Social rights were to be the completion of the citizenship status of all members within a political community. Through a variety of causes (their entanglement with the goals of full employment and the welfare state, the complexities of the political project of the European Union, and conceptual confusion) the development of these rights has been arrested. The article sketches some of the origins of the present predicament of (social) rights and (social) citizenship. The article is informed by the hope that the arguments it puts forward may contribute to a renewed discussion on the necessity and promises of an EU form of citizenship that is worth instituting and emulating.