Nationality

Nationality ex Wiki
Nationality is the legal relationship between a person and a state.^[1] Nationality affords the state jurisdiction over the person and affords the person the protection of the state. What these rights and duties are vary from state to state.^[2]

By custom and international conventions, it is the right of each state to determine who its nationals are.^[3] Such determinations are part of nationality law. In some cases, determinations of nationality are also governed by public international law—for example, by treaties on statelessness and the European Convention on Nationality.

Nationality differs technically and legally from citizenship, which is a different legal relationship between a person and a country. The noun national can include both citizens and non-citizens. The most common distinguishing feature of citizenship is that citizens have the right to participate in the political life of the state, such as by voting or standing for election. However, in most modern countries all nationals are citizens of the state, and full citizens are always nationals of the state.^[1][4]

In English and some other languages, the word nationality is sometimes used to refer to an ethnic group (a group of people who share a common ethnic identity, language, culture, descent, history, and so forth). This meaning of nationality is not defined by political borders or passport ownership and includes nations that lack an independent state (such as the Scots, Welsh, English, Basques, Kurds, Kabyles, Tamils, Hmong, Inuit and Māori).

Individuals may also be considered nationals of groups with autonomous status which have ceded some power to a larger government.

 

Citizenship ex Wiki
Citizenship is the status of a person recognized under the custom or law as being a member of a country. A person may have multiple citizenships and a person who does not have citizenship of any state is said to be stateless.

Nationality is often used as a synonym for citizenship in English^[1] – notably in international law – although the term is sometimes understood as denoting a person's membership of a nation (a large ethnic group).^[2] In some countries, e.g. the United States, the United Kingdom, nationality and citizenship can have different meanings. For more information, see

Nationality versus citizenship
Nationality is legally a distinct concept from citizenship. Conceptually, citizenship is focused on the internal political life of the state and nationality is a matter of international dealings.^[6]

In the modern era, the concept of full citizenship encompasses not only active political rights, but full civil rights and social rights.^[4] Nationality is a necessary but not sufficient condition to exercise full political rights within a state or other polity.^[1] Nationality is required for full citizenship, and some people have nationality without having full citizenship. A person who is denied full rights is commonly called a second-class citizen.

Historically, the most significant difference between a national and a citizen is that the citizen has the right to vote for elected officials, and to be elected.^[4] This distinction between full citizenship and other, lesser relationships goes back to antiquity. Until the 19th and 20th centuries, it was typical for only a small percentage of people who belonged to a city or state to be full citizens. In the past, most people were excluded from citizenship on the basis of gender, socioeconomic class, ethnicity, religion, and other factors. However, they held a legal relationship with their government akin to the modern concept of nationality.^[4]

United States nationality law defines some persons born in U.S. outlying possessions as U.S. nationals but not citizens. British nationality law defines six classes of British national, among which "British citizen" is one class (and the only one having the right of abode in the United Kingdom). Similarly, in the Republic of China, commonly known as Taiwan, the status of national without household registration applies to people who have Republic of China nationality, but do not have an automatic entitlement to enter or reside in the Taiwan Area, and do not qualify for civic rights and duties there. Under the nationality laws of Mexico, Colombia, and some other Latin American countries, nationals do not become citizens until they turn 18.

 

Sovereign State ex Wiki
In international law, a sovereign state is a nonphysical juridical entity that is represented by one centralized government that has sovereignty over a geographic area. International law defines sovereign states as having a permanent population, defined territory, one government, and the capacity to enter into relations with other sovereign states.^[1] It is also normally understood that a sovereign state is neither dependent on nor subjected to any other power or state.^[2]

The existence or disappearance of a state is a question of fact.^[3] While according to the declarative theory of statehood, a sovereign state can exist without being recognised by other sovereign states, unrecognised states will often find it hard to exercise full treaty-making powers and engage in diplomatic relations with other sovereign states.

 

Jus Sanguinis ex Wiki
Jus sanguinis (Latin: right of blood) is a principle of nationality law by which citizenship is not determined by place of birth but by having one or both parents who are citizens of the state. Children at birth may automatically be citizens if their parents have state citizenship or national identities of ethnic, cultural or other origins.^[1] Citizenship can also apply to children whose parents belong to a diaspora and were not themselves citizens of the state conferring citizenship. This principle contrasts with jus soli (Latin: right of soil).^[2]

At the end of the 19th century, the French-German debate on nationality saw the French, such as Ernest Renan, oppose the German conception, exemplified by Johann Fichte, who believed in an "objective nationality", based on blood, race or language. Renan's republican conception, but perhaps also the presence of a German-speaking population in Alsace-Lorraine, explains France's early adoption of jus soli. Many nations have a mixture of jus sanguinis and jus soli, including the United States, Canada, Israel, Greece, Ireland, and recently Germany.

Today France only narrowly applies jus sanguinis, but it is still the most common means of passing on citizenship in many continental European countries. Some countries provide almost the same rights as a citizen to people born in the country, without actually giving them citizenship. An example is Indfødsret in Denmark, which provides that upon reaching 18, non-citizen residents can decide to take a test to gain citizenship.

Some modern European states which arose out of dissolved empires, like the Austro-Hungarian or Ottoman, have huge numbers of ethnic populations outside of their new 'national' boundaries, as do most of the former Soviet states. Such long-standing diasporas do not conform to codified 20th-century European rules of citizenship.

In many cases, jus sanguinis rights are mandated by international treaty, with citizenship definitions imposed by the international community. In other cases, minorities are subject to legal and extra-legal persecution and choose to immigrate to their ancestral home country. States offering jus sanguinis rights to ethnic citizens and their descendants include Italy, Greece, Turkey, Bulgaria, Lebanon, Armenia and Romania. Each is required by international treaty to extend those rights.

In recent years, the Gulf Cooperation Council states have ensured that nationality is not easily awarded to residents and expatriates, unless they have some ethnic connection. This is mainly because they fear that a larger population could be a threat to the existing political systems in these countries. In the workplace, preferential treatment is given to full citizens. State benefits are also generally available for citizens only and not residents.^[3]

 

Jus Soli ex Wiki
Jus soli, meaning 'right of the soil',^[1] is the right of anyone born in the territory of a state to nationality or citizenship.^[2] As an unconditional basis for citizenship, it is the predominant rule in the Americas, but is rare elsewhere.^[3][4][5][6] Since the Twenty-seventh Amendment of the Constitution of Ireland was enacted in 2004, no European country grants citizenship based on unconditional jus soli.^[7][8] A study in 2010 found that only 30 of the world's 194 countries grant citizenship at birth to the children of undocumented foreign residents, although definitive information was not available from 19 countries.^[5]

Almost all states in Europe, Asia, Africa, and Oceania grant citizenship at birth based upon the principle of jus sanguinis (right of blood), in which citizenship is inherited through parents not by birthplace, or a restricted version of jus soli in which citizenship by birthplace is automatic only for the children of certain immigrants. Countries that have acceded to the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness will grant nationality to otherwise stateless persons who were born on their territory, or on a ship or plane flagged by that country.

Jus soli is associated with permissive citizenship rights. Most countries with unconditional jus soli laws tend to give birthright citizenship (and nationality) based on jus sanguinis rules as well, although these stipulations tend to be more restrictive than in countries that use jus sanguinis as the primary basis for nationality.

 

Anchor Baby Racket ex Wiki
Anchor baby is a pejorative^[1][2] term for a child born in the U.S. to a foreign national mother who is not lawfully admitted for permanent residence.^[3] The term is generally used as a derogatory reference to the supposed role of the child, who automatically qualifies as an American citizen under jus soli and the rights guaranteed in the 14th Amendment and can thus act as a sponsor for other family members.^[4][5] The term is also often used in the context of the debate over illegal immigration to the United States to refer to children of illegal immigrants, but may be used for the child of any immigrant.^[6] A similar term, "passport baby", has been used in Canada for children born through so-called "maternity" or "birth tourism".^[7][8]

There is a popular misconception that the child's U.S. citizenship status legally helps the child's parents and siblings to quickly reclassify their visa status (or lack thereof) and to place them on a fast pathway to acquire lawful permanent residence and eventually United States citizenship.^[9][10] Current U.S. federal law prevents anyone under the age of 21 from being able to petition for their non-citizen parent to be lawfully admitted into the United States for permanent residence. At best, the child's family would need to wait for 21 years before being able to use their child's US citizenship to modify their immigration status, and is thus, unhelpful for immigration purposes.^[11]

Editor's note: It is not necessary, or sometimes sensible to believe the Wikipedia without checking. It is often good when there is no agenda involved. With political issues things are different. Their "popular misconception" might well be an open and shut lie. Certainly with Obama in power abusing the law and the American Constitution, letting Illegal Immigrants get away with crime is policy.

 

The Athenian Approach To Citizenship
QUOTE
The Citizenship Law of Pericles
In 451 B.C. Pericles introduced one of most striking proposals with his sponsorship of a law stating that henceforth citizenship would be conferred only on children whose mother and father both were Athenians.¹ Previously, the offspring of Athenian men who married non-Athenian women were granted citizenship. Aristocratic men in particular had tended to marry rich foreign women, as Pericles' own maternal grandfather had done. Pericles' new law enhanced the status of Athenian mothers and made Athenian citizenship a more exclusive category, definitively setting Athenians off from all others. Not long thereafter, a review of the citizenship rolls was conducted to expel any who had claimed citizenship fraudulently. Together these actions served to limit the number of citizens and thus limit dilution of the advantages which citizenship in Athens' radical democracy conveyed on those included in the citizenry. Those advantages included, for men, the freedom to participate in politics and juries, to influence decisions that directly affected their lives, to have equal protection under the law, and to own land and houses in Athenian territory. Citizen women² had less rights because they were excluded from politics, had to have a male legal guardian³ (kurios), who, for example, spoke for them in court, and were not legally entitled to make large financial transactions on their own. They could, however, control property and have their financial interests protected in law suits. Like men, they were entitled to the protection of the law regardless of their wealth. Both female and male citizens experienced the advantage of belonging to a city-state that was enjoying unparalleled material prosperity. Citizens clearly saw themselves as the elite residents of Athens.
UNQUOTE
It is not too far removed from the Swiss way of dealing with matters.