The topic of the Conference is “European Society or European Societies?” The aim is to consider whether we can look at European society as an increasingly cohesive entity or whether divisions of nation, class, ethnicity, region, gender and so on continue to be more salient. Traditionally, the nation state has been explicitly or implicitly the unit of analysis in European sociology. But is the nation state the most appropriate unit through which to explore European society or should we be trying to find other perspectives? This raises the issue of whether there is convergence or divergence between regions in the European area. A particular focus of the Conference will be upon the role of sociology in helping to understand the European area and how sociologists from different countries and different traditions can work together to meet this challenge.

Claire Wallace
President of ESA