"Cultural pluralism and European polity-building: Neither Westphalia nor Cosmopolis"

Kraus, Peter A. (2001) "Cultural pluralism and European polity-building: Neither Westphalia nor Cosmopolis" . In European Union Studies Association (EUSA) > Biennial Conference > 2001 (7th), May 31-June 2, 2001, pages 27, Madison, Wisconsin.

Abstract

In view of the shortcomings of both "Westphalian" and "Cosmopolitan" approaches to the EU, the paper will follow a different path and argue that the regulation of cultural pluralism at he European level is characterized by the contradictions underlying the EU's institutional development. The principle of intergovernmentalism stresses the role of nation-states and tends to reaffirm the weight of national cultures. At the same time, however, European transnationalism offers possibilities for articulating cultural identities below and beyond the nation-state, contributing to some extent to the "denationalization" of political cultures. This is illustrated with examples taken from the area of European language policy. The last section of the paper deals with the potentials of a pluralist interpretation of the subsidiarity principle for inducing "reflexive identity management" in Europe.