Network Europe: Transnational Human Activities and European Integration

Following relational sociology (Emirbayer 1997) and transactionalist theory (Deutsch 1953), we suggest to conceptualize the European social space as a multiplex network of people’s transnational mobility and communication. To enhance our understanding of how this social space has evolved over time, we analyse the development of four types of cross-border interaction (migration, international student flows, tourism, phone calls) over periods of more than five decades (1960–2017). In specific, we examine: (1) how the magnitute and density of interaction within the European social space has changed over time, (2) whether the European networks have become more centralized or de-centralized over time, 3) whar are the determinants of this network structure; and 4) how the degree of closure of Europe towards the outside world has changed over time. Social network analyses of process-generated dyadic data from a variety of sources (UN, World Bank, World Tourism Organization, International Telecommunication Union) reveal, inter alia, that (a) the density of cross border interactions has consistently increased in Europe, (b) European social space is strongly centralized and this does not change much over time, (c) this centralization follows the pattern of social and economic inequalities in Europe, and (d) level and trends in closure are type-dependent. Thus, our findings provide new insights into the changing structure of Europe as a social space and highlight the necessity to take the multiplex nature of human interaction into account when examining processes of transnational integration.