Introduction

Citation

Avramopoulou E, Karakatsanis L, Leckie K, Papadogiannis N & Stammers T (2012) Introduction. European Review, 20 (1), pp. 1-9. https://doi.org/10.1017/s1062798711000263

Abstract
First paragraph: During the last four decades, especially since the Declaration of European Identity by the European Community, the question(s) about Europe's cultural and political identity have gained a revived impetus. Until the early 1990s, a line of argumentation that has been coined as the ‘orthodox story’ was predominant in the relevant analyses. This approach assumes that European integration/unification is connected to the construction of supranational institutions, which gradually superseded nation-states. This process, represented as the best guarantee of prosperity, is portrayed as an irreversible trend, despite shorter or longer periods of ‘stagnation’. This body of scholarship has usually adopted a bifurcated conceptualisation of ‘Europe’, which links a purported common heritage to the future of a ‘united Europe’. Stuart Woolf argues convincingly that in doing so, the exponents of the ‘orthodox’ approach seem to replicate the ‘original sin’ of nationalist histories: ‘namely, that the identity of the nation – in this instance of Europe as a commonality of peoples – can be traced historically, through the centuries, as an ideal continuity, even if the peoples were not always aware of this’.Reference Woolf The most systematic and well-known version of this ‘orthodox’ interpretation was provided by the historian Jean-Baptiste Duroselle, which has been translated into several European languages

Keywords
Political Science and International Relations; Geography, Planning and Development

Journal
European Review: Volume 20, Issue 1

People

Dr Nikolaos Papadogiannis

Lecturer in European History, History