Preface

When we started working on this book in early 2011, the euro crisis was in full swing. At the same time, we had practically no idea whether European integration would remain untouched and how the euro crisis would impact the central theme of this book – namely, the Europeanization of public spheres. Would Europe relapse into various nationalisms, would we see an increased politicization of European affairs (as some hoped and others feared), or would the European Union (EU) evolve into a full-fledged transnational community of communication?

Three years later, when this book went into production, European integration seemed to have survived the attacks of financial markets for the time being, but Southern Europe was still not out of the worst economic crises in decades, experiencing enormous (youth) unemployment. Regarding public spheres, the authors in this book agree that we observe growing politicization of European issues everywhere. However, we do not have consensus on the possible consequences (see, e.g., Chapters 6, 8, 9, and 10 in this volume).