Border Children: A Postcolonial Investigation of Italian Citizenship and Collective Identity Construction

This work presents an investigation of Italian citizenship. Using a postcolonial methodology it constructs a historical chronology of Italian citizenship legislation stretching from the late 1800s to present day. Specifically, this thesis lies within the school of thought which highlights citizenship's foundations upon exclusionary, racist and sexist systems of power, and highlights its role as a tool of collective identity construction within the national context. The focal point of analysis lies with classes of children that exist at the border of such identity construction, at times included and at times excluded, depending on the power structures that are hegemonic at a given moment of history. It draws a comparison between the class of mixed race children in the colonial context, and their transformation through various citizenship models, with a new class of children in present day Italy, whose citizenship is being continuously debated in the modern political context through the ius sanguinis, ius solis debate. In doing so, this thesis aims to discuss the implications for the human rights of these children, and provide reflections upon the future iterations of Italian citizenship.