L’ordine europeo post-allargamento. Europa “unita nella diversità?"

The enlargement of the European Union has led to the increase of diversity within the European area. While the project of enlargement can be understood as one in which the European Union has sought to defend a singular, common, and exclusive understanding of European identity (a ‘Fortress Europe’), the combined process of enlargement and constitutionalization can be seen to have ultimately contributed to an opening up as well as a rendering more contingent of the European project. While in one sense enlargement can be seen as sustaining the element of unity in the official motto of ‘unity in diversity’ (through the adherence to a common, overarching European ideal), in another it seems to support the element of political and cultural diversity (by adding to the cultural heterogeneity of the members as well as by extending the number of political visions of the finalité of Europe). Enlargement thus not only entails the widening of the European family, but also a diversification of its members and of understandings of Europe.