1st Edition

The Politics of Regional Identity Meddling with the Mediterranean

By Michelle Pace Copyright 2006

    A keen analysis of the impact of European regionalism in the Mediterranean, focusing on the politics of representation and constructions of identity.

    The Mediterranean - as a region, as an area of EU policy and as a place on the fringe of a rapidly integrating Europe - has been a theoretically under-researched area. Containing empirical research on Greece, Malta and Morocco, this theory-led investigation into the political effects of the Mediterranean's symbolic geography, complements work done on the constitution of entities such as nations, Europe and the West.

    The Politics of Regional Identity draws on the field of critical IR and critical geopolitics to examine both the theoretical and empirical manifestations of these changing geopolitical images and discourses.

    This book will be of great interest to all students and scholars of politics, international relations and the European Union.

    Foreword  1. Introduction  2. Regionalism in IR – theoretical overview  3. Understanding EU hegemony. Levels of Economic development between North and South and the EU’s Mediterranean policies  4. EU Foreign policy as a discursive practice of the Mediterranean  5. Discursive practices of the Mediterranean from Greece, Malta and Morocco. A comparative analysis  6. Which "Mediterranean"? A Comparison of discursive practices from the EU and the case studies  7. Conclusion

    Biography

    Michelle Pace

    'Not only a nice contribution to the new field of symbolic geography. It is also a contribution to the movement within the discipline of international relations back to the broad tradition of social science understood as a unitary undertaking that transcends narrow empirical specialisation.'- The Sunday Times  

    'This book is indispensable both for those who are interested in how discursive constructivism is applied to a specific case(region), and for those who are interested in knowing more about the EU's concrete policies towards the Mediterranean.' - Millennium Review

     

    'The author has tremendous factual knowledge about the EU's institutional development and concrete policies towards the Mediterranean, and she succeeds in presenting knowledge in a coherent and comprehensive manner.' - Ulla Holm, Danish Institute for International Studies