ABSTRACT
The current situation of community has been greatly transformed by globalization. This chapter focuses on virtual communities, which are more evenly balanced between the local and global poles and are sustained almost entirely by communication. It distinguishes thin and thick forms of community, hence, world community may be described as thin, while transnational communities and cyber- or virtual communities can take thin or thick forms, depending on the strength of local attachments. Classical sociology was preoccupied with the problem of the survival of community in modern society. World community is the opposite to local community and is largely the negation of community. Transnational community arises in the appropriation of the global by the local. The emergence of a sense of European belonging is a relatively recent phenomenon and has been much influenced by European policy making around cultural issues, such as the European Capitals of Culture programme, Erasmus exchange programmes, European research, a communication policy and a European citizenship.
