ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces the concept of transformational citizenship as a means of understanding how, in its configuration of citizenship, suzhi presumes an inadequate citizen and emphasises the necessity and possibility of transforming – through practice and learning – a citizen's embodied qualities and thought patterns into those required of a responsible and eligible citizen. The chapter provides an overview of citizenship in the West and China. The Purpose of this review is twofold: to highlight liberal and republican traditions of Western citizenship and debates about the process of citizenship growth in a nation-state in the West; to argue that analysis of citizenship in China is predominantly based on models crafted in the West, which is insufficient to take into account the cultural and historical roots of citizenship in China. The chapter discusses to construct a link between Confucianism as a particular mode of cultivating a person for social/political ends and the philosophical and psychological rationale of transformation citizenship.
