This study examines how transnational identity is lived and experienced at the Polish-German border, and how the COVID-19 pandemic border closure in spring 2020 affected it. Through 32 qualitative interviews with people living and working across this border, the research reveals four distinct "transborder phenotypes" differentiated by the benefits or disadvantages they derive from transborder life and their emotional/ideological involvement with the transnational. The study demonstrates that transnational identity is a real, consciously lived experience strongly associated with Europe as a daily reality. It introduces a new conceptual framework, "identity potentials", for understanding the complex, dynamic, and contextually embedded nature of identity formation at borders and beyond.

Bastian Küntzel is an Associate Researcher at the Jean Monnet Chair at the Faculty of Social Science of the University of Wroclaw, Poland and a Senior Partner at a boutique consulting firm specializing in organizational development and leadership transformation.