This book presents a cultural history of European integration. It revisits the European
Community¿s postwar origins through the lens of symbolic representation and so reveals a
hitherto unknown side to Europe¿s notorious technocrats. They were not simply administrators:
they were skillful marketing experts clever spin doctors and talented stage directors. After
all what made the European Community stand out among the multitude of postwar European
organizations? This book argues that it was not so much its vaunted supranationalism nor its
economic significance it was its self-proclaimed role as torchbearer of European unity.
Combining archival research with media analysis The Symbolic Politics of European Integration
reviews Europe¿s early parliaments its early diplomacy and its long search for ¿capital
cities ¿ from Strasbourg to Brussels. It tells the story of the political theater that staged
an enterprise of technocrats as the embodiment of a Europe united in peace and prosperity. This
book is an invaluable resource for historians of postwar Europe as well as for analysts of
today¿s EU who seek to understand how coal steel and tariffs became the stuff the European
dream was made of.
