Is There a Common European Culture and Citizenry?

The concept of the culture is difficult by it self. The concept of common European culture is more difficult. There are no one definition. Jan Figel, Commissioner for Education, Training, Culture, and Multilingualism, told in his lecture: ‘I bet you can find as many definitions of European culture as there are people in this room’1. Some thinkers see European culture in the way of life. Other thinkers argue that European culture is based on the universal moral values like humanity, respect to person, tolerance etc. Another even consider that there is no such phenomenon like European culture. In our turn we argue that common European culture does exist. And we will produce our own definition of this concept that is based on the vision of the European Union.
The concept of culture can be utilised in either a narrow or wide sense. Narrow, because it can be restricted to being defined by the arts, literature, music and philosophy. In its wider sense, however, culture refers to a complexity of values, customs, ideas, and political and social institutions which determine the human and social relations of a specific society. In this sense, culture becomes central to the notion of a community and its future.2 European culture presents wide concept of culture, because it has close links to identity, citizenship, political order in general. The function of European culture is to produce feelings of belonging to the community. European culture can not be understood outside wider political project of EU construction.
European cultural space is open and dynamic. It is open in two senses. The first reason is the possibility of enlargement process. In its beginning European Community pointed out that nations that share similar values and norms can join Community. …