This chapter focuses on individual and collective political activism marked by identity politics, and the contextual societal components characterizing contemporary European politics. It highlights how individual aspects of social identities such as gender and sexuality or ethnicity and race are connected to political cultures, i.e., the attitudes of citizens toward governance, in domestic and regional clusters in (Southern, Western, Northern, Central, and Eastern) Europe. Moreover, it provides evidence of political participation as expressed through voting and other participatory actions such as petitions, demonstrations, boycotts, etc. It traces the transformation of political culture and participation from traditional, more passive stances in representative democracies to more activated forms of political engagement, based on increased education, information, and identity politics. These characteristics, however, are more pronounced among political and economic elites, resulting in equality and participation gaps. Hence this chapter details the agency that citizens express, but also highlights how domestic socio-economic structural factors, such as the form of national governance, political economy, and degree of Europeanization play a role, as these factors contribute to a particular form of domestic political culture. Moreover, they condition the politicization, i.e., the increasing awareness and contentiousness of political issues, in each EU member state.
