East of the EU, west of Eurasia

The chapter explores various conceptualizations of Central Europe and its often precarious position between the geographical and geopolitical “East” and “West”. It examines the historical evolution of this spatial construct within a shifting context, beginning with the German response to the Enlightenment-era East-West polarity in the concept of “Mitteleuropa”. The overview then moves through Halford Mackinder's “Gateway to the Heartland” dictum and subsequent reinterpretations following the First and Second World Wars, culminating in the internally inconsistent reframing of the region as “Central and Eastern Europe” (CEE) at the end of the Cold War. The chapter concludes with an analysis of the ambitious yet short-lived effort to reimagine the region as a bloc of post-communist states aligned with the People's Republic of China in the “CEE-China cooperation” platform, formerly known as 16+1. This recent experiment highlights the potential of spatial constructs for political manipulation. At the same time, its rapid demise underscores that the deeper logic of region formation is not entirely arbitrary and cannot simply be bent at will.