On applying for a citizenship
15 July 2010
I applied for the German citizenship on Monday.
Becoming a citizen of a country is a big step for everybody and it took me a while to … you know, actually go for it. For many years now, I’ve been living without any citizenship at all. It’s a rather unusual status and one that’s not particularly liked by countries, because every country that did let me cross their boarders is responsible for me. The Wikipedia article on Statelessness is a comprehensive summary on the subject.
Non the less, I didn’t feel the pressure to become a citizen. With the current status, I have the right to live and work in Germany as well as travel without problems as long as the country signed the Schengen Agreement. Which means that I could to almost any country in Europe (except to UK, which is one of the reasons why I still didn’t manage to visit London …). It also meant that every time I wanted to the US, I had to apply for a visitors visa, which not only took a lot of time, but is also a costly procedure.
To be very clear about that: applying for a citizenship isn’t about identity for me. I don’t really think that I will feel myself more German after receiving the citizenship. The rights and responsibilities that are awarded with a citizenship will surely effect me, but I don’t feel like they will make me part of a particular society.
That said, I think being a German citizen is a big privilege. Every country has its problems and the rising conservatism here is scary, but at the end of the day it’s still the country with the best social system and a very high level of comfort. The constitution is, by design, one of the best in the world, mostly because it’s very new compared to its European counterparts. I know all of that, but I still don’t see myself as the usual citizen.
Maybe I’m wrong about that and it might even change with me becoming a citizen, but I really see states as a functional form and not one for identity. We’re, as a global society, surely not as tightly organized in tribes as Doctorow pictures it in his Eastern Standard Tribe, but I do see a tendency toward that concept. State boarders are, in a digital world, not a particular interesting concept. As with most regulatory concepts, we need to accept the fact that those as well can not be transferred into the future. And being mostly a citizen of this digital tribe, I’m really don’t have that much affection for those old boarders.
I’ve been interested in politics for the most part of my life now. With my background, that might be a natural development, but I really don’t know where it came from. In my family, there are a lot of opinions about various political situations, but nobody is politically engaged. At least not in an official manner. My interest, wherever it comes from, led me to apply for political courses during high school and as a class we won a tournament (on something, I can’t remember), which gave us the chance to visit the European Academy at the German boarder with Luxembourg. There, we stayed a couple of days and had the chance to work with some very bright minds. They split us up in groups and I was in one that debated the idea of a unified Europe. It stuck with me and I would love to see this idea come to life during my lifespan, but I’m not really counting on that.
Why am I telling you this? Well, mostly because to give you my perspective on things. As I said, becoming a citizen was not an emotional decision for me, but really a practical one. It gives me more freedom (as funny as that might sound from someone who doesn’t have a citizenship) and it gives me more security. Mostly, it gives me more flexibility and that’s is something I eager to get.
The whole process will likely take about six month and after a couple of checks into my past, I will be awarded a certificate, which will enable me to get a German ID and a passport. Looking forward to that.