The European Heritage: A Critical Re-Interpretation

245 Pages·2017·7.873 MB·English

by  Gerard Delanty

THE EUROPEAN HERITAGE
Gerard Delanty offers a critical interpretation of the European heritage today in
light of recent developments in the human and social sciences, and in view of a
mood of crisis in Europe that compels us to re-think the European past. One of
the main insights informing this book is that a transnational and global perspec-
tive on European history can reorient the European heritage in a direction that
offers a more viable way for contemporary Europe to articulate an intercultural
identity in keeping with the emerging shape of Europe, and with its own often
acknowledged past. He argues that the European heritage is based less on a univer-
salistic conception of culture than on a plurality of interconnecting narratives. Such
a perspective opens up new directions for scholarship and public debate on heritage
that are guided by critical cosmopolitan considerations that highlight contention,
resistances, competition, and dissonance. He argues that the specificity of the Euro-
pean dimension of culture is in the entanglement of many cultures rather than in
an original culture. The cultures of Europe are not separated but have been shaped
in close interaction with each other and with the non-European world. Nations
are not therefore unique, exceptional, or fundamentally different from each other.
The outcome of such intermingling is a multiplicity of ideas of Europe that serve
as shared cultural reference points.
Gerard Delanty is Professor of Sociology at the University of Sussex, Brighton,
UK. His other recent books include The Cosmopolitan Imagination (2009), For-
mations of European Modernity (2013), and Community (3rd edition 2014).

THE EUROPEAN
HERITAGE
A Critical Re-Interpretation
Gerard Delanty
First published 2018
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
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Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2018 Gerard Delanty
The right of Gerard Delanty to be identified as author of this work
has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in
any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing
from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Delanty, Gerard, author.
Title: The European heritage : a critical re-interpretation / by
Gerard Delanty.
Description: Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge,
2018. | Includes bibliographical references.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017017280 | ISBN 9781138038714 (hardback) |
ISBN 9781138038721 (paperback) | ISBN 9781315177229 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Europe—Civilization—Philosophy. | Europe—History—
Philosophy. | Group identity—Europe. | Cultural pluralism—Europe. |
Transnationalism—Social aspects—Europe. | Globalization—Social
aspects—Europe.
Classification: LCC CB203 .D37 2018 | DDC 303.48/2094—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017017280
ISBN: 978-1-138-03871-4 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-138-03872-1 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-17722-9 (ebk)
Typeset in Bembo
by Apex CoVantage, LLC
For Dario

CONTENTS
List of illustrations ix
Preface and acknowledgements xi
1 Introduction: the past in the present 1
PART I
Making sense of a transnational world 27
2 Transnationalism in historical and sociological analysis 29
3 Modernity and the plurality of Europe 45
4 Europe unbounded: critical cosmopolitanism and the
problem of Eurocentrism 67
PART II
Encounters, routes, transfers, and entanglements 85
5 Cultural encounters and European civilisation 87
6 Europe and modernity as reference cultures 123
viii Contents
7 The making of European society and the entanglement of
capitalism and democracy 143
8 The legacy of European integration: Europe in the world 158
PART III
Looking to the future 175
9 Solidarity as a political legacy for Europe today 177
10 Making sense of Brexit: a divided nation in a
divided Europe 190
11 Europe beyond the crisis: re-inventing the
European heritage 205
Select bibliography 222
Index 225
ILLUSTRATIONS
1.1 Cecil Rhodes Statue at Oriel College, Oxford University 5
1.2 Garden of Remembrance, Jewish Museum, Berlin 17
1.3 Leopold II Statue in Place du Trône, Brussels 19
2.1 The Mosque Cathedral of Cordoba 40
3.1 The Leibniz memorial in Hannover, with the motto ‘unity
in diversity’ 46
3.2 Removal of the bust of Lenin’s Statue, Berlin, 1991 59
4.1 The Stari Most bridge, Mostar, Bosnia 75
4.2 Convalescent Indian Troops at the Royal Pavilion, Brighton
during World War One 79
4.3 Entrance to Auschwitz with the Nazi emblem ‘Work makes
you free’ 81
5.1 Willy Brandt at the memorial of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
in 1970 104
5.2 Map of the Hansa League in the 15th century 105
5.3 Erasmus Statue at the Erasmus University Rotterdam 109
5.4 Christian and Muslim playing ouds Catinas de Santa Maria by
Alfonso X, 13th-century Spain 113
6.1 Map showing the telegraph lines in operation, under contract,
and contemplated, to complete the circuit of the globe by
H.H. Lloyd & Co. Publisher (1872) 130
7.1 The Match Girls march on Parliament, London, 1888, to demand
social protection from exploitative capitalism 149
8.1 The signing of the Treaty of Rome on 25th March 1957 in
Palazzo dei Conservatori on the Capitoline Hill, Rome 163