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Wikipedia / Regions of Europe

Europe is often divided into regions and subregions based on geographical, cultural or historical factors. Since there is no universal agreement on Europe's regional composition, the placement of individual countries may vary based on criteria being used. For instance, the Balkans is a distinct geographical region within Europe, but individual countries may alternatively be grouped into Central, Eastern, Southeastern, or Southern Europe.

Regional affiliation of countries may also evolve over time. Malta was considered an island of North Africa for centuries, but is now considered a part of Southern Europe. The exact placement of the Caucasus has also varied since classical antiquity and is now regarded by many as a distinct region within or partly in Europe. Greenland, and partially Iceland, is geographically a part of North America but has been politically and culturally influenced by Northern European countries for more than a millennium. As such, several regions are often included as belonging to a Greater Europe, including Anatolia, Cyprus, the South Caucasus, Siberia, Asian Kazakhstan (the part of Kazakhstan located east of European Kazakhstan), Greenland, as well as the overseas territories of EU member states.

Subregions

Groupings by compass directions are the hardest to define in Europe, since there are a few calculations of the midpoint of Europe (among other issues), and the pure geographical criteria of "east" and "west" are often confused with the political meaning these words acquired during the Cold War era.

Some typical geographical subregions of Europe include:

Central and Eastern Europe

Northern Europe

Southern Europe

Western Europe

Note: There is no universally agreed definition for continental subregions. Depending on the source, some of the subregions, such as Central Europe or South-eastern Europe, can be listed as first-tier subregions. Some transregional countries, such as Romania or the United Kingdom, can be included in multiple subregions.

Common geopolitical subregions of Europe include:

Two Europes

Three Europes

Historical divisions

Europe can be divided along many differing historical lines, normally corresponding to those parts that were inside or outside a particular cultural phenomenon, empire or political division. The areas varied at different times, and so it is arguable as to which were part of some common historical entity (e.g., were Germany or Britain part of Roman Europe as they were only partly and relatively briefly part of the Empire—or were the countries of the former communist Yugoslavia part of the Eastern Bloc, since it was not in the Warsaw Pact).

After Reformation: countries of Western Christianity (Catholic and Protestant Churches) and Eastern Christianity (Eastern Orthodox Church, Assyrian Church of the East, Oriental Orthodox churches and the Eastern Catholic Churches)

Contemporary

Economic and political

Other political

  • Council of Europe

  • An international organisation whose stated aim is to uphold human rights, democracy, and the rule of law in Europe, and to promote European culture.

  • It has 46 member states, with approximately 820 million people.

  • Eastern European Group

  • One of five United Nations regional groups

  • Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Georgia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Ukraine.

  • Eastern Partnership and the Euronest Parliamentary Assembly

  • A group of former Soviet Eastern European countries cooperating with the EU:

  • Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine.

  • European Political Community

  • An intergovernmental forum for political and strategic discussions about the future of Europe, with participants from 47 European countries.

  • OECD Europe countries

  • European countries that are a part of the OECD:

  • Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, and the United Kingdom.

  • Central European Initiative

  • A forum of regional cooperation including:

  • Albania, Austria, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Italy, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Ukraine.

  • Community for Democracy and Rights of Nations

  • A group of former Soviet disputed states in Eastern Europe:

  • Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and Transnistria.

  • Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe

  • The world's largest security-oriented intergovernmental organization, with 57 participating states mostly in the Northern Hemisphere.

  • Visegrád Group

  • A cultural and political alliance of four Central European states for the purposes of furthering their European integration, as well as for advancing military, economic and energy cooperation with one another:

  • Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Hungary.

  • Centrope

  • An Interreg IIIA project to establish a multinational region in Central Europe encompassing four European countries: Slovakia, Austria, Hungary, and the Czech Republic.

  • Middleeuropean Initiative

  • Promotes Central European cooperation.

  • Three Seas Initiative

Geographical

Peninsulas

Regional

Atlantic Europe

Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, and Sweden

Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, parts of France, and parts of Germany

Sweden, Norway, Finland, Denmark, Greenland, and Iceland

Portugal, Spain, France, Monaco, Italy, Slovenia, San Marino, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Albania, Greece, Turkey, Cyprus, Malta, and the British territory of Gibraltar

Other groupings

  • Blue Banana: describing the concentration of the wealth/economic productivity of Europe in a banana-shaped band running from north west England, London, through Benelux, eastern France, western Germany to northern Italy.

See also

References