Perceptions of deservingness: social and civil rights for diverse families

In this chapter, we use cross-national data from a pilot study fielded in 2014 and 2015 among students in Denmark, Spain, Croatia, Italy, and the Netherlands to explore whether people feel citizenship rights for same-sex families should be established at the national or European level and whether these rights should be transportable within Europe. Specifically, we focus on the civil citizenship rights to marriage and partnership, and parenthood (adoption, ART), as well as social citizenship rights, including cash benefits for parents, housing benefits, childcare benefits, and parental leave. We find several cross-country differences, and notable distinctions between civil and social rights with greater support for EU involvement in guaranteeing civil rather than social rights. We discuss the implications of these findings in the conclusion.