During the year 2007, when this thesis was completed, the European Union could look backat fifty years of collaboration, which began with the signing of the Treaty of Rome in 1957and which has developed from being mainly economic in character to incorporating a politicalas well as a social dimension at the European level. In 2007 the European Union alsocommemorated the twentieth anniversary of Erasmus, its higher education mobilityprogramme. It is this relatively new political dimension which I have been interested ininvestigating in this thesis. More precisely it is the political construction of a commonEuropean identity which is analysed using a critical discourse analysis approach.The majoraim of this thesis has been two-fold. The first aim has been to investigate how the European isconstructed in the discourse contained within the official European Union policy documents. Ihave been interested in analysing the various structures, in the form of ideas and norms whichare used in order to construct ‘the European’. The second aim has been to explore whether therole of higher education, as constructed in the official European Union discourse, is given asimilar identity-making role as education is argued to have in the nation-state according to thetheory on national identity. I argue that there are three version of European identityconstruction, i.e. cultural, civic, and neo-liberal, with their own relationship to highereducation, present in the empirical material analysed, consisting of official European Uniondocuments. Further, this thesis is also a study of the power of modern government. I arguethat there is an increase in normative soft power where ‘The Good European’ is notsomething ‘you’ are but something ‘you’ become by being a responsible active citizen.Through the use of critical discourse analysis I illuminate the power which resides in thelanguage in the discourse analysed. Thus, I have been interested in investigating how theofficial European Union discourse on European identity and higher education works to bothinclude and exclude individuals.

During the year 2007 when this thesis was completed the European Union could look back at fifty years of collaboration, which began with the signing of the Treaty of Rome in 1957 and which has developed from being mainly economic in character to incorporating a political as well as a social dimension at the European level. In 2007 the European Union also commemorated the twentieth anniversary of Erasmus, its higher education mobility programme. It is this relatively new political dimension which I have been interested in investigating in this thesis. More precisely, it is the political construction of a common European identity which is analysed using a critical discourse analysis approach. The major aim of this thesis has been two-fold. The first aim has been to investigate how the European is constructed in the discourse contained within the official European Union documents. I have been interested in analysing the various structures, in the form of ideas and norms which are used to construct 'the European'. The second aim has been to explore whether the role of higher educated, as constructed in the official European Union discourse, is given a similar identity-making role as education is argued to have in the nation-state according to the theory on national identity. I argue that there are three versions of European identity construction, i.e. cultural, civic, and neo-liberal, with their own relationship to higher education, present in the empirical material analysed, consisting of official European Union documents. Further, this thesis is also a study of the power of modern government. I argue that there is an increase in normative soft power where 'the Good European' is not something 'you' are but something 'you' become by being a responsible active citizen. Through the use of critical discourse analysis I illuminate the power which resides in the language in the discourse analysed. Thus, I have been interested in investigating how the discourse analysed works to both include and exclude individuals. / Under 2007 då denna avhandling färdigställdes kunde den Europeiska Unionen se tillbaka på femtio år av samarbete som började med Romfördraget 1957 och som har utvecklats från att vara framförallt ekonomiskt till att även behandla politiska och sociala frågor på den europeiska nivån. År 2007 firade den Europeiska Unionen även tjugoårsjubileet för Erasmus, sitt program för rörlighet inom högre utbildning. Det är denna relativt nya politiska dimension som jag har varit intresserad av att undersöka i avhandlingen. Närmare bestämt, det är den politiska konstruktionen av en gemensam europeisk identitet som analyseras med hjälp av kritisk diskurs analys. Syftet med avhandlingen har varit tvådelat. Det första syftet har varit att undersöka hur europén skapas i diskursen som finns att finna i officiella EU policy dokument. Jag har varit intresserad av att analysera de olika strukturer, i form av idéer och normer som används för att konstruera 'europén'. Det andra syftet har varit att undersöka om högre utbildning, som den konstrueras i den officiella EU diskursen, har samma identitetsskapande roll som utbildning sägs ha i nationalstaten enligt nationell identitetsteori. Jag påstår att det finns tre versioner av europeisk identitet, i.e. kulturell, politisk och neoliberal, var och en med sin egen relation till högre utbildning, i det empiriska materialet, bestående av officiella EU dokument, som har undersökts. Dessutom, avhandlingen är en studie av den makt som är del av modernt styrande. Jag påstår att det har varit en ökning då det gäller 'mjuk. makt där en 'God Europé' inte är något 'du' är utan något 'du' blir genom att vara en ansvarstagande aktiv medborgare. Genom kritisk diskursanalys belyser jag uttrycken av makt som finns att finnas i den diskurs jag analyserar. Med andra ord, jag har varit intresserad av att undersöka hur den analyserade diskursen både inkluderar och exkluderar individer.

Η παρούσα διατριβή διερευνά τα καινοτόμα στοιχεία και τις προβληματικές παραμέτρους των εταιρικών σχολικών συμπράξεων, με βάση τη συμμετοχή δύο ελληνικών σχολείων σε ευρωπαϊκή σχολική σύμπραξη (Comenius 1). Στη συνέχεια, προχωρά σε σύγκριση των δύο προγραμμάτων σε σχέση με τα κριτήρια αξιολόγησης που προσδιορίστηκαν πριν την έναρξη της έρευνας. Για το σκοπό αυτό, δόθηκαν συνεντεύξεις από τους εμπλεκόμενους εκπαιδευτικούς και απαντήθηκαν ερωτηματολόγια από τους συμμετέχοντες μαθητές και τους γονείς τους. Οι μεν εκπαιδευτικοί αναφέρθηκαν σε ζητήματα όπως η ιστορία και οι στόχοι των σχολικών συμπράξεων, τα οφέλη που αποκόμισαν μαθητές και εκπαιδευτικοί, τα προϊόντα που παρήχθησαν, οι μεθοδολογικές παράμετροι που πλαισίωσαν τα εν λόγω σχέδια, η διαχείριση των συμπράξεων, η αξιολόγηση και διάδοση των σχεδίων καθώς και το μέλλον παρόμοιων πρωτοβουλιών. Οι δε μαθητές ρωτήθηκαν για τους στόχους του προγράμματος, τα οφέλη που αποκόμισαν από τη συμμετοχή τους σε αυτό, τις μεθοδολογικές παραμέτρους που συνόδευσαν την εφαρμογή των σχεδίων, ενώ προέβησαν και σε αξιολογικές κρίσεις για το περιεχόμενο και τις δραστηριότητες των εν λόγω προγραμμάτων. Οι γονείς των εμπλεκόμενων μαθητών έκαναν αναφορά στους στόχους των προγραμμάτων, τα οφέλη που αποκόμισαν τα παιδιά τους από τις συμπράξεις και το βαθμό συμμετοχής των παιδιών τους και των ιδίων στα εν λόγω προγράμματα. Σε αυτό το πλαίσιο, επιχειρήθηκε σύνθεση των αποτελεσμάτων των ποιοτικών και ποσοτικών προσεγγίσεων με τη βοήθεια της τριγωνοποίησης (εκπαιδευτικοί, μαθητές, γονείς) και για τα δύο προγράμματα, και αξιολογήθηκαν τα αποτελέσματα της έρευνας σε σχέση με τα ερευνητικά ερωτήματα. Οι ενδιαφερόμενοι συμφώνησαν σε αρκετά ζητήματα, ενώ δεν έλειψαν και οι διαφορετικές εκτιμήσεις για το περιεχόμενο και τις δραστηριότητες των εν λόγω συμπράξεων. Αν και, όπως διαπιστώθηκε, οι σχολικές συμπράξεις συνιστούν φορέα αλλαγής στο σύγχρονο σχολείο, δεν έχουν διερευνηθεί από το αρμόδιο υπουργείο οι δυνατότητες για την ενσωμάτωση των καινοτόμων στοιχείων τους στην επίσημη εκπαίδευση. Ωστόσο, είναι σαφές πως η φιλοσοφία των σχολικών συμπράξεων και των υπόλοιπων προαιρετικών προγραμμάτων βρίσκεται στη σωστή κατεύθυνση. Αυτό που πρέπει να ληφθεί υπόψη είναι το θέμα της διαχείρισης της εκπαιδευτικής αλλαγής που προτείνεται μέσω των σχολικών συμπράξεων, της δημιουργίας δομών παρακολούθησης και αξιοποίησης των δεδομένων, της συνεργασίας όλων των φορέων που εμπλέκονται στην εκπαιδευτική διαδικασία, της επιμόρφωσης των εκπαιδευτικών και της συνεπούς υποστήριξης του εγχειρήματος. / The present thesis investigates the innovative elements and the problematic parameters of school partnerships, on the basis of the participation of two Greek schools in a European school partnership (Comenius 1). Then, it continues with the comparison of two programmes in relation to the evaluation criteria determined before the beginning of the research. To this end, involved teachers were interviewed and questionnaires were answered by the involved students and their parents. The teachers referred to subjects such as the history and the objectives of school partnerships, the profits acquired by students and teachers, the products, the methodological parameters, the management of the partnerships, the evaluation and distribution of the programmes as well as the future of similar initiatives. The students were asked about the objectives of the programmes, the profits they acquired through their participation, the methodological parameters of the programmes, while they also proceeded to the evaluation of the content and the activities of the programmes in question. The parents of the involved students referred to the objectives of the programmes, the profits their children acquired through the partnerships and the degree of their own participation and their children’ s participation in the programmes in question. In this framework, what was attempted, was a composition of the results of the qualitative and quantitative approaches in the framework of triangulation (teachers, students, parents) for both the programmes, and the results of the research were evaluated in relation to the inquiring questions. The participants agreed about various subjects, while there were some different opinions about the content and the activities of the partnerships in question. Although, as it was realised, school partnerships constitute an institution of change in modern schools, the possibilities for the incorporation of their innovative elements in formal education have not been investigated by the Ministry of Education. However, it is a fact that the philosophy of school partnerships and other optional programmes is in the right direction. What should be taken into consideration, is the subject of the management of the educational change proposed through school partnerships, the formation of structures for follow-up and exploitation of data, the collaboration of all institutions involved in the educational process, the teachers’ training and the support of the effort.

The theme of this dissertation thesis is the relation of bilingual education and educational projects aimed at European issues. The research part was conducted at bilingual upper secondary schools in the Czech Republic, Germany and Great Britain (Wales). In the thesis the themes such as European politics, intercultural dialogue, international peace, human rights, humanitarian aid and language education are primarily included into European issues. The empirical research was deliberately realized at bilingual schools, where the instruction is delivered throught the medium of two languages. With regard to this fact a frequent participation at educational projects with European focus (European projects) was anticipated at these schools. European projects are often interconnected with the laguage studies. In recent years education projects have been an important part of the curriculum in Czech, German and British environment and they play a vital role in education context. The projects enrich the bilingual instruction from both methodical and content perspective and enable launching cooperation between schools and other partner institutions. Bilingual education has lately been supported by international educational strategies aimed at cultural biodiversity and multilingualism. In European Union The...