Introduction

Abstract

This introductory chapter examines the multidimensional and often fraught scholarly relationship between European integration and culture. The complexity of culture as an area of European studies and European integration has inspired a growing body of scholarly literature in various disciplines. This literature agrees (for example: Bennett, 2007 ;Calligaro & Vlassis, 2017a ;Miller & Yúdice, 2002 ) that it is di cult to defi ne the limits of culture. Being such a vast and polysemous category, culture is seen as both a driving and centrifugal force of European integration. In this scientifi c literature, culture refers to artistic and intellectual heritage from the past, as well as to contemporary cultural expressions created by artists or produced and distributed by cultural industries ( Calligaro & Vlassis, 2017a : 10). More broadly, in the anthropological sense, a widened conception of culture deals with all aspects of the symbolic life of a group, such as traditions, customs, values and a set of ways of life and of shared representations ( Yúdice, 2003 ). Culture thus refers to the symbolic meaning and collective ideas that originate from or express cultural identities ( UNESCO, 2005 ). Culture therefore has a dual nature, oscillating between symbolic and material spheres, raising a series of economic, social, and identity-based issues for those actors involved in European integration policies.The introductory chapter highlights how this multidisciplinary literature seeks to explore the links between culture, European integration and European governance. It argues that this literature emphasises a twofold process: the role and place of culture in the process of European integration and in the establishment of the European Union's legitimacy, as well as the impact of European integration on the emergence of a European culture and on the sustainability of national and local cultures in a context of supra-national and/or extra-European pressures. In fact, this process is illustrated by the EU's motto, 'United in Diversity', representing the ways in which culture fosters integration, cooperation and common destiny, while, at the same time, it highlights identity particularities and cultural specifi cities. This literature therefore o ers di erent insights depending on the defi nition of culture, its theoretical scope and its methodological tools. It can be distinguished in four main categories: communication and cultural policy studies, the political sociology approach, the ethnographic and interpretivist perspectives and the legal-institutionalist approach. Political sociology approachFrom a political sociology perspective, an important strand of scientifi c literature asks what "Europe" and "culture" mean for European governance, and it agrees that culture is one of the most complex and contested fi elds of European integration. It sheds light on the dynamics of negotiation on culture as a European integration issue between EU institutions and other