Italy Restricts Citizenship by Descent

Only individuals whose parents or grandparents were born in Italy will be eligible for citizenship.

The Italian Constitutional Court has approved a 2025 law that restricts the principle of jus sanguinis (citizenship by descent), a doctrine that has been in place for 160 years since 1861.

Since Italy was established as a nation-state in 1861, the primary criterion for determining citizenship had been parentage.

The first page of Italy’s Civil Code, published in 1865 and defining the country’s legal framework, stated: “A child born to an Italian parent is an Italian citizen.”

This change will make it significantly more difficult for members of the Italian diaspora abroad to realize their aspiration of “returning to their ancestral homeland,” while also greatly reducing the likelihood that descendants of Italian emigrants will obtain citizenship.

The law effectively renders dual citizenship nearly impossible for the diaspora. It requires that the parent or grandparent transmitting citizenship must have held exclusively Italian citizenship either at the time of the descendant’s birth or at the time of their own death.

Source: Oksijen