Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Group identity – Europe'

This thesis analyses processes of discursive European identity formation in three cultural journals: Esprit, from France, the British New Left Review and the German Merkur during the time periods 1989-92, and, a decade later, during 2003-06. The theoretical framework which the thesis brings to bear on this analysis is that of the European Public Sphere. This model builds on Jürgen Habermas’s original model of a “public sphere”, and alleges that a sphere of common debate about issues of European concern can lead to a more defined and integrated sense of a European identity which is widely perceived as vague and inchoate. The relevancy of the public sphere model and its connection to the larger debate about European identity, especially since 1989, are discussed in the first part of the thesis. The second part provides a comparative analysis of the main European debates in the journals during the respective time periods. It outlines the mechanisms by which identity is expressed and assesses when, and to what extent, shared notions of European identity emerge. The analysis finds that identity formation does not occur through a developmental, gradual convergence of views as the European public sphere model envisages. Rather, it is brought about in much more haphazard back-and-forth movements. Moreover, shared notions of European identity between all the journals only arise in moments of perceived crises. Such crises are identified as the most salient factor which galvanizes expressions of a common, shared sense of European identity across national boundaries and ideological cleavages. The thesis concludes that the model of the EPS is too dependent on a partial view of how identity formation occurs and should thus adopt a more nuanced understanding about the complex factors that are at play in these processes. For the principled attempt to circumscribe identity formation as the outcome of communicative processes alone is likely to be thwarted by external events.

Defence date: 26 October 2007
Examining Board: Prof. Akira Kudo (University of Tokio) ; Prof. Willfried Spohn (Katholische Universität Eichstätt) ; Prof. Bo Stråth (Helsinki University and former EUI/Supervisor) ; Prof. Martin Van Gelderen (EUI)
PDF of thesis uploaded from the Library digital archive of EUI PhD theses
The aim of this thesis is to analyse the changes through the time of the West European academic images and stereotypes of Japan since the 1970s, and to study how Japan has been produced and constructed for Europe in some major academic disciplines, that is, economics, business management studies, social sciences, and across these disciplines. Therefore, it is a thesis to clarify the European imaginations and stereotypisations of Japan as reflected in the West European academic debate. It also aims to illuminate the European conceptualisation of Japan. How have the European academics perceived and interpreted the Japanese economy, its business management, society and historical backdrop since the 1970s? How have the images and stereotypes of Japan been constructed and developed for Europe as a model, as a threat or as the Other? Do any remarkable shared features or differences between images and stereotypes exist within each period or each academic discipline? These questions are addressed in the thesis. The thesis was born out of an academic interest in the development of the civilisational dialogue between Europe and Japan. Europe had always presented the models to emulate for the other non-Western nations, including - at least previously - Japan. After a century of Japanese interest in emulating European models of modernisation, in the 1970s influences started to operate in the reverse direction. It was during the 1970s that the West Europeans faced their serious economic, social and identity crises, and when the Europeans started to look to Japan for an alternative model with much more interest and close attention. Over the period since the 1970s Japan has provided itself to be the first non-Western nation in modern history that has demonstrated the alternative economic and social models from which Europe can learn or with which it can contrast itself for the first time.

This thesis looks at the role of discrimination and ethnic group identity as explanations of political behaviour of ethnic minorities in Britain. Chapter 2 examines vote choice and partisanship, arguing that a group utility heuristic explains the high level of support for the Labour party among ethnic minorities. I provide individual-level evidence of this heuristic by showing that ethnic minority voters support the Labour party to the extent that they are (i) conscious of the experiences of their ethnic group members with regards to discrimination, and (ii) believe that the Labour party is the best political party to represent their interests. These two attitudes mediate the effects of group-level inequalities. Chapter 3 asks whether Muslims are alienated from mainstream politics by Islamophobia and British military intervention in Muslim countries. I find that perceptions of Islamophobia are linked with greater political alienation, to a greater likelihood of non-electoral participation, but also to a lesser likelihood of voting. Likewise, disapproval of the war in Afghanistan is associated with greater political alienation and a greater likelihood of some types of non-electoral participation. I also provide strong evidence that Muslims in Britain experience more religious discrimination than adherents of other minority religions. Chapter 4 considers the interaction between the extreme right and ethnic minority political attitudes and behaviour. I find evidence that the extreme right British National Party (BNP) increases voting for the Labour party, at the expense of minor parties and abstention. Surprisingly, the BNP effect also benefits the other main parties. Although they do not benefit in increased vote share, Liberal Democrat and Conservative party and leader evaluations are more positive where the BNP stood and performed better in 2010, which I suggest is due to the electoral contrast provided by the BNP. Chapter 5 looks at the mobilisation effect of ethnic minority candidates on ethnic minority voters. I find a positive mobilisation effect of Pakistani and Muslim Labour candidates on Pakistani and Muslim voters, conditional on someone trying to convince the respondent how to vote. I also find a demobilisation effect of Labour Muslim candidates on Sikh voters.

Etude des relations entre représentations sociales et identités sociales dans le domaine des appartenances géopolitiques (régions, nations, Europe). L'introduction explore les liens conceptuels entre la théorie des Représentations Sociales (Moscovici, 1961) et les théories de l'Identité Sociale (Tajfel & Turner, 1986) et de l'Auto-catégorisation (Turner et al. 1987). Ces liens sont ensuite étudiés au travers de trois séries d'études empiriques. La première porte sur les effets du contexte de comparaison intergroupes sur les auto-stéréotypes des Belges francophones et néerlandophones. La seconde est consacrée à l'étude des relations entre identités nationale et européenne et les représentations sociales du processus d'intégration européenne. Enfin, la troisième étude empirique concerne les relations entre représentations sociales et processus identitaires en période de crise à travers une étude des explications profanes de l'affaire Dutroux (kidnapping et meurtre d'enfants)./Doctoral thesis on the relation between social representations and social identities in the framework of geopolitical memberships (regions, nations, Europe). The introduction explores the conceptual links between Social Representations Theory (Moscovici, 1961), and Social Identity (Tajfel & Turner, 1986) and Self-categorisation (Turner et al. 1987) theories. These links are then studied from different perspectives through three series of empirical studies. The first series addresses the effects of the context of inter-group comparison on self-stereotypes held by French-speaking and Dutch-speaking Belgians. The second is devoted to the study of the relations between national and European identities and social representations of the European integration process. Finally, a third empirical study examines the relations between social representations and identity processes in a period of crisis through a study of naïve explanations of the Dutroux affair (kidnapping and murder of children).
Doctorat en sciences psychologiques
info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

Introduction: This thesis investigates the experiences of young people who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and who are questioning their sexuality (LGBTQ) on the Internet. Specifically, the project explores how LGBTQ young people use the Internet, how they communicate online, the impact that the Internet has on their life and how they stay safe online. Despite the Internet being an ever-growing aspect of people’s lives and the potential opportunities that it presents for marginalised groups such as LGBTQ young people, there have been a relatively small number of qualitative studies in the area. Methodology: As there has been limited research regarding LGBTQ young people’s use of the Internet, a systematic review of qualitative studies exploring the experiences and views of cyberbullying by children and adolescents in the general population was conducted using Framework Synthesis. Subsequently, an empirical study was completed which involved conducting a secondary analysis, using Framework Analysis methodology, of data collected from focus groups with LGBTQ young people regarding their Internet use. In total, five focus groups were held with forty-one LGBTQ young people recruited across four European countries. Results: A total of eighteen studies were included in the qualitative synthesis exploring children and adolescents’ cyberbullying experiences. Although there was some variation in the quality of the studies, there was clear support for four main themes: Online vs. Traditional Bullying Environment, Risk Factors, Victim’s Experience and Preventative Measures. These themes highlighted both the potential causative factors of cyberbullying as well as how the victim experiences different aspects of the incident such as their initial understanding of the event to the long-term impact of cyberbullying. A number of preventative measures were also suggested, including the need for adults to increase their understanding of technology and cyberbullying in order to enable them to be a viable source of help. Within the empirical study, four main themes emerged from the data: Digital World as Part of Daily Life, In Control of Their Online World, Seeking Connection and Navigating Risk. The latter three main themes also consisted of a number of subthemes. The results indicate that participants have embraced the Internet into their everyday lives and that the LGBTQ population reaps specific benefits as the Internet allows them to overcome or compensate for barriers faced within their offline lives. Participants also reported the need to navigate many risks online, however interestingly they appeared confident in doing so and discussed the variety of ways in which they achieve this. Discussion: The results of the qualitative synthesis provided tentative support for two different theoretical models of cyberbullying, indicating that both an individual process model and an ecological system model are mutually useful ways of understanding this phenomenon. Clinical implications spanned both individual and systemic measures that could be taken to reduce the likelihood of cyberbullying occurring. However, it is also clear that further research, in particular qualitative research, is required to continue to develop our understanding of this topic as a whole. The findings from the empirical project suggest that LGBTQ young people must balance the opportunities provided by the Internet whilst also managing the risks that it poses. The importance of retaining the empowerment for young people on the Internet was clear, especially for young LGBTQ people who may use the Internet as an alternative way of meeting their needs and engaging in developmental tasks such as sexual identity development. However, there is also a need to ensure that these young people are safe online and therefore interventions such as parental education and the development of age appropriate resources are required to promote both empowerment and safety for this population.

This thesis is concerned with attitudes towards supra-national bodies, and more specifically with Scots' attitudes towards union in Britain and Europe. Firstly, it is suggested that support for, or opposition, to integration in a supra-national body depends on the extent to which this body is believed to enhance or undermine the ability to express national identity {identity enhancement vs. identity undermining). Identity undermining, in turn, depends upon a combined sense of incompatibility with outgroup identities/interests and of ingroup powerlessness within the supranational body. Secondly, it is suggested that these features of the social context and of identity meanings can be actively constructed in order to fulfil strategic purposes, such as persuading audiences in favour of separatism or integration. Five studies are reported which investigated these hypotheses. In study 1, we looked at the discourses of Scottish politicians and at the way their accounts of group identities and social reality could be understood in strategic terms, i.e. in relation to their political projects regarding Scotland's status in Britain and in Europe. In the second study, a survey design was used in order to provide quantitative evidence of the relationship between identity undermining, incompatibility, powerlessness and separatism. The third (experimental) study sought to clarify the causal relationship between these variables and showed that manipulating identity undermining lead to increased support for separatism. Finally, the fourth and the fifth (experimental) studies suggested that identity constructions, in the form of judgements of group prototypicality, can vary as a function of the strategic claim made by participants. In conclusion, the merits are stressed of an approach to identity processes and attitudes towards supra-national bodies that is sensitive to both context and content. It is also stressed that context and contents should not be taken as perceptual givens but as actively constructed by social actors.

Defence date: 7 July 2006
Examining board: Prof. Emanuele Castano (New School University, NY)(External Supervisor) ; Prof. Jaap Dronkers (European University Institute)(Supervisor) ; Prof. Geert Hofstede (Extramural Fellow, CentER for Economic Research, University of Tilburgh) ; Prof. Rick van der Ploeg (European University Institute)

Defence date: 24 November 2017; Examining Board: Professor Martin Kohli, European University Institute, Florence, Italy (EUI Supervisor); Professor Donatella della Porta, Scuola Normale Superiore, Florence, Italy; Professor Adrian Favell, University of Leeds, United Kingdom; Doctor Sophie Duchesne, Nanterre University, Paris, France.
This study takes an interpretative approach to the question of European identity. Based on 95 mixed-type interviews in three country cases (Estonia, Italy, and the Netherlands), it aims to answer the question what 'Europe' means to different groups of people (in a maximum variation sample), and how those meanings relate to their identities, their imagined geographies, and to political institutions and political narrative. The methodological approach centres around qualitative, semi-structured, and in-depth interviews of around two hours each. Within that, certain visual methods (photo elicitation and map drawing) are employed in order to develop a better understanding of meanings associated with Europe from the perspective of the interviewee. After that, a short questionnaire including a social network name generator was given to the interviewee. This study is presented as a methodological 'experiment' that attempts to explore alternative empirical avenues for approaching this subject, and what this means for its analysis and presentation. The analysis centres around three core themes: (i) a typology of perspectives on Europe, (ii) the imagined geographies within Europe, and (iii) the interplay between meanings of Europe and meanings of the EU. The first empirical chapter employs a typology approach to distinguish between three main types of narratives on Europe: Nationals, Situational Europeans, and Cosmopolitan Europeans. These three main types are further disentangled to ultimately range from cisnational to the European cosmopolitan tribe. The second empirical chapter draws on the data that was gathered by having interviewees express their views visually on a blank map of Europe, and examines the various Euroscapes that result from that analysis. Finally, the third empirical chapter looks at the relationship between meanings of ‘Europe’ and the EU. In doing so, it examines what Euroscepticism means in that context, and how political discourse may affect these meanings. In addition, it considers some of the ways in which European identity is measured in large-scale surveys, and how interviewees interpret such questions.

My aim in this project is to demonstrate how the reconfiguration of custom in the writings of Michel de Montaigne and Francis Bacon opened up a new discourse of collective identity that found its most developed expression in the writings of the French and English people who first colonized North America. Among the authors whose work I examine are Marc Lescarbot, Thomas Morton, Anne Bradstreet, Marie de l'Incarnation, Pierre Esprit-Radisson, and Mary Rowlandson. Their texts, I argue, radically reconceptualize identity, making it something that one performs rather than something one simply is. In charting custom's development I reveal how its radical potential was neutralized by the emerging opposition between nature and culture, illuminating the central role that the nascent concept of the nuclear family played in this transition. My dissertation thus closes with the work of the "American" authors Cotton Mather and Joseph-François Lafitau, who refined the meaning of custom to the brink of irrelevance at the turn of the eighteenth century, transforming it from the source of one's sense of communal belonging to a mere index of how far a given community had fallen from the state of grace. An epilogue on the Letters of an American Farmer by Hector St. John de Crèvecoeur demonstrates the aftermath of this transformation and gesture towards the afterlife of custom as a critical term.

Defence date: 8 July 2011
Examining Board: Prof. Martin Kohli, European University Institute (Supervisor); Prof. Mark Franklin, European University Institute; Prof. Jack Citrin, University of California at Berkeley; Prof. Juan Díez Medrano, Institut Barcelona d’Estudis Internacionals
In 2012 the author was awarded the Linz-Rokkan Prize in Political Sociology, and the Theseus Award for Promising Research on European Integration (Brussels, December 2012).
PDF of thesis uploaded from the Library digital archive of EUI PhD theses
Recent trends of euroscepticism seriously challenge Deutsch’s transactionalist theory that increased transnational interactions trigger support for further political integration. While transnational interactions have indeed proliferated, EU support has diminished. This dissertation aims at solving this puzzle by arguing that transnational interaction is highly stratified across society. Its impact on EU support therefore only applies to a small portion of the public. The rest of the population not only fails to be prompted to support the integration process, but may see it as a threat to their realm. This is even more the case as parallel to European integration, global processes of transnationalisation create tensions in national societies. Consequently, the hypotheses guiding this dissertation are as follows: (1) The more transnational an individual, the more (s)he is prone to support European integration. (2) This effect is more pronounced in countries and regions that are more transnationalised. These hypotheses are tested using multilevel analyses of survey data from the Eurobarometer waves 75.1 (2007) and 77.1 (2007). The analyses show that transnational interactions and networks are concentrated among a small group of highly educated, young Europeans. Individuals highly engaged in transnational interactions and well endowed with transnational human capital are significantly more likely to support EU membership and to consider themselves as European, even more so in highly globalised countries. This relationship is weaker, however, in intra- European border regions, where transnational interaction is less stratified across society.

INTRODUZIONE: Il presente progetto di ricerca nasce all’interno di un Dottorato Eureka, sviluppato grazie al contributo della Regione Marche, dell’Università di Macerata e dell’azienda Jobmetoo by Jobdisabili srl, agenzia per il lavoro esclusivamente focalizzata sui lavoratori con disabilità o appartenenti alle categorie protette. Se trovare lavoro è già difficile per molti, per chi ha una disabilità diventa un percorso pieno di ostacoli. Nonostante, infatti, la legge 68/99 abbia una visione tra le più avanzate in Europa, l’Italia è stata ripresa dalla Corte Europea per non rispettare i propri doveri relativamente al collocamento mirato delle persone con disabilità. Tra chi ha una disabilità, la disoccupazione è fra il 50% e il 70% in Europa, con punte dell’80% in Italia. L’attuale strategia europea sulla disabilità 2010-2020 pone come obiettivi fondamentali la lotta alla discriminazione, le pari opportunità e l’inclusione attiva. Per la realizzazione di tali obiettivi assume un’importanza centrale l’orientamento permanente: esso si esercita in forme e modalità diverse a seconda dei bisogni, dei contesti e delle situazioni. La centralità di tutti gli interventi orientativi è il riconoscimento della capacità di autodeterminazione dell’essere umano, che va supportato nel trovare la massima possibilità di manifestarsi e realizzarsi. Ciò vale ancora di più per le persone con disabilità, in quanto risultano fondamentali tutte quelle azioni che consentono loro di raggiungere una consapevolezza delle proprie capacità/abilità accanto al riconoscimento delle caratteristiche della propria disabilità. L’orientamento assume così un valore permanente nella vita di ogni persona, garantendone lo sviluppo e il sostegno nei processi di scelta e di decisione con l’obiettivo di promuovere l’occupazione attiva, la crescita economica e l’inclusione sociale. Oggi giorno il frame work di riferimento concettuale nel campo della disabilità è l’International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF), il quale ha portato a un vero e proprio rovesciamento del termine disabilità dal negativo al positivo: non si parla più di impedimenti, disabilità, handicap, ma di funzioni, strutture e attività. In quest’ottica, la disabilità non appare più come mera conseguenza delle condizioni fisiche dell’individuo, ma scaturisce dalla relazione fra l’individuo e le condizioni del mondo esterno. In termini di progetto di vita la sfida della persona con disabilità è quella di poter essere messa nelle condizioni di sperimentarsi come attore della propria esistenza, con il diritto di poter decidere e, quindi, di agire di conseguenza in funzione del proprio benessere e della qualità della propria vita, un una logica di autodeterminazione. OBIETTIVO: Sulla base del background e delle teorie di riferimento analizzate e delle necessità aziendali è stata elaborata la seguente domanda di ricerca: è possibile aumentare la consapevolezza negli/nelle studenti/esse e laureati/e con disabilità che si approcciano al mondo del lavoro, rispetto alle proprie abilità, competenze, risorse, oltre che alle limitazioni imposte dalla propria disabilità? L’obiettivo è quello di sostenere i processi di auto-riflessione sulla propria identità e di valorizzare il ruolo attivo della persona stessa nella sua autodeterminazione, con la finalità ultima di aumentare e migliorare il match tra le persone con disabilità e le imprese. L’auto-riflessione permetterà di facilitare il successivo contatto dialogico con esperti di orientamento e costituirà una competenza che il soggetto porterà comunque come valore aggiunto nel mondo del lavoro. METODI E ATTIVITÀ: Il paradigma teorico-metodologico adottato è un approccio costruttivista: peculiarità di questo metodo è che ciascuna componente della ricerca può essere riconsiderata o modificata nel corso della sua conduzione o come conseguenza di cambiamenti introdotti in qualche altra componente e pertanto il processo è caratterizzato da circolarità; la metodologia e gli strumenti non sono dunque assoggettati alla ricerca ma sono al servizio degli obiettivi di questa. Il primo passo del progetto di ricerca è stato quello di ricostruzione dello stato dell’arte, raccogliendo dati, attraverso la ricerca bibliografica e sitografica su: l’orientamento, la normativa vigente in tema di disabilità, i dati di occupazione/disoccupazione delle persone con disabilità e gli strumenti di accompagnamento al lavoro. A fronte di dati mancanti sul territorio italiano relativi alla carriera e ai fabbisogni lavorativi degli/delle studenti/esse e laureati/e con disabilità, nella prima fase del progetto di ricerca è stata avviata una raccolta dati su scala nazionale, relativa al monitoraggio di carriera degli studenti/laureati con disabilità e all’individuazione dei bisogni connessi al mondo del lavoro. Per la raccolta dati è stato sviluppato un questionario ed è stata richiesta la collaborazione a tutte le Università italiane. Sulla base dei dati ricavati dal questionario, della letteratura e delle indagini esistenti sulle professioni, nella fase successiva della ricerca si è proceduto alla strutturazione di un percorso di auto-orientamento, volto ad aumentare la consapevolezza nelle persone con disabilità delle proprie abilità e risorse, accanto a quella dei propri limiti. In particolare, il punto di partenza per la costruzione del percorso è stata l’Indagine Istat- Isfol sulle professioni (2012) e la teoria delle Intelligenze Multiple di H. Gardner (1983). Si è arrivati così alla strutturazione del percorso di auto-orientamento, composto da una serie di questionari attraverso i quali il candidato è chiamato ad auto-valutare le proprie conoscenze, le competenze, le condizioni di lavoro che gli richiedono più o meno sforzo e le intelligenze che lo caratterizzano, aggiungendo a questi anche una parte più narrativa dove il soggetto è invitato a raccontare i propri punti di forza, debolezza e le proprie aspirazioni in ambito professionale. Per sperimentare il percorso di auto-orientamento creato, nell’ultima fase della ricerca è stato predisposto uno studio pilota per la raccolta di alcuni primi dati qualitativi con target differenti, studenti/esse universitari/e e insegnanti di scuola superiore impegnati nel tema del sostegno e dell’orientamento, e utilizzando diversi strumenti (autopresentazioni, test multidimensionale autostima, focus group). CONCLUSIONI: I dati ottenuti dallo studio pilota, seppur non generalizzabili, in quanto provenienti da un campione esiguo, hanno evidenziato come il percorso di auto-orientamento attivi una riflessione sulla visione di sé nei diversi contesti e un cambiamento, in positivo o in negativo, nell’autostima e nella valutazione di sé in diverse aree, ad esempio nell’area delle relazioni interpersonali, del vissuto corporeo, dell’emotività ecc. Tali dati ci hanno permesso soprattutto di evidenziare punti di forza e debolezza del percorso creato e di apportare modifiche per una maggiore comprensione e adattabilità del prodotto stesso. Il valore del percorso orientativo è connesso al ruolo attivo di auto-valutatore giocato dal candidato con disabilità, affiancando a questa prima fase di autovalutazione un successivo confronto dialogico con un esperto, tale da permettere un ancoraggio alla realtà esterna, al contesto in cui il soggetto si trova a vivere. In questo senso, l’orientamento assume il valore di un processo continuo e articolato, che ha come scopo principale quello di sostenere la consapevolezza di sé e delle proprie potenzialità, agendo all’interno dell’area dello sviluppo prossimale della persona verso la realizzazione della propria identità personale, sociale e professionale.