Euroacademia Conferences
Europe Inside-Out: Europe and Europeanness Exposed to Plural Observers (9th Edition)April 24 - 25, 2020
Identities and Identifications: Politicized Uses of Collective Identities (9th Edition)June 12 - 13, 2020
8th Forum of Critical Studies: Asking Big Questions AgainJanuary 24 - 25, 2020
Re-Inventing Eastern Europe (7th Edition)December 13 - 14, 2019
The European Union and the Politicization of Europe (8th Edition)October 25 - 26, 2019
Identities and Identifications: Politicized Uses of Collective Identities (8th Edition)June 28 - 29, 2019
The European Union and the Politicization of Europe (7th Edition)January 25 - 26, 2019- 7th Forum of Critical Studies: Asking Big Questions AgainNovember 23 - 24, 2018
Europe Inside-Out: Europe and Europeanness Exposed to Plural Observers (8th Edition)September 28 - 30, 2018- Identities and Identifications: Politicized Uses of Collective Identities (7th Edition)June 14 - 15, 2018
Papers
EU Ordo-Liberalism and Anti-Systemic Movements: The Disruption Potential Combined
From different sides we are hearing in the academic milieu that the current European settings are somehow a situation similar to the twenties, and the consequential social response of the thirties of last century. Furthermore, along these lines, even Karl Marx thesis on capitalism has been recently resurrected from dusty bookshelves. Predicting such critical situation to happen, anyway soon or later, in the development of liberal capitalism. However, without taking these statements for granted, as right or wrong, the reflection in the paper tries to present if such methodological approach is consistent enough to analyse the current situation across Europe today. In other words, if the situation presented by scholars and in particular in the media today reflects, per-consequence, a social-psychological transformation that Europe has already experienced a century ago. I also conclude in proposing a tentative possible solution to the problem of divergence and discontent that is currently locking the progress of European integration.Legitimacy and EMU: Between Monetary Community and Monetary Association
Which legitimacy criteria are appropriate for the institution in question? I develop two alternative criteria, one for international institutions we have moral duty to create, and one for those we are merely free to create. Institutions of the former, mandatory kind have to allow those they govern as much democratic control as is consistent with citizens’ willingness to take decisions with a view to the common good. Institutions of the latter, optional kind have to secure the continuous approval of concurrent majorities in their member states. If the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) is of the mandatory kind, we may call it a monetary community; if it is of the latter, optional kind, we may call it a monetary association. Whether EMU is mandatory or optional, i.e. whether it is a monetary community or a monetary association, depends on the degree of interdependence in the policy areas it regulates and the degree of basic solidarity, i.e. willingness to take decisions with a view to the common good, of Eurozone citizens.Negotiating the Third Greek Bailout: A Signalling Game with Double-Sided Incomplete Information
In Spring 2014, Greek Prime Minister Samaras asked Chancellor Merkel to start debt talks in line with promises made by the Eurogroup in November 2012 but she turned down Samaras’ offer. So why did Merkel refuse to cooperate with Samaras in the first place? Using a signalling game-theoretical framework, we will show that double-sided incomplete information is a necessary condition for explaining the bargaining dynamics leading to the third Greek bailout. Even if both Germany (as representative of creditor countries) and Greece were more Grexit-averse than compromise-averse, incomplete information about each other’s preferences ordering induced the players to take risks, exchange threats and escalate a conflict in order to make the opponent yield first.European Social Thinking and the “Other”
In the search for the European path ahead, philosophers have been exploring different approaches. The purpose is, firstly, bringing some little-visited approaches (Hanna Arendt, Simone Weil or Maria Zambrano) in a complementary manner and to replace the previous deductive method of modern ideologies with a more inductive bottom-up process that harvests, from their different essential contributions, a better understanding of the “other”. Secondly, it is suggested that the contemporary recognition of Europe should be placed more firmly within this tradition of aspiration for fraternity, putting into goal more in the people that in the institutions of the society that put up the walls of their cognitive closure. This is because, usually, fraternity is not considered as a premise and it could be not only the missing premise but a contribution of European culture.A Philosophy for Europe: German Philosophy, French Theory, Italian Thought
What are the characteristic features that distinguish “German Philosophy” from the “French Theory” and “Italian Thought”? The central research hypothesis of this paper is that, since its origins in Renaissance humanism, each tradition has particular characteristics. For example, in Italy, there has never been great attention paid to the philosophy of science and logic which is ever-present in the Anglo-Saxon context, nor a philosophy of the interior as seen in France from Pascal to Maine de Biran; nor again a highly metaphysical tradition as in Germany, from Leibniz, to Kant up to Idealism. The nature of the Italian tradition of thought is to be a “philosophy of praxis” (political and civic vocation, great attention to history, etc.). The structurally plural soul of European philosophy will be shown: the big difference between “German Philosophy”, “French Theory” and “Italian Thought” is only one of the several examples of the richness of European culture.The Sin of Indifference: Europe and the Ancient Greece
This paper consists of two parts. In the first part, I will question the entrenched presuppositions behind the idea of Ancient Greece as the cradle of European civilization. On this account, it is widely argued that the defining and commencing difference of Europe is the invention of a theoretical, that is, a detached and disinterested, attitude whereby the totality of "the world" was, for the very first time in "history", has been discovered and thematized. This singular and unprecedented discovery, so it is further argued, consisted in a radical questioning which demanded of the "man" to take nothing for granted. Elaborating on this trite account, taken as the dogmatic understanding of what Europe is, I will try to unearth a myriad of experiences, ideas, and assumptions hidden in the seemingly unsophisticated deployment of the concepts "world", "history" and "man".
Autonomy, Independence, the Self and Identity
The paper will address the dynamics of conceiving identity in relation with the self, starting from the Kantian principial view on autonomy to contemporary placements of autonomy in relation with historicity, finitude and alterity making practices inherent to the making of the self within a social `genetic soup` (J.Olsen) and in the boundaries of social imaginary institutions (C. Castoriadis).Politicising the Saint: Far Right and the Appropriation of National Saints
This paper seeks to examine the ongoing process of politicising National Saints by far-right groups. Through linking the historical past of saints, specifically those that figure prominently within the identities of countries, far-right groups have sought to co-op the actions and values of individual saints and religion into a form of self-ideology. This has given rise to an intrinsic linking of far right, particularly anti-immigration, and chauvinistic policy with that of well known figures of public and national pride. These connections have given legitimacy to the far-right, through the linking of religious, canonised bodies being accepted as embodying the policies and beliefs of the right.Populist America: What Objects Reveal about US Identitarian Formations
By interrogating the logic of identity formations through visual and material cultures in political processes will I explore the relevance of visual and object design in everyday American cultural life as part of ongoing political processes beyond formal exercises such as voting. I suggest that Visual Design has the capacity to objectify the metaphysics of identitarian formations, to materialize in cultural objects —images— a not-yet fully constituted community of political actors like voters and rally participants.The Construction of Modern Greek Identity in the Nineteenth Century
Within this framework, this paper analyzes the construction of the modern Greek identity in the nineteenth century. By examining the tension between the two mutually opposed forces in the cultural and linguistic realms, the paper aims to illustrate how dualism shaped the whole of Greek life. Furthermore, the Greek state had to formulate and develop a national identity for its nation. Religious differentiation of the Greeks from the Muslims could no longer cultivate the Greekness of the Greeks adequately. However, as Greek peasants designated themselves as Christians and speakers of Greek, the new nation-state had to transform this religious identity into a secular national identity.
