The 70th edition of the Eurovision Song Contest will take place in Vienna, the Austrian capital, on May 16. This music event, often dismissed as kitsch and flashy, was founded in 1956 by the European Broadcasting Union and is broadcast live by about thirty countries worldwide, attracting around 160 million viewers. Despite its entertainment value, Eurovision has evolved into a geopolitical platform and a reflection of contemporary tensions.
Why does Eurovision remain a soft power tool for many participating states? How did a contest meant for cultural exchange turn into a stage for identity or linguistic rivalries, exclusions, and diplomatic maneuvers? Has Eurovision strayed from its original purpose of fostering European peace? Is it now just a showcase of global pop culture, or does it still serve as a platform for sharing in the face of competition from global media giants?
These questions are the subject of debate among experts in geopolitics and philosophy. Florent Parmentier, a geopolitics doctor specializing in European dynamics at Sciences Po, and Cyrille Bret, a philosophy doctor affiliated with the Jacques Delors Institute and also teaching at Sciences Po, discuss the Eurovision phenomenon in their book “Geopolitics of Eurovision, the soundtrack of European construction” published by Bréal editions.
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