ABSTRACT
Every political authority has to deliver a legitimizing discourse in order to give meaning to the order its creates. This discourse may take various forms, of which the publications edited by the Commission for the general public in the 11 official European languages is one particularly meaningful example. These documents present the European Union to its citizens through the diversity of its sectoral policies and as an original institutional system or as a major historical process started by the ‘Schuman declaration’ of 9 May 1950. Through text and images, these booklets describe a political panorama assigning a place to every actor and emphasizing the ‘necessity’ of European integration. The Commission poses as both spokesperson for Europe and as the translator of the ‘hidden truth’ (Lagroye 1985: 408) who justifies the failures which mark daily practice.
