THE ROLE OF EDUCATION AND CULTURE IN THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF THE EUROPEAN UNION

Abstract

As a dynamic and ongoing process European integration has faced many difficulties so far. Nevertheless through widening and deepening the European Union (EU) is trying to expand its competence within different policy areas. Two of these areas, namely education and culture have close links to today 's highly debated subject of 'integration of the people' within the EU project. The aim of this paper is to analyze the role, the effects and the aims of the education and cultural fields in creating the 'peoples of Europe' project. In the field of education, the EU has been pursuing the aims of the Bologna Process to establish the European Higher Education Area until 2010. Closer cooperation and protection of the common cultural heritage of Europe owns are the main concerns of the cultural policy. These two policy areas also support the efforts to create the 'Peoples of Europe' project which was introduced for the first time in the Tindemanns report. The programmes introduced under education and culture (such as student exchange, student mobility, and cultural action programmes) are opening the way for intercultural dialogue, harmonization of people, creating the feeling of belonging to the same community, strengthening EU Citizenship, and spreading the 'we' feeling across Europe. In short, these two policy areas interact with the aim of supporting the social construction of the EU. Keywords: Education policy, Culture, Cultural diversity, Social Cohesion, EU Citizenship.