This paper is an attempt to offer a new theoretical framework for the study of citizenship in the early twentieth-century Middle East. The paper focuses on both the theoretical possibility of ‘citizens without states’ and various methods of ‘speaking to the state.’ Throughout the paper I develop the idea of ‘citizens without states’ by referring to the structural barriers to full international citizenship placed on individuals in the mandated territories of the former Ottoman Empire. At best these individuals were colonial citizens, yet more often than not their basic political rights were denied for various political and security reasons. With this in mind, the paper then develops the idea of ‘speaking to the state,’ a process through which individuals both asserted and attempted to claim their basic rights despite the various obstacles put in place by the mandates system. These methods varied from individual to individual, and place to place, but they nonetheless display certain similarities. These similarities are traceable to the legacies of the formation of Ottoman citizenship in the mid-nineteenth century. These connections, both across time and space, challenge notions of temporality and locality, and provide us with a more nuanced understanding of the interconnectedness of the former provinces of the Ottoman Empire. In the age of globalization, the connections between the emerging states of the mandate period were indeed strong, and they displayed a remarkable resilience despite the resistance of the mandate authorities. The paper draws upon archival sources and unpublished personal records as a background for a substantial reworking of citizenship theory in the early twentieth-century. The paper speaks across disciplines, and incorporates literature from political science, anthropology, and sociology to formulate a more dynamic historical understanding of citizenship and the effects of globalization on a region that is traditionally left of this particular historical narrative. By moving the focus of citizenship away from the nation-state, I hope to offer an alternative framework that truly speaks to the global connections of the early-twentieth century.