The naturalization procedure in France requires five years of permanent residence, French language competence, assimilation into the French community, and good morals and customs including no prison sentences of more than six months or offences or crimes against State security.

The first modern political parties were formed at the end of the 18th century.

Marshall connects the three different sets of rights with three different centuries—civil (with the freedom of speech, thought and faith) to the eighteenth, political (with active and passive suffrage) to the nineteenth, and social rights (like welfare and economic security) to the twentieth century.