Unity in Diversity: European Citizenship Through the Lens of Popular Culture

Abstract

Citizenship plays a central role within the political, legal and academic discourse of the European Union. It has been instrumental in attempting to foster a European identity across national boundaries, and it is a useful heuristic device for analyzing wider issues of membership and belonging. Citizenship theory also has been developed using examples drawn from popular culture. This article seeks to build upon this approach and enrich our understanding of European citizenship by interrogating one important annual European cultural event: the Euro-vision Song Contest. The Contest, like Europe itself, illuminates a central tension between identity and difference, which demands skepticism towards grand narratives of an inevitably exclusionary European identity and destiny.