Does Political Europeanness Exist? (Post)Democracy and Civil Society after 1989

Starting from the question regarding natural Europeanness and political Europeanness, the present paper aims to open an ample discussion about the role of intellectual traditions and political mentalities in the creation of a common European methaphorical identity space. As it is shown by the contributors of this volume, mainly reflected in the way that democracy, liberal State, citizens’ participation, modernity are understood by European societies, the post’ 89 differences between East and West are to be explained in relation to the legacy of previous regimes and local traditions of political thought. Moving the focus to some new issues in the literature on political science, i.e. the postdemocracy and new forms of participation, the present paper implicitly invites us to reflect to the future of European democratic regimes, “Europe of values” and political Europeanness.