In search of a strong European public sphere: some critical observations on conceptualizations of publicness and the (European) public sphere

Abstract

The present-day popular advocacy of the 'European public sphere' is not only a normative-theoretical endeavour, but largely also an expression of the general (political) dissatisfaction with a neoliberal domination of economy over other political issues essential for democratic citizenship in the 'New Europe', or a reaction to an imbalance between the intense economic and rather sloppy political integration, and the democratic deficit in the decision-making. The idea of a pan- European post-national political public (sphere) contains an enlightened humanist ideology focused on its emancipatory potential, but it may also denote the fabrication of a fictitious Europe of elites without citizens if not deep-rooted in the concept of the 'strong' public sphere. The genealogy of the 'public (sphere)' demonstrates that the contemporary concept should be considered neither selfevident nor coherent. The article relates the concept to its late-18th-century ancestors and delineates main currents of thought in the subsequent two centuries. The concept of the weak public sphere dominates both in theory and in empirical research, and thus also in many contemporary media-centred studies of the/a 'European public sphere', which tend to reduce its definition to 'the lowest common denominator'.

Transnationalism as an Index to Construct European Identities: an Analysis of ‘Transeuropean’ Discourses

“…Habermas sees the EPS as a transnational site of participation in the democratic debate on European issues which must exist for a European civic identity to emerge and for the European project to be fully legitimized. Although there is little consensus as to whether (and to which extent) the EPS exist in transnational forms (see, inter alia, Closa 2001, Salvatore et al 2013, Eriksen and Fossum 2001, Splichal 2006, Triandafyllidou et al 2009, Risse 2010, an increasing number of European social actors -such as non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and (in)formal networks -have emerged in recent years which are focused on transnational clusters of interests (Kaiser 2010, Della Porta andTarrow 2005 . The salience of investigating DC4E lies therefore in the NGO's cross-border set up and, most of all, in its advocacy for framing the debate over European issues within the construction of a transnational (civic) community.…”

Social Capital and the Networked Public Sphere: Implications for Political Social Media Sites

“…Splichal discusses the public sphere of contemporary European politics, and draws a line between weak and strong public spheres [28]. The former talks about enlightened individuals that meet and construct shared meanings, and who are "members of a complete commonwealth or even cosmopolitan society", while the weak public sphere is concerned with freedom of the press, and the public's right to access information and act as an "effective check on the legislature based on people's distrust" (of the government) [28].…”

“…Splichal discusses the public sphere of contemporary European politics, and draws a line between weak and strong public spheres [28]. The former talks about enlightened individuals that meet and construct shared meanings, and who are "members of a complete commonwealth or even cosmopolitan society", while the weak public sphere is concerned with freedom of the press, and the public's right to access information and act as an "effective check on the legislature based on people's distrust" (of the government) [28]. The strong public sphere, which is the one that most resembles Habermas' own visions, is an idealised "space" for a small proportion of the public, based on ideals held by the ruling classes, and have been criticised for excluding certain social groups, and especially for not including the working classes [9].…”

A Cosmopolitan Temptation

“…Slavko Splichal (2006) has noted that the Kantian principle of publicity makes a universal claim that necessarily extends beyond a national or indeed, a European, political framework. In line with this, for cosmopolitans, public communicative space is precisely potentially global in scope.…”