European Citizenship: Conceptualisation and Contextualisation of a Construct

• Main Author: Hendrik Jan Rebel
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: National University of Political Studies and Public Administration (SNSPA), College of Communication and Public Relations, Bucharest 2016-05-01
• Series: Romanian Journal of Communications and Public Relations
• Subjects: European citizenship; European Union; comparative methodology; positivism approach.
• Online Access: http://journalofcommunication.ro/index.php/journalofcommunication/article/view/188

This article is partly based on a preparative article for the European Citizens Conference at the Romanian National University of Political Studies and Administration and some notes for the keynote speech, Bucharest, November 5, 2013. It contains an epistemological (concept formation) and methodological (operationalisation) approach to the construct of European Citizenship. In the epistemological part occurs a confrontation between the socio-legal conceptual development of the idea of national citizenship (400 BC – 1945 AD) and the politico-legal construction of the idea of European Citizenship after 1945 until the present day. The latter gives rise to a bifurcation of the European part (the space) and the devalued local part (the place), where national citizenship comes in between, such that we deal with a tripartite citizenship construct. The confrontation between these three forms is shown particularly in EU communication efforts through PR. and PD. which result in a gradual crystallization of the trend in public opinion on the citizenship idea. The epistemological developments should have an effect on the methodology of measurement, for which some indices are constructed as example. These indices form a critical counterpoint against the measurement devices in the Eurobarometers that do not reckon with other relevant disciplines besides social-psychology.