Segal Enriched Categories I

Abstract

We develop a theory of enriched categories over a (higher) category M equipped with a class W of morphisms called homotopy equivalences. We call them Segal M_W -categories. Our motivation was to generalize the notion of "up-to-homotopy monoids" in a monoidal category M, introduced by Leinster. The formalism adopted generalizes the classical Segal categories and extends the theory of enriched category over a bicategory. In particular we have a linear version of Segal categories which did not exist so far. Our goal in this paper is to present the theory and provide some examples. Applications are reserved for the future.