how to reduce disorder in european identity research

The article aims at opening a debate by offering some ideas about how we can avoid analytical confusion in future inquiry on European collective identity. I discuss two important theoretical deficiencies that impede advancement in the research on this topic. These shortcomings are: (1) the two-level problem in analysing collective identities; and (2) the issue of equating 'belonging to' with 'belonging together'. In doing so, I will also make some proposals on how we can deal with these problems. Finally, I present a few considerations on further research questions and point to several empirical desiderata.