Participation in EU Programmes and Participants’ Conceptualisations of Citizenship

In the current multilevel governance, participation is seen as a ’super-ideology’. In the EU-context, European governance and the open method of coordination have set citizens' participation as a goal. We must ask, what particularly citizens are invited to participate in, is participation connected with democracy and what kind of chances of influence are opened for the citizens. The topic of the presentation is citizens’ participation in the projects funded by EU programmes, such as Europe for Citizens. I analyse how the participants tell about their experiences concerning participation in the EU programmes and what meanings they give to their activity. The main question is how citizenship is conceptualised in the texts written by the participants of the projects. I examine what kind of conceptual continuums or breakages regarding citizenship and Union citizenship in particular can be found in participants’ discussions.