Citizenship, language tests, and political participation

This article critically examines the argument that language testing for citizenship is necessary in order to ensure that naturalized citizens have sufficient language proficiency to participate in democratic life. First, we contend that as they are currently designed, language tests are normally unsuitable to assess the ability of would-be citizens to participate in the complex linguistic interactions that characterize democratic life. We further claim that if language tests were redesigned in order to meet this challenge, this would unjustly exclude (or exacerbate the exclusion of) many categories of migrants from citizenship, especially humanitarian entrants and adults with low-level literacy skills. Finally, we argue that language tests and language skills may be unnecessary for political participation, if institutions and social norms are in place which enable speakers of different languages to participate in political life effectively and without fear of prejudice.