European Union Solidarity or European Solidarity? The effect of European integration on citizens’ concern for the living conditions of other Europeans

Representatives of EU institutions and scholars of European studies often cite the relevance of European solidarity for the political integration of the continent. Despite, little effort has been made yet to disentangle the relation between EU membership of a country and its citizens’ European solidarity. Are citizens in the EU more likely to show concern for the living conditions of other Europeans than if there would be no EU? This paper starts form the premise that European solidarity is a curiosity, given that pro-sociality among humans is group-bound. I argue that the EU expands the ’solidarity boundaries’ of citizens beyond the nation. It anchors Europe as a relevant group category for solidarity in citizens’ minds. Moreover, EU integration has indirect effects on citizens’ solidarity attitudes: It increases citizens’ standard of living and changes their perceptions of national identities, making them more willing to share resources with those beyond their national borders. To empirically support my arguments, I make use of the European Values Study trend data file. In the survey, respondents are asked to express the concern they feel for the living conditions of others in different territorial scopes, including Europe. The dataset comprises more than 160.000 individual respondents in 47 European countries and at three points in time (1999, 2008, 2017), which provides sufficient variance in the macro context of respondents to estimate the effect of EU membership of a country on citizens’ concern for the living conditions of other Europeans.