ligation? Surely a voluntarily stateless person with residency in a given country would be expected to obey criminal law and pay taxes on goods and income, but can they be expected to participate in compulsory military service, or jury duty? And what of those voluntarily stateless individuals who do not hold legal residency? What are the expectations that can be reasonably placed upon them? On the other side of the duty coin, what obligations does a state have towards voluntarily stateless persons who reside on their territory? Does a voluntarily stateless person renounce with their citizenship their ‘human’ rights to health care and education, for example? Does a state’s moral duty, typically reserved for refugees, extend to those who choose to exist outside of the purview of the state? This dilemma has presented itself as it relates to undocumented people, but the difference here is that undocumented people are citizens of somewhere. It can be generally assumed that they have merely reprioritized the state which they choose to obey. They have not renounced the idea of obligation in totality. What can this tell us about how the state should interact with those residing in a polity which they at the same time reject? Membership From republication values of public participation to liberal individuality to post-modern perspectives on belonging, membership is a deeply contested idea. But what unites these myriad positions is that there is value in belonging at some level. Voluntary statelessness thus presents a unique challenge to what we know about how shared values are perceived. Choosing to disengage from the state system is not only an act of resistance against the state’s omnipresence, but more importantly, for the individual it is a provocative statement against the notion of shared values, and for communities it can be seen as a challenge to the disconnect between their values and those of the state in which they reside. “Voluntary statelessness, therefore, necessitates a rethinking of the foundations of political thought referring to, at the very least, participation, civic virtue, the common good, friendship, and social relations” Shared values have guided community development for millennia. They sustain us in times of conflict, differentiate between cultures, and contribute to what some refer to as the strength of diversity. Voluntary statelessness, therefore, necessitates a rethinking of the foundations of political thought referring to, at the very least, participation, civic virtue, the common good, friendship, and social relations. Western systems of government are founded upon the notions of representation and equality. What is the value of political participation if people choose to disengage from systems of representation? http://community.apsanet.org/migrationcitizenship/home 50