A community of Europeans? : Transnational identities and public spheres

304 Pages·2010·1.51 MB·English

by  Risse, Thomas

A COMMUNITY OF
EUROPEANS?

A COMMUNITY
OF EUROPEANS?
Transnational Identities
and Public Spheres
Thomas Risse
CORNELL UNIVERSITY PRESS ITHACA AND LONDON
Copyright © 2010 by Cornell University
All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or parts
thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from
the publisher. For information, address Cornell University Press, Sage House,
512 East State Street, Ithaca, New York 14850.
First published 2010 by Cornell University Press
First printing, Cornell Paperbacks, 2010
Printed in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Risse-Kappen, Thomas.
A community of Europeans? : transnational identities and public spheres /
Thomas Risse.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8014-4663-4 (cloth : alk. paper) —
ISBN 978-0-8014-7648-8 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Group identity—Europe. 2. Transnationalism—Social aspects—Europe.
3. Social integration—Europe. 4. Nationalism—Europe. 5. European
federation—Public opinion. 6. Public opinion—Europe. I. Title.
HM753.R57 2010
305.80094—dc22 2009047395
Cornell University Press strives to use environmentally responsible suppliers and
materials to the fullest extent possible in the publishing of its books. Such materials
include vegetable-based, low-VOC inks and acid-free papers that are recycled, to­
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visit our website at www.cornellpress.cornell.edu.
Cloth printing 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Paperback printing 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents
List of Figures vii
Acknowledgments ix
List of Abbreviations xiii
Introduction: The Europeanization of Identities
and Public Spheres 1
Part I AN EMERGING EUROPEAN IDENTITY?
1. Collective Identities: Conceptual and
Methodological Questions 19
2. Multiple Europes: The Europeanization
of Citizens’ Identities 37
3. Modern Europe and Its Discontents: The Europeanization
of Elite Identities 63
4. Europeanization of National Identities: Explanations 87
Part II AN EMERGING EUROPEAN PUBLIC SPHERE?
5. Transnational Public Spheres: Conceptual Questions 107
6. The Gradual Europeanization of Public Spheres 127
7. A European Community of Communication? 157
Part III CONSEQUENCES
8. “Deepening”: European Institution-Building 177
9. “Widening”: EU Enlargement and Contested Identities 204
10. European Democracy and Politicization 226
Conclusions: Defending Modern Europe 243
References 253
Index 277

Figures
2.1. National and European Identities, EU Average, 1992–2004 41
4.1. Net European Identity by Country, 2004 92
4.2. Levels of Net European Identity over Time 95
6.1. EU Visibility in Articles on Military Interventions 132
6.2. Issue Cycles in the “Haider Debate,” Oct. 1999–Sept. 2000 135
6.3. Issue Cycles on Wars and Military Interventions,
1990–2005 137
6.4. Issue Cycles on Military Interventions Only, 1990–2005 138
8.1. Support for EU Coordinated Action in
Economic Crisis, 2009 184
10.1. Position of Party Families in the European
Cleavage Structure 239

Acknowledgments
This book has been in the making for a long time. It documents a rather long
journey from Konstanz, Germany, via Florence, Italy, to Berlin and also includes
a stay in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
I first became interested in questions of European identity shortly after I had
started teaching at the University of Konstanz in 1993. My first research proj­
ect on “the idea of Europe” started in the mid-1990s and was originally funded
by the state of Baden-Württemberg and subsequently by the German Research
Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, or DFG). Members of this first
team included Daniela Engelmann-Martin, Hans-Joachim Knopf, and Klaus
Roscher. Martin Marcussen joined the group in 1997 when I moved to the Eu­
ropean University Institute (EUI) in Florence, Italy. This group got me going on
questions of European identity, for which I am extremely grateful.
In 1999, I served as codirector of the European Forum at the EUI’s Rob­
ert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies entitled “Between Europe and the
Nation-State: The Reshaping of Interests, Identities and Political Representation,”
together with Stefano Bartolini, the political scientist, and Bo Strath, the histo­
rian. Shortly afterward, I coordinated IDNET, a thematic network funded by the
European Commission’s fifth framework program on socioeconomic research
and focusing on “Europeanization, Collective Identities, and Public Discourses”
(Risse and Maier 2003). This network brought together sociologists (Klaus Eder,
Bernhard Giesen, Wilfried Spohn), political scientists (Jeffrey Checkel), and so­
cial psychologists (Laura Benigni and Anna Triandafyllidou). The debates and
discussions of the European Forum and IDNET made me realize how poorly
equipped political scientists are to tackle questions of collective identities and
how much we can learn from interdisciplinary exchanges.
In 2000, Bernhard Giesen from the University of Konstanz talked me into
a project on the Europeanization of public spheres, which was subsequently
funded by the DFG. This was my first venture into media analysis and commu­
nication studies. We conducted a frame analysis of newspapers in five countries
pertaining to the so-called Haider debate, the EU reaction to a right-wing popu­
list party in Austria entering into government (Van de Steeg 2002, 2005; Risse
and Van de Steeg 2008). The research team included Valentin Rauer, Sylvain
Rivet, and Marianne Van de Steeg. I owe a lot of what I learned about public
spheres and Öffentlichkeit to this group of wonderful and dedicated researchers,
in particular Marianne.