EU enlargement based on the economics of innovation and knowledge. Architecture is called upon to design historical “places” as handed on by tradition and the “non-places” emerging from the crisis in modernity.
Enlarged Europe: Places and Non-Places
Europe is coming of age and its enlargement to encompass another ten member nations opens up new horizons for the Union, not just politically and economically but also on a socio-cultural level.
Debate about the enlargement process and the eventual need to review the tight constraints imposed by the Stability Pact has focused attention on economic issues in New Europe as it grows from 15 to 25 member states. “An époque-making moment,” as the President of the European Commission Romano Prodi describes it in his article for arcVision. A new era is beginning within the realms of Old Europe, as, at the dawning of the third millennium, it strives to regain its status as the driving force behind world growth. This is a leap forward toward finding a common cultural denominator for a new geo-political entity that is still too young to claim it has achieved a certain stability.
A social change on a continental scale that must come to terms with much wider cultural realms, expanding spaces that are destined to become the common heritage of a community whose population and territorial extension are increasing respectively by 20% and 23% compared to old Europe with its fifteen member states. In this kind of context the question of “places and non-places” featured in the Projects section of this issue suddenly takes on even greater importance, as Maurizio Vitta points out. “If a place can be defined as relational, historical, and concerned with identity—so Marc Augé claims—then a space which cannot be defined as relational, or historical, or concerned with identity will be a non-place.” And in new Europe new places/nonplaces will, according to Augé, be “the installations required for the accelerated circulation of people and goods, as well as the means of transport themselves or the big shopping malls.” And one of the first places destined to represent the new community of different nations is the European Parliament Building in Strasbourg designed along centripetal architectural lines capable of embodying the drawing force bringing together all the members of the Union.
This is certainly one of the places where discussions will be held about the need or otherwise of keeping clear rules—not open to interpretation—for Europe’s growth and development. According to Carlo Secchi, without the kind of definite guidelines governing public finance set down in the Stability Pact, Euroland’s economic prospects would be compromised in the long run, as it lost such a key factor as stability. A condition taken as a question of internal stability—as a prerequisite for investments—rather than referring solely to the exchange rate. This view is opposed by Jean-Paul Fitoussi, who maintains that the rules need to be applied with greater flexibility, because at times like these “there is no point in inserting automatic pilot and relying on set rules. Ironically, Europe is the only part of the world that is governed technically, not politically.”
The new member states will be expected to come to terms with these rules: according to Nariman Behravesh and Emilio Rossi the signs are moderately encouraging, although these countries will be expected to make even greater efforts to fall in line. Luigi Passamonti’s analysis of the new central European partners is even more optimistic: they are “nations, whose sleeves are still rolled up as they deal with the changes still under way, as they strive to find a political balance while working toward both greater efficiency and the need for solidarity. This is a valuable laboratory for experimenting on the best policies for developing the European Union in an increasingly competitive world.”
So what kind of relations does this newly emerging Europe entertain with the USA, particularly after all the in-fighting that went on in dealing with events in the wake of September 11th? According to Sergio Romano, after the end of the Cold War and the disappearance of the old Soviet enemy, divergences between the two blocks were bound to be more evident and it is getting harder and harder to reach any compromises. A picture that ought to force the European Union to speed up its own political growth and development.
