pp. 725-753

Using data from the 1981 and 1999 European Values Surveys, the article first shows that it is still meaningful to people to identify themselves as being on the right or left. These political identities are relative, nuanced, plural, but they extend beyond national borders : the same relations between values and the right-left scale – though they may be more or less strong – are observed throughout Western Europe. The article then shows that political identities are linked to religious ones and that these two facets of the constructed individual have complex combined effects on many values. But generation and educational attainment can also be highly relevant in accounting for the world of values. In an individualized Europe, values are many and they tend to be cobbled together, but there is some regulation of individual preferences.