Ethnic Nation no more? Interpreting Recent Changes in Germany’s Dual Citizenship Legislation against the Backdrop of a New Canadian Law

At the same time that Canada is legislating changes that will make citizenship harder to obtain and easier to lose, Germany is moving the opposite way allowing the majority of children born on German soil to foreign nationals to hold dual citizenship indefinitely. In this paper, we argue that reform of Germany’s citizenship law gains new meaning if interpreted against the backdrop of Canada’s 2014 Strengthening Canadian Citizenship Act, which is particularly harsh on dual nationals, whose Canadian citizenship can be revoked if they are convicted of crimes such as terrorism, high treason, spying offences or taking up arms against Canada. Are Germany and Canada -- countries that have traditionally been located at the opposing poles regarding their policies of citizenship and immigration – moving in opposite directions?