What would actually change for foreigners living in Italy, and where does the debate leave the country’s second generation?
Italy has spent years debating how easily a foreigner should become Italian. Now the argument is shifting. The question is no longer simply who deserves citizenship, but who should be prevented from obtaining it - and under what circumstances the state should be able to take it away.
On 19 October, Italy’s Chamber of Deputies began debating Bill A.C. 2124-A, promoted by the right-wing Lega party and led by MP Igor Iezzi.
The legislation proposes stricter criminal-record requirements, changes to Italian-language certification, and wider grounds for revoking citizenship acquired through certain legal routes.
The Lega has also announced a last-minute amendment designed to prevent foreign nationals born in Italy from obtaining citizenship if they have been convicted of offences involving attacks on police officers, devastation or looting.
Yet an essential distinction has been lost in some of the headlines: these are proposed changes, not laws already in force.
And their implications extend beyond political rhetoric.
Born in Italy does not automatically mean Italian
For many foreigners, this remains one of Italy’s most surprising legal realities.
Unlike countries that broadly apply citizenship by birth on national territory, Italy primarily follows ius sanguinis, the principle of citizenship through descent.
A child born in Italy to foreign parents does not normally become Italian simply by being born there.
Under the current rules, someone born in Italy who has resided legally and continuously in the country until turning 18 can declare their intention to acquire citizenship before their 19th birthday.
The new legislation would introduce additional restrictions to this route.
Certain serious criminal convictions, including offences against the security of the state and specified drug-related or hate-aggravated crimes, could prevent citizenship being acquired.
The proposal also provides for suspension where criminal proceedings have reached the relevant formal stage, while recognising that rehabilitation or certain successfully completed suspended sentences can remove the obstacle.
This is not a blanket ban for anyone with a criminal record. The offences, sentences and legal circumstances matter.
But the underlying political shift is substantial: citizenship for those born and raised in Italy would be made conditional on additional assessments of criminal conduct.
For supporters, this strengthens the idea that nationality entails responsibilities as well as rights.
For critics, it raises a different question: should a young person born and educated in Italy remain legally distinguishable from an Italian-born peer because the two inherited different citizenships from their parents?
The B1 language requirement: what is actually new?
Much of the reporting suggests that Italy is introducing an Italian-language test for citizenship.
That is misleading.
A B1 level of Italian has already been required for many citizenship applications through marriage and naturalisation since 2018.
The proposed reform would instead remove existing exemptions for some applicants, including holders of EU long-term residence permits and people who have signed an integration agreement.
Applicants covered by the revised rules would have to provide accepted evidence of their Italian-language ability, such as a recognised educational qualification or certification.
Importantly, the text emerging from parliamentary committee does not impose a general new B1 test on the separate route available to young people born in Italy who meet the continuous-residence requirements.
The bill would also expressly require the citizenship oath, where applicable, to be delivered in Italian.
And constitutional safeguards remain relevant: Italy’s Constitutional Court ruled in 2025 that people with severe, medically certified limitations affecting their ability to learn a language cannot simply be excluded by a rigid B1 requirement.
In other words, this is less about inventing a language requirement than making an existing one more extensive and more consistently documented.
For long-term residents planning to apply for citizenship, however, the administrative consequences could be considerable.
Criminal convictions, looting and citizenship revocation
The bill goes further than language requirements.
It would extend certain criminal grounds for refusing citizenship through naturalisation, bringing them closer to restrictions already applicable to citizenship through marriage.
It would also broaden the categories of serious offences that can lead to revocation of citizenship acquired through specified routes.
These would include certain mafia-related offences, terrorism, serious cyberattacks against public-interest systems, human trafficking and female genital mutilation.
The revocation provisions do not mean that every Italian national could lose citizenship after committing a crime. They concern citizenship acquired through particular procedures, not Italian nationality generally.
The Lega’s newly announced anti-looting amendment adds another political dimension, following recent violent disturbances in Milan.
There is an important legal distinction here. Article 285 of Italy’s Criminal Code addresses devastation, looting or massacre directed against the security of the state. Article 419 separately addresses devastation and looting as offences against public order.
They are not interchangeable provisions.
The precise reach of the new amendment must therefore be assessed against its final parliamentary wording, rather than the political announcement alone.
Criminal violence clearly deserves prosecution. But citizenship law raises a separate issue: whether nationality should become an additional sanction that applies to some people but not to others who commit the same offence.
Italy needs immigration. Its citizenship debate is becoming more restrictive.
The timing is significant.
According to ISTAT, Italy had approximately 5.56 million foreign residents at the beginning of 2026, representing 9.4% of the population.
The country recorded around 196,000 acquisitions of Italian citizenship in 2025, compared with approximately 217,000 in 2024.
ISTAT attributes much of that decline to the separate 2025 restrictions on citizenship by descent.
Italy is also dealing with a shrinking population, exceptionally low birth rates and an economy in which foreign workers and internationally mobile families play a significant role.
Against that background, citizenship policy is more than a question of criminal justice.
It helps determine whether people who have built their lives in Italy see the country as a permanent home or somewhere they may eventually leave.
The Lega argues that citizenship should represent the successful conclusion of an integration process, not an automatic entitlement detached from personal conduct.
Opposition lawmakers, meanwhile, have questioned the proportionality and constitutional implications of the proposal, particularly for young people born and raised in Italy.
Fondazione Migrantes, which participated in parliamentary hearings, warned against creating weaker, more uncertain forms of citizenship that could undermine integration rather than strengthen it.
Both positions expose a genuine policy dilemma: how to uphold the responsibilities associated with citizenship without turning nationality into a permanently conditional form of belonging.
What does this mean for foreigners living in Italy?
For the international community, it is important not to confuse citizenship with the legal right to live in Italy.
The current proposal does not introduce a general new restriction on foreigners relocating to Italy, purchasing property, obtaining ordinary residence permits or establishing a business.
Its principal focus is on acquiring Italian citizenship and on revoking citizenship acquired through certain pathways.
For those considering naturalisation or citizenship through marriage, the potential changes deserve attention, especially where language-test exemptions or criminal proceedings may be relevant.
For parents raising children with foreign citizenship in Italy, the implications may be even more personal.
The proposal also envisages a 24-month administrative timeframe, extendable to 36 months, for processing applications under the Italian-born route. That is a meaningful procedural change for young adults seeking recognition at 18.
None of these proposals should be treated as final until the parliamentary process is complete, the legislation is enacted and its applicable provisions enter into force.
Existing applicants should continue to distinguish the current law from proposed future requirements.
What makes someone Italian?
There is no serious argument that violent crime should go unpunished or that citizenship carries no responsibilities.
But the debate becomes more complicated when two people can grow up in the same city, attend the same schools, speak the same language and commit the same offence - yet face different consequences for their nationality.
The distinction may be legally explainable. Whether it is socially desirable is another question.
Italy has long struggled to reconcile a nationality system historically grounded in ancestry with a society increasingly shaped by immigration, mobility and second-generation families.
The latest legislation will not resolve that contradiction.
It may, however, sharpen it.
Italy is entitled to decide the conditions of citizenship. The more difficult challenge is deciding when someone who has spent an entire life in Italy should finally be allowed to stop being a foreigner.
This article reflects the legislative position available on 20 October 2026 and is intended as general information and analysis, not individual legal advice.
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