A Mediterranean perspective on European union and disunion: introduction

Abstract: The Mediterranean is a region long marked by linguistic, literary, culinary, musical and intellectual traditions of Catholic, Arab, Jewish, Turkish and Latin cultures. It has existed as a mutable space of adjacent and overlapping cultural and historical currents, defying neat cartographic or civilisational delineations of national identity. The Mediterranean’s place within Europe, and particularly European integration over the last half century, however, seems increasingly fragile, as a growing number of Mediterranean nations turn inwards, partly because of misgivings towards wider forms of membership and affiliation, despite the very many ways they are co-constituted. The articles in this issue consider the fractures of belonging in Europe and some ways of mending them by alerting us to the deep history of the Mediterranean as a meeting ground and crossing point between cultures.

Keywords: Integration, Europe, belonging.

Article posted to Journal of the British Academy, volume 8, supplementary issue 1 (A Mediterranean Perspective on European Union and Disunion).