Cross-territorial Governance via EGTCs for Territorial Cohesion

The chapter Cross-territorial Governance discusses the governance aspect of territorial cohesion in the EU which itself is considered as a genuine model of multi-level governance (MLG). During the last 70 years, the EU managed to generate a new discourse on geographic space opposing the nation-state model profoundly connected to the concept of ‘territoriality’ inherited from the modernity. The EU challenges this modernist concept by creating alternative discourses on space represented by a diverse set of governance structures, including the criss-crossing international (European UnionEuropean Union (EU), Schengen Zone, Monetary Union, etc.) the transnational (macro-regional strategies) and the local/regional level (EuroregionsEuroregions, twin-cities, European Groupings of Territorial CooperationEuropean Groupings of Territorial Cooperation (EGTCs), i.e. EGTC). In this chapter, the authors position the EGTC within the MLG system of the EU with a focus on the role of the groupings in re-shaping the modernist concept of territoriality (marked with strictly protected borders) by creating a new dimension of cross-border spatial integration stretching over administrative borders. When doing this, the EGTCs contribute to the re-interpretation of European space and generate a new discourse on territoriality – within the frames of a new approach to territorial cohesion.