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Book Review: Maurice, Roche, Exploring the Sociology of Europe. An analysis of the European social complex and Monica, Sassatelli, Becoming Europeans: Cultural Identity and Cultural Policies

Europe, ontologically and as a research object, continues to provide ample material for interpretation and theorisation. To start with, the claim of ‘Europe’ alone raises questions about the region’s geographical, political or cultural constitution, its corresponding borders and assumed principles. What kinds of delimitations accompany a research project that aims to explore European societies as part of a greater sum? What kinds of questions are best left un-asked so that the right ones come to the foreground? Where does the researcher stand in relation to the ‘Europe’ in question: an integral part of it, an unintended participant observer or a convinced political opponent? Although the writings about Europe and its various institutional and geo-cultural incarnations have been plenty, one can hardly claim that the aforementioned questions are closer to an answer or that the fascination causing such rich scholarly work, mostly represented under the rather broad umbrella of ‘European Studies’, is fading. Scholars have gained the historical memory of observing and treating Europe for its high and low tides when it comes, for example, to institutional development and maintain to a great extent a ‘calmer’ more nuanced perspective on the continent (and its islands). Two such pieces of work come to remind us of the multifaceted dimensions of Europe and its dynamic and ever evolving nature that includes both the political construct of the European Union and the broader terrain that reaches the Ural Mountains. Maurice Roche and Monica Sassatelli have each provided ambitious, multilevel analyses of Europe that move seamlessly between the examination of the role of institutions to that of society, history and culture, economics and politics. Both provide sociological approaches that aim to offer complex accounts of the central role of these factors in the shaping of Europe as political, social and cultural reality in the lives of citizens. To do that, both authors visit familiar and less known territories, and the results are very interesting. Roche’s book is organised in three parts: the first part is entitled ‘The development of social complex: civilisations and nation-states’; the second part turns its attention to the role of the state in modernity and the European social complex (nations, warfare and welfare states); finally part three opens up the discussion to processes of change at societal level with 21st century Europe and particularly European welfare capitalism. The main concern of the book is processes of ‘Europeanisation’ in their historical development and the author aims to design a sociological view of ‘Europe’. Roche’s tools for the 436778 MCS34610.1177/0163443712436778