European Identity in Switzerland

• Author: Georg Datler,Julia H. Schroedter,Jörg Rössel
• Published date: 01 November 2015
• Date: 01 November 2015
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/0002716215595394
• Subject Matter: Section I: Intermarriage, Boundary Crossing, and Identity

148 ANNALS, AAPSS, 662, November 2015

DOI: 10.1177/0002716215595394

European

Identity in

Switzerland:

The Role of

Intermarriage,

and

Transnational

Social Relations

and

Experiences

By

JULIA H. SCHROEDTER,

JÖRG RÖSSEL,

and

GEORG DATLER

595394ANN The Annals of the American AcademyEuropean Identity in Switzerland

research-article2015

We analyze the impact of intermarriage, and transna-

tional social relations and experiences on the emer-

gence of European identity. According to the

structuralist theory of identification, European social

relations, with European intermarriage as an especially

important relation, and experiences should explain

European identifications. Our analysis is based on a

survey in Zurich, Switzerland, providing a broad array

of data that allow testing the impact of a European

partner on European identification for Swiss and how

transnational social relations and experiences contrib-

ute to both Swiss and non-Swiss feeling European.

Overall, we find that a partner from another European

country (for Swiss natives) and transnational social rela-

tions and experiences have an important role in explain-

ing European identification. The most important

differences are between Swiss and EU citizens living in

Switzerland where, for the latter, the meaning of

Europe is differently constructed. Specifically, EU citi-

zens see less conflict between national and European

identification.

Keywords: European identity; intermarriage; trans-

national social relations; Switzerland;

Europeanization

In this article, we use original data from a

survey of couples in Zurich, Switzerland, to

study the impact of European intermarriage,1

and transnational social relations and experi-

ences on the emergence of European identity.

Sociologists have only recently begun to take a

Dr. Julia H. Schroedter is a post-doctoral researcher at

the Institute of Sociology at the University of Zurich.

She has published in the fields of social integration,

family sociology, and Europeanization. Her current

research focuses on various transnational activities of

the population in Switzerland.

Dr. Jörg Rössel is a professor of sociology at the Institute

of Sociology at the University of Zurich. His main

research interests include economic sociology, migration,

and sociological theory. His publications appeared in

European Societies, European Sociological Review,

Journal of Consumer Culture, Poetics, Population,

Space and Place, and Sociological Quarterly.

EUROPEAN IDENTITY IN SWITZERLAND 149

serious interest in processes of Europeanization and the formation of a European

society (Gerhards and Hölscher 2006; Díez Medrano 2008; Fligstein 2008;

Schroedter and Rössel 2014). Hitherto, sociology has tended to regard society as

an all-embracing and self-sufficient social system within the territory of a nation-

state. This assumption has led to the problem of methodological nationalism and

the neglect of transnational forms of social integration and sociation (Chernilo

2007; Rössel 2012). This problem is heavily discussed in migration research on

the one hand and in more general research about internationalization and trans-

national relations on the other hand.

The dominant perspective in migration research focuses on the process of migra-

tion from one national society to another and the ensuing dynamics of integration

into the host society, usually conceived of as taking place in several dimensions, such

as acculturation (language and culture), structural assimilation (positioning in the

educational and economic system), social integration (social networks, friends, and

intermarriage), and identificational assimilation (identification with the new society)

(Alba and Nee 1997; Berry 1997; Esser 2009). This nation-based paradigm in migra-

tion research has been challenged by the transnationalism concept. Several authors

have argued that contemporary migration is not a one-way process of migration from

a country of origin to a country of destination and a subsequent process of integration

(Portes, Guarnizo, and Landolt 1999; Levitt and Jaworsky 2007). Instead, migration

today is depicted as a process characterized by several steps, including travelling to

the destination country, commuting, and sometimes finally returning to the country

of origin. These flows of people are taking place in transnational social spaces without

reference to political borders, often connecting geographically distant regions (Glick-

Schiller, Basch, and Blanc-Szanton 1992). Thus, it is claimed, integration into the

country of destination is replaced by integration into transnational social fields, which

connect the countries of origin and destination (and possibly others too) and are

characterized by different forms of economic, political, and social transactions (Levitt

and Glick-Schiller 2004). Subsequent empirical research has shown, however, that

transnational relations are not as prevalent among migrants as originally envisaged

and that the national society of the destination country is still the most important

framework for analyzing processes of integration (Portes 2003; Schunck 2014).

Prior to this discussion in migration research, empirical studies on more general

processes of internationalization and transnationalization have been conducted in the

social sciences (Katzenstein 1975; Deutsch and Merritt 1979; De Swaan 1995;

Dr. Georg Datler is a researcher at the Institute of Sociology at the University of Zurich. His

main research areas are political sociology, survey methodology, and survey methods. His

publications have appeared in Social Science Research and in Perspectives on European

Politics and Society.

NOTE: This research was supported by the European Science Foundation (project number

09-ERCP-044) and the Swiss National Science Foundation (project number 127818). We

would like to thank the guest editor and the anonymous reviewers for their helpful criticism

and suggestions. A previous version of the article was presented in the panel “Intermarriage,

Mixedness, Integration and Social Cohesion Revisited: International Experiences and Cross-

disciplinary Approaches” at the 11th IMISCOE conference in Madrid in 2014. We would like

to thank the organizer and the participants for their valuable suggestions and comments.