Colloquia Series - Suspect Citizenship: Rethinking Belonging and Non-belonging in Plural Societies

Research discussion on Suspect Citizenship: Rethinking Belonging and Non-belonging in Plural Societies

Abstract: Based on years of ethnographic research on France’s present antiracist movement and mobilization against state violence, I introduce a framework of “suspect citizenship” which demonstrates how ethnoracial minorities are constantly outside of the boundaries of full societal inclusion. I argue that postcolonial plural societies like France position a certain populations as suspect or suspicious, due to their ethnoracial assignment. I examine suspect citizenship at the nexus between active citizenship, belonging/non-belonging, antiracism at a macro level, and activism against state violence. I consider how certain populations are automatically rendered suspicious or suspect by virtue of their ethnoracial assignment on micro and macro levels, and how this construction of citizenship is not just a postcolonial formation. I discuss how we can understand how individuals resist their categorization as suspect through examining mobilization against state violence, as well as how suspect citizenship exists without state recognition of ethnoracial difference. Suspect citizenship is therefore a framework and mode for understanding and making sense of how colonial hierarchies are maintained in postcolonial or neocolonial societies.