European identity – its feasibility and desirability

European Politics and Society ISSN: 2374-5118 (Print) 2374-5126 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rpep21 European identity – its feasibility and desirability NoelleAnne O'Sullivan To cite this article: NoelleAnne O'Sullivan (2015) European identity – its feasibility and desirability, European Politics and Society, 16:2, 334-335, DOI: 10.1080/23745118.2015.1029109 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/23745118.2015.1029109 Published online: 07 Apr 2015. Submit your article to this journal Article views: 63 View related articles View Crossmark data Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=rpep21 Download by: [Orta Dogu Teknik Universitesi] Date: 20 February 2016, At: 10:12 334 Book Reviews Downloaded by [Orta Dogu Teknik Universitesi] at 10:12 20 February 2016 European identity – its feasibility and desirability, Kenneth Keulman and Agnes Katalin Koos Plymouth, Lexington Books. 2014. ISBN 978-0-739-191-538 This book sets out to examine the concept of a collective ‘we-ness’ in the European psyche. The authors seek to address what, if any, kind of European identity is in the process of forming, its elements, who or where does it originate from, who supports its creation and why, and whether it is necessary for continued EU integration and a common political space. Taking as a base point national identity and citizenship – the ‘the single most important factor of explaining attitudes towards integration’ (p. 267) – the authors seek to pinpoint how European identity relates to national and sub-national identities, and what that implies for the formation of European identity, given the differences in concepts of national identity across EU member states. The book is divided into two parts. Part I develops the theoretical framework of identity. While the authors accept that there is no single agreed definition of identity in social science, they employ the conceptual framework of collective identities borrowed from social psychology, framing identity as a socio-territorial concept that includes local, regional, ethnic, national and post-national identities. Currently, say the authors, citizens have a ‘welfare-civic’ view of being a ‘European citizen’ which is easily compatible with national identity, and can be felt as an additional upper-layer to other notions of socio-territorial identities, without conflict or rivalry. Taking into account that the EU is a young entity, and all socio-territorial attachments are shown to weaken with prolonged EU membership, the authors believe there may be potential for an increased attachment to European ‘civic-welfare’ identity, though it is unlikely to ever be as strong as nineteenth- and twentieth-century nationalisms which combined civic with understandings of shared culture. Do we need a European identity to construct the EU? The authors argue that ‘a culturally unified demos is not necessary to legitimize a polity as a democracy’ (p. 187), merely that citizens enjoy their civic duties and rights. European collective identity is driven, say the authors, by support derived from a favourable cost-benefit analysis of the EU by individuals, who see that the EU can bring benefits that a nation state cannot, although this pay-off is insufficient in itself to sustain European identity. Utilitarian self-interest in material terms – a dominant feature of Euroscepticism rhetoric – and views on the ultimate purpose of a nation (for welfare, or war) influences people’s opinion about an EU sized super polity. Precisely, the authors find that people’s views vary, depending on the policy domain. Part II moves the discussion to the interesting political angle of EU identity, namely, who supports its creation and why? Traditionally, Europeans were believed to be passively consensual to a deeper and wider integration driven by pro-European ‘elites’ who satisfied self-interests more than the masses, though this gap between elite and voter support for the EU was shown to have narrowed by 2004. By analysing roll-call votes and party manifestos, the authors trace European political parties’ support, revealing that the Christian Democrats, supported by the Liberals, have been the motors of integration since the 1950s on the economic integrationist front of market integration and dismantling of trade barriers, but since the 1990s the Social Democrats have shown increased support for integration, promoting integrationist policies related to employment, labour, welfare, social policies, civil rights and democratic legitimacy, to the extent that by 2004 they were as equally supportive as the Christian Democrats and Liberals. Future Downloaded by [Orta Dogu Teknik Universitesi] at 10:12 20 February 2016 Book Reviews 335 strengthening of European identity, posit the authors, will depend on issues related to welfare, redistribution and minorities policies, and essentially, European peoples’ willingness to harmonise and connect their social protection systems and redistribute to the disadvantaged. Will the Party of European Socialists be the main drivers of EU integration in the next phase of polity building? The authors do a thorough job of using Eurobarometer public opinion survey data dating from 1970, complimented by European Social Survey, and European and World Value surveys, with all the challenges that these raise – from inconsistency of questions, to gaps in time series, to a paucity of data consulting minorities. The notion of ‘European-ness’ is also difficult to measure consistently since it has been so fluid and progressive. In attempting to answer the question of what causes ‘passive permissiveness’ of large publics, it may have been interesting to correlate the authors’ assumptions that certain policies gain public support, with electoral data that tests that public support. This reader was disappointed that the data analysis stopped at 2011, given that many EU issues have headlined across Europeanised national public spheres since then, and the changes seen in the European elections of 2014, where the Social Democrats gained 0.4% votes compared to the EPP vote falling by 6.6%. The authors’ findings that over 80% of European citizens do not want to slow down the pace of integration, and less than 20% are opposed to EU membership are surprising, given the disparities currently seen in member states concerning attachment and sentiment to the EU, but individual member state differences towards EU identity and support for integration are not examined in depth, leaving important questions unanswered as to why some nations are more pro-European than others, given the impact that one member can have on the whole community. NoelleAnne O’Sullivan University of Kent, Brussels School of International Studies, Belgium [email protected] © 2015, NoelleAnne O’Sullivan http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/23745118.2015.1029109