One immediate casualty of Brexit has been the notion of lifelong citizenship, most easily observed by a dramatic surge in applications for advantageous passports from countries like Ireland—part of the British Isles but not the UK, therefore remaining in the European Union. Facing an unprecedented run on applications forms, the Irish government asked aspiring passport-swappers hoping to take advantage of Irish ancestry to maintain a European foothold to take a breath. Many young British students and professionals who have staked their bet on remaining part of, and taking advantage of, the EU as a political, social, and economic project. For these British citizens, the Brexit vote was devastating.
Likewise, there is a rising apprehension among immigrants that they may also be booted from the UK. This led to an increase in the number of EU citizens applying for British passports in the run up to the June 23rd referendum, helping to fuel a 29% increase in applicants from 2014 to 2015. UK immigration lawyers also reported seeing a rush of new clients in the weeks following the shocking result. [...]
Here’s a quick thought experiment: Could a country offer you a range of citizenship subscription options, and bill your taxes based on “membership” and services used? If countries like Germany, Italy, and Estonia are willing to reconsider what constitutes citizenship just to keep up with broader global pressures of economic competitiveness and migration, what package of benefits and protections might a forward-thinking country offer economic migrants, or extend to refugees seeking assistance while residing in another country? What if tapping the benefits of a third country wasn’t only the privilege of the wealthy, but something as easy as signing up for Netflix?
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