Recognition in the European Union: struggles for ethical community, justice and identity

This paper argues that a focus on recognition helps in analysing a series of underlying- and salient- yet often under-studied aspects in the process of European integration. The first section revisits the debates in IR literature on recognition and introduces a complementary analytical framework developed around a functionalist typology of recognition in IR. This builds, first, on three models of recognition, that is, a struggle for ethical community (Hegel); a struggle for justice (Honneth) and a struggle for identity (Ringmar). Second, it involves three structuring mechanisms, that is, institutional biases; stigmatisation; and pecking orders (status hierarchies). The third section applies this framework and focuses on the dynamics of recognition struggles revolving around the notions of ethical community, justice and identity in the EU. The analysis operates on two levels: first, on the level of individual member states, it offers an illustrative case study of relations between Viktor Orbán’s government in Hungary and the EU’s institutions and governments of fellow member states. Second, on the polity-level, it assesses a number of recent crises in the EU in the last two decades and the shifting patterns of in-group/out-group recognition dynamics in the EU.