Rethinking Subsidiarity as a Principle of Educational Policy in the European Union

Abstract

For Europe, the turn of the century has meant the end of a decisive decade full of hopes and disappointments. The euphoria following the events that unfolded in the eastern countries at the end of the 1980’s, symbolized by the fall of the Berlin Wall, was in turn followed by a much lower moment of European ideals, worsened by the uncertainty that usually follows ‘revolutionary’ processes (Dahrendorf, 1991), by the recurrent war in former Yugoslavia, the return of xenophobic attitudes and neo-fascist movements, political scandals, economic ups and downs, etc. In this irresolute context, the European Union has often been perceived by the citizens of its Member States as a distant bureaucracy that affects our daily lives through regulations, taxes, the currency we use to buy and sell,... and yet we fail to see ourselves reflected in its decisions. Those who drew up the Treaty of the European Union signed in Maastricht in February 1992 were well aware of this ‘democratic deficit’ and largely responded to it with the Treaty’s appeal to the principle of subsidiarity. It is also probably part and parcel of the new role that the Treaty conceded to education.