A More Perfect European Union?: The Transnational Networks of the European Union’s Embassy Open House in Washington, D.C.

Abstract

Annually, the Delegation of the European Union (EU) in Washington, D.C., holds an embassy open house day for its 27 member nations to celebrate European culture and educate tourists on the functions of EU politics and international relations. Amidst an ongoing debt crisis and a continuing exploration of its identity as a supranational entity, “Embassy Day” affords an opportunity to see the EU as a spatial network uneasily caught in the tensions between the often nostalgic nationalism of its constituent countries and the future-oriented technocratic transnationalism of its composite alliance. By analyzing the cultural artifacts of Embassy Day from its handouts, maps, speeches, architecture, and performances, I treat Embassy Day as a “rhetorical experience” and the EU embassies as a transnational network imposed over the city space of Washington, D.C. In the process, I argue that the very fragmented nature of the open house’s complex simulation of Europe mirrors the fragmented nature of European identity itself, and thus displays the anxiety around how the EU places itself and its power vis-à-vis the global community.

Notes

² Associated Press, “Sarkozy is Latest Leader Booted From Office Amid European Financial Crisis,” Washington Post, May 6, 2012; Associated Press, “Greece to Undergo New Election Next Month After Coalition Talks Collapse in Acrimony,” Washington Post, May 15, 2012; Associated Press, “Democracy Vs. Austerity: Will Irish Vote Deal Mortal Blow to Europe’s Deficit-Fighting Treaty?,” Washington Post, May 13, 2012.

³ For a most recent set of discussions on the relationship between rhetoric and materiality see the collection by Biesecker and Lucaites (Eds.; 2009), Rhetoric, Materiality, & Politics.

⁴ Etymologically, an embassy has come to mean both an envoy of diplomats and an actual material site for diplomacy—and that tension still exists today. See MacDowell (2000).

⁵A curious handout from the EU Delegation that particularly emphasizes this technocratic outlook is the booklet of essay by Robert Billing, a software engineer who wrote a series of science fiction stories that all center around particular technological innovations that EU scientists are working on. See Billing (2011).