ABSTRACT
This article addresses the paradoxical politics of heterosexism within European Union (EU) policy through a critical consideration of matrimony as the primary legitimating link between EU nationals and third-country spouses. It also emphasizes the discrimination experienced by same-sex couples to whom the protection and privileges of marriage are unavailable and questions efforts to extend state-sanctioned unions to same-sex partners. Indeed, it argues against the presumption that relationships (whether spousal, cohabitational, sexual or familial) provide justifiable criteria for citizenship and the privileges associated with it. The article has theoretical implications for those studies in which the themes of citizenship, immigration, family, sexuality and social exclusion are central.
