ABSTRACT
A key external relations priority for the European Union (EU) is the creation of an
area of dialogue, co-operation and exchange in the South and East Mediterranean
and the Middle East – an area of vital strategic importance for the EU. With the
Euro-Mediterranean Partnership (EMP), the EU created an innovative policy basket,
in that, through the Barcelona declaration, the 27 signatories recognized that for the
Euro-Mediterranean relationship to work, dialogue between people (not just the
elite) was essential. Activities under the third (social, cultural and human affairs)
basket of the EMP have since flourished (MEDA-Democracy, Euro-Mediterranean
Heritage, Euro-Mediterranean Audiovisual, Euro-Mediterranean Youth Action
Programme, etc). These have been complemented (since 1995) by the Forum Civil
Euro-Mediterranean (FCE) through civil society conferences that run alongside all
Euro-Mediterranean Ministerial Conferences. One of the main functions of the FCE
is to encourage and enhance intercultural dialogue between the Mediterranean
partners and the EU member states. Other turning-points in Euro-Mediterranean
relations were the launching of the Euro-Mediterranean Parliamentary Assembly,
the Euro-Mediterranean Non-Governmental Platform and the setting up of the
‘Anna Lindh Euro-Mediterranean Foundation for the Dialogue between Cultures’.
Despite these various activities, there has been no systematic analysis of what the
Euro-Mediterranean dialogue actually implies and how it increasingly shapes EU-
Mediterranean agendas. At a time when the perception of the irreconcilable nature
of cultures is growing it is important to take seriously the concept of dialogue
between European and Mediterranean cultures. This essay aims to fill this gap in the
literature by critically examining the role of dialogue in Euro-Mediterranean
relations. It first establishes the nature of dialogue and its significance for Euro-
Mediterranean relations. For this purpose, it draws upon the work of a key thinker on
dialogue, Mikhail Bakhtin. The theoretical section also draws upon the work of
Bruce Tuckman’s 1965 forming, storming, norming and performing group
development model and adapts these theoretical frameworks to the EMP. The
empirical section, which follows, sketches out what Euro-Mediterranean dialogue
actually entails, analyses what dialogue seeks to attain, and finally concludes with
some implications for the future of Euro-Mediterranean dialogic relations.
