The Politics of Inclusion

Abstract

In this article I examine the Baltic states' return to Europe through the prism of collective identity formation. I argue that the European Union during the 1990s has been articulating a `politics of inclusion' vis-à-vis the Baltic states, a politics that is conducive to a strengthened independence for the latter. Inclusion in this sense is taken to mean an extension of a European political identity to incorporate the Baltic states. Emphasizing the social and discursive construction of identities — and consequently social reality — I introduce two conceptual categories, inside-inside articulations and inside-outside articulations, that may be used as points of reference when inquiring into the (re)construction of identities in world politics. By means of a discourse analysis of the foreign policy of the European Union towards the Baltic states, I provide a guide to the inscription of inside and outside as regards the European Self in contemporary European politics. I suggest that foreign policy is instrumental in writing state identities not only in relation to the state articulating the policy, but also in relation to a collective of states. I thus attempt to theorize the formation of collective political identity at a supra-state level.