National Identities and European Integration "From Below': Bringing the People Back In

Transcription

1 National Identities and European Integration "From Below': Bringing the People Back In by U1f Hedetoft Aalborg University Working Paper Series #54 Abstract!. The point of departure of this paper is the relative neglect of questions of culture and identity in research on European integration. Almost as a copycat version of problems also besetting research on nationalism eo ipso, people(s) and their values, assumptions, and attitudes have at best been the stepchild of an area dominated by neofunctionalist approaches, privileging the "independent variable" of elites, politics, and officially fonnulated interests. Through the presentation and discussion of two case studies-imaginings of the Single Market and of Political Integration as evidenced by data collated in Denmark, Gennany, and Great Britain between 1991 and 1993, and analyzed comparatively-the paper argues that there is a strong case to be made for taking the "view from below" more seriously, both from a functional and an "autonomous" research perspective-i.e., one interested in the forms, substances, and processual tendencies of nationalism and national identities in contemporary Europe (including the forms and degrees of existence of that much-abused tenn, "a European identity"). The paper focuses both on similarities and distinctive traits in and among the three countries, and tries finally to situate the results of the analyses as signs of a more globalizing tendency toward a dislocation and disaggregation between "politics" and "culture" within the traditional framework of nation-state convergence.

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3 Ulf Hedetoft National Identities and European Integration 'From Below' Bringing the People Back In 1. Introduction Scholarly publications on European integration and nationalism have long been dominated by interest in such issues from political and economic, rather than cultural perspectives. And to the extent that questions of culture, identity, mentality, and values have indeed been dealt with, this has often been limited to fairly superficial exercises based on attitude surveys, and more often than not predicated on a hidden - or overt, as the case may be - agenda informed by an overarching, functionally guided problematique: Are the opinions and attitudes of people more or less consonant with the objectives of political integration at any given time - and what is the degree of their (mis)match with EU decision-making processes?1 Only rarely have questions of national mentality been regarded as worthy of treatment in their own right. Lately, the lacuna that this relative neglect of an important aspect of integration represents, has begun to be recognised. 2 A few years ago, Anthony D. Smith diagnosed it from the vantage-point of a historian of nationalism: "... relatively little attention has been devoted to the cultural and psychological issues associated with European unification - to questions of meaning, value and symbolism. What research there has been in this area has suffered from a lack of theoretical sophistication and tends to be somewhat impressionistic and superficial" (Smith, 1992, p. 57). And Sidney Tarrow, from the perspective of the political scientist, rightly points out that

4 "while the EC-commissioned Eurobarometer charts citizens' feelings of European identity almost monthly, it did little to predict the variations of opinion around the Maastricht treaty" (Tarrow, 1994, p. 17). As a consequence, he calls for "a better understanding of political and cultural integration" (ibid.), necessitating "more involvement by sociologists and anthropologists" (ibid.) in research into these issues. It should be noted, however, that the scant attention given to identities, values, sentiments, and cultural loyalties in the area of European integration is not solely the result of neofunctionalist neglect. In a sense, it is little more than a carbon copy of a similar gap in scholarship on nations and nationalism eo ipso. What Eric Hobsbawm calls "the view from below" (Hobsbawm, 1990, pp ) - the "assumptions, hopes, needs, longings and interests of ordinary people" (ibid.) - has not so far found its own forms of scholarly representation in studies of nationalism. 3 Subjective configurations of national belonging have traditionally been either downgraded at the expense of approaches privileging nationalism as an objective, programmatic, or political object of interest, or have been inferentially teased out on the basis of public opinion surveys, macro-historical studies, or - most often - by assuming that the discursive manifestations of nationalism - whether political, journalistic, literary, musealised, or whatever - are adequately able to represent national "structures of feeling" (Raymond Williams). In this light, it makes more sense, perhaps, that 'views from below' only crop up in piecemeal and unsatisfactory forms in research on European integration. This article should be seen as a modest contribution towards remedying this deficit, towards bringing people back in at a time when, in a certain sense, the state is on its way out (see section 5). It is based on extensive questionnaire and interview-based data collated in three EU countries - Denmark, Germany, and Great Britain - between 1991 and 1993, constituting the pivotal basis for in-depth interpretive and analytical readings attempting to uncover the mental archaeology of

5 nationalism and European integration in the three countries. 4 The aim is qualitative rather than quantitative, i.e. to identify both nationally specific patterns of interest, value, and meaning, as well as common configurations of views and (self-)perceptions as far as European and more globalising processes are concerned. Respondents - 20-odd in each country - were asked to freely express their views, images, and sentiments on issues pertaining to 1) their own national affiliation, 2) the other two countries, 3) the structures and processes of the EC/EU,. and 4) the USA as the 'Significant other' of European identity constructions. This article will be primarily based on responses to the third of these items, though passing reference will be made to other parts of the data. 5 category 3 of the questionnaire consisted of fourteen deliberately open-ended questions, giving respondents the possibility to air their views on the benefits, drawbacks, and basic aims and nature of different dimensions of European integration, both from a subjective and a more objective (national-interest) angle. The questions ran as follows: "1. Do you see EC membership as a good thing for yourself? Has it in any way affected you directly?; 2. Do you see membership of the EC as advantageous for <country>? Have you changed your opinion about membership within the last 5-10 years? If affirmative, why?; 3. What is your view of closer political cooperation within the EC? Should the EC develop towards a European federation?; 4. Are you in favour of closer cultural/educational cooperation, and if so, what types would you prefer?; 5. Do you view the EC as a threat to your national sentiments and as a threat to <national> sovereignty, or can <Danishness/Germanness/Britishness> be maintained within the EC?; 6. Do you think <national> politicians do enough to defend <national> interests within the EC?; 7. What does 'the Single Market' mean to you?; 8. Which other EC countries do you have most confidence in? Which other EC countries do you know most about?; 9. Should the EC have a common defense policy, and perhaps even a joint army?; 10. Do you ever feel European? If affirmative, in which ways and when?

6 What do you feel you have in common with other Europeans?; 11. Should the EC be extended - if so, to include which other countries?; 12. Has the EC contributed towards weakening or strengthening your impressions and perceptions - negative or positive - of other EC countries? 13. In your view, is the EC a necessity in the world of today - or could it be dispensed with, e.g. be replaced by other types of international cooperation?; 14. Is the EC democratic? If not, should it be? How could that come about?". Within the scope of this paper, it is not possible to address all these questions in detail. The following presentation will limit itself to addressing two select cases, based on responses to Question 7 (the Single Market) and Questions 3 and 9 (Political Integration), respectively, and obviously supplemented by parallel interview data. This will be followed by a section synthesising the main results to be gleaned from the entire corpus of data on this count, and written in a more panoptical vein. The closing section will try to extrapolate some likely pan-european and global lessons that may be learnt from these specific studies. Thus, the presentation will work its way 'upwards', from a microscopic to a macroscopic perspective, from induction to deduction, and from structural-synchronic to interpretive-diachronic extrapolation. 2. Case 1: Imagining the Single Market without being able to address the issue specifically, it is initially worth noting that responses to the questions dealing with the general issue of membership of the EC/EU elicited quite positive responses in all three national groups, though differences were visible between assessments based on an objectivistic, 'national' angle, and those viewing membership through a more subjectivistic, 'personal' prism. However, passing from the sphere of generalities to that of a specific - and highly significant - aspect of EC cooperation ('the Single Market'), a strange and distinctive phenomenon appears: Assessments are generally more negative and fearful, the gap being

7 insignificant in the German text and widest in the British. In addition, and as a clear exception to an otherwise well established pattern in this total data, the Danish and British texts are fuller, the respondents more vocal than is the case in the German responses. The Danish level of approbation of the EC in the abstract has here abated quite significantly. It is not surprising that the most vehement opponent of the EC in the Danish group (DK-6) should ruminate that "free mobility will probably damage Denmark. (... ) completely free mobility will probably be harmful to many Danish businesses that are less competitive. (... ) Europe as a trading bloc will do nothing but widen the gulf between developed and developing countries"; it is more surprising that a number of the respondents who, as regards membership, were positive or 'neutral', now voice clearly negative views: "It is probably not going to be all for the good - not for the individual either!" (DK-7A); "Economically I would want to see some results before I am seriously going to believe all the talk about free and unhindered mobility. <The Single Market is> an incredibly misused and trendy slogan used by everyone as they deem fit" (DK-24)i "I doubt whether Denmark is prepared to cope with the flow of labour power, students and business investors etc. that will also result from a total opening of the borders" (DK-28); "I do not like the idea of 'open' borders in the Ee, if it means that the member countries, in return, are going to be more restrictive at the borders to non-ec countries. Moreover, in my opinion Denmark should retain the Danish Krone <currency> and not accept the ECU as a common currency for everyday use" (DK-36). It is obvious that these Danes primarily associate the Single Market with 'open borders' as a rather frightening prospect for the future, both in terms of the Danish economy and a number of non-specified negative consequences for themselves. Other respondents, however, perceive the opening of borders as positive, e.g. in the context of their own occupation, or as consumers who will have access to more and hopefully cheaper goods (DK-2, 5, 25, 26, 34). Nevertheless there is a signifi-

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