Fortress Europe in the Making? How Migration and Radical Right Politics Shape the Evolution of European In-Group Preferences

Building on recent evidence that dual national-European identifiers distinguish between EU and non-EU migrants, this paper investigates how such communitarian preferences evolve and vary across national contexts. While European identification has been traditionally associated with cosmopolitan attitudes, the boundary-drawing between European “us” and non-European “others” may be intensified or weakened depending on contextual factors. Using pooled Eurobarometer data (2014-2019) across EU-27 member states, this study employs multilevel modelling to test how temporal changes and country-level factors shape the relationship between European identification and migration preferences. The paper advances three main hypotheses. First, I expect the preference for EU over non-EU migrants among dual identifiers to strengthen over time (H1), particularly following crises which might have activated demarcation against non-European others, such as the 2015 migration crisis and Brexit. Second, I hypothesise that countries with higher ratios of EU to non-EU migration will exhibit stronger communitarian preferences among European identifiers (H2a). In contrast, countries with predominantly non-EU migration flows will exhibit weaker in-group distinctions (H2b). Third, I anticipate that the electoral strength of far-right parties will moderate this relationship. Still, in complex ways: far-right success may amplify the distinction between EU and non-EU migrants where these parties adopt welfare chauvinist frames (H3a). In contrast, cultural nationalist frames that reject all migration may actually weaken the European in-group preference (H3b). By examining within-country changes and between-country variations, this research contributes to understanding how supranational identity boundaries are negotiated in response to social and political pressures. The findings contribute to the debate about the communitarian logic in European identification, asking whether it represents a stable feature of supranational community-building or a contingent response to specific events. This has important implications for debates about European integration, as it reveals whether the EU’s promise of “unity in diversity” can accommodate internal openness while maintaining external boundaries, or whether rising migration pressures and populist mobilisation fundamentally challenge the cosmopolitan project of European identity.