A Europe of the Regions?

Introduction

This unit discusses the future of Europe, and it looks particularly closely at what may happen to the smaller political units presently existing below the level of the nation-state. These include nation-regions like Scotland and Wales, larger entities like the German Länder, and smaller more recently created regions with less existing cultural unity. Despite the very large differences between them, for our purposes all these political entities are called ‘regions’. The unit takes a historical glance at how they came into being, and assesses how they are being affected by political and economic developments like globalisation and the growth of the political institutions of the European Community. For the fate of the ‘regions’ depends not just on the nation-states of which they are a part: it cannot be separated from the future of the European Community (EC) itself.

This material is from our archive and is an adapted extract from Governing Europe (DD200) which is no longer taught by The Open University. If you want to study formally with us, you may wish to explore other courses we offer in this subject area [Tip: hold Ctrl and click a link to open it in a new tab. (Hide tip)] .