Negotiating the limits of the possible: a perspective from Western Europe

This paper examines the emergence of the discourse of globalisation in Western Europe. It claims that in Western Europe, the question of ‘what is globalisation?’ led to the (existential) questions of ‘what is European?’ and ‘what is possible?’. Here a long list of adjectives (e.g. Anglo-Saxon, Continental, Germanic, Nordic/Scandinavian, Mediterranean) and actors (e.g. political parties, business associations, labour unions, civil society organisations, religious leaders) seem to blend and struggle with each other, trying to communicate or enforce their own views on Europe and globalisation. This struggle gradually evolved into a negotiation on the limits of the possible. To study the nature and direction of these dynamics the paper examines public opinion trends in France, Germany, Greece, Ireland and the UK.