European Identity - Individual, Group and Society - HumanitarianNet

WHAT WE MEAN WHEN WE SAY EUROPE 39What we are: “Is there a European Identity?”The topical question of European identity is not new, even thoughit seems to concern us more deeply nowadays as the changes at aglobal level apparently affect us more directly.We have the impression that the European Union is focussing thedebate on how to bring out our identity as a European society. Let usnot be deluded however; such advances do not always result in what iscommonly referred to as “more Europe”, nor are they a sign of ahigher degree of closeness among the region and people around us, ofan increase in mutual appreciation of the enlarged Europe we areheading towards.Firstly, there the difficulty in defining the European identity, inparticular if one wants to delineate it clearly. For one thing, in order toidentify oneself it is necessary to have a clear “idea of oneself and ofothers, which implies the acknowledgment of a certain difference, and,in fact, that of belonging to a community. [A growing problem], if, asProf. Dumoulin points out, we frame it in the context of that vast andcomplex loss in values and certainties that is marking our time” 3 .In this sense and in accordance with reality, a “polyidentity” isbestowed on contemporary man, not referring to multiple identities ofthe person, but “only to one made up of all the elements that havegiven shape to it” 4 , which is almost a permanent feature in our world inwhich one can no longer speak of loyalty to one single identity withoutthis presupposing the denial of one’s own roots. On the other hand,“globalization confirms the mixing in several spheres and can constitutean element of universal reference [...]” 5 , valid in these sort of matters.In the sphere we operate in, Europe is a multi-dimensional reality,and for this reason is “recognized and understood in its historicaldimension, as diverse and subjected to movements of construction anddestruction during the course of time, which perhaps represents one ofthe most prominent identity traits.” 6 It does not seem, then, that the3Dumolin, M. (1998) Identité européenne et légitimité du projet européen, in thework edited by Toussignat, Nicole: Les identités de l’Europe: repères et perspectives.Actes du Colloque tenu à Louvain-la-Neuve le 9 mai 1996, Université Catholique deLouvain, pp. 7 y 11.4Marin, M.ª Angeles (2000) La construcción de la identidad en la época de lamundialización y los nacionalismos, in the work coordinated by Bartolomé PinaMargarita: Identidad y ciudadanía. Un reto a la educación intercultural, Madrid, NarceaS.A. de Ediciones, pp. 31-32.5Ibid., p. 27.6Cf. M. Dumoulin, op. cit., p. 11.