Is it possible to qualitatively distinguish a citizenship literacy from a mere amalgamation of the different school subject literacies (historical literacy, scientific literacy etc.), and what would such a distinction look like? Is it also possible to distinguish citizenship literacy from the DeSeCo project and its links to three kinds of literacy: reading, mathematical and scientific? In my paper I will draw on the distinction made by Douglas Roberts (2007) concerning scientific literacy, between what he calls vision I and vision II, where vision I “looks inward at science itself”, while vision II should “enable students to approach and think about situations as a citizen well informed about science would”. From that starting point I will ask the question whether there is a tension that implies vision I to be more related to narrower, more one-dimensional, test-based school knowledge and vision II to have as its aim a citizenship literacy offering scope for open communication between different perspectives. And, if that is the case, in what way could different literacy intentions be investigated and distinguished from each other?