When the Stranger Become the Enemy. the Imagine of the Est-Europeans in Western-Europe Political Discourse

Europe nowadays is under rupture more than ever between normativity  and reality, between the rich North and the poor South, between the democratic West and the (ex) communist East. Attracted by the temptation of the West (liberty and welfare) and driven out of poverty and the lack of perspective inside the ex- COMECON space, the latest European citizens choose to inhabit –more or less legally - the western side of Europe. It is indeed apparent that every new wave of EU integration has recently lead to a new wave of immigration.

These citizens bring with them not only cheap labor force, but also different principles, behaviors and attitudes towards the “adoptive” state, the institutions, etc. In fact, the readiness of migrant workers from the new EU states to accept the hardships of their new existence in the host state, leads not only to a desirable multiplication of diversity, but also to interethnic tensions. The Polish plumbers or the Romanian maids have become characters with well-known and recognizable traits all over Europe. However, along with these characters came also the Romanian beggar, the Bulgarian burglar etc. ; as Umberto Eco argues, by extending the characteristics of its marginalized members to a whole ethnic culture, one can provide an ideal scapegoat for a society caught up in ethnic change which is not able to recognize itself.

The purpose of our study is to identify and explain the imagine of the Este-Europeans  in Western-Europe political discourse and  to find out  if, under the displayed tolerance one can find the premises for a stereotypical transformation of the Stranger into the Enemy.

 In order to rich our epistemic goal, we will analyze the political discourses in the euro-parliamentary election process in 2014.We base our research on Serge Moscovici’s social representation theory (1961).