The EU and its American Other: The uses of Anti-Americanism and Anti-Europeanism

Anti-Europeanism is a much broader concept than anti-Americanism, as it does not only covers aversion and opposition to EUrop(ean actors) from other places, but also internal opposition to European integration in general and the EU institutions and policies more specifically. Moreover, even when anti-Europeanism and anti-Americanism both pertain to divisions among Western partners, ranging from comparative schemes with room for complementary between “America” and “Europe “ to utmost hostility based on essentialist perspectives, they do not contribute to the formation of comparable American and EUropean identities. While anti-Americanism targets the US and American actors, anti-Europeanism may alternatively refer to a national other situated in Europe (the French for example, during the 2004 American presidential campaign) or to a European model. Similarly anti-Americanism is more prevalent in certain EU member states than in others, and it often contributes to the reproduction of a national identity rather than a EUropean identity. The paper examines how different kinds of anti-Europeanism and anti-Americanism have hardly contributed to the institutionalization of a EUropean self, even during the 2003 opposition against the US war on Iraq and the alleged birth of a EUropean public opinion celebrated by Habermas and Derrida (2003).