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Models of European identity: Reconciling universalism

and Particularism
a
Gerard Delanty
a
Department of Sociology , University of Liverpool E-mail:
Published online: 29 Feb 2008.

To cite this article: Gerard Delanty (2002) Models of European identity: Reconciling universalism and Particularism,
Perspectives on European Politics and Society, 3:3, 345-359, DOI: 10.1080/15705850208438841

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 Gerard Delanty
Models of European Identity: Reconciling Universalism
and Particularism

ABSTRACT

The paper offers an analysis of the four main conceptions of

European identity, which can be termed: moral universalism, post-
national universalism, cultural particularism and pragmatism. The
first three of these models can be analysed in terms of an empha-
sis either on universalism or on particularism. In this paper it is
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argued that these three models suffer from an excessive concern

with either 'thin' univeralistic conceptions of identity or with 'thick'
particularistic identities and that the fourth possibility does not
offer a satisfactory alternative. What is neglected in all four mod-
els is the potential for pluralisation that is expressed in an alter-
native model of European identity. The paper offers a defence of
this in terms of a pluralised cosmopolitan European identity.

Introduction

European identity presents a dilemma: how can it

be constructed in a way that does not reduce it to a
minimal set of values (and which are not specifically
European but 'Western' and or even universal) or
make it 'thick' and thus exclusive of much that is de
facto European in terms of actual practices of life?1
Given the choice of a 'thin' versus a 'thick' definition
of identity, it would appear that the former is more
desirable.2 Thick identities tend to be exclusive and

Perspectives on European Politics and Society, 3:3

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands, 2002
 are often coded in terms of adversity. Thin identities on the whole do not
stress divisive relations of self and other. The result however might be a cul-
turally neutral kind of European identity that is not able to offer an alterna-
tive or resistance to thick form of identities, such as xenophobic and racist
identities. The question, then, is can European identity be conceived in terms
of a culturally thick identity that is also inclusive and having a capacity for
pluralisation? Another way of putting this is to find a way of avoiding - or
at least reconciling - thick particularistic identities as well as thin universal-
istic ones. Especially in the context of the eastern enlargement of the European
Union and the much discussed 'democratic deficit' such considerations are
very important at the present time. Can Europe rest on values as opposed to
procedural norms and the related 'thin' identity that might be the basis of
such a minimal social and political order?

There are four existing positions on this question, which can be termed as
follows: moral universalism, postnational universalism, cultural particular-
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ism and pragmatism. In the following analysis, I outline and critically assess
the relative merits of each of these with respect to the problem of reconcil-
ing the dilemma of universalism versus particularism. Arguing that none of
these models provides an adequate theorisation of European identity, I argue
for an alternative conception, which I call cosmopolitan. I put forward the
argument that this model not only offers a theoretical alternative to the other
models in reconciling universalism and particularism, but also corresponds
to an empirical reality. The notion of cosmopolitanism that is used here makes
explicit its dual components, the universal order of the 'cosmos' and the par-
ticular order of the 'polis'.3 Cosmopolitanism, I argue, has a universalistic
moment as well as a particularistic one. One of the tasks of a European iden-
tity is to express this double structure.

The paper adopts a critical-normative approach of theoretical models rather

than an empirical analysis of social identities. The aim is to clarify from a
normative perspective how European identity might be conceived as a desir-
able and meaningful kind of collective identity. The models discussed in the
following are mostly implicit, if not explicit, in writings and various debates
on Europe. The critical approach adopted aims to clarify some of the assump-
tions in these discourses in order to arrive at a fuller and more reflexive
understanding as to what a European identity might conceivable stand for.

346 • Gerard Delanty

 1. Moral Universalism

The first model is a definition of European identity in terms of universal

human values, such as those of human rights, humanitarianism or a notion
of justice. In this conception, Europe is based on moral values, which in gen-
eral can be associated with the liberal, democratic heritage of moral univer-
salism. There is an implicit assumption in many debates on European
integration that Europe is based on democratic values, respect for the per-
son, toleration of difference and moderation in politics. Robert Schuman, for
instance, saw one of the early treaties that led to the later EEC, The Treaty
of Paris (1951), as a continuation of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and
Citizen (1789). This was also the conception of Europe of Jean Monnet. Another
example of this understanding of Europe might be the vision of Europe in
the Council of Europe, with its very broad conception of Europe. More recently
the 'Charta of European Identity' expresses such a general understanding of
Europe as based on the values of 'tolerance, humanity and fraternity' which
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became the foundation of democracy.4 'The Charta' also looks to the 1950
Convention on Human Rights and the (1989) EC Charter of Fundamental
Social Rights along with the wider notion of EU citizenship as the most impor-
tant expressions of this universalistic kind of identity. This universalistic
understanding of Europe is clearly popular with European Union represen-
tatives, as is evident from Romano Prodi's book on Europe.5
In classical sociology, Max Weber's famous opening words to The Protestant
Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism are also representative of this universalistic
view of Europe which saw science as the highest expression of the European
inheritance:
A product of modern European civilisation, studying any problem of uni-
versal history, is bound to ask himself to what combination of circumstances
the fact should be attributed that in western civilisation, and in western
civilisation only, cultural phenomena have appeared which (as we like to
think) lie in a line of development having universal significance.6
The advantages with this 'thin' definition of Europe are obvious: it is rela-
tively flexible and compatible with national identities. But the problem with
this model of the European is that the values it appeals to are not specifically
European.7 They are more 'western' than European, and are also in a sense
genuinely universal in the sense of being found to varying degrees in all

Models of European Identity; Reconciling Universalism and Particularism • 347

 human cultures. Science after all is universal, not specifically European. This
universalistic conception of the European has little cultural content or no
explicit political content other than a general endorsement of liberal, demo-
cratic values. It is a weak model, based on a very thin concept of identity.
This model of identity is not relevant to integration or pluralisation since it
is too general and does not take a specific institutional form. Moreover, it is
open to the charge of being eurocentric, the view that universalistic ideas are
those of European civilisation.8

2. European Postnational Universalism

The second model is to define European values less in universalistic terms

than in a qualified universalism, a particularisation of the universal. In this
view, European identity is expressed in political-juridical norms and institu-
tions but in a way that never reduces them to the concrete institutional level.
An example of this more critical view of Europe is Habermas's concept of
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'constitutional patriotism' which sets up a tension between norm and reality

and thus indicates a more transformative kind of identity.9 While basically
sharing the universalistic moral idea of human rights, it focuses identity on
specific institutional and cognitive achievements of the European heritage,
such as the constitution, but does not reduce it to the empirical level. Like
the first model, it is also a fairly thin concept of identity, but one that adds
to the purely moral, a legal dimension which gives it more substance. However,
it is also culturally neutral, since the whole point of it is to neutralise culture
of its ethnocentric dimensions. According to Habermas, culture, especially
when it takes an ethnic, or a particularistic form, is divisive.

The disadvantage with this approach is that it is also a minimal identity of

form rather than of content in that it expresses only a common denomina-
tor. It cannot easily be transferred to the postcommunist societies, coming as
it does from the constitutional tradition. It also presupposes relatively stable
political structures and the absence of basic struggles over cultural identity.
Moreover, it cannot be so easily applied to the EU, since the constitutional
tradition has been based on the nation-state and the EU is neither a state nor
a nation, or even a nation-state.10 It is also questionable that a constitution
can be a basis for collective identities. Yet, it clearly offers an alternative to
purely institutional designs. Although this conception of European identity

348 • Gerand Delanty

 is focused on the constitution, it otherwise does not have a specific institu-
tional dimension. For Habermas, a postnational identity also expresses the
culture of critique and reflexivity that is inherent in modernity. It is also an
explicitly universalistic position in the qualified sense of the universalism of
critique and communication as opposed to substantive values. According to
Habermas, only such a limited universalism is possible today, given the real-
ity of multicultural and, in the German context, the discrediting of historical
narratives of legitimation. Nevertheless, the main concern of constitutional
patriotism in its original formulation is law, which Habermas sees as dis-
cursively shaped and thus linked to democracy. For this reason, this model
of European identity can be linked to the 'civic' tradition, as opposed to the
liberal or purely communitarian traditions.

A European Cultural Particularism

The third model is a thick cultural identity in which universalism is com-

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promised for particularism. While the first model is one based on morality,
the second on law, this model is based on the primacy of culture. In this
model, cultural heritage is the basis of European identity. Typically, as is illus-
trated in the European federalist tradition and in certain kinds of Euro-nation-
alism, identity is a matter of culture, and generally the 'high' culture of
'civilisation' as opposed to the 'low' or popular culture, such as national and
regional culture. Most of the famous philosophical and literary conceptions
of European identity - Max Scheler, Martin Heidegger, Edmund Husserl,
Daniel de Rougement, T.S. Eliot, Paul Valery, Karl Jaspers - have appealed to
this sense of Europe as the expression of a spiritual idea that underlying the
diversity of Europe is a higher point of unity. Unlike the other conceptions
of European identity this is clearly a thick identity. But it has many prob-
lems. To begin with there is the basic confusion of identity with an 'idea' or
even with a 'collective representation'.

Defining European identity as one shaped by the Greek, Roman, (Latin)

Christian culminating in the Enlightenment, results in an exclusive Europe,
as the western, secular heritage. The place of Orthodox, Islamic traditions is
uncertain, if not marginalised or excluded. This way of defining Europe has
been very prevalent in the EU, which has a strong Catholic basis to it. It offers
a thick cultural identity, but at a price. It is also one that is hardly relevant

Models of European Identity: Reconciling Universalism and Particularism • 349

 to the global popular cultures of Europe, and is often anti-American. Until
now it has been one of the cultural legitimations for the building of a 'Fortress
Europe' and a central part of the official ideology of the new managerial elites
of the EU. It has been especially attractive to Euro-federalists, and reflects a
communitarian conception of identity. The absence of culture is often taken
to be a symptom of a crisis in values. Thus what is demanded is more cul-
ture, or rather a civilisation notion of European culture, as in Husserl's essay
'Philosophy and the Crisis of European Humanity'.11

There is some evidence to suggest that this idea of European identity as 'unity
in diversity' is abating, at least where the emphasis in on an underlying unity.
The Declaration European Identity of 1973, signed in Copenhagen by the then
nine member states, referred to the 'diversity of cultures' in the plural and
to a 'common European civilisation' based on a 'common heritage' and 'cov-
erging' attitudes and ways of life. The declaration strongly emphasised the
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notion of 'Identity' with a capital T as an official identity - 'The European

identity' - to define the political structure of the then EEC in its relation with
the external world.12 The idea of European 'civilisation' is totally absent from
the Maastricht treaty - although there is some mention of a 'common cultural
heritage' - and there has been no attempt to define a 'European Identity' com-
parable to the 1973 declaration. It would appear that nothing has been sub-
stituted in its place and as a result there is no means of reconciling particularism
and universalism in a new synthesis. Inadequate as it was - an unambiva-
lently functional and official identity - the notion of 'European civilisation'
served to provide a point of unity for the diversity of cultures and for the
unity of high and low cultures. The notion of civilisation has been seen as
too ethnocentric and with resonances of cultural superiority, it has been
dropped in favour of a general endorsement of 'cultures' and thus with a
general preference for 'diversity' over 'unity'. In saying that nothing has been
substituted in place of this older notion of European civilisation and its ideo-
logical conception of 'the European Identity', some qualification is necessary:
the notion of 'European cultural identity' is coming more and more into focus,
presenting a possible challenge to the notion of integration.13 Privileging diver-
sity over unity thus has the problem of pitting a tendentially relativistic con-
ception of culture against society and thus undermining the prospect of
common ground emerging.

350 • Gerard Delanty

 A European People?: European Pragmatism
This model looks for the source of the specifically European in a distinctively
European 'way of life'. It differs from the cultural model in that it is based
less on the cultural than on the economic and social aspects of life. A certain
pragmatism underlies it. Thus rather than looking for the distinctively European
on the level of high or elite culture, it is manifest in institutions and the prac-
tices of life, as well as in popular cultures.14 For instance the growth of inter-
nal tourism with Europe, the common market, the absence of border controls
is often seen as opening up a space for stronger links between national cul-
tures, and thus of a European identity. This kind of a popular Europe based
on purely pragmatic concerns avoids the problems of universalism and par-
ticularism of the other models.15 There is no commitment to a normative or
purely moral sense of identity, which at the most may rest on symbolic cul-
tural forms that do not require explicit commitment. It also suggests a thicker
kind of identity that is to a degree pragmatic, defined in the actual practice
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of ways of life rather than in the normative appeal of an idea. The Euro might
be one such example of something that can be gradually accommodated on
the basis of partial continuity of ways of life and in the absence of complete
disruption to established practices. In the coming years it will be an impor-
tant symbolic marker of a collective identity that is otherwise pragmatic.
Other expressions of a pragmatic people's Europe is democracy and civil soci-
ety. While the debate on a democracy and European integration is dominated
by the question of the democratic deficit, it might be argued that a different
kind of democracy might be achievable on the transnational level of gover-
nance, at least as a project to be attained and which cannot be simply excluded
from all consideration.16
The disadvantage with this pragmatic 'people's Europe' as a model for
European identity is that it lacks the critical transformative moment of the
second model, and is too institutional. In many respects it is largely indis-
tinguishable from global American culture, although there is a sense in which
it might be compared to national identities in Europe in the post World War
11 period. There is no common Europe language, one of the major obstacles
for a genuine European identity. Popular music, sport, tourism, the Euro, are
possible expressions of this new kind of Europe, but it is one that is largely
shaped by consumer capitalism.17 The model of integration in it is relatively
low, although not as low as in the others, and it has not been based on a
Models of European Identity. Reconciling Universalism and Particularism • 35 I
 commitment to a social Europe as such. This 'people's Europe' in fact has
very much the signs of a bureaucratic enterprise. In fact, a European iden-
tity is probably more likely to be found in the new Euro-elites than in the
wider populace. However, as a concretely existing model of European iden-
tity it can hardly be denied.

The Limits of European Identity

Clearly Europe cannot be defined by territory. There are no clear geograph-

ical markers, especially on its eastern boundaries. Boundaries of west, cen-
tre and east have shifted many times in European history to make the exercise
meaningless.18 The first and third models of European identity discussed in
the foregoing analysis have presupposed a certain geographical reference
point for Europe. In appealing to cultural models a problem of a different
order is created: European identity becomes drawn into either universalistic
or into particularistic codifications.
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Is a European cultural identity possible that is thick enough to be a source

of integration; or are all thick identities necessarily exclusive? Many critics -
for instance Anthony Smith and Dieter Grimm - have come to the conclu-
sion that there can be no European identity of any substance, save perhaps
for the very minimal commitment to a common concern with morality, as in
the first model discussed above.19 Varying from conservative to liberal a la
carte views on collective identity, the general oppositional position is that
Europe consists of a plurality of cultural forms and that a European identity
is either impossible or must be no more than the recognition of diversity.
Thus, even the liberal, pluralist position is ultimately one of particularism.
In the civic republican variant of this - represented by, for instance, J.G.A.
Pocock - an alternative reading of European history will only reveal differ-
ent national models and not a unified European narrative.20

Rejecting moral universalism and cultural particularism as inappropriate, the

second model with its emphasis on law offers a possible alternative, but at
the cost of being culturally too thin. The fourth model is more promising in
that it is more inclusive than the others, but is not rooted in a thick identity
that will make it inclusive enough to compete with nationalist models. Of
these four models, in my view the second and the fourth are the most promis-
ing. The first is too universalistic and the third too particularistic.

352 • Gerard Delanty

 In the following, my proposal is to combine the second and fourth models
in the articulation of an alternative conception of European identity. What
these models share is a certain kind of openness that is consistent with cul-
tural pluralisation and reflexivity as well as the avoidance of an affirmative
stance. While this is more explicit in the postnational position, it is also poten-
tially present in the pragmatic position. In both positions the preoccupation
with either universalism and particularism is diminished, allowing for pos-
sible reconciliation. In Figure One below these positions and their attitudes
to Europe are summarised.
It can also be seen from the diagram that these models can be conceived in
terms of their cultural forms as entailing a normative, symbolic, critical or
pragmatic concept of Europe.

Towards an Alternative Conception of European Identity:

European Cosmopolitanism
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An alternative conception of European identity is one that addresses the cos-

mopolitan heritage in Europe. This is not essentialistic, as in the second model,
but more hermeneutic. Rather than look for a common transEuropean cul-
tural heritage that is shared, it might make sense to define European iden-
tity in terms of its conflicts, traumas and fears which have ranged from

Figure 1: Models of European Identity

Universalistic Particularistic
Limited potential for Moral universalism Cultural particularism
pluralisation (Normative concept (Symbolic, ethnocentric
of Europe) concept of Europe)
Political tradition: Political tradition:
liberal, democratic Euro-federalism,
communitarianism

Strong potential for Postnationalism/ Pragmatism

pluralisation and 'Constitutional patriotism' (Pragmatic and
reflexivity (Critical concept of Instrumental concept of
Europe) Europe)
Political tradition: Political tradition: social
civic republicanism democracy

Models of European Identity. Reconciling Universalism and Particularism • 353

 religious conflict to class and national conflicts to a new era of multicultural
conflicts over cultural rights and anti-globalisation conflicts today.21

One of the features of European history has been the constant negotiation of
difference; the existence of borderlands; the reinvention of the past.22 To make
a virtue out of this seems a viable solution to the problems that have beset
European cultural identity.23 Culture need not be excluded in favour of a
memory-less identity or one that is minimal to the point of being meaning-
less. An example of this reintroduction of a cosmopolitan culture, might be
in the 'Europeanisation' of the holocaust as a European memory and not a
nationally specific one. The deterritorialisation and recodification of the holo-
caust as a European memory was evident in the Intergovernmental Conference
on the Holocaust in Stockholm in January 2000. As the holocaust loses its
national particularity, it becomes more and more a European memory. As
memory ceases to be sustained by particular social and national groups and
becomes more and more mediated by culture under the conditions of glob-
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alisation, it also becomes more open to new readings.24 Other examples might
be SOS against racism, the emergence of a European ecological conscious-
ness and the formation of specifically European discourses that all take Europe
as their reference point.

In this view, European identity is not an expression of a shared culture but

a recognition of difference consisting of the ability to see the other within the
self and oneself as other.25 There is thus no reason why memory cannot be
subject to the same contestation as other aspects of culture. This way of look-
ing at the question of European identity also avoids the dilemma of 'unity
in diversity' - implicit in the second model discussed above - whereby a bal-
ance has to be attained between unity and diversity. Although this will be
an important aspect of European identity, a more far-reaching dimension is
the potentiality for critical dialogue suggested by Habermas's conception of
a European identity.

European identity is thus more one of 'polyvocality' than universalism or a

common cultural heritage that has survived nationalism. If it is to compete
with nationalism and xenophobic sentiments, Europe needs cultural reference
points, but not essentialistic ones. Thus rather than separate the cultural from
the political, to see the political in the cultural should be the aim. In order
for this to become a real alternative, it will need to be more than a soft-inter-

354 • Gerard Delanty

 culturalism with token cosmopolitan values. Education can play a role in this,
as can popular culture and tourism. However the conception of collective
identity that is suggested here is a strong one, entailing a commitment to
strategies of anti-racism, the overcoming of symbolic forms of violence and
the inclusion of marginal voices. This suggests a more discursive kind of
identity, which might involve empowering marginal groups. In order to resist
xenophobia, such discursive forms of identity building need to be devised.
Looking at European identity in this way moves the debate beyond the level
of symbolic realities to a more communicative conception of identity.

Such cultural encounters must be on local and national levels, and not exclu-
sively on the transnational level. Cities are thus important cites of European
identity.26 With the emergence of a European public sphere, a space already
exists in which European identity corresponds to something real. There is an
undeniably growing European public sphere, measured in terms of growing
links, discourses, and transnational spaces.27
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Despite the apparent resilience of nationalism in Europe today, the reality is

that national identity is not a primary identity. It must compete with more
and more identities. National cultures have become pluralised as a result of
multiculturalism, migration, globalisation, social movements, changes in the
class structure and in gender relations. They are no longer homogeneous. The
same applies to European identity, which cannot be conceived of as another
version of nationalism just written larger. European identity must be seen as
an expression of the growing reflexivity within European collective identi-
ties. This notion of cosmopolitan European identity can be seen too in terms
of the second and forth models discussed above, that is as reflexive post-
national consciousness and one that is embodied in the actual social prac-
tices of contemporary European societies.
With respect to the question of universalism and particularism, a cosmopolitan
European identity can be conceptualised as an expression of the conflicts in
European history. Where national identity is about the 'forgetting of history',
European identity might be about memory, the remembering of history. It is
also a cautious reminder of the dangers of identity. This suggests the possi-
bility of making non-identity, a feature of all identity construction, be it per-
sonal or collective, becoming a more central aspect of identity. We need to
rescue it and give it a more prominent place in European culture in order to

Models of European Identity: Reconciling Universalism and Particularism • 355

 protect European societies from the often violence logic of identity and the
rule of the self.28 Rather than seeing the other as a kind of non-self, who needs
to be subjugated, or even to seeing the self in the other, who must be eradi-
cated, or cleansed, to use a contemporary metaphor, we need to see the other
in the self, the self as constituted in relations of difference.
Finally, returning to a point made earlier, concerning the possibility for
European identity to take a thicker form than might be indicated by Habermas's
model of a minimal or common denominator identity. Although the analy-
sis in this paper is much indebted to Habermas's notion of critical dialogue,
a stronger European identity is possible. It is in this context that some con-
nections can be established with the fourth model discussed above, the idea
of a pragmatic Europe. Cultural approaches, including Habermas's particu-
lar critical philosophy, tend to neglect social factors, especially issues of social
justice. Some of the most characteristic achievements of Europe - especially
in the latter half of the twentieth century - are social and economic rather
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than cultural or even political. In most, if not all, European societies the com-
mitment to the social contract is evident in a view of the state as responsible
for alleviating social suffering. When viewed in contrast to the United States
and much of the rest of the world, it is all the more clear that in Europe cap-
italism is considerably more constrained by a vision of the common good.
Although conceptions of the common good clearly differ, there is consider-
able agreement in many European countries, as well as on the EU level, that
capitalism must be contained by a different order of values. The neo-liberal
ideology in Europe is considerably weaker than in the United States and
social democratic values, even in the era of "Third Way' politics, have con-
tinued to be influential. The social and economic values of, for instance, cit-
izenship, anti-corruption, sustainable development, stake holder capitalism,
corporate responsibility could be said to be the defining values of a European
social contract.

Conclusion
The argument is that an important dimension of Europeanisation is that of
cultural pluralisation and social justice. Given the diversity and contestabil-
ity of cultural identities, Europeanisation is likely to succeed only if it cre-
ates an ethos of pluralisation and justice rather than one of cohesion. Only

356 • Gerard Delanty

 in this way can the dilemmas of universalism and particularism be recon-
ciled. With the gradual enlargement of the European Union to include up to
27 members, only such a vision of European identity will be relevant to a
very culturally diverse Europe. The mistake is to see identity as something
that binds people together in a simple mechanistic way. Identities are based
on the projects of social actors and entail conflicts of many kinds. Culture -
including historical memories - is not just a resource in these struggles but
is also actively produced in identity politics. For this reason, European iden-
tity must be conceived in terms of a more active model of values. In this
view, European identity is not an already existing identity, the property of
the fiction of a 'European people', but a more diffuse and open ended process
of cultural and institutional experimentation.

Department of Sociology, University of Liverpool

e-mail: [email protected]
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Notes
1
An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Symposium Integration in a
Multiple Europe: Memory, Democracy, Markets, and Citizenship, University of Riga,
Latvia, 4-6 October, 2001 and a later version at the 13th International Conference of
Europeanists 'Europe in the New Millennium: Enlarging, Experimenting, Evolving'
Chicago, 14-16 March, 2002. In addition to the comments of the participants I am
grateful to Monica Sassateli and Gregor McLennan for very useful remarks on a yet
earlier draft of this paper.
2
The terms 'thick' and 'thin' are suggested by M. Walzer, Thick and Thin: Moral
Argument at Home and Abroad (Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, 1994).
3
This is discussed in G. Delanty, Citizenship in a Global Age (Buckingham: Open
University Press, 2000).
4
The charta was proposed by Vaclav Havel in 1994 and was taken up by Europa-
Union Deutschland and was drafted in 1995. It can be found at http://www.europa-
web.de/europa/02wwswww/203chart/chart_gb.htm.
5
R. Prodi, Europe as I see it (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2000).
6
M. Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (London: Allen and Unwin,
1978 [1904/05], p. 13).
7
A point made by Jean Baudrillard in his America (London: Verso, 1989).
8
See D. Chakrabarty, Provencializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference
(Princeton: Princeton University Press).

Models of European Identity: Reconciling Universalism and Particularism • 357

 9
J. Habermas, The New Conservatism: Cultural Criticism and the Historians Debate
(Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1989); J. Habermas, Between Facts and Norms: Contributions
to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1996);
J. Habermas, The Inclusion of the Other: Studies in Political Theory (Cambridge, MA:
MIT Press, 1998); J. Habermas, The Postnational Constellation (Cambridge: Polity
Press, 2001).
10
See J.H.H. Weiler, The Constitution of Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1999).
11
E. Husserl, The Crisis of the European Sciences (New York: Harper and Row, 1965
[1935]).
12
Bulletin of the European Communities, 1973, No. 12, Section 5, Clause 2501, pp. 118-
22. The declaration states: 'The Nine member countries of the European Communities
have decided that the time has come to draw up a document on the European
Identity. This will enable them to achieve a better definition of the relations with
other countries and of their responsibilities and the place which they occupy in
world affairs'.
13
See also B. Strath (ed.), Europe and the Other and Europe as the Other (Brussels: Peter
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Lang, 2000).
14
Anthropologists have encouraged this approach to European identity, see J. Borneman
and N. Fowler 'Europeanisation', Annual Review of Anthropology, 26, 1997, 487-514.
15
See G. Therborn, European Modernity and Beyond: The Trajectory of European Societies,
1945-2000 (London: Sage, 1995) as an example of this more pragmatic approach to
Europe. See also W. Hutton, The World We are In (London: Little, Brown, 2002).
16
For quite different positions on this see L. Siedentop, Democracy in Europe (London:
Penguin, 2000) and M. Castels, 'The Unification of Europe', in End of the Millenium,
vol. 3 The Information Age (Oxford: Blackwells, 1998).
17
For an analysis of the cultural politics of European integration, see C. Shore, Building
Europe: The Cultural Politics of European Integration (London; Routledge, 2000).
18
See G. Delanty, Inventing Europe: Idea, Identity, Reality (London, Macmillan, 1995);
G. Delanty, 'The Limits and Possibility of a European Identity: A Critique of Cultural
Essentialism' Philosophy and Social Criticism, 21 (4), 1995, 15-36; J. Fontana, The
Distorted Path: A Reinterpretation of European History (Oxford: Blackwell, 1995).
19
A. Smith, Nations and Nationalism in Global Era (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1995);
D. Grimm, 'Does Europe Need a Constitution?' in P. Gowman, and P. Anderson
(eds.), The Question of Europe (London: Verso, 1997).
20
J. Pocock, 'Deconstructing Europe' in P. Gowman, and P. Anderson (eds.), The
Question of Europe (London: Verso, 1997); J. Pocock, 'Enlightenment and Counter-
Enlightenment, Revolution and Counter-Revolution; A Eurosceptical Enquiry',
History of Political Thought, 20 (1), 1999, 125-39.

358 • Gerard Delanty

 21
F. Cerutti, 'Can There Be a SupraNational Identity?', Philosophy and Social Criticism,
18 (2), 1992, 147-62; K. Eder, 'Integration through Culture?: The Paradox of the
Search for a European Identity' in K. Eder and B. Giesen (eds.), European Citizenship
between National Legacies and Postnational Projects (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2001); P. Schlesinger, 'Europeaness: A New Cultural Battlefied', Innovation, 5 (2),
1992, 11-23.
22
E. Balibar, 'The Borders of Europe' in Cheah, P. and Robbins, B. (eds.), Cosmopolitics:
Thinking and Feeling Beyond the Nation (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press,
1998).
23
R. Bodei, 'Historical Memory and European Identity' Philosophy and Social Criticism.
21 (4) 1995, 1-13.
24
These remarks are suggested by Levy and Sznaider in, 'Memory Unbound: The
Holocaust and the Formation of Cosmopolitan Memory', European Journal of Social
Theory, 2002, 5, 1, 87-106.
25
J. Derrida, The Other Heading: Reflections of Todays Europe (Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana
University Press, 1994); H.-G. Gadamer, 'The Diversity of Europe: Inheritance and
Future' in D. Misgeld and G. Nicholson (eds.), Applied Hermeneutics NY: SUNY,
Downloaded by [LIU Libraries] at 14:04 21 April 2014

1992); P. Ricouer, Oneself as Another (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1994).

26
M. Sassateli, 'Imagined Europe: The Shaping of a European Cultural Identity through
EU Cultural Policy', European Journal of Social Theory, 5 (4), 2002; G. Delanty 'The
Resurgence of the City: The Spaces of European Integration', in E. Isin (ed.), The
Politics and City (London: Routledge, 2000).
27
K. Eder, 'Zur Transformation nationalstaatlicher Öffentlichkeit in Europa', Berliner
Journal fur Soziologie, 10 (2), 2000, 167-84; Van de Steeg, 'Rethinking the Conditions
for a Public Sphere in the European Union,' European Journal of Social Theory 5 (4),
2002.
28
See D. Holmes, integral Europe: Fast-Capitalism, Multiculturalism, Neofascism (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 2000).

Models of European Identity: Reconciling Universalism and Particularism • 359