This session explores the nexus between intra-European mobility and welfare provision in the European Union at a key moment for the Union. The panel addresses the following questions: What are the parameters of, and limits to, transnational and EU citizenship in theory and practice? How are the rights of EU citizens co-produced by regulations that traverse the field of tension between member state politics and EU law? Why is mobile EU-citizens’ equal treatment for access to social security rights so contested, and are we reaching the social and political limits of the EU integration project? Can the Union manage the tension between member state social protectionism and EU-mobility in a sustainable way? What are mobile EU-citizens’ experiences of transnational social protection and portability, and what do they reveal about social citizenship in practice in the EU?

The panel offers papers that move from the theorisation of transnational citizenship in the context of EU integration, to the role of policy discourses and regulations in shaping social rights, through to citizens’ lived experiences and coping strategies in the face of unequal social rights. They present conceptual and empirical research from a large-scale comparative research project (www.transwel.org), framing portability of social security rights in a larger debate on migration, mobility and welfare and integrating transnational, as well as intersectional, approaches to citizenship. Empirically, the presentations focus on (labour) mobility between pairs of EU8 and EU15 member states (Hungary-Austria, Bulgaria-Germany, Estonia-Sweden and Poland-UK).