THE MYTH OF THE CULTURAL COMMUNITY IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

Cultural issues in international relations form a different picture depending on whether we focus on "relations" or on their "internationality". One may speak of a culture of international relations, but also of relations that arise between nations characterized in cultural terms - their unique identities. Particularly important among the various ways of understanding culture in the field of international relations is the perseverance of the meaning, which brings culture down to the property of a particular social group - to the cultural community. Such an approach led to one-sided focusing on the differences which form the basis for identity, and on the symbolic borders between different cultures. Criticism of the myth of cultural integration is aimed at the conception of the cultural community as an integrated sociocultural whole. The field known as international relations should be analyzed as a field of power relations, which are shaped with the help of cultural resources. Despite its initial connotations of harmony and unity, the myth of the cultural community generates conflicts. This chapter attempts to criticize one of the firmly rooted meanings of the term "culture", pertaining to the unity of lifestyles, values, beliefs and customs. Such holistic comprehension unilaterally imposes the issue of cultural differences, whereas in the global age, many diverse interacting actors participate in the field of cultural meanings. The culture of relations and the global relations of power, including symbolic power, play a key role in the field traditionally known as international relations.