Bringing Pierre Bourdieu’s Reflexivity into Political Sociological Analysis of the EU

How can Pierre Bourdieu’s reflexive approach to sociological analysis be used to analyze the new political sociological phenomena in the EU? This is a timely question since a number of international relations scholars and political sociologists are increasingly employing some of Bourdieu’s conceptual language, such as field, capital, and practice, to address new realities emerging in the EU. Transnational spaces is one new area were traditional institutional and more recent constructivist approaches appear to come up short in offering sufficient explanations. Yet many scholars drawing from Bourdieu conceptual language to describe these transnational spaces neglect the critical reflectivity that underpins his concepts. As a consequence, such analyses change conceptual jargon without furthering much our understand of these phenomena. This paper will explore the reflexive foundation of Bourdieu’s thinking and suggest ways it can be employed more effectively to understand new social phenomena in the EU such as transnational spaces and their actors.