Thursday, August 30, 2007

Civics 101

Hmmm, I just read a very interesting post on the Spiegel website. For those with difficulty reading the German text, the essence of the story is that from now on, EU and Swiss citizens resident in Germany may acquire German citizenship without giving up their original citizenship.

There would be two advantages to me in taking this step:
  1. I could vote here
  2. I could travel with a credit-card-sized Ausweis rather than a bulky passport.
There don't seem to be any disadvantages that I can think of, apart from the admin effort plus fee that will be inevitable.

And yet I am still unsure that this is a step I want to take. Previously I was quite sure that German citizenship was not for me, because I want to remain an Irish citizen. Now I could have both, and I'm still not sure. It seems that I am carrying more emotional baggage with regard to my nationality than I had supposed.

Has anyone else undergone a citizenship transplant?

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