Issues of the social integration of migrants and their descendants, about what commitments citizens can legitimately ask that they show to the political community and what measures political communities are permitted or required to foster their integration raise questions about the nature of the social bonds that tie members of the political community together. Social integration prompts us to examine our political self-identification as inhabitants of the state, and our philosophical view of what, as citizens, we saliently share. In this paper I survey three responses to the question. The nationalist view regards citizens as sharing a substantive national identity rooted in history and tradition. The duties it imposes on those wishing to integrate are substantial, but I argue against the nationalist understanding on the grounds that there is nothing about nationality per se which makes it a valuable relationship. The institutionalist view, by contrast, locates the ties between citizens in the fact they live under institutions which reliably enable them to discharge the duties and enjoy the rights of citizenship. It will not impose conditions on migrants beyond those which are necessary to ensure the effective functioning of civic institutions. Finally, the republican view sees something intrinsically valuable in the citizenship relationship as such, a relationship which realises equality in the world, enables collective self-determination and grounds a variety of co-operative practices. The republican view places more demanding conditions on migrants than the intuitionalist view, but these are pre-requisites for civic, not social integration. It places relatively demanding conditions on polities to assist migrants in their journey into citizenship and it is sceptical toward permitting resident non-citizens to continue that status in the long-term. I conclude by noting that, whether we endorse the institutionalist or republican views, it will only require migrants to integrate in a moderate civic, not strong social, sense.
