Professional paper
The Holy Roman Empire, building tool of a European unity?
Paul Marguier
; Sciences Po Paris
Aesa Virely
; Sciences Po Paris
Abstract
The European Union has been going through deep crises since its creation, bringing into question its foundations. The question of its essence has been a heated one for the past years, and some have turned to the past of the continent in order to find clues as to what the European Union is today. Resorting to past models of unity can prove a hazardous task if taken as such, but it can also provide interesting insights to understanding our contemporary reality. The Holy Roman Empire was a thousand-year-old Empire which constituted the political reality of many Europeans from the Middle-Ages until the 19th century. Its lifespan and its width raise the question as to how it was able to foster a certain degree of unity. Through its imperial narrative, gathering multiple religious and political fictions, the Empire endowed itself with an ambition of European unity. It tried to use its flexible feudal structure to achieve it, within and beyond its borders. And while it met some serious obstacles and eventually collapsed, the Holy Roman Empire remains a major figure in the attempts to form European unity.
Keywords
European unity; Feudalism; Holy Roman Empire; Imperial narratives; Westphalia
Hrčak ID:
265895
URI
Publication date:
25.11.2021.
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