The Concept of Europe as an Idée-force

Abstract

This article considers the formation of the European Union at the level of ideas over a long period of time. The title responds to Fouillée's concept of idée-force as applied to the development of the concept of Europe. First, Edgar Morin's theory of Europe is presented. The author emphasizes the ambiguity of the concept. The idea of two models of Europe has existed for a long time. The next stage is to show the different concepts of Europe that existed in the 1940s and how, in spite of optimistic visions of a European future, the creation of unity was a rather slow process, focusing successively on the economic, legal and political dimensions, but only superficially on the cultural level. The following step shows that the proposition enunciated by Cris Shore - that the European Union is becoming a superstate and a supernation - is incorrect; by examining the European audio-visual dimension one can easily conclude that the pace of unification is extremely slow. Finally, it is suggested that national and European identity are not the same type of discursive practice.