CHAPTER ONE LIBERAL CITIZENSHIP: AMBIGUITIES AND INCONSISTENCIES To set the stage for an analysis of the mode of incorporation in Israel and the exclusionary dynamics of its citizenship regime, the concept of citizenship is examined in this chapter with a particular focus on the kinds of relations that can be formed among political subjects within a liberal citizenship regime. The interrelated tensions and themes of citizenship, including, among others, individual and group identities, representation, legal categorization, political subjectivity, rights and respon­ sibilities, inclusion-exclusion, Otherizing, deterritorialization, resistance and emancipation, are here extracted. As we will see in the prospective chapters, these elements and notions integral to the concept and practice of citizenship resurface in various problematized forms when applied to the Israeli citizenship regime. Taken together, the dynamics of the classical liberal model of citizenship discussed in this chapter will inform my forthcoming excursus into the stateless citizenship of Palestinians in Israel. Framing Citizenship Nation-states use the citizenship framework as the primary organizing relation between the state and its constituents, or citizens. Traditional readings of citizenship depict it as the intersection of identity and law, where both a national belonging and a constitutionally recognized membership in a state are articulated. It is conventionally conceived of as a mechanism of civic incorporation within a state; a form of social membership used as a basis for claim-making with which comes access to rights, privileges, and freedoms allocated and protected by state institutions. As an institution, citizenship is comprised of the social community and implies that access to public goods and services, as well as participation in state institutions, exhibit the political, civil and social rights of this collective. Indeed, citizenship has emerged as an issue which is central, not only to practical political notions concerning access to health-care systems, educational institutions, public programs, and the welfare state, but also to concepts of legal jurisdiction and social membership.