Becoming ‘New Europe’: The Iraq Crisis as the Construction of Poland’s ‘Latecomer’ Stigma in European Public and Political Discourse

Both academic literature and public discourse portray the eastern enlargement of NATO and the EU as the end to Cold War divisions between ‘East’ and ‘West’ in Europe. From the perspective of the new Central and Eastern European members, joining these institutions symbolized their ‘return to Europe’. However, as the former outsiders have become insiders, they have become subjected to a new form of hierarchy. The new members continue to be perceived as geographically and culturally on the ‘verge of Europe’, ‘not quite European’ or ‘in transition’. This is also reflected in international relations literature that studies the socialization of the new members into ‘European’ or ‘Western’ states. The new members internalize this narrative placing them ‘on the margins’ of the West. Their ‘latecomer’ status in the Western institutions acts as a stigma To understand how hierarchization affects political processes, this paper looks at Poland’s foreign policy since its accession to the EU. As the biggest and most vocal among the new members, Poland has alternatingly (and sometimes simultaneously) held the reputation of ‘success story’ and ‘trouble-maker’. The paper revisits the Iraq crisis as a defining moment for the role of Poland and the other Central and Eastern European members in the enlarged EU. Language in the media and the political sphere, such as French President Chirac’s statement that the (prospective) member states’ support for the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq was ‘not well behaved’, contributed to stigmatization of the newcomers. This discourse targeted the already vulnerable subjectivity of the candidate countries, which depended on recognition as ‘full members’ of the EU identity community. This paper argues that as a lesson drawn from the Iraq crisis Poland’s elites internalized as sense of ‘incomplete transformation’. In response Polish foreign policy makers alternatingly pursue two types of strategies of dealing with stigmatization: adaptation (acting as ‘model Europeans’) and contestation (rebelling against dominant approaches in EU policy). Paradoxically both of these strategies often reinforce stigmatization.