A COSMOPOLITAN APPROACH TO THE EUROPEAN CRISIS

Year 2012, Volume: 4 Issue: 2, 47 - 59, 01.12.2012

Angelopoulou Maria

Abstract

The paper analyses the political implications of the European crisis from a
cosmopolitan perspective. A qualitative approach grounded on cosmopolitanism
and cosmopolitan democracy seeks the ways with which the EU could overcome
the crisis enhancing its limited a) internal and b) external cosmopolitanism. In the
first case the analysis focuses on how the EU could shift away from
intergovernmentalism towards cosmopolitanism with new institutional
instruments of solidarity, unity and cooperation. In the second case, the argument
is that a successful enlargement strategy, especially towards Turkey, can
contribute to the cosmopolitanisation of Europe. Overall, the conclusions drawn
from the attempt to apply cosmopolitanism to the EU suggest that, indeed,
cosmopolitanism, which transforms political and cultural subjectivities in the
encounter of the local/national with the global, can potentially be practically
feasible, showing that globalisation and European integration can be conceived as
processes that may strengthen each other.

Keywords

cosmopolitanism, EU crisis, enlargement

References

• Agne, Hans (2011), “Cosmopolitan Democracy and Legitimate Founding of Political Community: Why Turkey has a Right to Participate in the Politics of EU enlargement” (in: Daniele Archibugi and Guido Montani -Eds, The Ventotene papers), Italy: The Altiero Spinelli Institute for Federalist Studies, pp.7-19.
• Archibugι, Daniele, Held, David and Kohler, Martin (eds) (1998), Re-imagining Political Community, Cambridge: Polity Press.
• Archibugi, Daniele and Held David (eds) (1995), Cosmopolitan Democracy: An Agenda for a New World Order, Cambridge: Polity Press.
• Baban, Feyzi and Keyman, Fuat (2006), “Turkey and the postnational Europe: challenges for the emerging political community” Paper Presented at the Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association. San Diego.
• Beck, Ulrich and Grande, Edgar (2007), Cosmopolitan Europe, Cambridge: Polity Press. Delanty, Gerard and He, Baogang (2008), “Cosmopolitan Perspectives on European and Asian Transnationalism”, International Sociology, vol. 23, no. 3, pp. 323-344.
• Delanty, Gerard and Rumford, Chris (2005), Rethinking Europe: Social Theory and the Implications of Europeanisation, London: Routledge.
• Delanty, Gerard (2003), “The Making of a Post-Western Europe: A Civilisational Analysis”, Thesis Eleven, vol. 72, pp. 8-24.
• Eriksen, Erik (2009), The Unfinished Democratisation of Europe, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Habermas, Jurgen (2003), “Toward a Cosmopolitan Europe”, Journal of Democracy, vol. 14, no. 4, pp. 86-100.
• Habermas, Jurgen (2001), The Postnational Constellation; Political Essays, Cambridge: Polity Press.
• Held, David (1995), Democracy and the Global Order: From the Modern State to Cosmopolitan Governance, Cambridge: Polity Press.
• Herrmann, Richard, Risse, Thomas and Brewer, Marilynn (eds) (2004), Transnational Identities: Becoming European in the EU, New York: Rowman and Littlefield.
• Hoffe, Otfried (2007), Democracy in the Age of Globalisation, Germany: Springel.
• McGrew, Anthony (1997), The transformation of democracy?, Londres: Polity Press. Mignolo, Walter (2000), “The Many Faces of Cosmo-polis: Border Thinking and Critical Cosmopolitanism”, Public Culture, vol. 12, no. 3, pp. 721-48.
• Muftuler-Bac, Meltem (2011), “The European Union and Turkey: Democracy, Multiculturalism and European Identity” RECON Online Working Paper. Oslo: ARENA-Centre for European Studies.
• Parker, Owen (2009), “Cosmopolitan Europe and the EU-Turkey Question: the Politics of a common destiny”, Journal of European Public Policy, vol. 16, no. 7, pp. 1086-1101.
• Rumford, Chris (ed.) (2006), Cosmpolitanism and Europe, Liverpool: Liverpool University Press.
• Zurn, Michael (2000), “Democratic Governance Beyond the Nation-State: the EU and Other International Institutions”, European Journal of International Relations, vol.6, no. 2, pp. 183-222.