From Tension to Dialogue? The Mediterranean between European Civilization and the Muslim World

Abstract

Historically the Mediterranean has always been an area of dense relations and conflict between Europe and the Muslim world. In this chapter I will reconstruct the field of tension where European and Islamic civilizations have interacted—a field where the cultural and the political levels are intersected. It is my goal to link culture to power. The field of tension is given by how power is culturally defined and how culture becomes a yardstick for power politics. Power is not a liquid standard, like money, but is culturally constructed and embedded.