ABSTRACT
The crux of the argument, then, is that while the rights to many welfare state benefits are formally guaranteed through collective entitlements, arrangements involved in securing such benefits emphasize the individual’s role as consumer more than his or her role as an active political citizen.2 If this line of argument is valid, it suggests that the winning of more encompassing social rights may serve to weaken and undermine the use, if not the meaning, of political rights. Presumably this is not what T.H.Marshall had in mind when he set forth his treatise on the development of citizenship (Marshall 1950). The historical analysis presented by Marshall implies what has been interpreted as a linear and cumulative development of citizenship rights. From such a perspective, social rights are the result of and build upon previously won political rights; social rights should serve to reinforce the meaning of political rights, not weaken them.
