Schuman’s lessons for today’s Europe

I first realised I was European during my journalism studies in New York in 1998. After graduation I wrote about the European Union (EU) for a Spanish weekly magazine until I finally took a communications job in the European Parliament in 2008. Around the same time, together with some Jewish, Christian and Muslim friends, I co-founded an interfaith NGO in Madrid called Foro Abraham. Intercultural activities were my grassroots engagement in society, and I did not make the connection with European integration until later. In 2014, I published a non-fiction book about the EU Founding Fathers and their friendship. When I was invited to conferences, someone in the audience would always ask what the pioneers would think about the EU today. Often the question came from discontented citizens who felt Europe had lost its soul, sometimes even “its Christian soul”. I never dared to answer, but I had one thing clear: they would still work for unity and for overcoming mental and physical barriers.

How would the Founding Fathers work for unity today? That was my question. What would they do at a time when eurosceptic sentiment is growing and right-wing parties blame the EU for opening borders and diluting national identity? Due to my experience in intercultural dialogue, I thought that somehow I might find an answer by learning from Robert Schuman without instrumentalising him to fit my own thinking. This is why I started a PhD and worked on my dissertation for seven years. It took time for me to set aside my journalistic hat and acquaint myself with the theory and methodology of scientific research.

This book is the result of that intellectual journey. I hope it can help Robert Schuman’s thought continue to inspire intellectuals reflecting on Europe, policy-makers, practitioners of intercultural dialogue and anyone who wonders what an ordinary person in the twenty-first century can do to contribute to a more cohesive society. For publication purposes, I have streamlined methodological details and omitted annexes containing tables, surveys and interviews.

This project was also a personal journey. Along the way, I discovered much about the Founding Fathers and about myself. I also learned a lot from my PhD advisor, Professor Léonce Bekemans, to whom I am so grateful for his guidance and patience. The empirical field research of three case studies would not have been possible without the generosity and help of three wonderful women, Claudia Emmanuel Laredo (Anti-Rumours in Bilbao), Stéphanie Lecesne (Belieforama) and Diana Damsa (YAP). I must also thank two friends who encouraged me along the way and provided invaluable advice, Professor María José Canel and Professor Karen Sanders. Finally, my heartfelt thanks go to Ivan Vasilev for the original cover illustration. Drawing inspiration from a portrait of Robert Schuman, he crafted a contemporary interpretation that reflects what I hoped this book would do: bring Schuman’s vision into today’s conversation.

I first met Victoria many years ago as a journalist by training, deeply committed to the European idea and its value-driven perspective. By then, she held a Master’s degree from the College of Europe in Bruges and had been working at the European Parliament for seven years. Yet, she wanted to deepen her area of interest from a more academic perspective. After an extensive period of reflection and exploration, Victoria decided to embark on a PhD within an interdisciplinary field at the Sophia University Institute near Florence.

The final result of her doctoral research presents a strong, original, and innovative contribution, combined with a methodologically robust approach, to a complex interdisciplinary subject. It brings together insights from philosophy, political science, sociology and anthropology to analyse Robert Schuman’s vision of community-building in the contemporary European context and to apply it to the field of intercultural dialogue. More specifically, the work conceptualises intercultural dialogue as a key instrument for developing a human-centred, transnational civilisation project.

This book closely follows the framework and line of argument elaborated in her doctoral dissertation. It is well structured, firmly grounded in existing scholarly literature, and coherently developed across both its theoretical and empirical components. It successfully establishes a clear and well-argued connection between the complex theoretical framework and the empirical analysis of three carefully selected case studies. The conclusions are both stimulating and forward-looking, offering valuable conceptual, policy-oriented, and practice-based recommendations for community-building within a broadly defined European context.

It has been a genuine pleasure and a real satisfaction to guide the PhD project step by step, year after year. Developed over an extended period, the research has matured into an excellent result and is now published as a shortened, updated and accessible book. The work rightly centres on a Schuman-inspired model of Europeanisation and an applied model of intercultural dialogue for community-building.. I am convinced that readers with a critical interest in the European integration process may greatly benefit from this book, which is scientifically rigorous, interdisciplinarily argued, and offers a broad yet concrete societal outreach for those who believe in a values-driven European future, very much needed in the current provoking times.

Bruges, 6/01/2026

Léonce M. Bekemans

Prof. Dr. Léonce Bekemans

Jean Monnet Professor ad personam

Addressing Europe’s Unfinished Business (AEUB)

Anti-Defamation League (ADL)

A Jewish Contribution to an Inclusive Europe (CEJI)

Committee of the Regions (CoR)

Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe (CSCE)

Council of Europe (CoE)

European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom)

European Court of Justice (ECJ)

European Economic Community (EEC)

European Economic and Social Committee (EESC)

European External Action Service (EEAS)

European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR)

European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC)

European Defence Community (EDC)

European Economic and Social Committee (EESC)

European Union (EU)

Initiatives of Change (IofC)

Intercultural Dialogue (ICD)

Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO)

North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO)

Organisation for European Economic Co-operation (OEEC)

Treaty of the European Union (TEU)

Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU)