Components of European Citizenship and Identity

Many researches have proposed different models of how European citizenship and identity are perceived by ordinary citizens. They often examine the relative importance of cultural and political dimensions of European identity (Bruter, 2003) or the importance of narratives such as “Europe as a cultural space” or “Europe as an uploader of democratic values” (Aydin-Düzgit, 2012). This paper tests these different models so as to examine what Europeans, in France, Germany, Italy and the United-Kingdom, perceive as the most important components of European citizenship and identity. It makes uses of Eurobarometer questions asked between 2000 and 2014 and rarely analyzed in the literature. The paper uses structural equation modeling to build different models of how European identity and citizenship are perceived and multilevel regressions to assess the effect of socioeconomics variables on those perceptions. In the four countries investigated, a European social welfare system is always chosen as the most important change to make to strengthen the feeling about being a European citizen. Moreover, far beyond historical heritage or religion, democracy and common currency are the two most chosen answers when it is asked what are the most important elements that go to make up a European identity. The results evidence therefore that in the four countries under investigations, Europeans have shared perceptions of identity and citizenship and they largely agree that citizenship should be based on socioeconomic rights and not only on identity or cultural components.