kEiThZ
Superstar
PUBLICATION: GLOBE AND MAIL
IDN: 090980166
DATE: 2009.04.08
PAGE: A19
BYLINE: NATALIE BRENDER
SECTION: Comment
EDITION: Metro
DATELINE:
WORDS: 731
WORD COUNT: 772
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IMMIGRATION If we're going to talk citizenship, let's have a principled debate
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NATALIE BRENDER On April 17, a new law comes into effect changing the rules of citizenship.
From that date on, when foreign-born Canadians have children born abroad, those children cannot inherit Canadian citizenship. Under the current rules, such children do receive citizenship and can retain it as adults - even if they've never stepped foot in this country - by showing knowledge of Canada and ability to speak English or French.
The new law stems from the 2006 removal of 15,000 Canadian citizens from war in Lebanon, many of whom subsequently returned there. At the time, Stephen Harper's government condemned so-called citizens of convenience who use citizenship as insurance against turmoil in their home countries. The new law ensures that only one generation of emigrant Canadians will gain such "conveniences" in the future.
It seems this is not the only citizenship reform afoot. Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney has recently made comments suggesting that further steps be taken to make citizenship more difficult to obtain.
At an event in Alberta last month, Mr. Kenney was asked about "birth tourists," who come to have their children in Canada so they can acquire citizenship. He said his department is considering how to prevent such people from abusing our generosity. He mentioned the estimated quarter of a million Canadian citizens living in Hong Kong and the 50,000 or more in Lebanon - and the current right of these citizens' great-grandchildren to become Canadian citizens - as further evidence of abuse. In another recent speech, Mr. Kenney suggested there be tighter enforcement of the existing rule that immigrants be able to speak an official language before being granted citizenship.
There are reasons to think Canada ought to change its citizenship policies in an age of accelerated global travel and migration - and lots of reasons for caution, too. But none of those reasons seemed to guide the actions of a government eager to score political points after Lebanon. A principled public discussion of the value and purpose of Canadian citizenship has yet to take place.
What would such a discussion look like? It would begin by acknowledging that many Canadians, native-born and immigrants alike, see our citizenship as instrumentally valuable in world of porous borders: It brings rights of entry, protection abroad and other social benefits. If this sounds opportunistic, the fact is that opportunism abounds on both sides. Successive governments have wooed talented and wealthy immigrants to choose Canada by offering easy access to citizenship's benefits. The bargain has been overwhelmingly successful for Canada, economically and socially. The presence of Canadian citizens abroad also helps Canada through the bilateral economic activity they generate, their nation-building efforts in developing countries and their informal status as goodwill ambassadors.
From this instrumental perspective, the new law may seem unjust and unwise. As immigrant advocates have noted, it renders foreign-born Canadians unequal to native-born ones in the capacity to pass citizenship to children born while parents are studying or working abroad. It is arguably a law unsuited to an age in which citizens often temporarily live abroad without losing ties to home.
From a non-instrumental political perspective, however, it may be that a healthy Canadian democracy does demand tighter citizenship rules. Migration scholar Rainer Bauboeck has proposed that democracies adopt a "stakeholder citizenship" criterion to define which people, regardless of where they live, have ongoing substantive ties to a self-governing political community.
Such a principle accords citizenship an intrinsic value as part of political freedom. It implies that conferring citizenship on extended generations born abroad, or to children born to parents temporarily in the country, works against the goal of ensuring that only those with a substantial interest in Canada's well-being gain citizenship's political rights.
But it isn't an either-or choice: Citizenship has both instrumental and intrinsic value for Canada and its people. That's why debates about citizenship law should be fraught with complexity - and why they do need to take place. When the government introduces further changes, it owes Canadians an account of the goals and values it aims to advance. Federal legislators must ensure that a full and principled debate on these topics happens before further citizenship laws are passed.
Natalie Brender is writing a book on Canadian citizenship in a globalized age. Former policy adviser to foreign affairs minister Bill Graham
IDN: 090980166
DATE: 2009.04.08
PAGE: A19
BYLINE: NATALIE BRENDER
SECTION: Comment
EDITION: Metro
DATELINE:
WORDS: 731
WORD COUNT: 772
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
IMMIGRATION If we're going to talk citizenship, let's have a principled debate
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NATALIE BRENDER On April 17, a new law comes into effect changing the rules of citizenship.
From that date on, when foreign-born Canadians have children born abroad, those children cannot inherit Canadian citizenship. Under the current rules, such children do receive citizenship and can retain it as adults - even if they've never stepped foot in this country - by showing knowledge of Canada and ability to speak English or French.
The new law stems from the 2006 removal of 15,000 Canadian citizens from war in Lebanon, many of whom subsequently returned there. At the time, Stephen Harper's government condemned so-called citizens of convenience who use citizenship as insurance against turmoil in their home countries. The new law ensures that only one generation of emigrant Canadians will gain such "conveniences" in the future.
It seems this is not the only citizenship reform afoot. Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney has recently made comments suggesting that further steps be taken to make citizenship more difficult to obtain.
At an event in Alberta last month, Mr. Kenney was asked about "birth tourists," who come to have their children in Canada so they can acquire citizenship. He said his department is considering how to prevent such people from abusing our generosity. He mentioned the estimated quarter of a million Canadian citizens living in Hong Kong and the 50,000 or more in Lebanon - and the current right of these citizens' great-grandchildren to become Canadian citizens - as further evidence of abuse. In another recent speech, Mr. Kenney suggested there be tighter enforcement of the existing rule that immigrants be able to speak an official language before being granted citizenship.
There are reasons to think Canada ought to change its citizenship policies in an age of accelerated global travel and migration - and lots of reasons for caution, too. But none of those reasons seemed to guide the actions of a government eager to score political points after Lebanon. A principled public discussion of the value and purpose of Canadian citizenship has yet to take place.
What would such a discussion look like? It would begin by acknowledging that many Canadians, native-born and immigrants alike, see our citizenship as instrumentally valuable in world of porous borders: It brings rights of entry, protection abroad and other social benefits. If this sounds opportunistic, the fact is that opportunism abounds on both sides. Successive governments have wooed talented and wealthy immigrants to choose Canada by offering easy access to citizenship's benefits. The bargain has been overwhelmingly successful for Canada, economically and socially. The presence of Canadian citizens abroad also helps Canada through the bilateral economic activity they generate, their nation-building efforts in developing countries and their informal status as goodwill ambassadors.
From this instrumental perspective, the new law may seem unjust and unwise. As immigrant advocates have noted, it renders foreign-born Canadians unequal to native-born ones in the capacity to pass citizenship to children born while parents are studying or working abroad. It is arguably a law unsuited to an age in which citizens often temporarily live abroad without losing ties to home.
From a non-instrumental political perspective, however, it may be that a healthy Canadian democracy does demand tighter citizenship rules. Migration scholar Rainer Bauboeck has proposed that democracies adopt a "stakeholder citizenship" criterion to define which people, regardless of where they live, have ongoing substantive ties to a self-governing political community.
Such a principle accords citizenship an intrinsic value as part of political freedom. It implies that conferring citizenship on extended generations born abroad, or to children born to parents temporarily in the country, works against the goal of ensuring that only those with a substantial interest in Canada's well-being gain citizenship's political rights.
But it isn't an either-or choice: Citizenship has both instrumental and intrinsic value for Canada and its people. That's why debates about citizenship law should be fraught with complexity - and why they do need to take place. When the government introduces further changes, it owes Canadians an account of the goals and values it aims to advance. Federal legislators must ensure that a full and principled debate on these topics happens before further citizenship laws are passed.
Natalie Brender is writing a book on Canadian citizenship in a globalized age. Former policy adviser to foreign affairs minister Bill Graham
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