The EU’s notion of territoriality: the "Westphalian memory" vs. the "new Empire" : Consequences for the Macro-regional Dimension of the Adriatic Sea Region

The spatial predominant conception of the EU contributes to an evident emergence of a sharpened territorial building of the European space. The idea of both the territorial cohesion and territorial continuity shows how relevant the notion of territoriality in the “European geographic discourse” is and consequently how accepted the instrument of hard and closed border and the sharp inside/outside dichotomy are. In fact, the EU’s concept of political integration became an instrument of an old conception of territoriality. The Maastricht Treaty clearly established an increasing importance of the EU’s territorial basis. Nowadays the prevailing discourse about the European spatial development is increasingly littered with references to territory, territoriality and territorial cohesion. However Europe has never been a clearly demarcated continent or a fixed bordered entity. The Mediterranean once was a bridge of civilizations. Only recently it became a European periphery and a border in the modern sense. Due to this pragmatic notion of territoriality, the idea of the EU as a “non-Westphalian new empire” (according to the theoretical “neo-medieval paradigm”) became at least unrealistic. The EU’s notion of territoriality and of borders is a clear obstacle for the emerging identity of what is increasingly being termed “the Euro-Balkan dimension” in the Adriatic region. Many factors connected to geographic and cultural proximity make possible the intensification of relationships and macro-regional cooperation among Adriatic coastal (and non-coastal) regions and states for dealing with severe problems and unrealized potentials in the Region. However, despite the obvious desirability of improved cooperation in the Adriatic Sea and the EU’s action at the macro-regional level, the EU’s territorial dimension faces a number of policy dilemmas and contradictions.