The boundaries of citizenship

The idea that citizenship is the fundamental expression of the right of membership in a territorially defined political system is usually taken for granted, both from common sense and academic theories. In political and social theory, however, is beginning to emerge the idea that citizenship can be projected beyond the borders of the nation-state. This alternative conception has taken different classification: "global citizenship", "transnational citizenship", "postnational citizenship". The thesis of this article is that the proposals of deterritorialization of citizenship represent an aspiration or a goal to reach rather than a fact that is simply to record. Essentially, it is a way to defy the nation-state perspective, according to which the boundaries of the civic community necessarily coincide whit the geographic boundaries of the State.