español · B2 · vocabulary · 4 minutes
Society and civic life
Discuss rights, duties, elections, laws, and public services.
Understand the choice
Discuss public life with language for rights, duties, equality, laws, elections, and services. These collective and institutional nouns often control agreement differently from the people they represent.
Core rule: Collective ciudadanía takes a singular verb even though it refers to many people.
Notice it in context
La ciudadanía exige servicios públicos accesibles y transparentes.
Citizens demand accessible and transparent public services.
Collective ciudadanía takes a singular verb even though it refers to many people.
La ley protege el derecho a la privacidad.
The law protects the right to privacy.
Derecho a is the fixed noun-preposition pattern.
Las elecciones se celebrarán en otoño.
The elections will be held in autumn.
Passive se focuses on the event.
What to remember
- La ciudadanía is grammatically singular even though it refers collectively to citizens.
- Derecho a names an entitlement; el derecho is also the academic or professional field of law.
Common trap: Do not make the verb plural after ciudadanía: la ciudadanía exige, not la ciudadanía exigen.