This paper proposes to analyse how a new value – diversity – was placed at the core of EU cultural policy in the last decade. Cultural diversity was already presented as European value in EU policies but its definition changed. Until the 1990s, it mainly referred to diversity of national cultures within a European cultural unity; the category has been then incrementally extended to encompass diversity within the European societies due to migratory flows and multi-ethnic populations. My aim is to determine how deep social changes and the necessity to re-think the conditions of cohesion between European citizens prompted a shift in the conceptual background of EU cultural policy. “European cultural heritage” was originally the backbone of this policy, which has been criticized for its promotion of an essentialist and exclusionary definition of Europe through top-down initiatives. I will show that the introduction of “cultural diversity” as new pivotal value of European culture had also consequences in terms of policy: “intercultural dialogue” became the buzzword in recent EU cultural initiatives and is now presented as the best operating mode to promote and defend cultural diversity and to make citizens actors of this process. I will investigate the evolution of this category. It appeared in EU vocabulary in the 1990s as a tool to facilitate communication with Mediterranean neighbours, perceived as geographical and cultural Others. In 2005, the EU recognised the necessity of an internal intercultural dialogue taking into account the coexistence within its member states of diverse – and not strictly European – cultural heritages. These conceptual and policy changes, which reflect a crucial evolution in the EU’s representation of the body of European citizens, will be explored through an examination of EU official documents and cultural programmes and through interviews with EU officials in charge of cultural policy.
