Definitions of citizenship often lack a solid grounding in the lived realities of ordinary citizens. They tend instead to focus on the debates of elites and on geopolitical processes. Citizenship in the postsocialist context defies the narrow definitions given by political elites, primarily because representatives of the state have been unable to guarantee the ‘social rights’ that citizens expect. This volume seeks to provide information by looking both at the making of citizenship from above and at the perceptions and responses of citizens from below. How citizens conceive of their relations to the state determines their involvement (or lack of involvement) in public life, including voting and participation in social movements. It also determines whether or not they will seek an alternative citizenship, and their attitudes towards ethnic conflicts. It follows that the possibilities of citizenship offered by postsocialist Moldova constitute a vital factor in addressing the political, economic, and social difficulties which this young state faces.

The Editor: Monica Heintz is associate professor in Social Anthropology at the University of Paris X-Nanterre and a member of the Laboratoire d’Ethnologie et de Sociologie Comparative (CNRS).