Focus on Greek investment immigration and the Greek lifestyle. Follow the footsteps of the wise and experience the charm of other countries. Citizenship, as a political identity, first emerged within the political structure of Greek city-states. The Greek word "citizen" (polites) is derived from the term for city-state (polis), originally meaning "a person belonging to the city-state." The concept of citizenship mainly refers to the awareness of one's identity and political role, along with the rights and obligations that come with it, as well as their views on the relationship with the citizen community, namely the city-state, and their political values. The Greek concept of citizenship represents the primitive form of citizenship. However, studying the concept of citizenship from two thousand years ago cannot employ modern survey methods; we can only discover their political ideas based on historical records of the political behaviors of Greek citizens, the political systems they established and how they operated, as well as the political philosophies articulated by their intellectual representatives. The political behavior of citizens is the external manifestation of the concept of citizenship, the democratic system of the city-state is its materialized form, while Greek political philosophy is its rational refinement and elevation.
The Greek city-state is a very unique form of state. Its external characteristic lies in its small size and population, while its essential characteristic is its socio-political structure, which is an autonomous community of citizens, a political system where citizens share common life and rights and obligations under a common law. Aristotle provided a classic summary of the Greek city-state. He pointed out that the criterion for identifying a city-state is not based on population, walls, etc., but on whether it is composed of citizens. "A city-state is precisely a combination of several citizens." "When several citizens gather within a political group, they become a city-state." Therefore, citizens are the fundamental elements that constitute the city-state; they are "people belonging to the city-state." Subjects under a monarchy also belong to the state, but because the state belongs to the monarch, they are ultimately the monarch's servants, while the state to which citizens belong is a community of citizens; they are members of the community rather than servants of any individual. This is the original meaning of the concept of citizenship.
However, Greek citizens are merely a special identity group among the residents of the city-state. Generally speaking, only adult males of pure local descent can become citizens. Thus, the majority of the population, including slaves, foreigners, and women, are excluded from the citizen community. However, the qualifications for citizenship have changed throughout the evolution of the city-state. At the beginning of the formation of the city-state, often only nobles or those with certain property qualifications could become citizens, while lower-class commoners only gained citizenship rights during the more developed democratic era of the city-state. Sometimes, those who could not fulfill their civic duties due to poverty or other reasons would lose their citizenship. During times of war crises or when the number of citizens was insufficient, foreigners and freed slaves were often admitted into the citizen community. However, these variations do not affect the substantive meaning of citizenship. The city-state is a community of citizens; only citizens belong to the city-state. Gaining citizenship means becoming a part of the city-state, while residents without citizenship, although living within the city-state, do not belong to it. When Greeks refer to "Athenians" or "Spartans," they are only referring to the citizens of Athens or Sparta, excluding other residents. Foreigners are regarded as resident guests, while women and slaves belong only to family members. Throughout their lives, citizens sequentially become members of families and villages, and upon reaching adulthood, they undergo a solemn ceremony to obtain citizenship, at which point they enter the public life of the city-state and become people belonging to the city-state. The core content of the concept of citizenship is the citizens' recognition of their political role as "belonging to the city-state."
The Greek concept of citizenship is a privilege of the few, and in contrast to other residents without citizenship, the identity and status of citizens are distinctly highlighted. Compared to other residents within the state, they feel that they belong to the city-state. Compared to citizens of other city-states, only this city-state belongs to them. This feeling is very real. Their personal safety and honor primarily depend on the fate of the city-state. When the city-state perishes, they are the primary victims; slaves remain slaves, foreigners remain foreigners, but they lose their citizen privileges. Without the city-state, they become slaves or foreigners, and sometimes even face collective slaughter. When the city-state thrives, they are the first to benefit. Not to mention other advantages, their most cherished freedom can only be obtained within their own city-state. Therefore, the concept of citizenship is primarily a concept of privilege.
This special identity of citizens is a "historical right" retained by tribal members during the evolution from tribes to city-states. Before the formation of the city-state, the blood ties among tribal members were considered sacred, and the boundaries between blood tribes and outsiders were very strict. People from the same blood group regarded themselves as a "natural" whole. This "natural" whole was further reinforced in the Greek mindset by their religious beliefs and religious life. Tribes had their own deities, altars, sacred fires, and priests. Only members of the tribe could enter their sacred enclosure, and their communal meals (sacred meals) and festivals could only be attended by them. The deities of the tribe absolutely excluded outsiders, and there were strict taboos in this regard. The gods do not accept offerings from outsiders, and even outsiders witnessing the rituals are considered ominous. This created a deep boundary between tribal members and outsiders, and invisibly fostered a sense of integration among tribal members.
The republican politics of the city-state originated from blood relations, being a union of primitive families and tribes with a common ancestor. As tribes evolved into city-states, tribal members became citizens of the city-state, while the religion of the city-state remained exclusive. People still viewed the city-state through the lens of blood and religious community from the tribal era, and the relationship between individuals and the social whole from the tribal era continued to influence the concept of citizenship. As legal historian Maine stated: "In early republican politics, all citizens believed that any group of which they were a member was built on common blood." Although the blood relations gradually disintegrated during the formation and evolution of the city-state, and foreigners were continuously absorbed and assimilated among the same kin, blood relations had become mixed, and the city-state was no longer "natural." Even so, it was still regarded as "natural," that is, a blood group. People still viewed the internal relationships of citizens through the lens of blood relations. This is what Maine referred to as the "earliest and most widespread legal fiction," which legally assumed that these outsiders also came from the same ancestors, presuming that all "people belonging to the city-state," namely citizens, belonged to the same bloodline and the same primitive family. This is an important source of the citizen community's self-enclosure and extreme exclusivity, while also fostering a sense of belonging to the city-state among citizens.
In fact, in Sparta, the notion that all citizens are descendants of the same ancestor remained true for hundreds of years after the formation of the city-state. The entire citizen group belonged to the members of the conquering tribe. For hundreds of years, very few foreigners obtained Spartan citizenship. Many customs of tribal life, such as communal ownership, equality among citizens, and communal meals, continued in Spartan life. Compared to the Athenian type of city-state, Sparta achieved a higher degree of unity, which should be related to this. Plato once fabricated a "myth" stating that the people of the city-state were born from the same land and were siblings, which probably has its historical basis. He attempted to transform the entire city-state into one big family, where each citizen would completely merge into the whole of the city-state, eliminating the distinction between "yours" and "mine," which should also have a certain realistic foundation.
Thus, the Greek concept of citizenship differs significantly from the modern concept of citizenship. The modern Western concept of citizenship originates from social contract theory. According to this theory, the state is a collection of equal and independent individuals, and citizenship is a personal right protected by law. However, Greek citizens are "people belonging to the city-state," and they do not have the consciousness or demands of separation from the city-state. In their minds, "citizenship is not about possessing something, but about sharing something. It is very similar to being a member of a family." In the West, the concept of rights formed in Roman private law; the Greeks did not yet have a concept of rights; what they referred to as citizenship only indicated citizenship qualifications or identity, not a form of personal rights.
The smallness, closed nature, and exclusivity of the citizen group, akin to the collapse of a star leading to a high degree of material condensation and density, brought about a close-knit life within the city-state, which undoubtedly reinforced the mindset of integration among citizens. They viewed the city-state as an organic whole, of which they were a part. Individuals have no independent value; their value depends on the whole. Their property, family, interests, honor, hopes, their physical and spiritual lives, their entire lives, and even their souls after death belong to the city-state and are tied to it. In the city-state, they have everything; losing the city-state means losing everything. As Democritus said: "A well-governed state is the most reliable refuge, where everything exists. If it is safe, everything is safe; if it is destroyed, everything is destroyed." Therefore, citizens strive to maintain the independence and autonomy of the city-state, sharing life and death with it. In wars between city-states, the victors sometimes execute all adult male citizens of the defeated city-state. In the political life within the city-state, people often engage in life-and-death struggles over citizenship rights. Those who enjoy citizenship cherish and protect it, while those without citizenship seek to obtain it, and those who have lost their citizenship strive to restore it. Citizenship indeed brings certain practical benefits to citizens, but it also imposes heavy obligations on them. These obligations can sometimes lead to bankruptcy and death. Therefore, their pursuit of citizenship is not only about the benefits that come with it but, more importantly, about obtaining citizenship status, thus preventing themselves from being excluded from the city-state. This sense of belonging to the city-state is very important in the Greek mindset; the penalties for deprivation of citizenship and expulsion from the city-state are only second to the death penalty, as it equates to the deprivation of a person's spiritual life.
In the eyes of citizens, the city-state is like a divine entity. Citizens grant it absolute political, religious, and ethical authority, capable of comprehensively controlling and intervening in personal lives. The physical and spiritual aspects of citizens, as well as their personal and family matters, property, and marriages, are all governed by the city-state. Individuals are tools of the city-state; they are born for the city-state and die for the city-state. This is most evident in Sparta. Even in Athens, it was the same. According to contemporary descriptions, Athenians believed that their bodies "were for the use of their city-state, as if they did not belong to themselves." They cultivated their wisdom, "with the purpose of achieving something significant for their city-state." Aristotle explicitly stated, "We should not assume that any citizen can privately own themselves; rather, we should consider that any citizen should be owned by the city-state." He believed that even a citizen attempting suicide should be punished because it causes the city-state to lose a citizen. From birth, the city-state is the highest guardian of each citizen, responsible for raising and educating them according to the needs of the city-state. Disabled individuals deemed useless to the city-state have no right to exist. The legendary Spartan legislator Lycurgus did not allow parents to raise their offspring according to their own wishes. After a child is born, it must be inspected by the elders of the tribe on behalf of the state; if the child is weak or deformed, it is to be discarded on the mountains and not raised. In the ideal city-states designed by Plato and Aristotle, this practice is affirmed. Generally, Greek city-states prohibited unmarried individuals, and Sparta further punished late marriages. Marriage is not a private matter for citizens; it is the responsibility of citizens to bear the next generation of citizens for the city-state. Individual property is always subject to the control of the city-state, and the education, lifestyle, and even clothing, drinking, and entertainment of citizens are all regulated by the city-state. Everything is arranged according to the needs of the city-state, and for the city-state, individuals must make unconditional sacrifices. Individuals must also sever all personal feelings and completely base their actions on the interests of the city-state. It is recorded that Sparta suffered a defeat in a battle, resulting in many citizen casualties. When the news reached the homeland, the parents of the fallen soldiers had to smile in public, rejoicing that other people's children survived, while those who knew their sons had survived and were about to reunite had to weep, mourning for the loss of others' sons. The inversion of natural feelings shows how deeply citizens are integrated into the city-state!