Paul Magocsi delivers Ivan Franko Memorial Lecture at University of Ottawa (04/02/06)

Paul Magocsi delivers Ivan Franko Memorial Lecture at University of Ottawa

by Halyna Mokrushyna

OTTAWA The Chair of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Ottawa invited Prof. Paul Magocsi, University of Toronto, to deliver the annual Ivan Franko Memorial Lecture that marks its 20th anniversary this year.

This public lecture by noted scholars from Canada and abroad has helped raise the profile of Ukrainian studies and awareness of Ukrainian issues in Canada's capital.

It was launched in 1986 by the Ukrainian Canadian Professional and Business Association (UCPBA) of Ottawa and Carleton University, on the initiative of Prof. Bohdan Bociurkiw and Ivan Jaworsky, at that time a graduate student at Carleon University.

Later, in 1996, the UCPBA and the newly inaugurated Chair of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Ottawa joined forces to continue the lecture series.

The Ivan Franko series has featured such well-known names in Ukrainian studies as Roman Szporluk, John-Paul Himka, Orest Subtelny, Frank Sysyn, Peter J. Potichnyj and Marta Dyczok.

Prof. Magocsi, an internationally known historian and expert on cultural minorities, delivered a lecture with the very intriguing title "Where Does Europe End? Ukraine? Turkey? Israel?" The lecture was well-attended and proved to be a great success.

Prof. Magocsi began his lecture by citing Liguria, a borderland stretching from Genoa in northern Italy to Nice in southern France, as an example of a natural reassertion of one's historical past. In the reality of today's European Union, with its common market and absence of national borders, the traditionally multicultural regions are returning to their initial status prior to the division of Europe by the great nation-states. For instance, Liguria, an Italian region annexed by France in 1860, is now reviving its Italian heritage. The two local dialects, Nicois and Monègasque, are taught in elementary and secondary schools, while the Italian language is spoken more and more on the streets and in churches.

This return of cultural regions to their ancestral past is occurring peacefully and gradually throughout the whole of Europe, from Alsace to Silesia, and, according to Prof. Magocsi, this is likely to happen also in Transylvania once Romania joins the European Union in 2007.

The same "natural" course of events should be followed in approaching the question: "Where Does Europe End?" For Prof. Magocsi, the answer to this question is quite obvious. Europe, as a geographical entity, includes a vast territory from the Atlantic coast of western France to the Ural Mountains in Russia. Thus, Ukraine, Belarus and Russia should be offered membership in the European Union, while Turkey, from the geographical point of view, has never been part of Europe and, therefore, the debate over its eventual entrance into the European Union is pointless.

In his lecture Prof. Magocsi stressed that this question should be viewed rather from an economic prospective. Instead of debating endlessly whether to welcome Turkey as a new member, the European Union, in Prof. Magocsi's opinion, should be more creative in its approach to this question and should look for a geopolitical scenario that would be in the best interests of both Europe and Turkey, and especially of the geopolitical sphere in which Turkey is situated.

Such a scenario would be the creation of a Middle East Union, where Israel and Turkey would be the foundation, Dr. Magocsi said. This new framework should be based on economic and not on cultural or linguistic affinity. Just as at the end of World War II the United States favored the formation of the European Coal and Steel Community and then the common market as the first step toward European integration, the European Union and the United States should now favor the formation of a Middle East Union.

Turkey and Israel, which would be a cornerstone of this union, have a lot in common: economically, they are the two most successful countries in the region, both already are trading partners, and both were founded and function as secular states with a strong religious opposition (Orthodox Jews in Israel and fundamentalists in Turkey). Finally, for the past 50 years, both Turkey and Israel have been assisted by the United States.

Prof. Magocsi said he believes that the United States along with the European Union should continue to support the economic development of Turkey and Israel as a whole, i.e., the Middle-East Union, which would attract other counties in the region (Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Iraq, Syria, perhaps even the Mediterranean states of Northern Africa). Thus, the European Union would have a strong and stable partner at its southeastern flank.

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