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This article examines the ways in which citizenship regimes shape social struggles. It traces the conscientious objection movements in France during the war in Algeria, in America during the Vietnamese War, and in Israel after the invasion of Lebanon to show how they employed different practices and formed different alliances despite having similar goals. These differences can be attributed, in part, to the djfferent citizenship regimes in each country: republican in France; liberal in the US.; and ethnonational in Israel. Arguments and practices that seemed sensible in one locale seemed utterly inappropriate in another. Social movements' activists did not manipulate conceptions of citizenship strategically. Rather, citizenship regimes constitute subjectivities and thereby shape the sensibilities and preferences of activists and state actors. Citizenship regimes shape social dramas by structuring the repertoire of contention available in a particular struggle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]