The knowledge society requires an indepth development of lifelong learning, benefitting from a variety of interconnecting learning resources. However, today’s policy towards a learning society implies a more innovative capacity to (re) design (new) institutions of political, economic, social and educational governance, which can respond properly to the challenges of the multi-faceted process of globalisation.
As was said in Chapter 3 and 4, what is European can be termed by forms of identity, practices, ways of life, means of production and types of interaction that go beyond national, regional or disciplinary frontiers.
It is about continuous border-crossing. The intertwining of globalisation and Europeanisation has various policy consequences and produces different lines of thought and action that need to be taken into account in European studies:
– The dismantling of national borders in Europe has an impact on the European dynamic of socio-economic inequalities. The social dimension for the European integration process has policy implications within and beyond European borders, in particular in relation to internal and external solidarity and a sense of belongingness.
– The Europeanisation process is initiating a historically new positive sum game: joint solutions serve the national interest. On some
5 Bekemans, L. (ed.),A Value-Driven European Future, Brussels: P.I.E. Peter Lang, 2012, 242 p.
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occasions and policies the EU is sometimes better placed to solve problems than nations or regions could possibly be by acting alone.
From a cosmopolitan perspective, this diversity (whether in languages, economic systems, political cultures, or forms of democracy) appears primarily as an inexhaustible source of Europe’s cosmopolitan self-concept and not as an obstacle to integration. A cosmopolitan Europe is first and foremost the Europe of difference of recognised particularity.
– A third line of thought and action is that Europeanisation requires a collective memory culture that spans borders, an “Europeanisation of perspective”. This might lead to genuine intercultural dialogue and mutual learning, conceived as an enrichment of one’s own integral human development.
– The fourth line is the understanding of European society as a regional world risk society. Reference is made to the theory of reflexive modernisation, which is characterised by three constitutive elements, namely, the theorem of risk society, the theorem of forced individualisation and the theorem of multidimensional globalisation.
This means that the experience and dynamics of modernity bear risks in the sense that along with its success, modernity also contains negative consequences. This requires policy coordination and rule setting of both obstacles and opportunities in European and global contexts.
– The fifth concluding line concerns the understanding and shaping of new forms of political authority that have emerged in Europe beyond the nation-state. The management of globalisation effects, specifically the problems related to the flows and crises of global finance and the neglected European dimension of current socio-political developments, requires a more courageous approach, in respect of the various levels and actors involved in the process.
2. Renewing European Studies
How can we renew, deepen and widen European studies without in any way abandoning the acquired excellence of the current approaches to European studies? It is our conviction that: education institutions should accept European lifelong learning as their collective responsibility; governments should invest in a broad European studies curriculum for all stages of informal, non-formal as well as formal education; and finally that Europe should strengthen its lifelong learning agenda to active and responsible citizenship.
Support for such a European oriented education about responsible citizenship and multiple identities would need to consider the following three elements: a differentiated and multi-leveled discourse; curriculum content; and a social and cultural relevance.
– Discourse refers to people’s internalised values and the way they behave. A deeper understanding of how people build up a self-image will help educators provide effective and adequate learning programmes for those most excluded from the mainstream. Educational inclusion for a responsible citizenship also means that different and alternative ways of knowing and doing within our mainstream learning programmes should be recognised.
– The development of a curriculum content in a European context would need: i) to contextualise the curriculum building in critical, reflexive learning experiences with the objective of understanding the role of the self is critical to learning how to contribute actively to a changing world; and ii) to introduce the idea of an alternative curriculum, alongside the conventional mode of disciplinarity, as a new mode of knowledge that is context specific, transdisciplinary, and created and transmitted largely outside of formal learning.
– The most common method proposed for democratising the selection and control of knowledge is through discussion and dialogue.
There is need for a critical dialogic approach to learning, which recognises community experience as a contribution to knowledge and as a means of understanding its social and cultural relevance to the curriculum. This also implies recognising values outside the dominant perspective of the education system, in particular an education on intercultural dialogue, human rights and democratic citizenship.
Consequently, the promotion of a European oriented education on responsible citizenship and multiple identities needs to be understood and realised in a wider societal context of the knowledge triangle.
3. Possible trajectories
In view of Europe’s priorities within the globalising context (i.e.
connecting Europe to the citizens; increasing the EU’s visibility in the world; pursuing reflection on intercultural dialogue; providing analysis and guidance on economic, social and financial integration) European studies with the support of the Jean Monnet programme, could engage in following trajectories for deepening and widening European studies at various learning levels.
A balanced support for launching new projects and strengthening existing ones within a broader scope should become a priority of the Jean Monnet Programme’s contribution to the field of European studies.
The programme has been moving from a successful phase of introducing the European dimension to traditional university curricula to a phase where a consolidation, strengthening and deepening of the European dimension in teaching, research and disseminating activities within and beyond universities has become a quality label. This would
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imply granting continuous support (financial & structural) on the basis of content and technical criteria of good practice, distinguishing short and long term perspectives and differentiating deepening and widening European issues. Such an approach will certainly strengthen the sustainability of a platform of competences and excellences in the field of European studies. It would also mean the adoption of a more horizontal approach for supporting transversal programmes and cooperation networks with a focus on the added (European) value in disciplinary and interdisciplinary approaches. Moreover, the creation of learning and research spaces within and beyond the traditional university landscape might be opened up to the society at large through curricular and extra-curricular activities embedded and rooted in the territory.
We are also convinced that a focus on a committed, balanced, diversified and plural structure of thematic networks will certainly strengthen the identity of the Jean Monnet brand. Recognising the diversity of approaches but searching for synergies between chairs and centres would imply a good mixture between: informative and formative tasks, disciplinary and interdisciplinary networks; broad areas and specific issues, traditional and innovative themes and approaches;
local/regional embeddedness and European dimension. In short, the Jean Monnet Centres of Excellence are platforms and laboratories for issue-related collaboration with different disciplines in the university and between universities.
Possible supportive tools range from: the development of Jean Monnet fellowships, joint degrees and Ph.D/Post-Ph.D support; the search for synergy with other EU programmes; benefitting from the mobilising capacity of individual Jean Monnet professors through the national associations of professors and researchers in European integration (ECSA); increasing internal and external visibility by using the Jean Monnet web space as an interactive tool; setting up strategic thematic knowledge clusters of transnational transdisciplinary transversal research networks, involving scholars from political science, economics, environmental studies, international affairs, international and EU law, sociology, and history (e.g. thematic networks on multilevel governance and international democracy, climate change, citizenship and human rights, the future of the EU for (good) global governance, etc.).