Gender and Citizenship: Problems of Exclusion and Inclusion in Europe

One of the main points is that there is no universal story about citizenship. In modern democracies, gender systems are dynamic concepts embedded in national histories, institutions and cultures. One of the objectives of the network “Gender and Citizenship: Social Exclusion and Social Exclusion in European Welfare States” (see appendix) has been to develop a gender perspective on the framework of citizenship confronting feminist rethinking of citizenship with the discourses and politics of women’s citizenship in different contexts. One main theme has been the interplay between political, social and civil rights, and the relations between social citizenship, political participation and power. In the paper I will use examples from my book to illustrate the different vocabularies and dynamics of gender and citizenship as well as the different processes of exclusion and inclusion of workers, mothers and citizens in different national contexts. I ask first what does feminist approaches to citizenship have to offer to the framework of citizenship? Secondly, I ask what a gender sensitive model of citizenship looks like and discuss crucial questions concerning the interaction between discourses, institutions and agency using examples from a comparative study of France, Britain and Denmark (Siim, 2000). Thirdly, I give an overview of path dependencies and changes in women’s citizenship during the last 30 years and illustrate some of the shifts in the political meaning of gender with examples from France, Britain and Denmark. Finally, I discuss the new challenges to social and political inclusion of citizens posed by European integration, immigration and unemployment, as well as the promises connected with the new Social Democratic governments in France, Britain and Denmark.