CONCEP II EUROPENE DESPRE APARTENEN A NA IONAL I PREFERIN E PUBLICE N MATERIE DE POLITICI ALE CONTROLULUI IMIGRA IEI

This paper quantitatively explores the patterns that shape popular conceptions of national belonging in the European Union member states and their implications in terms of public preferences for specific immigration control policies. By using the most recent data from the European Values Study (2008), this paper points to the similarity of the structure of individual conceptions of national belonging in the 27 countries analyzed and identifies three main ways of articulation between representations of nationality and preferences for different immigration control policies: the maximalrestrictionist type, the elective-conditional type and the minimal-liberal type. These types are configured by both the content of “popular” models of national belonging and the salience of specific criteria of national membership.