Measuring Identity at the Micro-Level

Abstract

In times of political turmoil, the link between citizens and political system has become even more pressing. In the panel “Measuring identity at the micro level” we approach the methodological questions of this issue. Capturing identity at the micro level appears to be so difficult, that many researchers stay away from the concept. This, however, bears the risk of leaving highly relevant research questions unexplored. On the other side, some researchers only use conceptual approximations and capture identity only loosely via mass surveys. Here we face the risk of creating fundamentally biased models. Our panel focuses on the question of how identity can be measured at the micro level. We want to open up the debate and assess a wide array of empirical approaches on identity.