaches during the historical process of the citizenship and the differences between the world citizenship and global citizenship, and they are discussed in the context of structural and factual features of nation-state and the concepts of nation and nationalism, which are the early steps of nation-state citizenship.Moreover, the economical, social and cultural consequences of the transition from nation-state citizenship to global citizenship and the outlook of global citizenship project are stated. We live in a new century in which micro-nationalism and ethnic awakening is increasing rapidly under the name of nation-state citizenship global citizenship project, and the compulsions of the international powers over inoffensive countries are becoming more intense day by day. However, this century will be a century in which the presence of nation states is appreciated once more.