1 The EU Defence Debate: What kind of power is it?
by
Stephanie B. Anderson
University of Wyoming
Introduction
Although the European Union 1 (EU) member states (MS) have long
cooperated on defence issues outside the auspices of the EU, the first mention of
defence in the EU context was in the Maastricht Treaty on European Union in
1993 calling for ‘the implementation of a common foreign and security policy
including the eventual framing of a common defence policy, which might, in time,
lead to a common defence.’2 A common defence policy differs significantly from
a single defence policy: a single policy is one policy or one voice emanating from
Brussels; a common policy is the coordination of the 28 separate, but similar
member state policies: in other words, a chorus of 28 singing from the same page.
Cooperation in security and defence remains intergovernmental. Despite the
Saint-Malo Declaration of 1998, and the successful launching of a multitude of
Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) missions, sixteen years after
Maastricht, the language in the 2009 Lisbon treaty regarding defence was almost
identical.3 The EU still has no exclusive competence for security or defence
affairs, and national capitals retain vetoes in this area. Nick Whitney, former
chief executive of the European Defence Agency (EDA), observed, ‘Somehow,
collectively, the Europeans are not serious about defense.’4
On the other hand, the member states have achieved a great deal of
cooperation on military matters. The EU has created a military staff and
earmarked national military headquarters to conduct independent operations. It
is developing indigenous European airlift, precision-guided munitions
capabilities, as well as satellite reconnaissance and navigation systems. The EU
has a roster of EU Battlegroups on call on a rotating basis. MS defence ministers
now meet informally in the Council, and the MS have promised to come to each
others’ aid in case of armed aggression or a disaster. The European Defence
The author will use the term European Community (EC) for the years 1957-1992, and refer to the
European Union after 1993 when its name changed.
2 The Maastricht Treaty on European Union states clearly in article B of the Common Provisions.
3 Lisbon Treaty on European Union, article 11.2.
4 Judy Dempsey, “Little Action on Common E.U. Defense” New York Times, 16 April 2012.
1
2 Agency rationalizes military procurement; and since 2003, the EU has launched
more than 25 CSDP5 military and civilian missions.
Nevertheless, a common defence, that is a collective military force
generated by the member states, does not yet exist. Part of the problem is that
member state defence capabilities vary greatly depending on the country’s
wealth, inclination, and affiliations. The United Kingdom and France are both
nuclear powers whereas Luxembourg’s military is limited to an army numbering
in the hundreds that is merged with the police in the Force Publique, while Malta
has only a merchant marine. Six countries, Ireland, Sweden, Austria, Finland,
Cyprus and Malta are neutral, although Sweden has a very powerful military and
arms sector. All other 22 countries are members of both the EU and the North
Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO). Money is a continual problem. Although
the NATO allies promise to spend at least two per cent of GDP on defence, only
Britain and Greece meet these targets.6 The lack of funding, exacerbated by the
financial crisis, means minimal progress in improving capabilities. According to
the capabilities improvement chart, of the 63 different capabilities listed between
2002 and 2005, 53 had not been improved at all.7 In the UK House of Lords,
one Lord was so disgusted he asked whether the 2010 headline goal could even be
achieved in the next 50 years.8
Defence is a veritable political minefield requiring MS governments to
bring their national security interests to the negotiating table. Defence
cooperation has ramifications for each state’s military industrial complex, its
foreign and security policy, its relationship with NATO and/or the United States,
and for the character of the European Union itself. Member states have been
loath to give up control over national military spending for a host of reasons
including protection of their national champions in the defence industry as well
as questions of governance: can Brussels force a national parliament to spend
money on helicopters rather than on school buses?
Further complicating matters, Article 41.2 of the Treaty on European
Union explicitly bars the spending of the Union budget on defence or military
The Saint-Malo Declaration established the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP). In
2009, with the coming in force of the Lisbon treaty, the name changed to the Common Security
and Defence Policy (CSDP).
6 http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/23/world/europe/europes-shrinking-military-spendingunder-scrutiny.html?pagewanted=all
7
‘Capability Improvement Chart I/2005’, Council of the European Union,
http://ue.eu.int/ueDocs/cms_Data/docs/pressData/en/misc/84902.pdf.
8 House of Lords, Select Committee on European Union, Minutes of Evidence, Examination of
Witnesses (questions 20-33), Lord Drayson, Andrew Mathewson, and Robert Regan, 19 January
2006, www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200506/idselect/ideucom/125/6011903.htm
5
3 expenditures. Therefore, any funding for such endeavours must come from the
member states at an additional expense. As a result, the EU’s CSDP missions
each resemble a different ‘coalition of the willing’: as of 2013, no mission had
involved all member states, and all missions had included non-EU member
states, such as Norway and Turkey.
In the end, the Lisbon treaty required convoluted language to
accommodate the political realities of the member states in this area. Although
the Lisbon treaty’s mutual defence clause obligates member states to come to
each other’s aid, making the 1948 Treaty of Brussels and the Western European
Union (WEU) redundant, article 42.7 also adds caveats that the provision ‘shall
not prejudice the specific character of the security and defence policy of certain
Member States,’ i.e., their neutrality, nor will it affect those member states who
are also members of NATO, which ‘remains the foundation of their collective
defence and the forum for its implementation.’ In other words, the EU treaty
explicitly recognizes that, for some MS, NATO will remain the premier defence
institution.
This chapter provides an historical and theoretical overview of academic
discourse on European defence policy. Section I traces the evolution of the
literature based on the major historical events of the past fifty years. Section II
maps out the most important theoretical developments regarding its analysis.
Section III delves into the on-going ontological questions regarding the EU’s
foray into defence, specifically the how defence changes the identity of the EU
and what it means for the Atlantic Alliance. The chapter concludes that EU
defence, rather than being fertile ground for rational actor models and game
theory, that is theories associated with defence analysis, is proving itself more
fertile ground for a host of social theories that better fit the integration and
identity questions that surround the subject.
Longitudinal/Historical Approach
Academics are moved by current affairs; not surprisingly, EU defence
literature is very sensitive to international events. During the Cold War, very
little was written on the European Community as a security or defence actor
because NATO dominated the landscape. Once the Cold War was over,
academics argued over whether NATO would go the way of the Warsaw Pact and
what Maastricht’s Common Foreign and Security Policy would mean for the EU.
Soon after, when the Yugoslav crisis broke out, it should have been the ‘hour of
4 Europe’,9 but many academics were disillusioned by the EU’s lack of unity, vision
and military might. Kosovo drove a wedge between the US and Europe, pushing
the UK and France together at Saint-Malo where they agreed to forge ahead on
European defence. The Iraq War exacerbated anti-American feeling and drove
academics to question whether Europeans and Americans shared the same values
or were even from the same planet. Finally, the ratification of the Lisbon treaty
and the ten-year anniversary of the CSDP led to many retrospectives and
evaluation of the EU’s foray into defence.
The European Defence Policy Debate During the Cold War
Jean Monnet was not interested in using defence policy as a way to unify
Europe: ‘I had never believed that we should tackle the problem of Europe via
defence. Although this would no doubt be one task for the future federation, it
seemed to me by no means the most powerful or compelling motive for unity.’10
Nevertheless, the onset of the Korean War forced the question of German
rearmament. Monnet helped design a European Defence Community (EDC) as a
corollary to a European Coal and Steel Community because he had little choice.
In any case, defence was still too sensitive a subject, and the proposal died in the
French Parliament in 1954.
After the EDC debacle, the 1957 Treaty of Rome steered clear of security
and defence policy. With NATO taking care of defence, the EC became a de facto
civilian, economic power paying little attention to traditional security concerns.11
In 1983, Stanley Hoffmann predicted that the need for a European defence
regime would increase: ‘this vacuum, or absence, is a major source of weakness,
both for each West European nation, and for the 'civilian' European entity as a
whole,’ 12 but warned but that its formation would be difficult as defence
questions were so sensitive.
During this period, European defence literature either 1) described the
security institutions such as the Western European Union, 2) analysed
transatlantic relations, 3) evaluated the defence capabilities of the countries
within the European theatre, or 4) entered the debate on the security architecture
of Europe. Simply put, the EC was the ‘civilian’ power and NATO, the military.
9 The Financial Times, 1 July 1991.
Monnet, Memoirs, 338.
11One should note that the EC played an active role in disarmament and arms control before the
establishment of CFSP.
12Stanley Hoffmann, ‘Reflections on the Nation-State in Western Europe Today,’ Journal of
Common Market Studies (1983): 37.
10
5 Very few theoretical or empirical attempts were made to bridge the gap between
European integration and security studies.
Although a minority, several European scholars, a few American
academics, as well as some political elites, advocated that EC should involve itself
in traditional security affairs. The European Parliament has long supported EC
involvement in security.13 Wolfram Hanrieder wrote that considering European
wealth and technology:
the West Europeans must ask whether they truly regard themselves as so
lacking in common purpose and strength that they cannot establish on
their own a sufficiently credible joint deterrent, nuclear and conventional,
to safeguard their fundamental security interests, augmenting if not
replacing an increasingly shaky American commitment to their defense.14
End of the Cold War– 1990-1992
Three distinct views, somewhat along paradigmatic lines, emerged from
the change in the international structure stemming from the end of the Cold War:
1) that realist analysis was still valid; 2) that realist analysis was no longer valid
(usually supporting pluralism); and 3) critical of both realism and pluralism, that
called for a paradigmatic shift altogether. Each different theoretical perspective
implied a different role for the European Community in the ‘new’ Europe.15
Supporting the realist positions and charging that the Cold War was
responsible for European integration, John Mearsheimer, wrote ‘Without a
common Soviet threat and without the American night watchman, Western
European states will begin viewing each other with greater fear and suspicion, as
they did for centuries before the onset of the Cold War.’16 In such an analysis,
the bi-polarity was responsible for the longest period of peace in Europe. Cooperation within the framework of the European Community was a by-product of
the Cold War environment. In France especially, academics continued to see the
13See the Leo Tindemans, ‘‘European Union’ report to the European Council', chapter II.C,
December 1975, Bulletin of the European Communities Supplement of January 1976.
14Wolfram Hanrieder, Germany, America, Europe: Forty Years of German Foreign Policy
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989), 384.
15This section builds on a framework introduced by Patricia Chilton, 'Common, Collective or
Combined Defence as the Path to European Security Integration' Paper presented at biennial
meeting of the European Community Studies Association (ECSA), Charleston, SC, 11-14- May
1995.
16 John Mearsheimer, ‘Back to the Future,’ International Security 15 (summer 1990): 47.
6 worth of realism and its framework.17 Dominique Moïsi and Jacques Rupnik
shared Mearsheimer's concern that the end of the Cold War could mean a return
to 19th century balance of power politics.18 François Heisbourg found realism
useful even after the Cold War in analysing direct threats to Europe.19 Other
academics such as Richard Pipes20 and William Wohlforth21 agreed, realism
was still applicable in the post Cold War world: 'Realist theories emerge from the
end of the Cold War no weaker (though certainly no stronger) than they entered
it.'22 Pessimistically, Wohlforth recommended keeping a wary eye on Russia.
Many other academics disagreed; realism had met its Waterloo with the
end of the Cold War.23 Thomas Risse-Kappen directly challenged Mearsheimer's
realist analysis of post-Cold War Europe contending that any analysis of Europe
should be based on institutions.24 Stephen Van Evera criticized Mearsheimer’s
realist analysis maintaining that 'these pessimistic views rest on false fears.'25
He made the case that the causes of war in Europe had vanished or were
vanishing. The threat of nuclear war, American military presence, a decrease in
militarism, hyper-nationalism, imperialism, and a rise in democratic regimes and
in per-capita wealth would all make war less likely. In his version of events, the
17 P. Terrence Hopmann, ‘French Perspectives on the International Relations After the Cold War,’
Mershon International Studies Review 38 (1994): 69-93. For examples, see Georges Ayache and
Pascal Lorot, La conquête de l'est: Les atouts de la France dans le nouvel ordre mondial (Paris:
Calmann-Lévy, 1991), André Fontaine, L'un sans l'autre (Paris: Fayard, 1991), Pierre Lellouche,
Le nouveau monde: De l'ordre de Yalta au désordre des nations (Paris: Grasset, 1992), and
Alain Prate, Quelle Europe? (Paris: Julliard, 1991).
18Dominique Moïsi and Jacques Rupnik, Le nouveau continent: Plaidoyer pour une Europe
renaissante (Paris: Calmann-Lévy, 1991).
19François Heisbourg, ‘The European-US alliance: Valedictory reflections on continental drift in
the post-Cold War era,’ International Affairs 68 (1992): 665-678.
20Richard Pipes, ‘The Soviet Union Adrift,’ Foreign Affairs 70 (1991): 70-87.
21William C. Wohlforth, ‘Realism and the End of the Cold War,’ International Security 19
(Winter 1994/95): 91-129.
22Ibid., 125.
23 See for example, Charles W. Kegley, Jr, ‘The Neoidealist Moment in International Studies?
Realist Myths and the New International Realities,’ International Studies Quarterly 37 (June
1993): 131-147, Friedrich Kratochwil, ‘The Embarrassment of Changes: Neo-realism as the
Science of Realpolitik without Politics,’ Review of International Studies 19 (January 1993): 6380 and John Lewis Gaddis, ‘International Relations Theory and the End of the Cold War,’
International Security 17 (Winter 1992-93): 5-58.
24Thomas Risse-Kappen, ‘Correspondence,’ International Security 15 (Fall 1990), and also see by
the same author, ‘The Long-Term Future of European Security’ in European Foreign Policy: The
EC and Changing Perspectives in Europe, eds. Walter Carlsnaes and Steve Smith (London:
SAGE Publications, 1994).
25Stephen Van Evera, ‘Primed for Peace: Europe After the Cold War’ in The Cold War and After
ed. Sean M. Lynn-Jones and Steven Miller (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1993), 195.
7 European Community was not going to dissolve, but neither was it play a strong
role in future European security arrangements; a revamped NATO was more in
order.
Even those academics who recognized the importance of the EC failed to
see the Community as an active participant in the security of the ‘new’ Europe.
Some academics responded by arguing that both the realist and the
liberal/idealist schools were faulty prescribing a third path that recognized the
power of co-operative international institutions.26 In what Jack Snyder called
'neo-liberal institutionalism', he advocated, in the integrationist’s tradition, that
‘The most effective scheme would gradually integrate reforming Soviet bloc states
into the European Community.’27
Although all of these authors recognized that the European Community
could play a role in guaranteeing the security of the Continent, they all saw the
EC in a civilian role promoting stability in the Eastern bloc through trade, not
through a security or military identity. With so many security organizations in
Europe (NATO, WEU, CSCE/OSCE28), there seemed little reason to advocate the
formation of a security arm for the Community.
Yugoslav Crisis – 1992-1997
When the Yugoslav crisis erupted, the CFSP was being hammered out in the
1991 Intergovernmental Conference that led to the Maastricht treaty. So
confident was Jacques Poos, Luxembourg’s foreign minister, of the EU’s
emerging prowess, he declared: ‘It is the hour of Europe, not the hour of the
Americans.’ The days of political deadlock were ‘pre-history’.29 Nevertheless,
the EU Member States could not agree on whether or how to intervene militarily
or even whether or not to recognize the breakaway republics.
Perplexed by the EU’s inability to live up to its treaty aspirations, Jan
Zielonka applied five different theories with the goal of (and title of his book)
Explaining Euro-paralysis: why Europe is unable to act in international
26 See for example, Jack Snyder ‘Averting Anarchy in the New Europe,’ International Security 14
(Spring 1990): 5-41 and republished in The Cold War and After eds. Sean M. Lynn-Jones and
Steven E. Miller (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1993), 104-141, Jiri Dienstbier, ‘Central Europe’s
Security,’ Foreign Policy 83 (Summer 1991): 119-127, and Richard H. Ullman, ‘Enlarging the
Zone of Peace,’ Foreign Policy 80 (Fall 1990): 102-120.
27 Snyder, The Cold War and After, 131.
28 The Conference for Security and Cooperation in Europe, later changed to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. 29 Financial Times, 1 July 1991.
8 politics.30 Christopher Hill was most likely influenced by Yugoslavia when he
coined the term: ‘capabilities-expectations gap’.31 Stephanie Anderson compared
the EU’s, NATO’s and the CSCE’s responses to the Yugoslav crisis, and found that
some member states preferred stalemate to action.32 David Reiff was extremely
critical of the EU and judged they had learned ‘nothing’ from the experience.33
Franklin Dehousse and Benoit Galer concluded that the Amsterdam treaty set up
a defense project founded on a need-only basis explaining the EU’s inability to
react militarily to the war in Yugoslavia.34 Theovald Stoltenberg argued that the
EU’s power of attraction, that is its civilian power status, made it the most
important peacekeeping institution in Europe, and stressed the need for the
eventual integration of former Yugoslavia into the EU.35
Birth of the ESDP – 1998-2002
The Kosovo crisis created a rift between the British and the Americans that
the French exploited. The UK and France were willing to put ‘boots on the
ground”, but the Clinton administration, embroiled in the impeachment trial, and
gun shy after the ‘Black Hawk Down’ incident in Mogadishu, refused until a
settlement was in place. Wanting more autonomous capabilities for Europe, the
UK, reversing previous policy, agreed in Saint-Malo, in late 1998, to an actual
European security and defence policy. Simon Duke explained that Kosovo
brought the EU to a crossroads: either it would rejuvenate the CFSP and give
practical effect to European defence or leave it to the Americans.36 Elizabeth
Pond as well as Anthony Forster and William Wallace wrote that the EU had
learned from their experience in Kosovo, thus spurring key changes in EU
security policy including the appointment of Javier Solana as the High
Representative or ‘Monsieur PESC’ and the formation of policy planning unit.37
Jan Zielonka Explaining Euro-paralysis: why Europe is unable to act in international
politics.(Basingstoke: Palgrave, 1998),
31 Hill, Christopher. ‘The Capability-Expectations Gap, or Conceptualizing Europe’s International
Role’ Journal of Common Market Studies 30 (September 1993): 305-328.
32 Anderson, Stephanie B.. ‘EU, NATO, and CSCE responses to the Yugoslav crisis: Testing
Europe’s New Security Architecture.’ European Security 4 (Summer 1995): 328-353.
33 ‘The Lessons of Bosnia: Morality and Power’ Rieff, David. World Policy Journal 12.1 (Spring
1995): 76
34 From Saint-Malo to Feira: The Stakes in the Renaissance of the European Defense Project
Dehousse, Franklin; Galer, Benoit. Studia Diplomatica 52.4 : 1-114.
35 INTRODUCING PEACEKEEPING TO EUROPE
Stoltenberg, T. International Peacekeeping 2.2 : 215-223.
36 Duke, Simon (01/01/1999). ‘From Amsterdam to Kosovo: lessons for the future of CFSP’.
Eipascope, (2), pp. 1-14.
37 Pond, Elizabeth. ‘Kosovo: Catalyst for Europe’ The Washington Quarterly 22.4 (Autumn 1999):
77-92 and Anthony Forster and William Wallace, ‘Common Foreign and Security Policy: From
Shadow to Substance?’ in Helen Wallace and William Wallace (eds.) Policy-Making in the
European Union, 4th edition, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 461-492.
30
9 Considering these accomplishments, and in light of the 9/11 attacks and the
changing security environment, Laurent Cohen-Tanugi argued it was time for the
EU to lead in the transatlantic context.38 Charles Kupchan agreed in his book
titled The End of the American Era making the case that Europe needed a
security identity for when the US did not want to get involved.39
Iraq War 2002-2009: Of Mars, Venus, and Emancipation
Just as during the Gulf War and the Yugoslav crisis, the US invasion of
Iraq in 2003 split the EU Member States and demonstrated the fragility of the
CFSP. Eager to prove themselves good NATO allies, the former eastern bloc
countries, and soon-to-be members of the European Union, vociferously
supported the United States. In reaction to France and Germany’s criticism of
US foreign policy, Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld said the US could
ignore ‘old Europe’ because new Europe was on their side. 40 The eastern
members’ vocal support for the United States caused French president Jacques
Chirac to suggest publicly that they ‘be quiet.’41
Just before the 2003 Iraq War rift, Robert Kagan, alluding to the famous
book on relationship advice,42 argued that America was from Mars and Europe
from Venus. Like men, Kagan characterized the United States as more violent
and action-oriented whilst the EU, like women, were more passive and peaceful,
placing more emphasis on consensus and communication.43 Kagan’s assertions
framed the next five years of the academic debate: did Americans and Europeans
share the same values, the same interests or even a future together? German
chancellor Gerhardt Schroeder called for ‘emancipation’ from US security policy,
and some academics, such as Jolyon Howorth concurred contending that the EU
needed its own defence to ‘defend’ itself from the United States.44 Taking a neorealist approach, Seth Jones and Barry Posen agreed that the shift from bipolarity
to unipolarity meant that ‘European states … [had] bec[o]me increasingly
An Alliance at Risk: The United States and Europe since September 11. Laurent Cohen-Tanugi.
(The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003).
39 See, for example, Charles A. Kupchan, The End of the American Era.
40
‘Outrage
at
‘old
Europe’
remarks’,
January
23,
2003,
BBC
News,
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/2687403.stm.
41 Janet McEvoy, ‘France warns EU candidates risk membership over Iraq,’ Agence France Presse
– English, 18 February 2003. There is some controversy as to whether Chirac’s use of ‘se taire’
should have been translated as ‘be quiet’ or ‘shut up’. In any case, even if inappropriate, this term
was widely quoted in the English-speaking press as ‘shut up’, see Oana Lungescu, ‘Chirac blasts
EU candidates’ BBC News, 18 February 2003.
42 John Gray, Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus: A Practical Guide for Improving
Communication and Getting What You Want in Your Relationships, (New York: HarperCollins,
1992).
43 Robert Kagan, ‘Power and Weakness’ Policy Review 113 (2002): 5-23 (electronic copy).
44 Jolyon Howorth, Defending Europe.
38
10 concerned about American power and, with a growing divergence in security
interests, wanted to increase their ability to project power abroad and decrease
US influence.’45 When explaining the motivations for the ESDP, Salmon and
Shepherd placed at number one that the ESDP ‘may reduce the perception of a
unipolar international relations system dominated by a single superpower.’46
Nevertheless, Mette Eilstrup-Sangiovanni made the case that the ESDP was ‘bad’
for Europe as it wasted resources and was divisive.47
Assessing the Impact of the CSDP: 2009 to present
Ten years after its launch, many authors took the opportunity to evaluate
the impact of the CSDP in creating a cohesive defence policy and in influencing
world events.
The EU Institute for Security Studies (EUISS) published an
extensive report on all the CSDP missions.48 In an article entitled ‘Empowering
Paradise? The ESDP at Ten’ 49 Anand Menon assessed whether Kagan’s
statement ‘European integration has proved to be the enemy of European
military power and, indeed, of an important European global role’ was true.
Two years later, in 2011, he guest-edited along with Bastien Irondelle and Chris J.
Bickerton, a special issue for The Journal of Common Market Studies called
‘Security Cooperation beyond the Nation State: The EU’s Common Security and
Defence Policy.’50 Roy Ginberg and Susan Penska devised a rubric for evaluating
the global impact of CSDP missions,51 and Xymena Kurowska and Fabian Breuer
catalogued the different theories applied to the CSDP.52
Latitudinal/ Theoretical Approaches
Before the end of the Cold War, European integration studies and security
studies seldom crossed; in general, the Community was perceived as a civilian
power and the US and NATO dominated defence leading to ‘a paucity of
S. Jones, The Rise of European Security Cooperation, 9 and Barry Posen, ‘ESDP: Response to
Unipolarity?’ Security Studies 15 (2): 149-186.
46 Salmon and Shepherd, 2-3.
47 Eilstrup-Sandiovanni, ‘Why a Common Security and Defense Policy is Bad for Europe,’ 193-206.
48 European Security and Defence Policy: The First 10 Years (1999-2009), edited by Giovanni
Grevi, Damien Helly and Daniel Keohane, 265-274. Paris: European Union Institute for
Security Studies, 2009.
49 Anand Menon ‘Empowering Paradise? The ESDP at Ten’ International Affairs 85: 2 (2009)
227–246.
50 Anand Menon, Bastien Irondelle and Chris J. Bickerton eds., The Journal of Common Market
Studies, Special Issue: Security Cooperation beyond the Nation State: The EU’s Common Security
and Defense Policy.50
51 The European Union in Global Security: The Politics of Impact, by R.H. Ginsberg and S.E.
Penksa, Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012.
52 Xymena Kurowska and Fabian Breuer (eds.) Explaining the EU’s Common Security and
Defence Policy: Theory in Action (New York: Palgrave Macmilan, 2012).
45
11 theoretical studies.’53 International relations scholars have long used realism and
its variants to analyse state interactions, but the theory fell short in the case of the
CFSP, because it could not ‘integrate’ European integration into its analysis. By
the same token, neo-functionalism, long associated with European integration,
had trouble taking into account the intergovernmental nature of the CFSP.54
Therefore, especially over the past decade, scholars have adopted institutional
and sociological approaches to CSDP, for example social constructivism, social
theory and sociological institutionalism, and even critical theoretical approaches
to explain the development of European defence policy.
Realism and its variants
Realism and its variants stress how power structures affect outcomes.
Sten Rynning has defended the utility of realism with regards to the CSDP55 and
many authors, such as Adrian Hyde-Price, Julian Lindley-French and Michael
Lariaux find it the theory of choice as well.
Since the Iraq War, many scholars have used realism to analyse the
balancing of power vis-à-vis the United States. Barry Posen and Seth Jones
posited that Europe no longer trusted the US, and therefore had built up a
military.56 However, how useful was military power in a post 9/11 world? Could
the EU soft-balance the US? Joseph Nye’s book Soft Power: The Means to
Success in World Politics defined soft power in terms of a state’s values and not
military might: ‘A country may obtain the outcomes it wants in world politics
because other countries admiring its values, emulating its example, aspiring to its
level of prosperity and openness want to follow it.’57
Rather than being a civilian power, the EU utilized soft power compared to
the US’s over reliance on hard power, although there was some confusion
regarding the term. Although Robert Art called it ‘soft-balancing’, he referred
Chris J. Bickerton, Bastien Irondelle and Anand Menon, ‘Security Co-operation beyond the
Nation-State: The EU’s Common Security and Defence Policy’ The Journal of Common Market
Studies 49:1 (2011), Special Issue: Security Cooperation beyond the Nation State: The EU’s
Common Security and Defense Policy, 8.
54 Jakob Øhrgaard, ‘Less than Supranational, More than Intergovernmental: European Political
Co-operation and the Dynamics of Intergovernmental Integration’, Millennium: Journal of
International Studies 26:1 (1997) 8.
55 Sten Rynning, ‘Realism and the Common Security and Defence Policy’ Journal of Common
Market Studies 49:1 (2011): 23-42.
56 Barry Posen, ‘ESDP and the Structure of World Power’, The International Spectator 39:1
(2004): 5-17, and Barry Posen 2006, and Seth Jones, ‘The Rise of a European Defense’ Political
Science Quarterly 121:2, (2006) 241-67.
57 Nye, Soft Power: the Means to Success in World Politics, 5.
53
12 almost exclusively to the EU’s potential military power. 58 Robert Pape and
Joseph Nye defined ‘soft-balancing’ differently. Pape defined it as measures ‘that
do not directly challenge US military preponderance but that use non-military
tools to delay, frustrate and undermine aggressive unilateral US military policies
[for example] international institutions, economic statecraft, and diplomatic
arrangements.’59 Aysha agreed stating, ‘Soft power…refers to the policies adopted
by a state to promote its image abroad’ using public diplomacy and cultural
diplomacy.60 Brooks and Wohlforth were sceptical as to the usefulness of ‘softbalancing’ arguing that the subsequent EU Battle Groups of 1,500 troops would
also have a minimum impact on the balance of power. 61
Institutionalism and its variants
Assuming bounded rationality, institutionalism and its variants emphasize
how institutions influence outcomes. Michael E. Smith used it to explain the
development of over 40 years of security cooperation.62 Bailes used it to explain
member state participation in CSDP missions.63
Anand Menon thought historical institutionalism the most useful for
understanding the CSDP. 64 Defining institutions as the formal or informal
processes, rules and norms embedded in the organizational structure of the
polity, historical institutionalists agree that contending parties vie for limited
resources, but recognize that the institutional structure privileges some groups
and/or interests over others, often by creating a ‘moral or cognitive template for
interpretation and action.’ 65 Petar Petrov applied it to crisis management
operations.66
Robert Art, “Correspondence: Striking a Balance,” International Security, 30 (2005): 177.
Robert Pape, ‘Soft Balancing Against the United States,’ 8-9. A similar argument is supported
by T.V. Paul, ‘Soft Balancing in the Age of U.S. Primacy,’ 46-71.
60 Emad El-Din Aysha, ‘September 11 and the Middle East Failure of US ‘Soft Power’,’ 193.
61 Stephen Brooks and William Wohlforth, ‘Hard Times for Soft Balancing,’ International
Security 30 (2005), 92.
62 Michael E. Smith, Europe’s Foreign and Security Policy: The Institutionalization of
Cooperation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004).
63 A.J.K. Bailes, ‘The EU and a ‘Better World’: What Role for the European Security and Defence
Policy?’ International Affairs, 84:1 (2008): 11-30.
64 Anand Menon, ‘Power, Institutions and the CSP: The Promise of Institutionalist Theory’
Journal of Common Market Studies 49:1 (2011): 83-100.
65 Peter A Hall and Rosemary C. R. Taylor, ‘Political Science and the Three New Institutionalisms’
MPIFG Discussion Paper 96/6, 6-8, http://www.mpifg.de/pu/mpifg_dp/dp96-6.pdf .
66 Petar Petrov, ‘Introducing governance arrangements for EU conflict prevention and crisis
management operations: a historical instutionalist perspective’ in EU Conflict Prevention and
Crisis Management: Roles, Institutions and Policies (eds.) Eva Gross and Ana E. Juncos (New
York: Routledge, 2011): 49-65.
58
59
13 Mortiz Weiss used a version of rational choice institutionalism with a
focus on economic transaction costs as the explanatory factor for the
institutionalization of the ESDP. 67 Ana Juncos applied a sociological
institutionalist analysis to explain the role of culture and bureaucracy in EU crisis
management.68 In the same vein, Fabien Breuer analysed the ‘Brusselisation’ of
CSDP. 69 Stephanie Hofmann focused on the regime complex of crisis
management missions and on the networks that emerge within CSDP
institutions.70
Social Constuctivism
Social constructivists concentrate on the power of norms and identity,71
emphasizing the emergence of ‘a European security community.’ 72 Xymena
Kurowska and Friedrich Kratochwil stress its utility in understanding security
politics. Stephanie Anderson argued the CSDP was a tool for enhancing a
collective identity in Europe. In other words, the EU ‘pursues its own security and
defense policy as a way to increase its stature on the world stage and among its
people at home […] the ESDP is for nation-building purposes and not for defense
itself.’73
To be or not to be – what exactly? Timeless Ontological Questions in European
Defence
Over the decades, two major questions have dominated the European
defence debate: 1) what kind of power is the EU or should it be? and 2) does a
European defence mean the end of the Atlantic Alliance?
What kind of power is the EU? Civilian? Soft? Hard? Normative?
Moritz Weiss, Transaction Costs and Security Institutions: Unravelling the ESDP (New York:
Palgrave Macmilan 2011).
68 Ana E. Juncos, ‘The other side of EU crisis management: a sociological institutionalist analysis’
in EU Conflict Prevention and Crisis Management: Roles, Institutions and Policies (eds.) Eva
Gross and Ana E. Juncos (New York: Routledge, 2011): 84-99.
69 Fabian Breuer, ‘Sociological Institutionalism, Socialization and the Brusselisation of CSDP’ in
Kurowska and Breuer.
70 Stephanie Hoffman, “Why Institutional Overlap Matters: CSDP in the European Security
Architecture.” Journal of Common Market Studies 49 (2010): 101–120.
71 Alexander Wendt, Anarchy is what States Make of it: The Social Construction of Power Politics,
International Organization, 1992, Vol. 46, No. 2, 391-425; Peter Katzenstein, The culture of
national security: norms and identity in world politics, New York: Columbia University Press,
1996.
72 Ole Waever, Insecurity, Security, and Asecurity in the West European Non-War Community,
69-118, in Adler, E., and Barnett M., Security Communities. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
University Press, 1998.
73 Stephanie Anderson, Crafting EU security policy: in pursuit of a European identity.
Boulder, Colo: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2008, 46.
67
14 Does the European Union have more ‘power’ as a civilian actor (soft
power) or as a military actor (hard power), or is the question moot because the
European Union has almost no military power? In 1957, with the birth of the
European Community, Karl Deutsch’s definition of a 'security community', where
those countries within the community forego war as a means of settling disputes,
seemed most apropos.74 Did this mean that military power was irrelevant to a
discussion of the EC? In the 1970’s, François Duchêne and Hedley Bull each
represented different sides of the debate. Duchêne argued that the EC had
successfully replaced military power relationships in Europe (for example as
between France and Germany) with civilian economic ties.75 Having rendered
the traditional power relationships obsolete, military competition among EC
partners would become impossible. Moreover, the EC, as a civilian power, would
have little to fear from external aggression because of the strength of the
Community’s economic power.76
Using a realist framework, Bull made the case that military power was still
the most important tool of influence and would not go away with the addition of
this new pattern of civilian relationships in Europe.77 As long as states operated
in the anarchy that characterized the international system, military power would
remain the ultimate arbiter of disputes. In time, however, the EC might become a
sovereign state -- the basic unit of international relations -- with a security policy
where alliance formation would dominate the European landscape.78
After the Cold War, the debate continued. Especially in light of the birth of
the CFSP, would the EU become a sovereign state with a military as Bull
predicted, or was military power obsolete? Pekka Sivonen saw virtue in the EC as
a stabilizing presence, not as a military or security actor in the traditional sense:
'Today the systemic characteristics established by the Cold War in Europe have
become anachronistic .… There is now less room for the 'stabilizing' functions of
military force in the European security system than ever before.'79 As military
74 Karl Deutsch et al. Political Community and the North Atlantic Area (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1957).
75François Duchêne, ‘Europe’s Role in World Peace,’ in Europe Tomorrow, ed. Richard Mayne
(London: Fontana, 1972), 43.
76Ibid.
77 Hedley Bull, ‘Civilian Power Europe: A Contradiction in Terms?’ Journal of Common Market
Studies 21 (Sept.-Dec. 1982): 151.
78For further elaboration on these arguments, see also François Duchêne, ‘Europe and Changing
Superpower Relations,’ The Round Table 61 (October 1971): 577-584.
79Pekka Sivonen, ‘European Security: New, Old and Borrowed,’ Journal of Peace Research 27
(1990): 385.
15 power had become less useful than it was, Sivonen argued that European peace
should be secured through the creation of 'a network of institutionalized rules for
internal and international state behavior.'80 Björn Hettne agreed, but gave this
institutionalized network of rules a name -- a European Peace Order.81 Gerhard
Wettig argued that the end of the Cold War meant that 'This system of mutual
deterrence from war, successful as it was under the conditions of East-West
confrontation, cannot be continued once the situation has changed. Its basis
does not exist any longer.'82 The role the EC played in the security of Europe
was an important one: the EC would play the stabilizing economic and political
force in the former Eastern bloc. Dieter Senghaas concurred.83
When describing the foreign relations policy and power of the EC,
Christopher Hill concluded that the most accurate description was that of 'civilian
power'.84 For academics including Ginsberg, the EC was living proof of realism’s
shortcomings as an international relations theory. Rather than pursue power in
the traditional sense, the EC was a peaceful, civilian economic community with
no military ambitions. 85 More recently, Ginsberg wrote ‘regardless of the fate of
the CFSP, the foreign political, economic and diplomatic influence of the EU will
still be largely defined by the traditional Rome Treaty-based civilian actions still
found in Pillar One.’86 Others including Lily Gardener Feldman, David Long and
Michael E. Smith have argued that the EU’s impact on the world is unique
precisely because it is not a military superpower.87 David Allen and Michael
Smith made the case that the EU was so impotent militarily that it could only be
considered a civilian power.88 Finally, Christopher Piening argued that the EU
was a global power, but as its strength does not come from military power, it was
80 Ibid.
81Björn Hettne, ‘Security and Peace in Post-Cold War Europe,’ Journal of Peace Research 28
(1991): 279-294.
82Gerhard Wettig, ‘Security in Europe: A Challenging Task,’ Aussenpolitik 1 (1992): 5.
83Dieter Senghaas, Friedensprojekt Europa (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1992).
84Hill, 54.
85 See Ginsberg, Foreign Policy Actions of the European Community, 12.
86 Roy Ginsberg, ‘The EU’s CFSP: The Politics of Procedure’ in Martin Holland, (ed.) Common
Foreign and Security Policy, 14.
87 See L. Feldman, ‘Reconciliation and External Diplomacy’ in T. Banchoff and M. Smith (eds.)
Legitimacy and the European Union and David Long ‘Multilateralism in the CFSP’ in Martin
Holland (ed.) Common Foreign and Security Policy: The Record and the Reform. See also
Michael E. Smith, ‘Beyond Bargaining: The Institutionalization of Foreign Policy Co-operation in
the European Community, 1970-1996’, Ph.D. Thesis, (Irvine: The University of California, 1998)
as cited in Roy Ginsberg, ‘Conceptualizing the European Union as an International Actor,’ 445.
88 See David Allen and Michael Smith ‘The European Union’s Security Presence in the
Contemporary International Arena’ in Carolyn Rhodes (ed.) The European Union in the World
Community.
16 simply in a ‘class of its own’.89
However, in 2000, Karen Smith90 disagreed titling her paper ‘The end of
civilian power Europe’. Since the end of the Cold War, the EU has made the
most dramatic strides in a generation to build what Seth Jones termed ‘an
increasingly integrated and technologically-advanced defense industry’ on a
Europe-wide basis.91 G. Andréani, C. Bertram and C. Grant declared ‘Europe’s
military revolution’.92 Charles Cogan asserted that the EU was ‘squarely on the
road towards autonomy in matters of defense.’93
In 2002, Ian Manners tried to bridge the gap through use of the concept
‘normative power Europe’.94 Alluding to Bull, he argued that, rather than being
‘a contradiction in terms’, the EU could meld both civilian and military power
into something unique: normative power. In 2006, the Journal of European
Public Policy published a special issue called ‘What kind of power? European
Foreign Policy in Perspective’95 asking whether the EU was a civilian, civilizing96,
or normative power?
Will A European Defence Undermine NATO?
Academics from strong Atlanticist countries such as the US, the UK and
Denmark have approached EU defence from a different angle: what will mean to
the Atlantic Alliance?
The United States and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) still
dominate the European defence debate. Until the end of the cold war, Europe
could not afford to experiment with its defence policy. From 1966 to 1989, the
debate cantered on how equal a partnership the Atlantic Alliance was: the US
argued it paid too much in terms of military support and the European countries
argued they had too little say in policy. Immediately after the fall of communism,
Christopher Piening, Global Europe: The European Union in World Affairs, 196.
Karen E. Smith, ‘The end of civilian power Europe: a welcome demise or a cause
for concern?’, International Spectator 35: 2, 2000,
91 Jones, Seth. The Rise of European Security Cooperation. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2007.
92 G. Andréani, C. Bertram and C. Grant, Europe’s military revolution (London: Centre for
European Reform, 2001).
93 Charles G. Cogan, The Third Option: The Emancipation of European Defense, 1989–2000
(Westport, CT: Praeger, 2001), 134.
94 Ian Manners, ‘Normative Power Europe: A Contradiction in Terms?’ Journal of Common
Market Studies 40 (2): 235-58.
95 Journal of European Public Policy Volume 13, Issue 2, 2006 Special Issue: What Kind of
Power? European Foreign Policy in Perspective
96 Nicolaidis, Kalypso and R. Howse. ‘’This Is My EUtopia …’: Narrative As Power.’ Journal of
Common Market Studies 40 (2002): 767-92.
89
90
17 the debate shifted to the continued utility of NATO, and whether it would
disband as the Warsaw Pact had. NATO has always enjoyed strong public
support among all the member countries, on average 65 per cent; as a result, the
Atlantic Alliance has endured, but questions have remained as to how to reform it
to equalize the burden-sharing and the policy making.
During the Cold War, where integration was taken into account with
regard to security, many academics and politicians took note of the division
between the North Americans and the West Europeans and speculated on the
danger of such a division within the Atlantic Alliance. Henry Kissinger and David
Calleo based their analyses of European security issues on the alliance system
and NATO.
In The Troubled Partnership 97 and in Beyond American
Hegemony,98 both Kissinger and Calleo analysed European integration as it
related to the integrity of NATO, as opposed to how it factored in the overall
balance of power. They concluded that integration might strengthen Western
Europe’s resolve to resist American domination within NATO, and, therefore,
called for NATO reform to allow for a more equal partnership. However, the EC
played no other role in the balance of power in the European theatre. Indeed,
Calleo went so far as to say that American hegemony had made the development
of an EC security dimension impossible: 'NATO has made it unnecessary for
European states either to acquire the military resources they might otherwise
have been expected to maintain or to develop the security relationships with each
other that their interests might otherwise have commanded.'99
In a 640 page book entitled European Security Policy after the
Revolutions of 1989,100 no chapter or section even addressed the European
Community. For those who did address the possibility of an EC with a military
dimension, they were pessimistic:
NATO has from the start been built up around the forces of its members,
including the USA. To remove the forces of any one country would court
disaster. If that country were to be the USA, NATO would quite simply
collapse. Europe can probably build a new and different defence structure
in the long term, but this would demand much more expenditure, the
mobilisation of more manpower and a high degree of integration of
97Henry Kissinger, The Troubled Partnership (Garden City, NY: Doubleday Anchor Books, 1966).
98David P. Calleo, Beyond American Hegemony (New York: Basic Books, Inc., 1987).
99Calleo, 217.
100Jeffrey Simon, European Security Policy after the Revolutions of 1989 (Washington, DC:
National Defense University Press, 1991).
18 national armed forces. To attempt this with the WTO countries in a state
of turmoil and instability would be folly of the highest order.101
Charles Glaser conceded that 'A Western European alliance could serve some
[security] … functions,' but concludes, nevertheless, that 'NATO is still best'.102
As the CSDP developed, Sten Rynning asked, ‘Why not NATO?’103 Was
NATO no longer suitable as an organization to deal with Europe’s new security
agenda focusing on non-traditional threats such as environmental concerns,
political instability and terrorism?
Indeed, many see Europe’s pursuit of an ESDP as a self-fulfilling
prophesy: by building an autonomous capability, it will undermine NATO,104 as
well as create ill-will with the Americans, thereby encouraging its isolationist
tendencies. Although an extreme example, one author titled his article ‘Save
NATO from Europe’. 105 Lindley-French argued that seeing the formation of
security institutions as security ends in and of themselves was dangerous, naïve,
and could undermine NATO, the serious defence organization.106 As Stephen
Larabee explained, ‘many of the forces and assets that will be required for ESDI
already have NATO commitments. If these forces are restructured for ESDIrelated tasks, and especially if EU planning for these missions is not done in close
cooperation with NATO’s defense planning process, ESDI could weaken rather
than strengthen NATO.’ 107 Stanley Sloan 108 explored ways to revise the
transatlantic relationship in light of the ESDP and Martin Reichart109 catalogued
101 Martin Farnsdale, former commander North Atlantic Group (NATO Central Europe), in
Europe after an American Withdrawal, ed. Jane O. Sharp, (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1990), 454.
102Charles L. Glaser, ‘Why NATO is Still Best,’ International Security 18 (Summer 1993): 5-50.
Nevertheless, one should note that some authors including Ulrich Weisser, NATO ohne
Feindbild: Konturen einer europäischen Sicherheitspolitik, (Bonn: Bouvier, 1992) support the
EC developing a security and military dimension especially to allow Germany to participate
militarily in international peacekeeping forces.
103 Rynning, Sten. ‘Why not NATO? Military planning in the European Union.’ Journal of
Strategic Studies 26 (2003): 53-72.
104 Robert E. Hunter, The European Security and Defense Policy: NATO’s Companion – or
Competitor? (Santa Monica, CA: RAND 2002).
105 Jeffrey Cimbalo, ‘Saving NATO from Europe,’ 83.
106 Julian Lindley-French, ‘In the shade of Locarno? Why European defence is failing,’ 789-811.
107 ‘The European Security and Defense Identity (ESDI) and American Interests.’ Prepared
Statement of Dr. F. Stephen Larrabee, RAND, Washington, D.C. for a hearing before the
Committee on Foreign Relations, Subcommittee on European Affairs, United States Senate,
March 9, 2000, 4.
108 NATO, the European Union, and the Atlantic Community The Transatlantic Bargain
Reconsidered. Stanley R. Sloan. (Rowman & Littlefield, 2003).
109 The EU-NATO Relationship: A Legal and Political Perspective. Martin Reichart. (Ashgate,
2006).
19 the legal and political relations between the two.
Conclusions
Considering that Monnet had not originally conceived of defence as a
foundation for European unity and considering the dominance of the United
States and the Soviet Union in a bi-polar cold war, ‘integrating’ the European
project with security studies has been problematic. One of the most basic
characteristics of a state is the ability to defend itself. Does the EU’s having a
defence policy make it a state? Does the EU’s having a defence policy mean it can
defend itself? The answer to both questions is ‘no’, but the answers mean that
traditional security analysis does not apply to EU defence policy.
The poor fit creates ontological questions: What kind of power is the EU?
Will the EU become a state? Will the Atlantic Alliance continue to exist? Is the
US our friend or foe? Can a country be Atlanticist and European at the same
time? Understandably, academics have had to find other theories, often more
sociological and psychological theories, to explain EU developments in this field.