tag:theconversation.com,2011:/au/topics/european-identity-28230/articlesEuropean identity – The Conversation2023-05-30T12:23:53Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2022802023-05-30T12:23:53Z2023-05-30T12:23:53ZFrom its birth 50 years ago, hip-hop has spread throughout Europe and challenged outdated ideals of racial and ethnic identity<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/528381/original/file-20230525-19-f5v2fn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=662%2C53%2C4419%2C3337&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Rapper Eko Fresh performs during a fundraising concert in Hamburg, Germany, on Dec. 6, 2022. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/december-2022-hamburg-eko-fresh-rapper-is-on-stage-at-the-news-photo/1245427724?adppopup=true"> Georg Wendt/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>His name is <a href="https://top40-charts.com/artist.php?aid=15401">Alpha Diallo</a>, and in his 2016 song “I am at home,” the French rapper makes clear who and what he is.</p>
<p>“I am Black,” <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsOqEhMumaw">he sings</a>, “Proud to be French of Guinean origin.”</p>
<p>Known as Black M, Diallo, 38, is one of many African, Caribbean and Middle Eastern immigrants throughout Europe who use hip-hop to advance racial and economic justice. </p>
<p>In doing so, they are keeping their music in tune with rap’s <a href="https://www.pbs.org/opb/historydetectives/investigation/birthplace-of-hip-hop/">American origins</a>. The genre emerged in 1973 out of the anger and pain within Black American communities such as in the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20130809-the-party-where-hip-hop-was-born">South Bronx, New York</a>. </p>
<p>Back in those days, as they still do now, rappers talked about their experiences on the <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/hip-hop-standing-black-lives-decades-15-songs/story?id=71195591">margins of American society</a>. Those social messages connected with Black and immigrant youth throughout Europe who themselves were <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/13/arts/music/french-british-hip-hop-afrobeats-afrotrap.html">searching for identity</a> in countries that have become more diverse but yet where discrimination remains entrenched.</p>
<p>As a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=CeaQNawAAAAJ&hl=en">scholar of European studies and identity politics</a>, I know how historically oppressed people have used culture, language and music to regain a sense of identity throughout history. </p>
<p>But in my view, modern-day European rappers, particularly Black M, Arianna Puello and Eko Fresh, are taking those efforts a step further by challenging outdated European views of citizenship and reshaping public debate on racial and ethnic identity. </p>
<p>As migration from African, Caribbean and Middle Eastern countries to Europe continues to increase and European societies discuss questions of identity belonging, it’s my belief that hip-hop will continue to make significant contributions to ongoing public policy debates, and these three rappers briefly profiled below in particular will lead the charge. </p>
<h2>French ideal of a colorblind society</h2>
<p>In France, Black M is one of the musicians who raps about racism and the oppressive treatment of immigrants in a nation long known for its <a href="https://hir.harvard.edu/color-blind-frances-approach-to-race/">colorblind ideal</a> that all people share the same universal rights.</p>
<p>In many of his songs, he uses references to France’s national symbols, including the country’s red, white and blue flag and the <a href="https://ageofrevolution.org/200-object/phrygian-cap/">Phrygian cap</a>, a symbol of freedom. </p>
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<span class="caption">Black M performs at L'Olympia stadium in Paris in 2015.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/black-m-performs-at-lolympia-on-april-21-2015-in-paris-news-photo/470566590?adppopup=true">David Wolff - Patrick/Redferns via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>But in “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsOqEhMumaw">Je suis chez moi</a>,” or “I am at home,” Black M talks about the mixed feelings he has about the country where he was born after his parents migrated to Paris from Guinea, a West African country. </p>
<p>“France is beautiful,” he sings. “But she looks down on me like the Eiffel Tower.”</p>
<p>In the same song, Black M challenges the racist stereotype of immigrants abusing the welfare system by singing: “My parents did not bring me into the world to get financial aid.” </p>
<p>Black M uses his lyrics as well as his fashion to demonstrate his social activism.</p>
<p>In another video, where he raps about police violence against immigrants, Black M wears a shirt reading “Justice for Adama: Without justice, you will never have peace.” </p>
<p><a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-europe/assa-traore-and-the-fight-for-black-lives-in-france">Adama Traoré</a> was a Black French man <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/17/adama-traore-death-in-police-custody-casts-long-shadow-over-french-society">who died in police custody</a> in 2016 on his 24th birthday. His death sparked numerous anti-racist protests across France. </p>
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<h2>A Black woman in Spain</h2>
<p>Born in the Dominican Republic in 1977, <a href="https://17190.org/ari-puello/">Arianna Puello</a> moved to Spain when she was 8 years old and remembers listening to hip-hop music as she grew up in Salt, a small town nearly 4,000 miles away from rap’s birthplace in the Bronx. </p>
<p>“I used to listen to rap with my brother who did beat-boxing and my cousin who had contacts in New York and they gave him the vinyls,” she said in an interview. “But I wasn’t active. It was in Salt where I saw the rap groups that were there, the graffiti, break groups. … The whole hip-hop movement of the moment, the parties, the jams.”</p>
<p>Puello recalls telling herself: “This is my movement, and I want to be part of it.” </p>
<p>She recorded her first song in 1993, and her <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9kt8laXBjZE">2008 hit</a> “Juana Kalamidad” reached No. 6 on the Spanish music chart.</p>
<p>Now 46 years old, Puello is considered one of Spain’s most popular female rappers. Throughout her career, Puello has used her music and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5IEr4gnaL9U">rapid-fire delivery</a> to confront the racism that she has faced as a Black female migrant in Spain. </p>
<p>Her <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eiAP5yyEQsY">2003 track</a>, for example, “Así es la negra,” or “That’s what the Black woman is like,” tells the “ignorant racist” that “You’re going to have to put up with me, / If I am born again I want to be what I am now, / of the same race, same sex and condition.” </p>
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<p>Puello’s music is successful beyond Spain. She has had several tours in Latin America, the Caribbean and throughout Europe. </p>
<p>But for Puello and other European rappers, hip-hop is not only about international tours and commercial success. </p>
<p>“Hip-hop is a way of transforming pain, the darkness of life, into art,” <a href="https://17190.org/ari-puello/">Puello explained</a>. “Instead of picking up a knife, a gun, and going out to shoot, you pick up and write, and your mind turns into philosophy and you turn the reflection of the street into something beautiful.”</p>
<h2>Three generations of Turkish immigrants in Germany</h2>
<p>Since the early 2000s, <a href="https://www.allmusic.com/artist/eko-fresh-mn0001925342/biography">Ekrem Bora</a> has been a hip-hop sensation in Germany. Born in Cologne in 1983, Eko Fresh, as he is known, has rapped about his Turkish-Kurdish ancestry and the social stigma that his family endured in a country divided over the treatment of immigrants. </p>
<p>In his 2021 track “1994,” he describes his family story that starts with his grandfather leaving Turkey to work a blue-collar job in Germany. At the time, the grandfather only knew one word of the German language – “ja” or “yes” – and, as a guest worker, was not considered a German citizen.</p>
<p>Despite such meager beginnings, his grandchildren are now German citizens with full voting rights, and Eko Fresh thanks his grandfather for that. “Grandpa kept saying ‘We came here for you’,” <a href="https://genius.com/Eko-fresh-1994-lyrics">he raps</a>. “Because he didn’t come here with anything, his grandson can now have a say.”</p>
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<p>In his <a href="https://lyricstranslate.com/en/aber.html-0">2018 track</a> “Aber,” Eko Fresh explains how he uses his citizenship and specifically addresses the AfD, the <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/24/europe/afd-youth-wing-extremist-label-intl/index.html">right-wing political party</a> in Germany that opposes immigration:</p>
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<p>“I’m working hard and don’t even get a loan for a home<br>
You’ve got big cars, I’m still using the tram<br>
But on election day I’ll punish you, then<br>
I’ll take matters in my own hand and you will all see<br>
I stand for my country because I vote AfD.”</p>
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<p>Despite his ability to vote, his life as an immigrant in Germany is complicated. </p>
<p>Much like Black M, Eko Fresh laments his treatment as a second-class citizen in German society.</p>
<p>“We love Germany from the heart like crazy,” he writes in “Gastarbeiter,” or “Guest worker.” “But unfortunately it does not love us back every time.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/202280/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Armin Langer does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Born out of the pain and anger in Black American communities, rap music struck a similar chord throughout Europe, as immigrants struggle to retain their ethnic identities on the margins of society.Armin Langer, Assistant Professor of European Studies, University of FloridaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2049342023-05-05T14:51:21Z2023-05-05T14:51:21ZEurovision: even before the singing starts, the contest is a fascinating reflection of international rules and politics<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524394/original/file-20230504-29-itqkkp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=177%2C53%2C3763%2C2593&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Eurovision bandwagon has firmly arrived in Liverpool. During a week of two semi-finals, 37 competing countries will be whittled down to 26. Around 160 million people are then expected to tune in to the grand final on Saturday May 13. From humble beginnings in 1956, with only <a href="https://eurovision.tv/event/lugano-1956">seven countries competing in a theatre in Switzerland</a>, the contest is now one of the most watched entertainment events in the world.</p>
<p>And yet there remains some confusion about what counts as “Europe” in the context of Eurovision. Clarity on this point can, however, be found by understanding a little bit about the rules and practices of international politics. And along the way, the process of deciding who is in and who is out – and what the rules are for those who do compete – is an interesting reflection of international law. </p>
<h2>A different kind of union</h2>
<p>Participation in the Eurovision Song Contest reflects a basic principle of the international legal order: sovereignty matters. Being a state in this context counts for more than being physically located in Europe.</p>
<p>The actual participants in Eurovision are the TV broadcasters who are members of the <a href="https://www.ebu.ch/home">European Broadcasting Union (EBU)</a>, an international organisation which is open to membership from across the European Broadcasting Area. This area includes North Africa and the Middle East. Israel, which has won four times, has <a href="https://eurovision.tv/country/israel">participated since 1973</a> on this basis. Morocco <a href="https://eurovision.tv/country/morocco">participated once</a>, in 1980, but has not returned. </p>
<p>Other states come and go, often depending on budgetary constraints (hence the absence of <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-63276833">Montenegro and North Macedonia</a> this year), lack of national interest or success in previous contests (Andorra, Monaco, Slovakia), <a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/eurovision-2019-why-turkey-doesnt-participate">objections to the voting principles</a> (Turkey) or <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2019/nov/27/hungary-pulls-out-of-eurovision-amid-rise-in-anti-lgbt-rhetoric#:%7E:text=Hungary%20pulls%20out%20of%20Eurovision%20amid%20rise%20in%20anti%2DLGBTQ%2B%20rhetoric,-This%20article%20is&text=Hungary%20will%20not%20participate%20in,government%20and%20public%20media%20bosses.">rumoured discontent with the growth of LGBT+ visibility in the contest</a> (Hungary). Broadcasters from <a href="https://www.ebu.ch/news/2021/05/ebu-executive-board-agrees-to-suspension-of-belarus-member-btrc">Belarus</a> and <a href="https://www.ebu.ch/news/2022/03/statement-on-russian-members">Russia</a> were expelled from the EBU in 2021 and 2022 and are ineligible to complete. <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-43087349">Kosovo</a> is also keen to participate. While Kosovo’s statehood is recognised by a majority of European countries, it is not a full member of the EBU. EBU membership requires a country to be a member of the <a href="https://www.itu.int/en/Pages/default.aspx">International Telecommunications Union (ITU)</a>, which in turn requires UN membership (which Kosovo does not yet have).</p>
<p>As in international law, where the permanent members of the UN Security Council have a veto power, some states are more equal than others. Eurovision rules apply differently to the largest financial contributors to the contest – France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK – who, along with the previous winner, qualify directly for the final and do not risk elimination in the semi-finals. This sounds like an unfair advantage, but did not help France’s Alvan and Ahez or Germany’s Malik Harris (2022), the UK’s James Newman (2021), Germany’s Jenrik or Spain’s Blas Canto (2021) from finishing bottom of the pile.</p>
<p>You might also ask why Australia is competing. Due to long-term viewing figures of the contest down under, and the occasional Australian participant (often for the UK, including <a href="https://eurovision.tv/participant/olivia-newton-john">Olivia Newton-John</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ooh_Aah..._Just_a_Little_Bit">Gina G</a>), Australia – or technically the Australian broadcaster SBS – was invited as a special guest to the 2015 contest in Vienna. It was then invited to compete on a five-year contract running from 2018 to 2023. As in international law, sometimes the rules can be stretched.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">The full line up of countries taking part in 2023.</span></figcaption>
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<p>Eurovision is often wrongly assumed to be a product of the EU. Not only did the first Eurovision in 1956 pre-date the creation European Economic Community by a year, but membership of the EBU is neither required nor expected of EU members.</p>
<p>The concept of European integration has provided some inspiration for the songs – most notably Italy’s 1990 winner <a href="https://eurovision.tv/participant/toto-cutugno">Insieme: 1992</a> (Together: 1992). That was a contest held in Zagreb, in what was then Yugoslavia – the only socialist country to take part during the cold war years.</p>
<p>The Irish hosts in Dublin in 1988 worked with the European Commission to show an interval video tour around Europe to promote intra-European tourism. (This show was also notable for showing a clip of eventual winner Céline Dion <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w6b7BHGkKQA">inspecting a potato field</a>). Brexit, despite the <a href="https://edm.parliament.uk/early-day-motion/58535/eurovision-song-contest">efforts of a lone MP in the House of Commons</a>, does not mean the UK must stop competing. Nor does it mean the UK is doomed to failure – as Sam Ryder’s overall second place (and <a href="https://eurovision.tv/event/turin-2022/grand-final/results/united-kingdom">winner of the jury vote</a> for the UK in 2022 shows. Customary practice – also very important in international law – means that the winner is given the opportunity to host the subsequent contest, but not always. The BBC was invited to host instead of Ukraine this year.</p>
<h2>An international rules-based system</h2>
<p>Eurovision is also a pretty good example of how rules operate in international partnerships. Some are fixed and permanent, while others need or are allowed to evolve. Sanctions are sometimes needed and often difficult to decide upon. </p>
<p>Rules about the staging of Eurovision entries – original song not previously released, maximum six people on stage – are strictly enforced and do change over time. But since 1999, entries no longer have to be in an official language of the country, and some limited pre-recorded backing vocals are allowed.</p>
<p>A rule that does occasionally cause headaches for the EBU is the ineligibility of “political” songs. Georgia’s 2009 entry <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-georgia-eurovision/georgia-pulls-out-of-eurovision-over-put-in-song-idUKTRE52A4S920090311">We Don’t Want to Put In</a> was not allowed because it was ruled as alluding to then Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin – though Israel had successfully entered a thinly-veiled rap <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6405457.stm">about the (then) leader of Iran</a> two years previously. </p>
<p>Ukraine’s Jamala won in 2016 with a song called <a href="https://time.com/4329061/eurovision-jamala-russian-ukraine-crimea/">1944</a> about the deportation of the Crimean Tartars during World War II and a highly successful previous Ukrainian act, <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/8-times-ukraines-eurovision-entry-got-political/">Verka Serduchka</a>, was accused by the Russian delegation of actually singing <a href="https://youtu.be/hfjHJneVonE?t=76">“Russia, goodbye”</a> in the lyrics to the song Dancing Lasha Tumbai in 2007.</p>
<p>Policing the boundaries between what is said, and what is implied, is a difficult task. This year, <a href="https://eurovision.tv/participant/let-3-2023">Croatia’s entry is sung in Croatian</a>, but the meaning of lyrics such as repeated use of the word “armagedonona” is not difficult to guess.</p>
<p><a href="https://eurovision.tv/participant/teya-and-salena-2023">Austria</a> is tackling the topic of the lack of representation of women in the music industry and low amounts of money provided by streaming services to artists and songwriters with its lyrics “0.003, give me two years and your dinner will be free”. </p>
<p>Whole <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/720260/wild-dances-by-william-lee-adams/">books</a> and <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1354066116633278">academic articles</a> can be written on how Eurovision has led to primetime LGBT+ visibility – itself a hotly contested political topic across many states in Europe – most notably via <a href="https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/dana-internationals-lasting-eurovision-legacy">the victories of Dana International (Israel, 1998) and Conchita Wurst (Austria, 2004)</a>.</p>
<p>Love it or hate it, Eurovision has cemented itself as part of the cultural landscape of the continent and beyond. But more than that, it helps us understand both the complexity of the international and European legal orders, the interpretation and application of rules, and the ever presence of politics. As France memorably sang in 1991, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ESL6deuhJM"><em>C'est le dernier qui a parlé qui a raison</em></a> (It’s the last to have spoken who is right).</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/204934/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Let’s get one thing straight from the get-go: this contest is way older than the European Union.Paul James Cardwell, Professor of Law, King's College LondonJed Odermatt, Senior Lecturer, City Law School, City, University of LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1782262022-03-22T12:41:15Z2022-03-22T12:41:15ZDefending Europe: How cultural identity shapes support for Ukraine and armed resistance against Russia<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/452864/original/file-20220317-27-1tscvog.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=98%2C152%2C2896%2C1845&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Slovenia Prime Minister Janez Jansa (left), Czech Republic Prime Minister Petr Fiala (second from left) and Poland Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki (third from left) meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy during a visit to Kyiv on behalf of the European Council on March 16, 2022. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/prime-minister-of-the-czech-republic-petr-fiala-prime-news-photo/1239227422?adppopup=true"> Ukrainian Presidency/Handout/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Since the Russian invasion began on Feb. 24, 2022, the outpouring of <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/ukraine-protests-donations-and-solidarity-grow-across-europe/a-60933894">solidarity and material support for Ukraine</a> across Europe has been impressive – and highly unusual. </p>
<p>Sweden, for instance, has not provided <a href="https://www.dailysabah.com/world/europe/sweden-to-send-military-aid-to-ukraine-in-break-with-tradition">military aid to a country at war</a> since shortly after the Soviet Union invaded Finland in 1939. Germany has similarly had a <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/ukraine-war-russia-germany-still-blocking-arms-supplies/">policy of providing only nonlethal aid</a> to conflict zones. Both countries are now aiding Ukraine with military weapons.</p>
<p>As some observers have noted, <a href="https://english.alaraby.co.uk/opinion/armed-resistance-trendy-ukraine-not-rest">Western countries are quick to condemn armed resistance</a> when it happens elsewhere in the world. But European countries did not react by providing support in 2008, when <a href="https://www.euronews.com/2018/08/07/europe-s-forgotten-war-the-georgia-russia-conflict-explained-a-decade-on">Russia attacked Georgia</a>. Nor in 2014, when <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2014/03/03/world/europe/ukraine-crimea/index.html">Russia invaded eastern Ukraine and annexed Crimea</a>. </p>
<p>Something is different this time as many European countries have not only promised but also <a href="https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2022/02/28/italy-joins-growing-list-of-weapon-donors-to-help-ukraines-defense/">delivered arms to Ukraine</a>. </p>
<h2>Cultural identity</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.american.edu/sis/faculty/hardig.cfm">As a scholar of identity and social movements</a>, I see the current rise of European support for Ukraine as the result of a campaign waged by Ukrainians in recent years to shift Ukraine’s identity away from Russia and toward the <a href="https://op.europa.eu/webpub/com/eu-what-it-is/en/">European Union</a>, or EU, the group of <a href="https://european-union.europa.eu/principles-countries-history/country-profiles_en">27 European nations</a> that share military defense, trade and the Euro, the common currency.</p>
<p>In addition to Sweden and Germany, Denmark, Estonia, Latvia, Poland, France, the Czech Republic and Slovakia <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/28/which-countries-are-sending-military-aid-to-ukraine">decided it was legitimate</a> to provide weapons to Ukraine to resist the Russian invasion. In turn, the European Union jointly decided to further <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/800b9cdc-e0a8-42c5-9cb5-3e04242ad9b3">support Ukraine with military weapons</a>. </p>
<p>These measures can be contrasted with how controversial the issue of <a href="https://www.vaticannews.va/en/world/news/2020-03/pax-christi-germany-online-protest-yemen-war-europe-arms-supply.html">supplying weapons to conflict zones</a> in other parts of the world usually is for European nations. </p>
<p>Many of the countries that have now been quick to promise arms to Ukraine have <a href="https://www.thedefensepost.com/2022/02/28/sweden-arms-ukraine/">strict regulations against arms exports</a> to countries in conflict. In addition to national regulations, the European Union also has its own restrictions on arms exports. </p>
<h2>Europe and the Russian threat</h2>
<p>Given Russia’s military capabilities and geographical proximity, Russian aggression is of particular concern to European Union states. Indeed, neutral countries like Sweden have long considered Russia the main military threat, <a href="https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/reports/2007/R3776.pdf">suspecting the Soviet Union</a> and then the <a href="https://www.svd.se/swedish-military-even-more-certain-it-was-a-foreign-mini-submarine">Russian Federation</a> for submarine incursions into its territorial waters.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A black submarine is seen sailing before it submerges underneath the sea." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/452553/original/file-20220316-8117-14mm951.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/452553/original/file-20220316-8117-14mm951.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452553/original/file-20220316-8117-14mm951.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452553/original/file-20220316-8117-14mm951.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452553/original/file-20220316-8117-14mm951.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452553/original/file-20220316-8117-14mm951.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452553/original/file-20220316-8117-14mm951.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A Russian submarine sails through the Bosphorus Strait on on February 13, 2022.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/russian-navys-diesel-electric-kilo-class-submarine-rostov-news-photo/1238437982?adppopup=true">Ozan Kose/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>When I served in the Swedish army in the 1990s, there was no question that <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-apps-sweden-commentary/commentary-why-neutral-peaceful-sweden-is-preparing-for-war-idUSKCN1IV27N">we were training for guerrilla warfare</a> against an invader from the East – no one expected an attack from NATO in the West. </p>
<p>In Sweden, the sense of threat from Russia has heightened significantly in recent years with <a href="https://www.rferl.org/a/sweden-says-russian-military-planes-briefly-violated-airspace/29728754.html">incidents of Russian military planes</a> crossing into Swedish airspace. Many suspected that <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-60035446">unidentified surveillance drones</a> deployed in January 2022 over Swedish <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-01-17/sweden-probes-suspect-drone-flights-over-nuclear-plants">nuclear power plants and government buildings</a> had originated in Russia.</p>
<p>What is noteworthy is the extent throughout Europe to which Ukraine is framed as a distinctly “European” country, whereas Russia remains the threatening “other.” </p>
<h2>Who is European?</h2>
<p>European Commission President <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/commission/commissioners/2019-2024/president_en">Ursula von der Leyen</a> said that Ukraine is “<a href="https://www.euronews.com/2022/02/27/ukraine-is-one-of-us-and-we-want-them-in-eu-ursula-von-der-leyen-tells-euronews">one of us and we want them in the European Union</a>.” </p>
<p>Russia, she explained, seeks to target “<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/02/24/eu-to-move-ahead-with-new-sanctions-on-russia-after-ukraine-invasion.html">stability in Europe and the whole international rules-based order</a>.”</p>
<p>European identity is determined by more than geographical location. Not long ago, European identity decidedly excluded Central and Eastern European states. </p>
<p>When Poland and Hungary joined the EU in the 2000s, for instance, the inclusion of them as true Europeans was <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1057/9780230514430_12">tenuous at best</a>. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1369183X.2018.1451308">prejudice against them</a> was exacerbated during the days of Brexit in 2020 when the U.K. was deciding whether to exit the European Union. Poles and other eastern Europeans living in Britain feared attacks from extremists groups. A <a href="https://www.britsoc.co.uk/about/latest-news/2017/may/eastern-europeans-brexit-and-racism/">spike in hate crimes</a> occurred shortly after the U.K. decided to leave. </p>
<p>In <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/oct/13/hate-crimes-eu-referendum-home-office-figures-confirm">July 2020 alone</a>, more than 5,000 hates crimes were reported, an increase of 40% from the same period the previous year. The <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/jan/10/poles-in-uk-fear-spike-in-hate-crimes-when-brexit-process-begins">vast majority </a> of them were directed against citizens from eastern European countries, with more attacks against Poles than against all other nationalities put together.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Two men and a woman dressed in business suits are walking underneath a large gold-framed painting that depicts a battle scene." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/452562/original/file-20220316-7987-hax7bh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/452562/original/file-20220316-7987-hax7bh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452562/original/file-20220316-7987-hax7bh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452562/original/file-20220316-7987-hax7bh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452562/original/file-20220316-7987-hax7bh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452562/original/file-20220316-7987-hax7bh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/452562/original/file-20220316-7987-hax7bh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">From left to right, European Council President Charles Michel, French President Emmanuel Macron and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen walking inside the Palace of Versailles, near Paris on Mar. 11, 2022.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/european-council-president-charles-michel-french-president-news-photo/1239103639?adppopup=true">Ludovic Marin/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Clearly, something has shifted in the European understanding of who counts as “European” in only the last few years. </p>
<p>This shift, I argue, can be traced to the <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2020/02/21/ukraine-six-years-after-the-maidan/">Maidan protests in Ukraine of 2013-2014</a>. Civil unrest and street demonstrations broke out shortly after Ukraine’s then-president <a href="https://fortune.com/2022/03/02/viktor-yanukovych-yanukovich-putin-put-back-in-power-ukraine-russia/">Viktor Yanukovych</a> refused to sign an agreement to further integrate the country with the EU. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ukraine-maidan-revolution-anniversary-russia-invasion/">Some 25,000</a> people camped out in Maidan, Kyiv’s central square, where they were beaten and shot at by police and government security forces. Dozens of activists were killed. Ultimately, the protests resulted in Yanukovych fleeing the country and new elections were held. </p>
<p>Since the country’s independence in 1991, Ukrainian governments have waged a conscious campaign that has been described by some as “<a href="https://www.batory.org.pl/ftp/program/forum/eu_ukraine/ukraine_eu_policy.pdf">declarative Europeanization</a>.” </p>
<p>The Zelenskyy government’s <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/05/20/ukraine-zelensky-corruption-russia-european-union/">ambitions to join the EU and NATO</a> reflect longstanding goals of <a href="https://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/ukraines-quest-for-europe-history-geography-identity">segments of Ukrainian society</a>. </p>
<p>Social movements do more than change political systems and laws – they <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09546553.2015.1127807">change and create identities</a>. </p>
<p>For Ukraine, the Euromaidan protests are often cited by experts as a <a href="https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/the-significance-euromaidan-for-ukraine-and-europe">watershed moment</a> in the post-independence identity struggle between those who felt kinship with Russia, and those who leaned toward Europe.</p>
<h2>‘We are European’</h2>
<p>The subsequent efforts for increased integration with the EU and, eventually, membership has also led Ukraine to promote its “Europeanness” inside the EU. </p>
<p>At the 2020 EU-Ukraine Summit, <a href="https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/zelenskyy-ukraine-wants-a-step-by-step-plan-towards-future-eu-membership/">President Volodymyr Zelenskyy made that clear</a>.</p>
<p>“Ukrainians are quintessentially European in terms of the values we believe in,” Zelenskyy said. “We are European in our instinctive embrace of freedom and in our deeply felt democratic principles.”</p>
<p>In short, the overwhelming and emotional European <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/european-favor-defense-ukraine-diplomacy-poll/">support for Ukraine</a> is not simply a result of the greater scale of Russian aggression compared to 2014. </p>
<p>It is also related to the growing perception inside the EU that <a href="https://ecfr.eu/publication/the-crisis-of-european-security-what-europeans-think-about-the-war-in-ukraine/">Ukraine is, indeed, European</a>. </p>
<p>The Ukrainian government is well aware of the importance of this perception and makes sure to emphasize that the invasion is <a href="https://fortune.com/2022/03/03/russia-ukraine-nuclear-power-plant-on-fire-zaporizhzhia-enerhodar-volodymyr-zelenskyy-end-of-europe/">taking place on European soil</a>. “Russian army is firing from all sides upon Zaporizhzhia NPP, the largest nuclear power plant in Europe,” Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, <a href="https://twitter.com/dmytrokuleba/status/1499543775240196099">tweeted on March 3</a>. </p>
<p>On March 8, Olena Zelenska, Ukraine’s First Lady, <a href="https://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/vidkritij-list-oleni-zelenskoyi-do-predstavnikiv-svitovih-zm-73437">wrote an impassioned plea</a> to the European states on President Zelenskyy’s official website.</p>
<p>“This is a war in Europe, close to the EU borders,” Zelenska wrote. “Ukraine is stopping the force that may aggressively enter your cities tomorrow under the pretext of saving civilians.”</p>
<h2>The European response</h2>
<p>EU officials themselves have until very recently <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/jcms.12447">been resistant</a> to the idea of Ukrainian membership, but the Russian invasion has pushed them in the opposite direction. </p>
<p>A member of the People’s Party in the Spanish Congress of Deputies <a href="https://www.gmfus.org/news/young-european-parliamentarians-views-ukraine-crisis">summed it up</a>: “This is the West against the bad guys, the illiberal regimes, and we should be on the right side of history.” </p>
<p>European right-wing parties have long used rhetoric that claims superiority of European civilization. In Western Europe, right-wing groups have until recently employed it against <a href="https://www.euractiv.com/section/justice-home-affairs/news/dutch-website-causes-stir-in-central-europe/">Central and Eastern Europeans</a> as well as non-Europeans. But they did not invent this discourse – it is firmly rooted in old European stereotypes of civilized Europe and the barbaric hinterlands.</p>
<p>[<em>Over 150,000 readers rely on The Conversation’s newsletters to understand the world.</em> <a href="https://memberservices.theconversation.com/newsletters/?source=inline-150ksignup">Sign up today</a>.]</p>
<p>With its latest invasion of a European country, Russia continues to be seen as barbaric while at the same time Ukraine is swiftly being embraced as part of the civilized European community, valiantly defending its independence on the frontlines against Russia, once again. </p>
<p>If Ukraine prevails and exists as an independent country when this conflict is over, Vladimir Putin may well have unintentionally pushed Ukraine firmly into the arms of Western Europe.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/178226/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anders C. Hardig does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Russian invasion has triggered an outpouring of support for Ukraine from European countries. Will Putin’s gamble backfire and ultimately push Ukraine firmly into the European fold?Anders C. Hardig, Senior Professorial Lecturer, American University School of International ServiceLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1209472019-07-25T16:41:00Z2019-07-25T16:41:00ZA French victory in the Tour de France would mean ‘cycling’s coming home’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/285722/original/file-20190725-136781-1n38qg0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=10%2C0%2C3372%2C2297&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/saintquentinfallavierfrance-jul-16the-french-national-champion-487812610">Radu Razvan/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>England’s football fans know what it is to have their hopes raised and then cruelly dashed as they watch their team outplayed and outmanoeuvred in a sport they consider to be their own. For English fans, this recurring nightmare is a biennial experience that coincides with the European Championships and the World Cup, and is mostly played out abroad. But pity the French, who must sit through their equivalent annually, when for three weeks each year for more than 30 years French riders in the Tour de France have struggled to impose themselves over their foreign rivals. All this in front of their home fans.</p>
<p>But this may be about to change. The young French rider <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cycling/49102194">Julian Alaphilippe</a> has worn the <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/cycling/0/tour-de-france-2019-rules-what-jersey-colours-how-toilet/">yellow jersey</a> for most of this year’s edition and his compatriot <a href="http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/pinot-its-up-to-thomas-and-bernal-to-attack-in-final-tour-de-france-stages/">Thibaut Pinot</a> is well placed to win the general classification. Should either rider win, it will be the first French victory in the Tour since 1985, when <a href="https://www.procyclingstats.com/rider/bernard-hinault">Bernard Hinault</a> won the general classification. Why, though, does this matter to a nation that, beyond the Tour, now pays less attention to cycling as a sport?</p>
<h2>Fed by national enmities</h2>
<p>The Tour may well be, as author Chris Sidwell titles his engaging history, <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13327928-a-race-for-madmen">a race for madmen</a>, but it was mainly conceived as a race for Frenchmen. (And this emphasis on men explains in no small part organisers’ lack of investment in the idea of a <em><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grande_Boucle_F%C3%A9minine_Internationale">Tour féminin</a></em>.) On the eve of the first Tour de France in July 1903, the race’s founder Henri Desgrange used <a href="https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k46241894.item">his editorial</a> in the sporting daily L’Auto (which at that time owned the race) to explain how it would unite the French people, teach them about their nation and reinvigorate them through the energetic example set by competitors.</p>
<p>The Tour was launched at a time of immense international rivalry, principally with Germany. The need to re-energise the nation stemmed in part from the memory of the humiliating defeat to <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Franco-German-War">Prussia in 1871</a>, and the need to prepare for a new war with a reunified Germany, as Christopher Thompson notes in his excellent <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/France-Cultural-History-Updated-Preface/dp/0520256301">The Tour de France, A Cultural History</a>. It was a means of forging a new national spirit and a new form of French masculinity. For Desgrange, an arch-conservative, the Tour represented a form of moral as well as physical hygiene, designed to discipline its riders and, through them, to set an example to the crowds that flocked to cycling events throughout the interwar years.</p>
<p>Worried by the dominance of commercial teams but also in order to ensure an overdue French victory, Desgrange introduced national teams in 1930, a formula that was only ended by a boycott by leading professional, commercial teams in the 1960s. The Tour thus became a contest between France and its cycling neighbours, individual victories being shared by France, Belgium and Italy with occasional incursions by Luxembourg and Switzerland.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/285740/original/file-20190725-136786-erkbot.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/285740/original/file-20190725-136786-erkbot.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285740/original/file-20190725-136786-erkbot.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285740/original/file-20190725-136786-erkbot.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285740/original/file-20190725-136786-erkbot.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285740/original/file-20190725-136786-erkbot.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285740/original/file-20190725-136786-erkbot.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The final Tour de France stage on the Champs Elysee; here Chris Froome rides to victory in 2014, this year a Frenchman?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/paris-france-july-24-2016-road-458605333">Frederic Legrand - COMEO/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A lens through which to see France</h2>
<p>At different times, the Tour de France has been used to say different things about France. The 1947 tour, for example, was a way of highlighting both France’s suffering in World War II and its resurgence. Later, and as the Tour expanded and drew in riders from Australia, the US and the countries of the former Soviet bloc, the inclusion of <em>grands départs</em> in other European nations, such as Brussels in 1958 (the year after the <a href="http://www.europarl.europa.eu/about-parliament/en/in-the-past/the-parliament-and-the-treaties/treaty-of-rome">Treaty of Rome</a>), suggested France’s place at the heart of the European project. But the Tour always comes home and, since 1975, has always finished on the Champs Elysées.</p>
<p>French victors have largely come from the rural and urban working classes, from <a href="https://www.procyclingstats.com/rider/antonin-magne">Antonin Magne</a>, the son of farmers from the Cantal region who won in 1931 and 1934, to the legendary five-times winner <a href="https://www.procyclingstats.com/rider/bernard-hinault">Bernard Hinault</a>, son of a Breton railway worker. The unpopularity of one of France’s greatest winners, <a href="https://theprologue.com/7-things-you-didnt-know-about-jacques-anquetil/">Jacques Anquetil</a>, among many French cycling fans of the 1960s, was due largely to his aristocratic airs. Nicknamed “<em>Maître Jacques</em>” (Master Jack), a title that suggests both his achievements and aloofness, he suffered through his rivalry with <a href="https://www.procyclingstats.com/rider/raymond-poulidor">Raymond Poulidor</a>, a farmer’s son from Creuse who finished on the podium eight times but never won a single edition.</p>
<p>Similarly, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2010/sep/01/laurent-fignon-obituary">Laurent Fignon</a> could never match the popularity of Hinault in the 1980s, despite being dubbed his successor. Bespectacled and thus nicknamed “the professor”, Fignon suffered the indignity of losing the yellow jersey and the Tour itself to the American Greg LeMond in the final stage in 1989. LeMond’s victory was in part due to his <a href="http://www.220triathlon.com/gear/bike/components/what-are-aerobars/10772.html">use of aerobars</a> that created a lower profile. Retrospectively, it is seen as having ushered in a new phase, dominated by high-end technology and globalisation. (One commentator at the time in fact put it down to the drag created by <a href="https://sportspoetssociety.blogspot.com/2017/02/the-divine-ponytail.html">Fignon’s ponytail</a>).</p>
<p>For French critics of the Tour, the doping scandals of the 1990s and the Lance Armstrong affair are the logical extension of this process. The domination of the Tour by the largely non-French-speaking Team Sky also fitted the narrative of a sport that has lost its way thanks to rampant commercialisation and overseas investment.</p>
<p>A win by Alaphilippe or, more likely, Pinot could begin to restore France’s faith in its Tour. Both offer a familiar story, one that fits the tradition of French cycling. Both are from the depths of rural France dear to a certain vision of the nation, and what opponents of globalisation see as its real values. Pinot especially is known for maintaining his <a href="https://rmcsport.bfmtv.com/mediaplayer/video/sur-les-traces-de-thibaut-pinot-839575.html">rural roots</a>. So a victory by either will go some way to ending the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJqimlFcJsM">30 years of hurt</a> French cycling fans have felt since Fignon’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zzjv1XpGJnc">dramatic failure</a>. England fans, on the other hand, are still waiting.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/120947/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Martin Hurcombe does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>If you think English footy fans have it hard losing in the semis in far away away tournaments, imagine being French and losing the Tour de France on your home turf every year.Martin Hurcombe, Professor of French Studies, School of Modern Languages, University of BristolLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1170522019-05-21T19:55:36Z2019-05-21T19:55:36ZIs there such thing as a ‘European identity’?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/275431/original/file-20190520-69192-18csgul.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=42%2C39%2C2002%2C1306&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Is there such a thing as an European identity?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://foto.wuestenigel.com/screwed-up-european-union-flag-on-black-background/?utm_source=47318179001&utm_campaign=FlickrDescription&utm_medium=link">Marco Verch/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The outcome of the UK’s 2016 referendum on EU membership has sent shockwaves across Europe. Among other impacts, it has prompted debates around the issues whether a <a href="http://euroacademia.eu/presentation/european-culture-as-a-mirage/">“European culture”</a> or a “European identity” actually exist or whether national identities still dominate.</p>
<p>It would be wrong, in my opinion, to write off the identification of various people with “Europe”. This identification has been the outcome of a long process, particularly in the second half of the 20th century, involving both the policies of the European Economic Community (EEC) and EU institutions and grassroots initiatives. Cross-border youth mobility since 1945 is a key example of the former: it was often developed by groups that were not formally linked to the EEC/EU. They still helped develop <a href="https://www.press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/B/bo25400340.html">an attachment to “Europe”</a> in several countries of the continent.</p>
<p>As political scientist Ronald Inglehart <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1468-5965.1971.tb00641.x">showed in the 1960s</a>, the younger people were, and the more they travelled, the more likely they were to support an ever-closer political union in Europe. More recently, <a href="https://www.esn.org/erasmus">Erasmus exchange programmes</a> have also helped develop forms of identification with Europe.</p>
<h2>Feeling “European”</h2>
<p>Simultaneously, feeling “European” and subscribing to a national identity have been far from mutually exclusive. Numerous West Germans in the 1980s were passionate about a reunified Germany being part of a <a href="https://www.worldcat.org/title/in-europes-name-germany-and-the-divided-continent/oclc/28375767">politically united Europe</a>.</p>
<p>Attachment to “Europe” has also been a key component of regional nationalism in several European countries in the last three decades, such as the Scottish or the Catalan nationalism. A rallying cry for Scottish nationalists from the 1980s on has been <a href="https://edinburghuniversitypress.com/book-the-modern-snp.html">“independence in Europe”</a>, and it continues to be the case today. Indeed, for the 2019 European Parliament elections, the primary slogan of the centre-left Scottish National Party (SNP), currently in power, is <a href="https://www.snp.org/eu/">“Scotland’s future belongs in Europe”</a>.</p>
<h2>Diverse agendas</h2>
<p>What requires further attention is the significance attached to the notion of European identity. Diverse social and political groups have used it, ranging from the far left to the far right, and the meaning they attach varies. For the SNP, it is compatible with the EU membership of Scotland. The party combines the latter with an inclusive understanding of the Scottish nation, which is open to people who have been born elsewhere in the globe, but live in Scotland.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/LXV127hQehI?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Speech by SNP leader and first minister of Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon, on July 2, 2016.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>By contrast, Germany’s far-right AfD party (<em>Alternative für Deutschland</em>, Alternative for Germany) is critical of the EU, yet identifies with “Europe”, which it explicitly contrasts with Islam. A clear example is a one of the <a href="https://www.apnews.com/e4a3dca3c7464ca3925e4fe67afda5a6">party’s posters for the upcoming elections</a> that asks “Europeans” to vote for AfD so that the EU doesn’t become “Eurabia”.</p>
<p>Identification with Europe does exist, but it is a complex phenomenon, framed in several ways. and does not necessarily imply support for the EU. Similarly, European identities are not necessarily mutually exclusive with national identities. Finally, both the former and the latter identities may rest upon stereotypes against people regarded as “non-European”.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/117052/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nikolaos Papadogiannis ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>Does an “European culture” or a “European identity” actually exist?Nikolaos Papadogiannis, Lecturer in Modern and Contemporary History, Bangor UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1039582018-09-27T16:23:54Z2018-09-27T16:23:54ZDebate: Emmanuel Macron’s European university, an IDEA for moving Europe forward<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/238162/original/file-20180926-48653-5nwvzc.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C5%2C1280%2C712&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Humboldt-Universit%C3%A4t_zu_Berlin_04.JPG">Wikimedia</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In September 2017 Emmanuel Macron revived the idea of the European university during his <a href="http://international.blogs.ouest-france.fr/archive/2017/09/29/macron-sorbonne-verbatim-europe-18583.html">Sorbonne speech</a> on the future of Europe. Twenty of such European universities should emerge until 2024. Composed of four to six higher education institutions in at least three EU member states, European universities should develop joint-degree and executive-education programs, as well as ambitious research and innovation projects. An integrated and coordinated curriculum across several countries taught in different languages should enable and encourage students to move between participating universities instead of staying at one institution.</p>
<p>Several institutions and initiatives can be seen as predecessors of the European university, such as the <a href="https://sciencebusiness.net/news/deals-are-coming-4eu-alliance-signals-start-match-making-among-european-universities">4EU Alliance</a>, the <a href="http://eurotech-universities.eu/">EuroTech Alliance</a>, <a href="http://www.escpeurope.eu/">ESCP Europe</a>, the <a href="https://www.dfh-ufa.org/fr/">Franco-German University</a>, and obviously the <a href="http://ec.europa.eu/programmes/erasmus-plus/node_en">Erasmus+</a> program. The first official call for applications for the European university is planned to take place this fall. There are at least four pitfalls to avoid in order for the European university to best fulfil its intended purpose: to educate future Europeans, dedicated to European values, and able to work across national borders and cultures within and beyond the European Union.</p>
<h2>Identity</h2>
<p>EU higher education needs a European identity. Currently diplomas are only national. A European university graduate could thus obtain a French, German, or Italian diploma (or several of those in the case of double or triple degrees) but s/he will not be able to receive a European one. Symbolically, this is a hard sell – especially for students coming from outside Europe: a Chinese proudly studying at a European university would return with a national diploma from, say, the Netherlands.</p>
<p>Not being able to deliver a European diploma is hindering the development of a European identity and a sense of European-ness among its citizens, an identified aim of the European Commission: <a href="http://www.culturalfoundation.eu/library/education-and-culture-are-the-key-to-the-future">“Education and culture are the key to the future”</a> (Jean-Claude Juncker). To create a European degree, some seemingly simple yet in reality highly complex questions need to be answered: Who will deliver such a diploma? Who decides upon its requirements? Who will accredit that these requirements have been met?</p>
<h2>Diversity</h2>
<p>To gain <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_intelligence">cultural intelligence</a>, one necessarily needs to be exposed to cultural diversity. This is often easier said than done, because the teaching language can cause some serious headache. English might allow for a cultural mix in the lecture hall if the English level of all students and professors were sufficient. To achieve this, some more intensive language training during secondary education would be needed in several EU countries. The question becomes even more complex if one wants to reach trilingualism. Aware of this issue, the <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=2ahUKEwidtb_T36XdAhVS_qQKHYeeCzEQFjAAegQIABAC&url=http%3A%2F%2Fdata.consilium.europa.eu%2Fdoc%2Fdocument%2FST-9229-2018-ADD-2%2Fen%2Fpdf&usg=AOvVaw3Ukjj5p9l12eNdHfvYBwrO">Commission demands</a> that any European should finish secondary education with a “good knowledge” of at least two foreign languages.</p>
<p>Next to this cultural element, a second type of diversity needs to be considered at a European university: social diversity. Moving from one country to another and living in different cities within the scope of one’s studies is not cheap and there is a danger that only wealthier students could afford to do so. This obviously would be contradictive to European values and therefore solutions need to be found. Here, questions of scholarships, student jobs and loans will need to be addressed.</p>
<h2>Essence</h2>
<p>It goes without writing that a European university should teach European specificities in most academic areas. At <a href="http://www.escpeurope.eu/">ESCP Europe</a> Business School, for example, where all students move across Europe during their program, a European approach to management is taught defined as <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0263237314000425">“a cross-cultural, societal management approach based on interdisciplinary principles”</a>. Of course, this is easier in some areas than in others such as mathematics. But also here some common requirements could be found: For example, <a href="https://www.hrk.de/hrk-at-a-glance/executive-board/peter-andre-alt/">Peter-André Alt</a>, president of the German Rectors’ Conference suggests that texts from thinkers such as <a href="https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/marx-locke-and-rousseau-key-macrons-european-universities">Locke, Marx and Rousseau</a> should be mandatory readings at any European university.</p>
<p>Additionally, one could imagine that all students at a European university need to attend a course on European institutions and their functioning. In this line of thinking, the European Commission even suggests that specific attention (and budget) should be paid to higher-education institutions that <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&ved=2ahUKEwjr0I3U4aXdAhUosKQKHfFaADEQFjABegQICRAC&url=https%3A%2F%2Fec.europa.eu%2Fcommission%2Fsites%2Fbeta-political%2Ffiles%2Fcommunication-strengthening-european-identity-education-culture_en.pdf&usg=AOvVaw1XMJNTzcVJGgYC-ovCLnCB">“deliver education on European issues”</a>. Examples here are the <a href="https://www.eui.eu/">European University Institute</a> in Florence, the <a href="https://www.coleurope.eu/">College of Europe</a> in Bruges, or the <a href="https://www.eipa.eu/">European Institute of Public Administration</a> in Maastricht.</p>
<h2>Attractiveness</h2>
<p>Finally, European universities should be attractive for the brightest students. European politics might make this complicated. Well-known brands such as the <a href="https://www.hu-berlin.de/en?set_language=en">Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin</a> or <a href="http://www.sorbonne-universite.fr/en">Sorbonne Université</a> should participate. <a href="http://www.kurtdeketelaere.be/en/kurt">Kurt Deketelaere</a>, Secretary-General of the <a href="https://www.leru.org/">League of European Research Universities</a>, states that European universities should showcase the “excellence” in many universities across Europe and continues: <a href="https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/leru-head-warns-against-mediocrity-eu-university-network">“I hope […] not going to end up with mediocre institutions”</a> forming a cluster as they have the right geographical location and tick the right political boxes.</p>
<p>With respect to participating countries, the plan is to only have the <a href="https://www.erasmusplus.org.uk/participating-countries">Erasmus+ countries</a> be eligible. Thus countries like the post-Brexit United Kingdom and Switzerland might fall short – a pity when thinking of brands like <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxbridge">Oxbridge</a> or <a href="https://www.ethz.ch/en.html">ETH Zurich</a>. Also, some countries’ languages might be more attractive and easier accessible than others. Obviously no country within the EU should be hindered to participate. Still, when choosing candidates, pragmatism should rule over pure EU technocracy. For example, smaller countries could participate in clusters with universities from two larger ones, and this, notably in domains they dispose of particular expertise: Estonia, <a href="https://www.wired.co.uk/article/estonia-e-resident">Europe’s digitalisation expert</a>, could thus lead a European university in the area of digital transformation.</p>
<h2>An IDEA worth thinking about</h2>
<p>It is vital that the objective of the European university be clear. Some voices talk about the need to develop excellence clusters to be part of international university rankings, such as <a href="http://www.shanghairanking.com/index.html">Shanghai</a>. Others see a potential to help less-developed regions across Europe or to reduce inequalities between the North/South and West/East of Europe. However, successful initiatives usually have one primary focus. And if the European university is supposed to generate truly European, multilingual and culturally intelligent citizens open to the world, it will be necessary to put this purpose over politics and technocracy and follow the aforementioned <strong>IDEA</strong>: <strong>I</strong>dentity – <strong>D</strong>iversity – <strong>E</strong>ssence – <strong>A</strong>ttractiveness.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/103958/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andreas Kaplan ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>To succeed, Europe needs citizens who are multilingual and open to the world. EU-level universities can lead the way with four key concepts: Identity, Diversity, Essence and AttractivenessAndreas Kaplan, Rector, ESCP Business SchoolLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/762322017-04-18T15:29:16Z2017-04-18T15:29:16ZAll aboard for a train ticket to bring Europe together again<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/165611/original/image-20170418-32703-1xsmpwt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">from www.shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In many countries, turning 18 marks the transition into adulthood. With it comes the delights and difficulties of all new rights and responsibilities, from voting to drinking alcohol. Now, there’s talk that it could also be the beginning of an international adventure.</p>
<p>Last year, members of the European Parliament <a href="http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/news-room/20160930STO44534/meps-want-to-give-free-rail-passes-to-young-europeans">debated whether</a> young Europeans should be given a free <a href="http://www.interrail.eu/">Interrail</a> pass on their 18th birthday. The initiative was welcomed by representatives from across the political spectrum, and attracted grassroots support from <a href="https://www.change.org/p/europa-retten-schickt-die-junge-generation-auf-reisen-freeinterrail-eu-commission-junckereu?">over 33,000 petitioners</a>. Although the idea has yet to become an official policy, the European Commission has <a href="http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/news-room/20160930STO44534/meps-want-to-give-free-rail-passes-to-young-europeans">shown interest</a>.</p>
<p>Since Interrail launched in 1972, it has given young Europeans the opportunity to travel at low cost across most of the continent, including countries that don’t belong to the European Economic Community or the European Union. At the moment, a monthly Interrail pass costs between €43 and €493, depending on how far and how frequently one travels. Around 300,000 young Europeans use this programme <a href="http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/news-room/20160930STO44534/meps-want-to-give-free-rail-passes-to-young-europeans">each year</a>, but if the free Interrail pass initiative is successful, it could attract a sizeable proportion of the <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/interrail-passes-free-eu-parliament-debate-europe-train-tickets-a7339466.html">5.4m 18-year-old Europeans</a> annually.</p>
<p>The argument goes that underwriting Interrail passes for young adults is good value for money, because it helps the next generation of European residents to experience and understand other cultures. In theory, meeting and making friends with people from other European countries will strengthen cultural and political ties across the continent. Yet this optimistic outlook deserves closer scrutiny: we shouldn’t simply assume that young Europeans will take up the offer, or that travel will build a common European identity. </p>
<h2>Destination: Europe and beyond</h2>
<p>This is not the first time that travel has been touted as a way of fostering good relations across Europe. From the ashes of World War II, <a href="http://www.palgrave.com/us/book/9781137469892">diverse initiatives</a> sprung up to promote reconciliation through youth tourism. For example, the International Youth Hostel Federation successfully persuaded European governments to ease restrictions on youth travel by changing or getting rid of passport, visa and currency requirements.</p>
<p>Such initiatives proved attractive, and young people increasingly engaged in cross-border travel. By the 1960s, the majority of people aged 20 to 24 in West Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands had visited <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1468-5965.1971.tb00641.x/abstract">two or more</a> “foreign” countries. This trend continued in the following decades: in Germany, at the beginning of the 1990s, 17 to 19-year-olds <a href="http://www.berghahnbooks.com/title/SchildtBetween">had visited</a> seven to eight countries on average, both within and outside of Europe.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/165609/original/image-20170418-32700-xsc1na.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/165609/original/image-20170418-32700-xsc1na.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165609/original/image-20170418-32700-xsc1na.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165609/original/image-20170418-32700-xsc1na.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=361&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165609/original/image-20170418-32700-xsc1na.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165609/original/image-20170418-32700-xsc1na.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165609/original/image-20170418-32700-xsc1na.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Young hearts ride free.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Giorgis Charalampidis</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But since then, the financial crisis in several European countries, together with <a href="http://whytravel.org/fewer-young-people-in-europe-are-travelling-decline-goes-against-global-travel-trends/">high youth unemployment</a> rates, have apparently taken their toll. Recent market research <a href="http://www.4hoteliers.com/news/story/14930">has shown that</a> the number of foreign trips by young Europeans has fallen by around 10% over the decade to 2015. Based on these observations, it seems that initiatives which make travel cheaper and easier can encourage young Europeans to venture across the continent – and that the time is ripe to introduce another such policy. </p>
<h2>Ever closer union?</h2>
<p>The question remains, whether travelling would strengthen cultural or political ties across Europe. There is some basis for such a claim: young supporters of European unification in 1950 <a href="http://www.wallstein-verlag.de/9783835311732-europabilder-im-20-jahrhundert.html">asserted that</a> “our passport is the European flag”. It was not just youngsters who were already pro-European, that travelled across the continent. According to <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1468-5965.1971.tb00641.x/abstract">a study by Ronald Inglehart</a> in the 1960s, the younger people were, and the more they travelled, the more likely they were to subscribe to the idea of an ever closer political union in Europe – though this <a href="http://www.palgrave.com/us/book/9781137469892">did not necessarily mean</a> that they approved of the existing European institutions.</p>
<p>Yet, historically, youth tourism has brought about frictions as well as friendships. For example, my own <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0022009415619688">research shows</a> moments of cultural misunderstanding in youth hostels as far back as the mid-1960s, when staff at one West German youth hostel bemoaned that many French guests drank too much alcohol. Other scholars <a href="http://press.princeton.edu/titles/4833.html">have investigated</a> why local men in Greece in the 1980s sought out women from Northern Europe, including young ones, in tourist resorts to have sex with. Those men saw themselves as part of a poorer society, and sought to “sexually conquer” women tourists from richer countries, in order to take “revenge”. </p>
<p>These experiences show that youth tourism has the potential to deepen <a href="https://research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk/handle/10023/7665">divides in Europe</a> by playing on some negative stereotypes.</p>
<h2>Leaving the station</h2>
<p>A free Interrail pass could increase the number of young people travelling across the continent. But if the European Commission is looking to build stronger ties across Europe, this scheme won’t necessarily be enough to challenge negative stereotypes, let alone save the European idea. The commission will need to seek out other ways to maximise the impact of the scheme. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/165610/original/image-20170418-32713-b6knk8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/165610/original/image-20170418-32713-b6knk8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=459&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165610/original/image-20170418-32713-b6knk8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=459&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165610/original/image-20170418-32713-b6knk8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=459&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165610/original/image-20170418-32713-b6knk8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=577&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165610/original/image-20170418-32713-b6knk8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=577&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/165610/original/image-20170418-32713-b6knk8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=577&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Poser.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Giorgis Charalampidis</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Getting young tourists to narrate their Interrail experiences on social media could help achieve that. It wouldn’t be difficult: those who take up the pass could be asked to contribute to a blog, Instagram page or Facebook group. This would create a place for young travellers to describe how they feel about the people of different nationalities, ethnicities (including migrants) and genders they encounter on their travels, and where residents are given the chance to respond. </p>
<p>This would present an opportunity for all to honestly reflect on moments they shared together – both enjoyable and uncomfortable. Ideally, the commission would encourage all to think critically about the prejudices against one another that circulate throughout the media. Travel and the use of social media won’t eliminate racism. But they could well help people from across the continent to empathise with one another – and that is certainly a goal worth funding.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/76232/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nikolaos Papadogiannis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Turning 18 could be your ticket to a European adventure – literally.Nikolaos Papadogiannis, Lecturer in Modern and Contemporary History, Bangor UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/747772017-03-20T12:59:41Z2017-03-20T12:59:41ZThe European Republic: a bold vision to save the union<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/161562/original/image-20170320-9140-4gz357.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ACignani_Ratto_di_Europa_detail.jpg">Carlo Cignani/Wikimedia Commons</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The outstanding successes of the European Union are its historic contribution to <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/2012/">peace and reconciliation</a> across the continent, its post-Cold War role in the ongoing transformation of 14 former dictatorships into <a href="https://www.vox.com/2016/7/19/12216018/eu-eastern-europe-brexit">democratic market economies</a>, and the legal framework it has produced for its citizens. That framework is far from perfect but it protects consumers, workers and the environment, and underpins the <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/growth/single-market_en">single European market</a> – an economy larger than that of the US and <a href="https://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/stats/Economy/GDP">twice as large</a> as China’s.</p>
<p>This is all at risk. The union may not survive a series of major threats. Its institutional structures need reform – the decades-long process of intergovernmental haggling is not fit for purpose. Public confidence has also drained away. Now, less than a third of Europeans <a href="http://bit.ly/1SSQXw5">“trust”</a> the union and euroscepticism has become a continent-wide trend. Marine Le Pen’s Front National topped the poll in the 2014 European Parliament elections in France with <a href="https://www.europarl.europa.eu/elections2014-results/en/country-results-fr-2014.html#table03">25% of the vote</a>. One third of MEPs belong to <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-28107633">eurosceptic parties</a>.</p>
<p>Nor has Europe dealt adequately with the <a href="https://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-16-829_en.htm">migration crisis</a> that is placing an appalling burden on Italy and Greece. Only Germany and Sweden have stepped up to the plate, and the European Commission has struggled to gain acceptance for a common, proportional response to accommodating refugees. Meanwhile, the <a href="https://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2015/11/disagreement-europe">euro crisis</a> rumbles on. The austerity inflicted on Greece and others has failed to resolve fundamental weaknesses, and worse, exacerbated <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/63d8b354-ed5e-11e6-930f-061b01e23655">wealth disparities</a>.</p>
<p>Now there is Brexit. The departure of one of Europe’s three largest economies and its most important military power is a crisis in itself. Britain might just survive Brexit, becoming a right-wing Conservative dreamland, a low-tax friend to corporate elites in which a squeezed public sector offers crumbs to the poor and weak. But can the EU survive? Facing so many existential threats, what can be done?</p>
<p>EU governments must do what no British government has ever done – explain the benefits of the European Union to their people. They need to talk about everything from securing peace and promoting human rights to removing mobile roaming charges and cleaning up <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jan/11/whats-eu-ever-done-us">beaches and rivers</a>.</p>
<p>Reform must address institutional weaknesses and begin a process towards constructing a genuine a European Republic. This must reflect citizens’ priorities, be democratic, participatory and responsive to regional needs. It must encourage social entrepreneurship, and involve NGOs, grass roots cooperatives, and green and youth movements. A European Republic must commit to defending public goods such as fair trade, human rights, the environment, and human security.</p>
<p>An EU meltdown would pitch Europe backwards towards interstate competition, rivalry, and even the conflict it was initially set up to prevent.</p>
<h2>After Brexit</h2>
<p>In <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/world/europe/europe-far-right-political-parties-listy.html?_r=0">Europe</a> and the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/feb/04/white-house-agenda-collapse-global-order-war">US</a>, populist politicians peddle simple solutions to complex global problems. Europe must find its own popular vision. It must articulate an alternative to nostalgia and nationalism, which too easily descend into xenophobia and barbarism. Reform will take time, but unless the conversation starts now, it will never happen.</p>
<p>The union once had a <a href="https://adria.panda.org/en/campaigns/natureup/?277870/Jacques-Delors-Restoring-a-Europe-built-on-values-for-its-youth">vision</a> for a federal, social Europe. This was unachievable because of the primacy of intergovernmental bargaining based on national self interest rather than the common good. Only a shared vision that understands Europe’s global weakness can build on its strengths.</p>
<p>The next French president (presumably <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-france-election-idUSKBN16Q0J8">Emmanuel Macron</a>, not Le Pen) must forge a political union with Germany – a genuine economic union, with common taxation. The vision should be for a European Republic of democratic and cosmopolitan citizenship. Other states may join this crusade for a social Europe based on solidarity among European peoples.</p>
<p>The EU needs a strengthened European Parliament to be the principal legislative forum, backed by a reviewing chamber of regional and sectoral interests. State veto on community policy should be abolished with qualified majority voting in all areas.</p>
<p>Law making should promote environmental sustainability as the absolute priority and a condition of World Trade Organisation agreements. A reformed EU can once again be the <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1468-5965.00353/pdf">soft power</a> that shapes policy in other jurisdictions, raising the profile of human rights as a political and borderless issue, and insisting on product and labour standards for goods exported to Europe. It must also commit to common defence and security, fully compatible with, and contributing to, <a href="https://www.egmontinstitute.be/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/SPB55-Summit-of-our-Ambition1.pdf">NATO</a>. Free-riding on the US is no longer feasible. Britain, out of self interest, must engage in this. </p>
<p>The United Kingdom has long been Europe’s awkward partner. It has been the staunchest advocate of the neoliberal ideology that has undermined social Europe, the strongest defender of tax havens and the most resistant to common taxation. It has, with France, maintained the worst elements of the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jun/21/waste-cash-leavers-in-out-land-subsidie">Common Agricultural Policy</a>. The UK opposed the political union that should have underpinned economic and monetary union. It has been the most vocal opponent of common defence, so perpetuating duplication and waste through vanity projects and protective procurement in the defence industrial sector, and thereby undermining NATO capability and European security. </p>
<p>With the UK out of the way, the union can become what it should be – a genuine European Republic. Trump and Putin want Europe to fail. That alone should focus minds.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/74777/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Simon Sweeney does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Some radical thinking is in order if the union is to overcome the current crisis.Simon Sweeney, Senior Lecturer in International Political Economy and Business, University of YorkLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/694822017-01-31T09:09:33Z2017-01-31T09:09:33ZNot long ago, there was a British European identity – so what happened?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/154739/original/image-20170130-7675-1rsiwd6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Can Britain be European without the EU?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/european-union-united-kingdom-flags-waving-363077531?src=BYFHItCl-Uwe-UFdN4mgyQ-1-12">www.shutterstock.com/Fresh Stock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>National identity is a double-edged sword. It can give a <a href="http://www.historytoday.com/robert-colls/british-national-identity">shared sense of belonging</a> to something bigger; inspiring and helping people to band together. It can equally lead down a path of mistrust, exclusion, and xenophobia. In times of change it can be hard to maintain the balance, and is no doubt something many Britons are struggling with post-EU referendum.</p>
<p>In <a href="http://time.com/4636141/theresa-may-brexit-speech-transcript/">her big Brexit speech</a>, Prime Minister Theresa May spoke of how she wanted Britain to be “truly global”: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>… the best friend and neighbour to our European partners, but a country that reaches beyond the borders of Europe too. A country that gets out into the world to build relationships with old friends and new allies alike.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Certainly a sentiment that many were hoping for, but it was not so long ago that Britons were encouraged to realise the value in being part of the European family. Indeed, in the wake of World War II, the idea that both British and European identity should be embraced made an enormous amount of sense. </p>
<h2>Lessons from the past</h2>
<p>Since the war, national affairs have seen many peaks and troughs, but nothing compared to the crisis currently unfolding. Though a global view should not be ignored, we still need to cultivate and nurture European-ness going forward, especially when the union bonds are cut.</p>
<p>I recently came across <a href="http://www.britishpathe.com/video/the-people-next-door-reel-1/">news footage from 1948</a> which sheds some interesting light on how British-European identity developed. Among other things, the film features a group of British children, orphaned by the war, boarding a ship for a sponsored holiday to Belgium. The narrator explains that through such travels, “our children will be more than British: they’ll be Europeans”. </p>
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<p>In the period after World War II, insular nationalist perspectives were largely discredited. Extreme nationalism, after all, had been <a href="https://www.mtholyoke.edu/%7Eghost20j/classweb/ghost20j/Perpetrator%20Motivations%20Behind%20the%20Holocaust%20German%20Nationalism.html">one of the root causes</a> of the war. Many viewed integration and fostering a sense of European identity as a way to <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/can-europe-make-it/david-held-kyle-mcnally/europe-eu-and-european-identity">move beyond nationalism</a>. It was a chance for Europe to start afresh, with a renewed political, economic and social order.</p>
<p>This European consciousness worked well as a replacement for discredited nationalism in places such as divided Germany. However, in countries with less compromised pasts and presents, such as Britain, it had to be actively fostered and promoted. </p>
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<p>Citizen-led initiatives such as cultural exchange schemes, student mobility projects, <a href="http://www.alda-europe.eu/plus/public/publications/71-CITIES-final-publication-EN-web-31012011.pdf">town twinning</a>, and cross-national professional organisations <a href="http://isj.org.uk/the-ideology-of-europeanism-and-europes-migrant-other/">were part of a wider movement</a> that helped to build a sense of European belonging for ordinary British people. It is not a coincidence that many of these programmes focused on the young: here was a future-oriented vision of an emerging British citizen who would see him or herself as belonging to, and leading in, a democratic European project. </p>
<h2>Identity in the nuclear age</h2>
<p>This is not to imply that the British government had a straightforward relationship with European integration, however. Though Winston Churchill called for the <a href="http://www.cfr.org/europe/churchills-united-states-europe-speech-zurich/p32536">“United States of Europe”</a> in 1946, Clement Attlee’s government, which came to power in 1945, was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jun/21/brexit-euroscepticism-history">opposed to integration</a>.</p>
<p>By 1948, perspectives were changing. The Cold War was developing in earnest; the US was <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Q3S_63sGvPYC&pg=PT103&lpg=PT103&dq=america+favoured+%22united+states+of+europe%22&source=bl&ots=EJldeNctkD&sig=0g2TWvreX8DPNcalttlI4hyRMl8&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwic6qWbpbzRAhWKDcAKHbmhAtE4ChDoAQg5MAU#v=onepage&q=america%20favoured%20%22united%20states%20of%20europe%22&f=false">increasingly in favour</a> of a federalist structure for western Europe, to act as a bulwark against the Soviet sphere. The May 1948 Hague Congress prompted considerable <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Q3S_63sGvPYC&pg=PT103&lpg=PT103&dq=america+favoured+%22united+states+of+europe%22&source=bl&ots=EJldeNctkD&sig=0g2TWvreX8DPNcalttlI4hyRMl8&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwic6qWbpbzRAhWKDcAKHbmhAtE4ChDoAQg5MAU#v=onepage&q=america%20favoured%20%22united%20states%20of%20europe%22&f=false">enthusiasm for the European project</a>, both among policymakers and in popular opinion. Greater European integration was increasingly seen as an answer to national vulnerability in the nuclear age. </p>
<p>It was in this context that the orphaned British children of the newsreel made their voyage to Belgium, to become a new breed of European citizen. If these children are still alive, they would now be in their eighties – and potentially part of the 64% of British voters over 65 years of age that <a href="https://yougov.co.uk/news/2016/06/27/how-britain-voted/">chose to leave the EU</a>.</p>
<h2>Fostering identity</h2>
<p>You may be asking at this point what went wrong? It is not easy to say whether the social and cultural projects aimed at fostering a collective sense of European identity were a success or not. In 1948, they were experiencing a boom moment, and though some initiatives dried up over time – not many orphans are still sent for holidays in Belgium – others, like the <a href="http://www.erasmusprogramme.com/">ERASMUS student and teacher exchange programme</a>, founded 30 years ago, have flourished.</p>
<p>If integration programmes had more effectively reached areas where the Leave campaign had the greatest influence, would the referendum have been different? There is no research to back this up at present, but it is an interesting point to consider.</p>
<p>European integration was a response: an endeavour built on the shared desire for cooperation, unity, and protection from the threat of war. Without it, Britain will truly be diminished. Though there is nothing wrong with the global outlook that May suggested, neither should we rush to undo the years of European integration.</p>
<p>The British European spirit is still alive and can thrive, if there is commitment to build it. Just look at what happened when English astronaut Tim Peake went to the International Space Station on behalf of the European Space Agency: Britain responded with a great swell of pride. Indeed, the head of the European Space Agency said that it had delivered a fresh boost of “<a href="https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjM-YLS6OnRAhUnK8AKHdBSBMEQFggcMAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ibtimes.co.uk%2Ftim-peake-esa-boss-claims-british-astronaut-represents-european-spirit-1566098&usg=AFQjCNEoVjLB9OzVM_h-teJ8DfnD_aMWJQ">European spirit</a>”.</p>
<p>Perhaps the best way forward is fostering European spirit through such large-scale projects, rather than community initiatives. But without trying, Britons will never know.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/69482/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rebecca Clifford receives funding from the British Academy and the Leverhulme Trust. </span></em></p>Children in the 1940s were brought up believing that European identity was the way forward – so what went wrong?Rebecca Clifford, Associate Professor of Modern History, Swansea UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/387562016-06-17T09:39:44Z2016-06-17T09:39:44ZHow the young have forged European identity – from the Grand Tour to the Erasmus generation<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/125765/original/image-20160608-3513-1rxg132.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Taking in Lisbon on a student exchange. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/iscteiul/5406737985/sizes/l">ISCTE-IUL - Instituto Universitário de Lisboa/Flickr.com</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>As a wave of <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-36471989">Eurosceptic feeling</a> continues to spread across Europe, few voices are extolling the educational and cultural benefits of political union on the continent. Yet many of today’s young Europeans, as their ancestors did before them, see the European Union’s ability to widen their eyes to transnational forms of identity. </p>
<p>A 2015 <a href="https://brusselsdiplomatic.com/2015/03/06/erasmus-generation-survey-young-people-urge-eu-to-be-more-united-on-the-world-and-less-bureaucratic-europe-erasmus-youth/">survey</a> by the Brussels-based think tank ThinkYoung found that what young people regard as “the most significant achievements of the EU” are “peace and stability in Europe and the right of EU citizens to travel, to live or study in another member state”. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://ec.europa.eu/programmes/erasmus-plus/node_en">Erasmus student exchange scheme</a>, through which EU students can spend time studying in another member state, is a precious tool towards the creation of a postmodern world. The late Italian scholar and writer Umberto Eco <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/jan/26/umberto-eco-culture-war-europa">called our attention</a> to the important role Erasmus plays within this process of Euro-integration, combining the educational dimension with other formative aspects of life: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>The university exchange programme Erasmus is barely mentioned in the business sections of newspapers, yet Erasmus has created the first generation of young Europeans.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Part of a long tradition</h2>
<p>I regard the Erasmus exchange as the latest stage in a process of European integration that started during the Middle Ages, when a number of young people expatriated to get a better education. For example, Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Beckett, studied law at the University of Bologna around 1145.</p>
<p>Modernity accelerated this trend and in the 16th century <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/The_Origins_of_the_Grand_Tour.html?id=quF-AAAAMAAJ&redir_esc=y">many children</a> of the English aristocracy undertook journeys to Italy. This was necessary for the politics and diplomacy of the day: a cosmopolitan elite – with a firm command of foreign languages and customs – was needed to steer the country. </p>
<p>This phenomenon climaxed in the <a href="http://www.ledonline.it/index.php/linguae/article/view/859">early modern period</a>, with the inception of what the 17th century travel writer Richard Lassels would subsequently label <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/The_Voyage_Of_Italy_Or_A_Compleat_Journe.html?id=8ZFCAAAAcAAJ">the “Grand Tour”</a> in his 1670 The Voyage of Italy. </p>
<p>As shown by the Grand Tour, a transcultural education – pivoting on living and studying abroad – is actually conducive to change and innovation. The history of British art and architecture would have been different without the cultural hybridisation this social phenomenon fostered. Even an everyday word such as umbrella <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/Coryat_s_Crudities_Scholar_s_Choice_Edit.html?id=HwM3rgEACAAJ&source=kp_cover&redir_esc=y">was seemingly introduced</a> into English by the 17th century English traveller Thomas Coryate after his journey to Italy. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/125764/original/image-20160608-3509-lp9cf4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/125764/original/image-20160608-3509-lp9cf4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=869&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/125764/original/image-20160608-3509-lp9cf4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=869&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/125764/original/image-20160608-3509-lp9cf4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=869&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/125764/original/image-20160608-3509-lp9cf4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1092&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/125764/original/image-20160608-3509-lp9cf4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1092&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/125764/original/image-20160608-3509-lp9cf4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1092&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Douglas, 8th Duke of Hamilton, on his 18th century Grand Tour.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AJean_Preudhomme.jpg">Jean Preudhomme/Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
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<p>The Grand Tour originated against the backdrop of a deeply divided Europe, due to the rift caused by the Reformation and the Anglican schism. These young British travellers, however, were also the target of an anti-cosmopolitan campaign that portrayed them as monsters who had discarded their originally pure identity to embrace foreign languages and customs, not to mention the potential contamination of Papism. </p>
<p>After 1688, the presence of a Jacobite diaspora contributed further to the idea that continental travel was a suspicious pastime for young people. According to the <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/The_British_Abroad.html?id=XHB2QgAACAAJ&source=kp_cover&redir_esc=y">historian Jeremy Black</a>, it was only after the Hanoverian succession of 1714 that the debate over the Grand Tour “was freed to a considerable extent from the religious and political context of the previous two centuries”.</p>
<h2>A new generation</h2>
<p>Like the Grand Tour, Erasmus exchanges are a laboratory in which we are experimenting with the future of Europe. Established in 1987, two years before the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Erasmus programme is now a major aspect – together with other non-European exchanges – of what we call the internationalisation of European universities. </p>
<p>But today, British students <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk-students-trailing-eu-peers-on-take-up-of-erasmus-exchanges-26783">seem less enthusiastic</a> than other young Europeans about taking up the opportunity to study abroad. </p>
<p>By placing the emphasis on the potential of Erasmus I do not mean to downplay the multiple economic and political difficulties facing the EU. While acknowledging the shortcomings of the EU, <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/dec/07/europe-brussels-european-eu">writing in 2014</a> the British historian Timothy Garton Ash defined Erasmus students as “the first generation to have enjoyed Europe as a single space of freedom, from Lisbon to Tallin and Athens to Edinburgh”. He invited them to make their voice heard and to be more passionately involved in the making of Europe. </p>
<p>Europe needs to think of itself as <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1536-7150.2008.00626.x/abstract">transcultural</a> rather than simply multicultural. Instead of conceiving of identities as mutually exclusive, we need to regard them as permeable. We need to rediscover the beautiful and challenging complexity of our roots in the centuries that preceded the formation of nation states. And to do this we need the humanities; knowledge cannot simply be a passage to technological development and other forms of material progress. It must also foster critical thinking and curiosity and a renewed desire to explore the past in order to dig up tools that may better enable us to inhabit our present and build our future. </p>
<p>A form of “rooted cosmopolitanism” is possible – to borrow <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/1344038?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">Kwame Anthony Appiah’s definition</a> – and Europe can play a major role in exploring this new way of inhabiting the planet.</p>
<p>As an academic who coordinates four exchanges between Italy and the UK I can testify that the Erasmus programme has made a major contribution to the creation of a transnational European consciousness, fostering both language learning and the overcoming of cultural barriers.</p>
<p>Studying abroad is a great opportunity to learn by experience. When they come back from Erasmus, students are different. Living in a different country is a fundamental aspect of a Euro-education, so let us be brave and resolutely invest in the European project.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/38756/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Maurizio Ascari does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Travelling across the continent has been a staple of young people’s eduation for centuries.Maurizio Ascari, Senior Lecturer in English Literature, Università di BolognaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.