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Grappling With Climate Change and Overtourism, Italy Is Betting Big on Train Travel
(www.smithsonianmag.com)
this post was submitted on 05 Aug 2023
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Italy is considered Western Europe? Huh.
Yes, western and east Europe are very well defined actually. There was a popular wall back in the days in Berlin to clearly symbolize the division.
Italy is west Europe, and it has never been "eastern" (while history of places like Greece is less well defined). It had the capital of western Europe at the time of the late roman empire, when the first big separation between west and east Europe happened
I (and many people around me) group Italy under southern Europe. Just like Spain, Portugal and Greece.
Western Europe for me is roughly France, Benelux, Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Northern Europe is Scandinavia and Finland.
I'm sure others have a different view on this.
As an American I would consider all of what you classified as “Southern Europe” as “Western Europe”.
In fact, we would only divide Europe into only two primary regions; Eastern and Western (which generally includes both Scandinavia and the Mediterranean west of Turkey).
The division is primarily political/historical/cultural, with geography being secondary.
Where are you from, out of curiosity?
Spain and Portugal are definitely western than all countries you listed.
Italy is as west as Germany if you check the maps.
Italy and Spain are both south Europe and western Europe.
Western and eastern Europe is a division with ancient roots that goes back to roman empire.
South and north is more geographical to separate "latin" countries from Nordic countries.
France is actually borderline, half southern, half central.
Germany, Austria, switzerland are usually referred as central Europe
The Netherlands.
I see it more as a political and economic devide, hence grouping the German speaking countries also with the western countries.
Southern countries are seen as having a poorer economy, hence not being part of the western countries. The northern ones could be part of the western group, but for some reason they also don't mind being their own corner.
Spain is western than the Netherlands... Those are bs media definitions just to create some sensational news and nationalist politics. In all this bs definitions, for instance, uk is not even "western Europe", because they are just the exceptional empire.
Each country has similar stuff that doesn't makes sense.
Western Europe at the center of europe, while real west Europe (Portugal, Spain, France and uk) are not western, but central europe is west... Just because historically "west" sounds rich and civilized, since western roman empire.
It is a definition for poor journalism and political rhetoric.
The EU literally defines Italy as part of South Europe.
The UN literally defines Italy as part of South Europe.
It is not cold war. Western and eastern Europe is an historical subdivision that traces back to roman empire. Check how the cold war separation matches previously existing boundaries.
Italy is both south and western Europe.
Edit. as you added the link on UN. I n the same page you link, check
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Europe#UN_regional_groups:_Western_European_and_Others_Group
The part you point out (according to the page itself), it just for convenience of statistical reports. For political/historical purposes, Italy is western Europe
I had a discussion some time ago in Reddit with someone who argued that Spain is not western Europe, but Germany is. They even provided links and it seems that geopolitically it is considered like that, but having lived in Spain and Germany and in between I think barely anyone raised there would say so
An interesting thing to consider is that the difference between north and south Italy both culturally and economically is so massive they might as well be different countries.
The EU literally defines Italy as part of South Europe.
The UN literally defines Italy as part of South Europe.
Please tell me how I'm wrong here?
Yeah, reddit is crazy with these non senses. There are people who think Spanish aren't "white", whatever they mean by that.
But they are just kid that read some 4chan level blog, and have never learned history. They don't know that western and eastern Europe are historical definitions (not based on fictional races, as they like to frame it).
I wouldn't care about them