Based on research into war-related issues in Croatia and migration-related issues in Sweden, this article discusses belonging as conditioned by social and psychological concreteness: it is rooted in place, familiarity, sensual experience, human interaction and local knowledge. Inclusive identities resulting from a sharing of places are obvious in situations of crisis. However, they are always latently present, in war as in peace, in diasporic surroundings as well as among those who stayed behind, in different epochs and political systems.