Cambridge Graduate Conference in Political Thought and Intellectual History | 24 June 2025
Call for Papers, deadline – 5pm, Friday 14 March 2025
There is an idea of citizenship that predominates in contemporary discourse. We can trace it to Cicero, with his ‘commonwealth’ of ‘the people’ bound together under the rule of law, where justice is administered fairly and impartially. Or to Hannah Arendt, with her conception of the citizen’s ‘right to have rights’ as a function of their participation in a constitutional architecture of civil liberties. It is the citizenship of the native, the national, and the passport holder; the citizenship of those whose civil rights can be evidenced and defended. But is this all that has contributed to the making of the citizen and his most precious of possessions, his citizenship? That is to say, what is citizenship beyond its mechanics?
We welcome papers addressing such topics as the changing relation of citizenship to sovereignty, to property ownership, or to political agency; we especially seek papers that take account of these political questions and extend their application to address the relation of citizenship to gender, to race, to the emotions, or to religion. Similarly, we welcome papers that test the boundaries of canonicity, periodisation, and Euro-centricity in the history of political thought with respect to this theme.
The Conference will take place on Tuesday 24 June 2025. For scholars seeking to participate, we ask that you forward a paper abstract of 200 words, a speaker biography of 50 words, and a single-page academic CV to chptconference@gmail.com by 5pm on Friday 14 March 2025. Individual presentations should extend to no longer than 20 minutes.
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