This is a beautifully written, erudite text that traces the notion of citizenship from ancient Greece to the twenty-first century. It is primarily a consideration of political theory, but the writer reflects each theoretical shift against the practices of its time. The book picks out what we have come to recognize as the key points in the development of the western conception and habits of the citizen. He follows a fairly well-trodden path from the Greek polis and Roman Republic, to the Christine Europe of Augustine and Aquinas, the early modernity of Machiavelli, the Enlightenment of Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Smith, de Tocqueville, Kant and Burke, and their nineteenth century heirs: Bentham, the James and John Stuart Mill, Hegel and Marx. Other theorists are addressed along the way, and the final chapters include a consideration of Habermas. This is more than a chronological survey; the writer knows his material well and manipulates it skilfully to pull out the perennial themes including the tensions between sovereignty and citizenship and the evolution of social contract theory.