To What Ends EU Foreign Policy? Contending Approaches to the Union’s Diplomatic Objectives and Representation
The Hague Journal of Diplomacy, Vol. 7, No. 1, p. 11, January 2012
20 Pages Posted: 7 Oct 2011 Last revised: 12 Jan 2012
Date Written: July 15, 2011
Abstract
The strengthened Office of the High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and the new External Action Service (EAS) presuppose a set of interests and/or values that the EU wishes to pursue on the world stage. But what are those interests and/or values and how does the EU reach agreement on them? Rather than simply ‘cutting and pasting’ from EU treaties and strategy papers, this paper identifies seven distinct theoretical models of how the EU and its member states arrive collectively at a definition of their diplomatic objectives. The seven models include intergovernmentalist models of veto threats and log-rolling, normative institutionalist models of cooperative bargaining and entrapment, and constructivist and sociological institutionalist models of elite socialisation, Europeanisation and collective identity formation. The paper identifies the logics of each model and notes their implications for the role of the EU’s new foreign policy institutions.
Keywords: European Union, foreign policy, CFSP, interests, preferences
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