Region-building Processes Research Articles

Region-building in the eastern neighbourhood: assessing EU regional policies in the South Caucasus

The promotion of regional cooperation has been a central feature of the European Union (EU)'s external relations. Forms of sub-regional cooperation are deemed to be essential confidence-building measures, as a means of consolidating a shared community of values, practices and interests. This article looks at region-building processes in the EU's relations with the South Caucasus, as the interface between the existing approaches and the ensuing practices. It argues that the European Neighbourhood Policy and the Eastern Partnership (EaP) in particular have some critical limitations for effective region-building in the South Caucasus, mainly pertaining to the endorsement of artificial regional labels, limited ability to balance multilateral and bilateral approaches, and poor local ownership of identity-building processes. At the same time, the EaP offers some interesting possibilities for the development of a variable-geometry regional approach, in which these states could be included.

Constructing (Un)familiarity: Role of Tourism in Identity and Region Building at the Finnish–Russian Border

This paper investigates the role of tourism in the construction of (un)familiarity in Karelia at the Finnish–Russian borderland. From a historical perspective, it deals with a culturally homogenous space, which more recently became divided by the border into two nation states that differ politically, ethnically and linguistically. In the course of the Cold War, unfamiliarity was one of the tools used by the Soviet political elite in construction of national identity. However, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, when the border regime became liberalized and cross-border interaction began, familiarity became one of the key factors of the regional identity construction. The case of Sortavala, on which this study focuses, allows us to analyse how identity was constructed in official and media discourses. Although familiarity in the local context is more prominent, unfamiliarity is also at stake, not only in a negative sense, but also from a sense of curiosity about historical ties between the different parts of Karelia. This paper contributes to an understanding of EU external bordering politics. It also highlights the role of local actors in the (re-)construction and (re-)interpretation of borders. Tourism is seen as one of the facets of local identity formation. This study attempts to understand tourism-driven cross-border region-building processes.

The Nordic Countries as a Historical and Historiographical Region: Towards a Critical Writing of Translocal History

This article focuses on the recently increased interest in transnational and translocal regions and regionalism in the context of a general “spatial turn” in the social sciences and the humanities. Using the historical conceptualizations of “the North” and “the Nordic region” (Norden, Pohjola) as an example, the article analyzes the processes of region-building in general and the case of the Nordic countries (Scandinavia) as a historical and historiographical region in particular. On the one hand, the constructed character of Norden will be acknowledged; on the other, it is also argued that the regional constructions may have a certain degree of construct validity and a historical continuity, based on common historical experiences and the inherent spatiality of history. Finally, the article concludes that the acknowledgement of the transnational framework is important when rethinking the history of historiography, albeit it is not necessarily a more “enlightened” alternative to methodological nationalism.

Volatile Regionalism in the Mediterranean Area

This contribution aims to understand what kind of regionalism is experiencing the Mediterranean area. A theoretical model will be provided in order to analyze current patters of EuroMediterranean relations, and in particular EU’s action in the area. Is the EU pursuing a regionalist project in the area? Is the EU promoting region-building processes? The launching of the Union for the Mediterranean in July 2008 seems to have frozen the region building process promoted with the EuroMediterranean Partnership, and initiated a narrower neo-functionalist process. According to a list of technical priority areas indicated in the Paris Declaration, specific cooperation projects have to be elaborated and implemented also with the involvement of private actors and non-regional actors. We seek to demonstrate that EU’s role as regional-integrator in the Mediterranean as it was conceived in the mid-1990s has been currently weakened. DRAFT: Please do not cite, comments are welcome. 1 A preliminary version of this contribution was presented at the XXIII SISP Congress, Rome 17-19 September 2009. I would like to thank Elena Baracani, Eugenia Baroncelli, Manuela Moschella, panel organizers, and Vittorio Emanuele Parsi, paper discussant, together with Fulvio Attina, Carla Monteleone and Rosa Rossi for their comments. Of course, I retain the only responsibility for this work.

Institutional regionalism versus networked regionalism: Europe and Asia compared

For much of the second half of the twentieth century, regionalism has been conceptualized with reference to Europe. The European Union (EU) is seen as the most successful example of regional integration and this ‘model’ is largely based on an exclusive ‘institutional’ regionalism where integration is achieved through endowing specific institutions with far-reaching decision-making powers to shape the behaviour of the member states. In contrast, the East Asian region-building process seems to operate on a different logic, with an emphasis on open-ended networked regionalism. This article sketches out the process of regional construction in Europe and East Asia and attempts to develop and contextualize the idea of networked regionalism in order to assess how useful it can be in explaining the trajectory and contours of region-building in East Asia.

North Norway

The article has as a starting point the fact that regions are one of the central political topics of today. Though regions have certain roots in history, they were not politicized until the nineteenth century, when they were “invented” as a tool for identity-shaping and development in the fringe areas of the state. The article operates with North Norway as a case in analyzing modern region-building processes and state regionalization strategies. This region is well suited as a case because of its particular position as a border area and its unique position in Norway’s political and economic history. The region-building process developed through distinct stages. In the 1970s North Norway came close to being understood as an identity region. Since the early 1990s, however, there have been fissures in this identity and the old regional visions have been under pressure from within as well as from without. In addition old tensions within the region have been disclosed. The most striking example is Finnmark, the northernmost county of the region, and of the nation as well, which through history has played a role in the margin. It is a kind of historical irony that the current development of the Norwegian “northern policy” programme together with the promising prospect of ocean-based oil and gas industry has put Finnmark in the forefront of future expectations.

Arctic unity, Arctic difference: mapping the reach of northern discourses

Since the end of the Cold War, cooperative and region-building endeavours involving Arctic governments and peoples have flourished. These efforts have been rooted in a desire to pursue northern sustainable development and in assertions about the shared experiences and values of Arctic states and peoples. In this paper, a case study is presented concerning a Canadian development project designed to promote Canadian sustainable economic development models to indigenous and non-indigenous leaders and bureaucrats in the Russian north. In their efforts to move knowledge across northern borders, the Canadian project team relied clearly upon two central discourses of the Arctic region-building process: a common Arctic space and the shared pursuit of sustainable development. Drawing upon over thirty qualitative interviews and a year of participant observation at project events, the aim of this article is to map the currency and reach of these Arctic regional discourses at a more ‘local’ level amongst the Russian and Canadian Arctic residents involved in the project. The continuing debate during this development project over what Arctic regionalism and sustainable development mean in practice calls into question a key assertion of contemporary region-building rhetoric, the assumption or hopeful injunction that not only is a regional landscape or environment shared but that values and experiences are, or will come to be, shared as well.

Japan's Policy Stance on East Asian Neo-Regionalism: From Being a “Reluctant”, to Becoming a “Proactive” State

This article is a theoretically grounded empirical contribution aimed at shedding light on Japan's policy stance on East Asian neo-regionalism. It aims to examine the recent region-building process in East Asia. The dynamics in East Asia suggest that regional institutionalization, brought about by norm diffusion based on the idea of neo-regionalism, is likely to follow a progressive and evolutionary trajectory through the institutionalization of the Association of Southeast Asian Nation (ASEAN) + 3 (South Korea, Japan and China). It provides a wide spectrum of regional-integrationist perspectives in order to offer as full a picture as possible of Japan's role in promoting regional integration in East Asia. The key finding of this article is that Japan has changed from a being “reluctant”, to becoming a “proactive” state in the context of regional collaboration in East Asia.

The abrupt end of a promising start: the Romanian – Finnish diplomatic relations a the beginning of the 1920’s

This article approaches on the basis of fresh archival research some of the key reasons which led to the failure of the region-building process at the western periphery of Soviet Russia (Union). This research of the relations between Romania and Finland, two distant nations located at the two extremities of Soviet western border, points out to the role played by domestic agendas, cultural and political identities, lack of knowledge of each other, regional skirmishes, and outside powers intrusions as viable explanations for the fact that the cooperation between Border States remained to some extent restricted to diplomatic and intelligence sharing cooperation. It is a paradox that although the importance of the cooperation between Border States was rapidly acknowledged by policy-makers and public opinion the achievements remained well behind the projects, ambitions and interests.