What is it to be European? The new constitution for Europe seeks to define the EU's competencies, but also the very nature of what constitutes European belonging.
The long-standing "Idea of Europe," which the new draft constitution emphatically endorses, defines Europeanness according to four myths of origin -- the rule of Roman law, solidarity based on Christiutuality, liberal democracy rooted in the rights and freedoms of the individual and commonality based on reason and other Enlightenment universal principles.
It is worth asking if this model of belonging makes sense in a multicultural and multi-ethnic Europe. This is not to question the intrinsic merits of the core values but to cast doubt on their power to fire the imagination and loyalty of a very large section of European society.
ILLUSTRATION: MOUNTAIN PEOPLE
Europe is now home to millions of people from non-European backgrounds, many religious and cultural dispositions and many networks of attachment based on diaspora connections and cultural influences from around the world. Europe is as much a site of longings rooted in tradition -- regional, national and European -- as it is a site of trans-national and trans-European attachments.
The latter attachments are not just held by so-called third country communities and cosmopolitans living in the fast lane of global travel and hybrid identities, but also by native Europeans, now increasingly enmeshed in plural and global consumption norms and patterns. Slowly, Europe is becoming Chinese, Indian, Romany, Albanian, French and Italian, Christian, Islamic, Buddhist or New Age, American, Disneyfied, one-earth conscious, ascetic and locally communitarian. It is becoming a place of plural and strange belongings. It is constantly on the move in cultural terms.
The new and ever-changing yearnings for cultural difference and distinction within Europe make the old Idea of Europe a blunt instrument for unity. A new concept of European belonging is needed, one that acknowledges cultural difference without assuming any order of worth based on ethnicity or religion, and one able to forge a new commonality of values and principles that resonate across Europe's diverse communities.
For this reason, the starting point cannot be the Europeanness of Europe, for example, long-standing concepts such as universal reason, Catholic piety or the Protestant work ethic. A possible starting point, which happens to dig deep into European philosophical thought, is publicity for empathy and engagement with the stranger as the essence of what it is to be European. This signals an ethos of being and belonging that builds on the Socratic definition of freedom as the product of dialogue and engagement, rather than pre-given judgments of worth.
Two important principles for a new Idea of Europe spring out of this interpretation of what it is to be free. The first is the principle of hospitality, which the philosopher Julia Kristeva has linked etymologically to the original Greek definition of ethos as the habit of regular stay or shelter.
In a Europe in which we all will be strangers one day as we routinely move -- virtually or physically -- from one cultural space to another, the principle of refuge will become crucial for many more than the minorities that at present need protection from persecution and hardship. One hopes the rights and protections that come with an ethos of hospitality will offer more than the grudging concessions made to people such as refugees, immigrants and asylum seekers.
The second principle born out of the Socratic reading of freedom is an acceptance of mutuality as the source of identity and affiliation. To be European thus becomes a matter of publicity for, and the terms of engagement with the stranger, not only because without the stranger constituted as other the self cannot be defined, but also because the stranger -- whether we like it or not -- always disrupts the certitude of stable or pure identities. Recognizing, and taking responsibility for, the presence of the stranger forces us to consider the complexity of what it means to be European today.
This involves much more than the "reciprocal recognition of the Other in her/his Otherness," as the philosophers Jurgen Habermas and Jacques Derrida have most recently argued in a call for Europe to be "united in its diversity." Freedom based on mutuality means abandoning nativist preconceptions of who has first call on the label "European," as well as easy labelling of immigrants, travellers, ethnic minorities as non-European. Mutuality implies that Europeanness is not about being but about becoming European through engagement.
In a multi-ethnic and multicultural Europe, failure to openly acknowledge the principle of mutuality and all that it represents in shaping identities and ensuring cultural change will play into the hands of ethno-nationalists and xenophobes interested in perpetuating the fiction of homeland cultural identities in Europe.
Europe has a clear choice to make. It can deny the processes of cultural heterogeneity and hybridization daily at work and allow ethnicity-based antagonisms to grow, aided by an overarching white Europeanist ideal of the good life. Or it can recognize the coming Europe of plural and hybrid cultures and affiliations and seek to develop a concept of becoming European through engagement with the stranger, and in ways that imply no threat to tradition and cultural autonomy.
Only by radically reworking the prevailing Idea of Europe will the EU fulfil the promise of the new draft constitution, to "pursue ... the great venture which makes of it a special area of human hope,"
Ash Amin is head of the geography department at Durham University in the UK.
Recently, China launched another diplomatic offensive against Taiwan, improperly linking its “one China principle” with UN General Assembly Resolution 2758 to constrain Taiwan’s diplomatic space. After Taiwan’s presidential election on Jan. 13, China persuaded Nauru to sever diplomatic ties with Taiwan. Nauru cited Resolution 2758 in its declaration of the diplomatic break. Subsequently, during the WHO Executive Board meeting that month, Beijing rallied countries including Venezuela, Zimbabwe, Belarus, Egypt, Nicaragua, Sri Lanka, Laos, Russia, Syria and Pakistan to reiterate the “one China principle” in their statements, and assert that “Resolution 2758 has settled the status of Taiwan” to hinder Taiwan’s
Can US dialogue and cooperation with the communist dictatorship in Beijing help avert a Taiwan Strait crisis? Or is US President Joe Biden playing into Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) hands? With America preoccupied with the wars in Europe and the Middle East, Biden is seeking better relations with Xi’s regime. The goal is to responsibly manage US-China competition and prevent unintended conflict, thereby hoping to create greater space for the two countries to work together in areas where their interests align. The existing wars have already stretched US military resources thin, and the last thing Biden wants is yet another war.
As Maldivian President Mohamed Muizzu’s party won by a landslide in Sunday’s parliamentary election, it is a good time to take another look at recent developments in the Maldivian foreign policy. While Muizzu has been promoting his “Maldives First” policy, the agenda seems to have lost sight of a number of factors. Contemporary Maldivian policy serves as a stark illustration of how a blend of missteps in public posturing, populist agendas and inattentive leadership can lead to diplomatic setbacks and damage a country’s long-term foreign policy priorities. Over the past few months, Maldivian foreign policy has entangled itself in playing
A group of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers led by the party’s legislative caucus whip Fu Kun-chi (?) are to visit Beijing for four days this week, but some have questioned the timing and purpose of the visit, which demonstrates the KMT caucus’ increasing arrogance. Fu on Wednesday last week confirmed that following an invitation by Beijing, he would lead a group of lawmakers to China from Thursday to Sunday to discuss tourism and agricultural exports, but he refused to say whether they would meet with Chinese officials. That the visit is taking place during the legislative session and in the aftermath