Citizenship - The European Tradition

The evolution of human rights after the Second World War was central for changing the link between individuals and states, in that “ownership” over subjects was substituted with a reciprocal system based on the rights and duties of citizens vis-à-vis the state and the obligations and claims of the state vis-à-vis its members. The progressive abolition of military duty reflected this trend. It was followed by the transformation of the meaning of «loyalty» engrained in the notion of «citizenship» from the state’s presumption to an individual’s ascription