Eastern European Identity - Current Perspectives. A Romanian View.

The paper is investigating the cultural sources of the identity characterizing the eastern part of the European continent. After defining the concerned geographical region, which is usually called Central and Eastern Europe, its historical evolution is analyzed in order to see where the break-up point between Central and Eastern Europe occurred, somewhere during the communist rule and the post-communist era. As an illustration of this, the Romanian political relation with Russian is chronologically presented. Then, the current perspectives for a certain Eastern European identity in the region are presented. The conclusion is that, at present Eastern European identity is very much related to Russia, under the influence of geopolitical disputes, although some cultural elements are still present in countries which oppose Russia's current Eurasian regional project. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]