Report: Taking Stock of European Memory Policies Report: EUROM Meeting 2018 | Page 3

Opening remarks
Welcome session
Constanze Itzel, Head of Unit, House of
European History
Jordi Guixé, director of the European
Observatory on Memories
Following a guided tour of the
House of European History’s permanent
exhibition, given by one of its
commissioners Martí Grau, the
conference commenced with brief
welcoming remarks by Constanze Itzel,
Head of Unit at the House of European
History (HEH), and Jordi Guixé, director
of EUROM.
Itzel stressed the importance of
the meeting, the aim of the HEH to use
memory as a tool to break up a
chronological historical narrative and to
inspire critical reflection, questioned the
possibility to agree on a single way of
representing history, and pointed to the
benefits of being able to host such a
meeting at the HEH. Specifically, she
referenced the constructive possibilities
of learning from and incorporating
conclusions, remarks, and lessons
emanating from such meetings into HEH
itself.
Jordi Guixé remarked that the
basis for European public policies on
remembrance is the understanding of
memories as a duty, and a citizens’
democratic right. Guixé stressed the
many complex challenges Europe is
currently undergoing, and pointed to
dialogue with our recent past as a value
that can be instrumentalized in order to
avoid repetition of past mistakes. In this
vein, Guixé continued by pointing out
that memory policies should be
reinforced as a common democratic
value in Europe. “Although we don’t
have a common or equal history and
memory identities, the processes of
memory and memorialization nowadays
are much more similar in between
different countries”. According to him, it
is also necessary to work on different
scales and dimensions to achieve the
transmission of knowledge and values.
“Some of the keys are trans nationality,
comparative processes and social
participation”, Guixé remarked.