Transnational citizenship is a political concept which would redefine traditional notions of citizenship and replace an individual's singular national loyalties with the ability to belong to multiple nation states. Unlike national citizenship, where individuals interact in such capacities with one sovereign state, transnational citizenship transcends pre-established territorial boundaries to create a modern meaning of "belonging" in a globalized society. While preconceived notions of citizenship are often divided between national, social and individual forms of identity, all three categories serve to contribute to the meaning of transnational citizenship. State citizenship can be defined as an individual establishing their sense of belonging by espousing to the values of the state in the public sphere. When applied to transnational citizenship, an individual would have the opportunity to be civically engaged in multiple societies.
In terms of the categories of social and individual forms of belonging, transnational citizens are marked by multiple identities and allegiances, and often travel between two or more countries, all in which they have created sizeable networks of differing functions. Similar to global or cosmopolitan citizenship, it is composed of cross-national and multi-layered memberships to certain societies. Transnational citizenship is based on the idea that a new global framework consistent of subgroups of national identities will eventually replace membership to one nation-state. In a hyper-realized version of transnational citizenship, "states become intermediaries between the local and the global." Institutionalizing transnational citizenship would loosen ties between territories and citizenship and result in a reconstruction of the world order that changes the capacity in which individuals interact with government institutions.
