Defense Cooperation in Europe
How National Interests Define the Willingness for Cooperation
Name: A. P. Bosch
Address: Winschoterdiep 75c, 9724 GL, Groningen Student Number: 1716964
Table of Contents
Declaration by candidate ... 3
Introduction: The necessity of defense cooperation ... 4
Chapter 1: The relation between defense cooperation, sovereignty and national interests ... 15
The connection between defense cooperation and sovereignty ... 15
Debating sovereignty ... 20
Sovereignty as an identity ... 25
Identities drive a state’s national interests ... 29
Conclusion: A different theoretical framework ... 34
Chapter 2: European Defense Community ... 37
Pleven Plan ... 37
Solving diverging national interests ... 40
The problem of French ratification ... 43
Conclusion: Why the EDC failed to materialize ... 45
Chapter 3: BENESAM ... 47
A long-term defense cooperation relationship ... 48
After the Cold War ... 54
Conclusion: The success of BENESAM ... 57
Chapter 4: UK-French Defense Cooperation ... 59
Identities driving national interests ... 60
Joint Carrier Strike Group ... 65
Conclusion: Mixed results ... 69
Conclusion: The difficulties facing defense cooperation initiatives in Europe... 71
Declaration by candidate
I hereby declare that this thesis, “Defense Cooperation in Europe: How National Interests Define the Willingness for Cooperation,” is my own work and my own effort and that it has not been accepted anywhere else for the award of any other degree or diploma. Where sources have been used, they have been acknowledged.
A.P. Bosch
Introduction: The necessity of defense cooperation
On April 17, 2012 the defense ministers of the Benelux states (Belgium, Luxemburg and the Netherlands) signed a declaration stating their intention to cooperate more intensively in matters of defense.1 At the time Dutch defense minister, Hans Hillen, stated that this declaration should be seen in the context of the decreasing defense budgets in these states. As a consequence of this context, defense cooperation between the Benelux states has become a necessity in Hillen’s opinion, because the declining defense budgets of these three states allow none of them to maintain a credible military force on their own. He declared that only by working together can the Benelux states ensure they possess the necessary military capabilities to protect their individual national interests. In this regard defense cooperation would not mean making joint decisions about going to war, but working together in the areas of peace-operations and the maintenance and acquisition of defense equipment. However, Hillen also pointed out that this cooperation would mean a loss of sovereignty for each of the three states involved, because in his view cooperation is not without obligations.2 Through this declaration all three states have expressed their intention to investigate to what extent they are willing to give up their autonomy in matters of defense.3
This initiative of the Benelux states does not stand on its own. Across the European continent, states have been looking for closer defense cooperation with one another in recent years. For instance, on a bilateral level France and the United Kingdom (UK) declared their willingness to cooperate in the UK-France Defence Co-operation Treaty on November 2, 2010.4 Moreover, France and Germany recently signed a treaty stating their shared intention to investigate if defense cooperation would be possible on the issues of the acquisition of tanks and artillery units, the integration of the NH-90 and Tiger helicopter projects, and
1 Hans Hillen, Jean-Marie Halsdorf and Pieter de Crem, “Benelux-verklarg over Samenwerking op
Defensievlak,” Rijksoverheid, April 19, 2012, http://www.rijksinoverheid.nl/bestanden/documenten-en- publicaties/convenanten/2012/05/14/benelux-verklaring-over-samenwerking-op-defensievlak/benelux-verklaring-over-samenwerking-op-defensievlak.pdf (accessed on July 15, 2012), 1.
2 Ministerie van Defensie, “Minister Hillen: Samenwerking in Benelux niet vrijblijvend,” Ministerie van
Defensie, April 18, 2012, http://www.defensie.nl/actueel/nieuws/2012/04/18/46195085/minister_hillen_
samenwerking_in_benelux_niet_vrijblijvend (accessed on July 15, 2012).
3 Hans Hillen, Jean-Marie Halsdorf and Pieter de Crem, “Benelux-verklaring over Samenwerking op
Defensievlak,” Rijksoverheid, April 19, 2012, http://www.rijksoverheid.nl/bestanden/documenten-en- publicaties/convenanten/2012/05/14/benelux-verklaring-over-samenwerking-op-defensievlak/benelux-verklaring-over-samenwerking-op-defensievlak.pdf (accessed on July 15, 2012), 3.
4 David Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy, “Treaty: Between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern
working together in the area of missile-defense.5 In addition to these bilateral defense cooperation agreements there have been initiatives on an European level to facilitate closer defense cooperation between the members of the European Union (EU). For instance, with the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty the EU has gained competencies in the area of the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) which could form the foundation for an increase in European defense cooperation initiatives. More specific, the Lisbon Treaty introduced the Permanent Structured Cooperation procedure (PSC), which is an ambitious attempt to develop European defense cooperation initiatives by binding those member states, that already have established a defense cooperation relationship with each other, within an EU framework.6 Moreover, the EU already has developed several other initiatives that can help European defense cooperation forward. One of these initiatives is the European Defence Agency (EDA), which was founded in 2004, and has as its goal to be a platform for the development of European military capabilities. Furthermore, the defense ministers of the EU member states declared in 2010 their intention to take European defense cooperation to the next level in the so-called Ghent-initiative by focusing on the possibilities for the pooling and sharing of military capabilities.7 Clearly, the development of defense cooperation initiatives has caught the attention across the European continent in recent years.
Why has the development of defense cooperation initiatives caught the attention across the European continent? The answer to this question is two-fold. The first part is that the defense budgets of the European members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) have been decreasing ever since the end of the Cold War. Over the last twenty years these states have been cashing in on the so-called peace-dividend.8 With the fall of the Soviet-Union the European states did not have to fear an invasion of an external power any longer. This loss of an external enemy allowed them to decrease their defense budgets. Moreover, it allowed them to transform their armies with a primary focus on the defense of the continent
5 Sabine Siebold, “Germany, France Deepen Defense Cooperation,” Reuters, June 14, 2012,
http://www.reuters.com/ article/2012/06/14/us-germany-france-defence-idUSBRE85D10G20120614 (accessed on July 15, 2012).
6 European Union, “Consolidated Version of the Treaty of European Union: Article 42,” European Union Law,
March 30, 2010, http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:C:2010:083:0013: 0046:EN:PDF (accessed on August 3, 2012). Margriet Drent and Dick Zandee pointed out in their article, Breaking Pillars:
Towards a Civil Military Security Approach for the European Union, that the Lisbon Treaty does not stipulate
that member states have to mandatory pool their individual authority in matters of defense. They concluded that therefore, this EU framework will be merely used as a catalyst for the development of European defense cooperation initiatives.
7
“Pooling and Sharing, German-Swedish Initiative,” European Parliament, November 2010,
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/meetdocs/2009_2014/documents/sede/dv/sede260511deseinitiative_/sede260511 deseinitiative_en.pdf (accessed on March 15, 2012), 1.
8
into smaller, leaner and flexible forces that suited the ambitions of the European states better in the post-Cold War world. The European states declared that those ambitions consisted of the protection human rights, stopping the proliferation of nuclear weapons, combatting terrorism and providing cyber-security. These ambitions would be fulfilled by working together within the frameworks of the UN, EU and NATO.9 As a result of the loss of an external enemy and changing military ambitions, the defense spending of the European NATO-members was decreased from a total of 707 billion dollars in 1988 to 407 billion dollars in 2011.10 In terms of European Gross Domestic Product, the defense spending of the European NATO members has decreased since 1990 from 2.5 percent towards 1.6 percent in 2011, well below the two percent norm that has been agreed upon within NATO.11
It is likely that in the years to come this percentage will drop even further. The economies of the European NATO-states have felt the financial hardship that started with the 2008 financial crisis and that has developed into the sovereign debt crisis that still holds the European continent in its grasp. As a result, many of the European NATO-states have put austerity measures in place that will further decrease their defense budgets in future years.12 With defense budgets in Europe decreasing it is likely that the military capabilities that these states currently possess will also decline and as a consequence their ability to maintain their above described ambitions will be challenged. Moreover, as NATO Secretary-General Rasmussen made clear, it makes that these states will be less able to keep their end of the
9 Javier Solana, “Report on the Implementation of the European Security Strategy: Providing Security in a
Changing World,” European Union External Action, December 11, 2008, http://www.consilium.europa.eu/ ueDocs/cms_Data/docs/pressdata/EN/reports/104630.pdf (accessed on June 5, 2012), 3-5.
10 Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, “Europe: Military Expenditure in Europe by Subregion,
1988-2011,” SIPRI, 2011, http://www.sipri.org/research/armaments/milex/resultoutput/regional/milex_europe (accessed on August 22, 2012). This trend has not been gradual. European defense spending dropped severely between 1988 and 1992, but since then European defense budgets have hovered between 300 and 400 billion dollars annually. In 2011 European defense budgets grew for the first time in 20 years above 400 billion dollars. This rise can be attributed to the increase in defense budgets of the Eastern European states, especially Poland, due to rising economies and Russia letting its influence being felt in the region. In Western Europe defense budgets have steadily declined since the end of the Cold War.
11 NATO Public Diplomacy Division, “Financial and Economic Data Relating to NATO Defence,” NATO, April
13, 2012, http://www.nato.int/nato_static/assets/pdf/pdf_2012_04/20120413_PR_CP_2012_ 047_rev1.pdf (accessed on August 12, 2012).
12 Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, “Background Paper on SIPRI Military Expenditure Data,
bargain when it comes to fulfilling NATO-operations.13 Therefore, cooperation in matters of defense is being regarded by the European NATO-states as a way to ensure that they will continue to have access to certain military capabilities and are even able to acquire new ones, because it provides a way to pool and share scarce resources. This in return will allow them to fulfill their individual, European and NATO ambitions.
The second reason that the development of defense cooperation initiatives has caught the attention across the European continent is due to recent defense strategic changes by the US. Ever since the end of World War II the United States has shared the largest burden when it comes to the defense of Europe and later in NATO out-of-area operations.14 The fact that the US has played such a significant part in the protection of Europe had given the European NATO-members the opportunity to develop their economies after World War II, without having to invest in costly military capabilities. Since the US had filled the military void, and would continue to do so even after the end of the Cold War, this took away the incentive for the European NATO-members to invest in their militaries even though their economies eventually had allowed them to do so. Due to this fact a large military capabilities gap could develop between the European NATO-members and the US.15 This has led to a situation in which the European NATO-members now cannot undertake complex military operations without US participation, such as the operations in the former-Yugoslavia and Libya.16 During these operations the European states had to rely on American military capabilities to make these operations a military success.17 Therefore, given the reductions in defense budgets
13 Anders Fogh Rasmussen, “Keynote Speech by NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen at the
NATO Parliamentary Assembly in Prague,” NATO, November 12, 2012, http://www.nato.int/cps/en/SID-A2EED620-F0572CE0/natolive/opinions_91210.htm (accessed on June 5, 2012).
14 Richard E. Rupp, NATO After 9/11: An Alliance in Continuing Decline (New York: Palgrave MacMillan,
2006), 80. During the Cold War the US had 300,000 troops stationed in Europe to prevent a Soviet invasion of Western Europe and US nuclear weapons shielded the European states from Soviet nuclear might. When the Cold War had ended and NATO developed a new mission for itself it was the US that took the lead and shared the biggest financial and military burden in the new out-of-area operations in for instance; the former
Yugoslavia, Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya. NATO out-of-area operations are military operations that are conducted under the auspices of NATO, but fall outside of the original NATO charter which limited NATO’s mission to the defense of Western Europe against an invasion of the Soviet-Union.
15 Ibid., 81. Ever since the end of the Cold War this gap has become more severe due to the decrease in European
defense spending and the increase in US defense spending which started in the 1980s and the reform of its military capabilities after the end of the Cold War.
16 Willem van Eekelen, “Europe the Reluctant Security Actor,” in NATO’s Retirement? Essays in Honour of
Peter Volten, ed. Margriet Drent, Arjan van den Assem and Jaap de Wilde (Groningen: Centre of European
Security Studies, 2011), 81.
17 T.R. Reid, The United States of Europe: The New Superpower and the end of American Supremacy (New
York: The Penguin Press, 2004), 186. Gustav Lindstrom in his book, EU-US Burdensharing: Who Does What?, on page 23 pointed out that in operation Allied Force, during the war in the former Yugoslavia, the European NATO- members lacked all-weather aircrafts, did not possess enough precision guided munitions and could not refuel their aircrafts in mid-air. Moreover, the AIV in their report, European Defence Cooperation: Sovereignty
across the European continent, this dependency upon the US to provide the military capabilities necessary to perform complex military operations and fulfill the European ambitions with military means when required is likely to increase.
The current problem with this European dependency upon the US in the area of defense is that Europe is no longer at the center of US defense strategic priorities. This was already the case for quite some time, but now this process has been accelerated by the fact that the US is at the present moment no longer capable of sustaining its worldwide military presence due to the budget deficit and rising debt that its government has accumulated ever since the beginning of the new century.18 In order to get the US’ financial house in order President Obama signed into law the Budget Control Act (BCA) in August, 2011. The BCA has at its core the reduction of the government budget deficit, in order to eventually decrease the US national debt in the next ten years.19 As a consequence of the BCA, the projected US military budgets for the upcoming years will be reduced to such an extent that the US military has to make choices where it will maintain its military presence in the world. The US military has made that choice and has elaborated upon it in the new US national security strategy, which was released on January 5, 2012. In this new strategy the US argues that the nations of Europe are no longer consumers of security, but producers of it.20 Hence, the European states are regarded by the US as able to provide for their own security and the security of others in their vicinity. In light of this assessment the US stated that it would rebalance its forces and military capabilities away from the European theatre towards the region of Asia/Pacific where US national interests are seen as in more need of military protection.21 More importantly
conflict, the European states that participated lacked specifically military capabilities in the area of so-called enablers: Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR), unmanned armed vehicles (UAV’s), air transport, air-to-air refueling and cruise missiles. For these capabilities they still have to rely on the US.
18 According to the website http://www.usdebtclock.org/#, on December 26, 2012 the US national debt stood
almost at 16.3 trillion dollars and the US budget deficit at a little over 1.1 trillion dollars.
19 112th United States Congress, Budget Control Act (Washington, DC: GPO, 2011), 2.
20 Department of Defense, “Sustaining U.S. Global Leadership: Priorities for 21st Century Defense,” Department
of Defense, January 5, 2012, http://www.defense.gov/news/Defense_Strategic_Guidance.pdf (accessed on
February 14, 2012), 3.
21
however, several US officials, including US NATO-ambassador Ivo Daalder, made clear that the European states should no longer expect the US to automatically provide the military capabilities on which they have relied during past military operations due to this defense strategic withdrawal from the European continent.22 The European states are thus facing a future in which they no longer can rely on the US to provide the military capabilities they lack and need when required. Ideally, the European states would invest in those military capabilities for which they now rely on the US, but with the rising costs of the development and acquisition of those capabilities and the reduction in European defense budgets this is very unlikely to be possible for any individual European state.23 Hence, it is this combination of decreasing defense budgets of the European states and the defense strategic withdrawal by the US from the European continent makes that defense cooperation in Europe has become a necessity. Only by working together can these states ensure they will possess the necessary military capabilities to perform complex military operations, such as the one recently in Libya, and be able to fulfill their ambitions. This clarifies why the development of defense cooperation initiatives in Europe has caught the attention in recent years.
Nonetheless, it appears to be difficult to achieve cooperation in this area amongst the states of Europe. For instance, the aforementioned PSC has so far not been fully developed by the EU member states, because they disagree on whether several states will take the lead in this initiative and that the others will follow, or that the PSC should be developed with all states participating at the same pace.24 Moreover, the EDA is not being fully utilized as well, because member states give preference to national industrial and economic interests rather than a joint interest in the development of European military capabilities that could reduce European dependency upon American military capabilities.25 In addition, when it comes to bilateral agreements of defense cooperation a hailed success, namely the German/Netherlands Corps, shows the limits of cooperation when the states involved individually have to consent if the Corps can be deployed for operations. As a consequence, the Corps is rarely utilized during international operations, because the Netherlands and Germany do not always have the
financially healthy again. The consequence of which is that the US Defense Department will have to make choices were it will maintain its presence in the world.
22 Ivo Daalder, “NATO Allies Grapple with Shrinking Defense Budgets,” WashingtonPost, January 29, 2012,
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/nato-allies-grapple-with-shrinking-defense-budgets/2012/01/20/gIQAKBg5aQ_story.html (accessed on March 5, 2012).
23 Ministerie van Defensie, Future Policy Survey: A New Foundation for the Netherlands Armed Forces (Zwolle:
Zalsman, 2010), 188.
24 Adviesraad Internationale Vraagstukken, “Europese Defensiesamenwerking: Soevereiniteit en
Handelsvermogen,”Adviesraad Internationale Vraagstukken, January 2012,
http://www.aiv-advies.nl/ContentSuite/upload/aiv/doc/webversie_AIV_78_NL(1).pdf (accessed on March 4, 2012), 19.
same national interests. Hence, discussing cooperation in matters of defense is fine, but defense cooperation initiatives become complicated when the states involved want to retain control over when their military forces are deployed, how they are used and with which capabilities they are outfitted.
Recognizing these difficulties, the Dutch government asked the Advisory Council on International Affairs (AIV), an independent advisory organ for the Dutch government and parliament on foreign policy, to investigate to what extent sovereignty plays a complicating factor in the establishment of defense cooperation initiatives in Europe.26 The AIV concludes in her report, European Defence Cooperation: Sovereignty and the Capacity to Act, that sovereignty does not play a complicating role in establishing defense cooperation initiatives in Europe, because defense cooperation would actually strengthen a state’s sovereignty.27 The reason for this is that according to the AIV an adherence to the traditional strict judicial definition of sovereignty, as meaning the state’s possession of exclusive authority and control within its territory, is no longer possible given the rise of an UN human rights regime and, amongst other global issues, environmental threats. Hence, the AIV argues for the adoption of a redefinition of sovereignty by Liberal scholar Anne-Marie Slaughter in order to account for the state’s loss of exclusive authority and control within its own territory. She claims that in light of these global issues the concept has come to mean that the ability of a state to participate in trans-governmental networks will determine how sovereign it is. Only by working through these networks can a state regain some of the control it has lost due to these global issues and guarantee that is able to fulfill its national interests.28 The AIV concluded that in this light a shared European sovereignty is preferable over absolute national sovereignty in matters of defense, because only by setting up defense cooperation initiatives amongst each other can the individual European states ensure they will possess the necessary military capabilities to protect their individual national interests and hence strengthen their sovereignty.29 Therefore, the AIV concluded that the Dutch government should pursue a course which would lead to an increase of defense cooperation initiatives in Europe.
26 U. Rosenthal and J.S.J. Hillen, “Adviesaanvraag Betreffende Verdieping van de Internationale
Defensiesamenwerking van de Nederlandse Krijgsmacht,” in Europese Defensiesamenwerking: Soevereiniteit en
Handelsvermogen, January 2012, http://www.aiv-advies.nl/ContentSuite/upload/aiv/doc/webversie
_AIV_78_NL(1).pdf (accessed on March 4, 2012).
27Adviesraad Internationale Vraagstukken, “Europese Defensiesamenwerking: Soevereiniteit en
Handelsvermogen,” Adviesraad Internationale Vraagstukken, January 2012,
http://www.aiv-advies.nl/ContentSuite/upload/aiv/doc/webversie_AIV_78_NL(1).pdf (accessed on March 4, 2012), 48.
28
Ibid., 11.
In order to make this argument several steps will be taken, which will form the structure of this thesis. The first three steps will form the theoretical framework of this thesis and will be the first chapter of this thesis. One, the question will be answered of how defense cooperation relates to sovereignty given the idea that the latter influences the development of the former. Building upon Arthur A. Stein theory about why cooperation between states can be difficult it will be argued that the long-term dependency relationship that defense cooperation between the European states now entails threatens the sovereignty of these states. Two, by analyzing Slaughter’s definition of sovereignty it will be argued that this definition lacks the methodological underpinnings that can make it useful when analyzing defense cooperation in Europe. Hence, the AIV’s conclusion becomes problematic and another theoretical foundation must be found in order to be able to analyze defense cooperation initiatives in Europe and the role sovereignty plays in it. As a consequence, this thesis will then argue that the definition of sovereignty as meaning a status, as put forth by Constructivists Wouter Werner and Jaap de Wilde in their article The Endurance of
Sovereignty, provides the concept with the methodological underpinnings that Slaughter’s
definition lacks and is therefore a more suitable definition to work with.30 By showing that this definition of sovereignty can be viewed as an identity it will linked to Alexander Wendt’s theory about interests formation as driven by a state’s identities.31
Using Werner/de Wilde’s definition of sovereignty in order to get from Slaughter to Wendt is necessary, because Wendt definition of sovereignty is very limited. Wendt simply states that sovereignty is an identity, but does not explain in detail why this is case. Werner/de Wilde do explain their definition of sovereignty in detail and because of this form the link between Slaughter and Wendt. Three, building then upon Wendt’s theory about interest formation, this thesis will argue that whether European states are able to develop initiatives at defense cooperation in Europe is determined by the convergence or divergence of the multiple national interests of the specific actors involved, which are driven by the several identities a state has when dealing with this issue.32 It will be the incorporation of Werner and de Wilde’s definition into Wendt’s theory of national interests being driven a state’s identities that will form the theoretical foundation that will be used to analyze three case-studies in the following chapters.
30
Wouter G. Werner and Jaap H. de Wilde, “The Endurance of Sovereignty,” European Journal of International
Relations 7 (2001): 284.
31 Alexander Wendt, Social Theory of International Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999),
229.
The following three chapters will utilize this theoretical foundation by analyzing three case-studies, namely the European Defense Community (EDC), the Belgium-Netherlands Defense Cooperation (BENESAM) and the UK-France Defence Co-operation Treaty of 2010. These case-studies are chosen since together they give a brief historical overview of defense cooperation in Europe, provide a portrayal of how different sized European states deal with defense cooperation initiatives and because all three case-studies have different outcomes. More specific, the EDC is chosen as a case-study, because European states have never been closer to an ‘European army.’ In the aftermath of World War II, the main European powers and the US sought a way to stabilize the balance of power within Europe by binding West-Germany in a European defense community. France was the major instigator of this plan, but in the end it was the French National Assemblée that voted against the treaty that would allow the EDC to materialize. Analyzing the process that led to the French parliament voting against the EDC, will give an insight into how the development of a defense cooperation initiative in Europe between several major states has been influenced by their national interests. Furthermore, BENESAM has been chosen as a case in light of the success two smaller European states have had in establishing defense cooperation. Moreover, due to this success, they are now discussing new areas of defense cooperation as we have seen in the introduction. This case-study will be used to show how converging national interests could inform the successful establishment of this defense cooperation initiative and become a foundation for a deepening of it. Finally, the UK-France Defence Co-operation Treaty has been chosen as a case-study to show that European defense cooperation between two major European states is possible, but is not without difficulties when national interests diverge. Hence, these three case-studies reflect a variety of outcomes of defense cooperation initiatives between different sized European states: success, failure and the difficulty facing European states when they establish a defense cooperation initiative. Therefore, these three case-studies should provide a good overview of how national interests in different circumstances have influenced defense cooperation initiatives and make it possible to answer the main-question posed above.
In order to ascertain to what extent national interests influenced the development of these three defense cooperation initiatives, each case-study will be analyzed using a historical discourse analysis. The analysis of the discourse surrounding each of these case-studies will make clear how the national interests of each of the actors involved influenced the development of the defense cooperation initiatives.33 More importantly, the analysis will be
33
Jonathon W. Moses and Torbjørn L. Knutsen, Ways of Knowing: Competing Methodologies in Social and
able to show that these national interests were driven by the identities that each of the respective states had in relation to the development of the three defense cooperation initiatives mentioned in the case-studies. Thefore, the analysis will make use of primary source material derived from ministries, speeches and interviews given by government officials. The secondary source material will be derived from scholarly books and journals, reports of think tanks, newspaper articles and internet sources. However, several caveats in the analysis however have to be mentioned beforehand in relation to the availability of primary source material for two of the case-studies, namely the EDC and BENESAM. One, when it comes to the analysis of the EDC the analysis had to rely for a good part on secondary source material, specifically the books by Kevin Ruane and Francis William Edward Furdson, because these two authors have interviewed many of the participants in the unsuccessful development of the EDC. Given the fact that these participants have long since passed away their accounts could not be verified directly from these sources. Therefore, the books by Ruane and Furdson were valuable resources for analyzing the extent national interests determined the outcome of this defense cooperation initiative. Two, the analysis of BENESAM is hampered by the fact that not all the treaties underlying BENESAM could be retrieved. Specifically the treaties that formed the foundation for the development of the Tripartite minesweeper and the maritime logistical cooperation between 1995 and 2007, could not be found in the Dutch National Archives or in the archives of the Dutch Defense department. Hence, the analysis on these parts relies sometimes on secondary source material as well. Nonetheless, despite these caveats analyzing the variety of sources still provides a solid picture of how identities drove the national interests of the European states involved when dealing with these initiatives at defense cooperation in Europe. As a consequence, the analysis is able to show how a convergence or divergence of national interests determined the development of these defense cooperation initiatives, but the mentioned caveats have to be kept in mind.
Chapter 1: The relation between defense cooperation, sovereignty and
national interests
As stated this thesis disagrees with the theoretical premise on which the AIV builds its argument. By using Slaughter’s definition of sovereignty the AIV comes to the conclusion that defense cooperation will strengthen sovereignty and therefore should be pursued by the Dutch government. In the following chapter it will be made apparent that Slaughter’s definition lacks the methodological underpinnings to make it useable when analyzing defense cooperation initiatives. Hence, the AIV conclusion becomes difficult to maintain. Therefore, it will be argued that a different theoretical framework is necessary for analyzing defense cooperation initiatives in order to see, amongst other things, what role sovereignty plays in the establishment of these initiatives on the European continent. However, first it will be determined what the connection is between defense cooperation and sovereignty, since the idea exists that sovereignty complicates the establishment of defense cooperation initiatives. Second, Slaughter’s definition of sovereignty will be analyzed in order to show that it lacks the methodological underpinnings in order to be useable when analyzing defense cooperation initiatives. Third, it will be argued that the definition of Werner and de Wilde does have the methodological underpinnings to make it a useful concept for analyzing defense cooperation initiatives in Europe. Moreover, their concept of sovereignty will be linked to Wendt’s theory that national interests are driven by identities. Fourth, building upon Wendt’s theory it will be argued that sovereignty is not the only identity that influences the national interests of states in regard to defense cooperation initiatives. It will be shown that several identities inform the national interests of states when dealing with the defense cooperation initiatives and determine its outcomes. The chapter will end with a conclusion, which will reflect the theoretical foundation that will be used in later chapters to analyze the three case-studies mentioned in the introduction.
The connection between defense cooperation and sovereignty
sovereignty and defense cooperation relate to each other? Arthur A. Stein in his book, Why
Nations Cooperate: Circumstance and Choice in International Relations, looked into the
question of why cooperation between states can be difficult and concluded that states are only able to cooperate when there is a context that creates the opportunity for cooperation and the actors involved share common interests that make cooperation between them possible.34 Cooperation thus allows states to solve common problems only when the circumstances are ideal. As said above, the decreasing of defense budgets in Europe and the defense strategic withdrawal by the US from the European continent provide the required circumstances for the development of defense cooperation initiatives in Europe. However, Stein also points out that the extent and duration of cooperation are important factors in determining whether or not states are able to establish a cooperation initiative.35 Therefore, it will be argued that it is the long-term dependency relationship that defense cooperation between the European states now entails that challenges the idea that these states are sovereign.
Given the circumstances, the existence of a credible military apparatus in Europe would at this point in time requires that defense cooperation has come to mean the establishment of several long-term dependency relationships between the European states in the area of defense. This long-term dependency relationship has become necessary to deal with the lack of certain, and the maintaining of current, military capabilities. Several reasons will be given to support this statement. First, as said a large capabilities gap exists between the US and its European allies, which can be related to the fact that the European states have not provided their military forces with the defense budgets that would allow them to invest in new and maintain specific military capabilities. Moreover, it has become apparent that defense budgets in Europe will decrease in the near future due to the financial position that many European states find themselves in and the lack of a clear cut enemy, as was the case in the Cold War. In addition, defense simply appears not to have any priority at the moment in any of the individual European states. For instance, during the 2012 Dutch parliamentary election, defense barely registered as a priority amongst voters and political parties. As a consequence, it was regarded as an ideal target for further budget reductions when new austerity measures would prove necessary in order to balance the overall government
34 Arthur A. Stein, Why Nations Cooperate: Circumstance and Choice in International Relations (Ithaca: Cornell
University Press, 1990), 176.
budget.36 Therefore, when the European states want to ensure they do not lose military capabilities and want to invest in the capabilities that they currently lack, they have to start to cooperate in a structured manner in order to have the financial resources to do so, because individually they do not have the defense budgets to do so. Second, the lack of adequate financial resources of the individual European states ties into the next reason that defense cooperation between the European states has come to mean a long-term dependency relationship. The development of new military capabilities is a costly affair and, due to decreasing defense budgets, the only way for the development of those capabilities is when the European states pool their financial resources. In addition, the development of new military capabilities takes a considerable amount of time, which requires a long-term commitment of the cooperating states to make the development a success. For instance, the development of the Joint Strike Fighter had already started in the 1980s and so far has cost almost 380 billion dollars with operational aircrafts just now becoming available.37 At a smaller scale the same can be said for the NH-90 multi-role helicopter of which the development started in 1985, with five states participating in the project, and the first operational helicopters being delivered to buyers in 2006 at the development costs of 20 billion dollars.38 Therefore, the development of new military capabilities requires a long-term commitment by all partners if the program is going to be successfully concluded given the time and money required. This in return makes that they become dependent upon each other for an extended period of time. Third, when it comes to maintaining military capabilities, states have to rely on each other as well, because they do not have the financial resources to do so on their own. States are increasingly recognizing this and already have developed ways of dealing with it, for example, by the pooling and sharing of resources in order to maintain access to certain military capabilities. An example is the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between ten NATO- and two other participating states in the so-called Strategic Airlift Capability initiative. This initiative foresees for each country in the ability to have access to three Boeing C-17 strategic transport aircrafts. The costs for the acquisition,
36 Frank Bekkers, Marno de Boer, Joris van Esch, Rem Korteweg, Stephan de Spiegeleire, Tim Sweijs and Peter
Wijninga, “Defensie in het Stemhokje,” HCSS, September 1, 2012, http://www.hcss.nl/news/defensie-in-het-stemhokje-nl/538/ (accessed on November 25, 2012).
37 Jeremiah Gertler, “F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) Program,” Congressional Research Service, February 16,
2012, http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/weapons/RL30563.pdf (accessed on November 26, 2012).
38
maintenance and operation of these aircrafts are shared among the twelve partners.39 Hereby, these states retain access to a military capability that they were not able to maintain on their own. Hence, defense cooperation amongst the European states requires a long-term dependency relationship between each other if they want to develop and maintain military capabilities given the difficult financial situation many European states find themselves in, the fact that defense does not register as a priority amongst the general public and the amount of money and time it costs to develop military capabilities.
Since defense cooperation would mean at the present moment a long-term dependency relationship between the European states, defense cooperation in this thesis will be defined as the voluntarily establishment of a long-term structure, regime, agency or headquarters, in which actors jointly have to reach decisions about for instance the deployment, development or maintenance of those military capabilities that the actors involved see as best realized in unison. It is a voluntary commitment by these states to the extent that they can always make another decision. For instance, states can make the decision that jointly investing in their military capabilities is not a credible option, because their national interests differ. Hereby they accept the consequence that they will no longer have access to certain military capabilities and may lose the ability to perform certain military operations. Moreover, defense cooperation defined in this manner does not automatically mean that actors have to integrate their military apparatuses, which is certainly a possibility that falls inside this definition, but it means that any defense cooperation initiative that is dependency relation between all the actors involved, that goes beyond the fulfillment of an ad hoc goal, falls inside this definition. As an example, defense cooperation initiatives such as the German/Netherlands Corps or the Belgium-Dutch Marine Cooperation (BENESAM) would fall inside this definition. These are not ad hoc cooperation agreements, in comparison to the European Union’s planning, command and control system for military operations, but have implications for the long-term relation between the actors involved.40 For instance, when it comes to the German/Netherlands Corps, both states have to consent if the Corps is to be deployed in action. When in a certain situation either one of them does not approve, the Corps will not be
39
NATO Secretary General, “Strategic Airlift Capability (SAC) – Initiative Adoption of the NAMO Charter,”
NATO, June 20, 2007, http://www.nato.int/cps/en/SID-8DE4D371-E6621D70/natolive/official_texts_56625.htm
(accessed on November 9, 2012).
40
deployed.41 This has the effect that actors are so intertwined that they have to take account of each other’s position in order to reach a joint decision in specific circumstances. Defense cooperation would thus require that the European states become to a certain extent dependent upon each other for an extended period of time in the area of defense.
It is the long-term dependency relationship that defense cooperation currently entails that does not stroke well with the idea that states are sovereign. State sovereignty is traditionally defined as a state possessing ultimate internal authority and control over a defined territory and population, which is externally recognized by other sovereign states that therefore do not interfere in the internal issues of that state.42 This claim to sovereignty is accompanied by a claim to have a monopoly on the legitimate use of force.43 That sovereignty and the legitimate use of force go hand in hand is not strange. Harvard University professor, Stanley Hoffmann, made the argument in 1966, that claims of sovereignty are based on the idea and feelings of nationhood. An autonomous military apparatus is seen by him as the only way to secure nationhood and as a necessity for maintaining it.44 An idea not only heard amongst scholars of the Realists persuasion in International Relations Theory, who argue that security is the predominant concern for states, but also government officials, as can be seen from the Dutch government request to the AIV.45 Realist, Hans Mouritzen, in, The
Geopolitics of Euro-Atlantic Integration, discusses the way government officials regard this
connection between sovereignty and defense cooperation. He argues that governments are unwilling to become dependent upon another state for their military capabilities, because they can never be certain if the ally of today will remain so tomorrow. This bond that government officials see between sovereignty and their military forces has had the effect that, in Mouritzen words: “An autonomous defence has a value comparable with other essential state symbols like the flag, the national anthem and diplomacy.” Hence, it is essential for defining what a state is and is therefore not easily parted with.46 Therefore, giving up sovereignty in favor of defense cooperation would mean, in the minds of some government officials and
41 Adviesraad Internationale Vraagstukken, “Europese Defensiesamenwerking: Soevereiniteit en
Handelsvermogen,” Adviesraad Internationale Vraagstukken, January 2012,
http://www.aiv-advies.nl/ContentSuite/upload/aiv/doc/webversie_AIV_78_NL(1).pdf (accessed on March 4, 2012), 24.
42 W.C. Ultee, W.A. Arts and H.D. Flap, Sociologie: Vragen, Uitspraken, Bevinding (Groningen: Martinus
Nijhoff, 2003), 250
43 Christopher W. Morris, An Essay on the Modern State (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 204. 44 Stanley Hoffmann, “Obstinate or Obsolete? The Fate of the Nation-State and the Case of Western Europe,”
Daedalus 95, no. 3 (1966): 862.
45 R. Keohane and J. S. Nye, Power and Interdependence: World Politics in Transition (New York: Longman,
2001), 23.
46
scholars, that the very survival of the state would be put in the balance. Without an autonomous military apparatus, a state would become dependent upon other actors of which it cannot be a hundred percent certain if they will come to its aid in a hour of need. This is a situation that does not sit well with many government officials and in this light would problematize defense cooperation in Europe, because at this point in time it requires that European states become dependent upon one each other when it comes down to having access to certain military capabilities for an extended period of time.
Thus, defense cooperation in Europe would require a long-term commitment by the European states to each other, but it is the long-term commitment that gives rise to the uncomfortable idea that a state has to give up part of its sovereignty if it wants to cooperate in matters of defense. Hence, it is not strange to find that the Dutch government thought that state sovereignty played a complicating role in the development of defense cooperation initiatives. The AIV in its report tried to argue against this idea of giving up sovereignty by using Slaughter’s definition of sovereignty, which led to its conclusion that defense cooperation would strengthen a state’s sovereignty. However, to what extent would defense cooperation strengthen or diminish sovereignty and is that theoretically even possible?47 To answer this question it is necessary to look into Slaughter’s definition of sovereignty and see if it can be used to analyze the real world.
Debating sovereignty
Slaughters definition of sovereignty arises out of the globalization literature as the logical conclusion of how globalization challenges state sovereignty. The literature on globalization challenges the traditional conception of sovereignty by showing that states no longer can claim to possess absolute internal authority and control. How to define globalization has been a source of academic debate, but for the present purpose it is enough to know that some scholars argue that due to the process of globalization states are no longer able to fully control
47
Douglas Howland and Luise White, “Introduction: Sovereignty and the Study of States,” in The State of
Sovereignty: Territories, Laws, Populations, ed. By Douglas Howland and Luise White (Bloomington, In:
and regulate what goes on inside their given territories.48 Due to globalization some scholars have even proclaimed the end of state sovereignty or at the very least that states are less sovereign.49 These scholars argue that the sovereign state can no longer be seen as an actor that can act independently from its social surroundings as it is seen in the traditional definition of sovereignty. One of the scholars who made this argument is International Political Economist, Susan Strange. She has written in her book, The Retreat of the State, that global financial networks, transnational corporations and the overall interdependence between states have decreased the sovereignty of a state. She argues that these developments have eroded the exclusive authority that the state possessed in its own territories and made its authority claim just one amongst many in certain political areas.50 Strange points out ten areas in her book in which states used to be the dominant actor, but have receded that role to the world market, making them less sovereign in the process.51 In addition, Liberal political theorist, David Held, makes the argument that the internationalization of communication and culture, which he sees as distinctive parts of the process of globalization, has meant that the traditional definition of state sovereignty has no validity. He argues that the state can no longer control the effects these developments have on its populace, because they have moved outside the influence sphere of the individual state, which makes it less sovereign in the process.52 As a consequence of this loss of control over what happens in their territories, Liberal, Mark W. Zacher, argues that states are willing to trade part of their sovereignty for international regimes that are able to control these ever increasing international interdependencies.53 This consequence leads Slaughter, and is adopted by the AIV, to the logical conclusion that because of the increasing interdependence between states due to the process of globalization states can only be sovereign to the extent that they are able to effectively participate in
48
Georg Sørensen, The Transformation of the State: Beyond the Myth of Retreat (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004), 3. Despite this conceptual uncertainty globalization is a concept that is widely used, not only in academia, but also in the news media and in common parlance. Politicians and even citizens have the idea that globalization is undermining state sovereignty. For an overview of the debate about the different positions on how to define globalization read for instance; Chapter 1 in Transformation of the State by Georg Sørensen, Chapter 1 in Globalization/Antiglobalization by David Held and Anthony McGrew or Chapter 6 in The State,
Democracy and Globalization by Roger King and Gavin Kendall.
49
Robert King and Gavin Kendall, The State, Democracy and Globalization (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004), 139.
50 Susan Strange, The Retreat of the State: The Diffusion of Power in the World Economy (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1996), 82.
51 Ibid., 190. 52
David Held, “Violence, Law and Justice in a Global Age,” in Debating Cosmopolitics, ed. Daniele Archibugi (London: Verso, 2003), 189.
53 Mark W. Zacher, “Decaying Pillars of the Westphalian Temple,” in Governance without Government: Order
and Change in World Politics, ed. James N. Rosenau and Ernst-Otto Czempiel (Cambridge: Cambridge
governmental networks.54 According to her, defining sovereignty in this manner is only logical, because decisions that affect the state are no longer taken internally, but externally of it in an ever increasing web of governmental networks. Therefore, the ability of a state to be effective, meaning getting favorable decisions, in those governmental networks will determine the extent it is able to control its own destiny and hence how sovereign it is.55 Thus, globalization is regarded by these scholars as a challenge to the traditional definition of sovereignty since states no longer have full control over what happens within their own territories, because important decisions are increasingly taken externally of the state. Slaughter’s definition of sovereignty can be regarded as the logical conclusion of this idea. She argues that sovereignty should be defined in such a way that it deals with this lack of full control in terms of the extent states are able to reclaim control through getting favorable decisions in the trans-governmental networks in which these important decisions are now taken.56
At a first glance Slaughter’s definition of sovereignty seems to be a reasonable proposition, because decisions taken half-way around the globe can have an impact upon a
54 Anne-Marie Slaughter, “Sovereignty and Power in a Networked World Order,” Stanford Journal of
International Law 40 (2004): 285.
55
Ibid., 288.
56
However, there are scholars who claim that globalization does not cause an end or even at a minimum an eroding of sovereignty. These skeptics of the effect globalization has on sovereignty generally point out three reasons for why this cannot be the case. One, globalization is not a recent phenomenon it can be retraced throughout human history. Thompson and Krasner in 1989 had already made the argument that states never possessed sovereignty in the traditional sense. They always had to deal with internal and external challenges to their authority. An argument that Krasner developed further in several articles and books, in which he points out that what we nowadays call globalization has been part of human history for at least the last 200 years. The technological changes that have taken place in that period of time already caused people, goods, capital and ideas to far more easily cross borders than in the periods before. Moreover, Krasner points out that even at an earlier time Martin Luther’s 95 theses spread across Europe outside the control of the sovereign monarchs, but for which several monarchs paid with their head. Globalization in Krasner view thus does not so much challenge sovereignty as the idea that states have absolute control over what happens inside their borders. For him sovereignty and control are something entirely different, although he fails to specify what sovereignty exactly is for him. Two, globalization has generally been viewed in economic terms and how it has eroded state
state without it possessing direct unilateral control over the consequences of those decisions. For example, an extended closing down of the Strait of Hormuz by Iran would prevent a quarter of the world’s oil of reaching the market and causing a worldwide shortage of oil. Oil prices would soar, which would cause economic hardship in many parts of the world. When states want to force Iran into stopping the closing down of the Strait of Hormuz, in order to end the economic hardship, they would have a difficult time doing so individually, but jointly they would have a better change in controlling this event.57 For instance, by getting an UN resolution, states could try to force Iran into stopping the closing down of the Strait of Hormuz. When Iran would back down because of this resolution, the states in favor of the resolution would have gotten a favorable decision and by Slaughter’s definition of sovereignty become more sovereign.
A closer look however shows the major problem of Slaughter’s definition; it cannot be empirically proven to exist in the real world, because it lacks a sound methodology. The definition claims that due to globalization states can only be sovereign to the extent that they are able to effectively participate in trans-governmental networks. Accordingly, this can be measured by looking at how many favorable decisions a particular state gets in these trans-governmental networks. However, it is there where the methodology stops and remains underdeveloped. For example, nowhere is it stated if all states start from the same level of sovereignty or that for each individual state it is measured how sovereign it is at a particular point in time. Because of this, questions such as, are the US, North Korea and Somalia equally sovereign or do they have a different starting level of sovereignty or did they start from the same level, but has this changed over time due to certain decisions, remain. This latter question leads to another: How do you compare the extent a state is sovereign to the extent other states are sovereign. For instance, would a country like the US by definition be more sovereign than North-Korea, because it participates in more trans-governmental networks and can get more favorable decisions than North Korea? Giving North-Korea’s ability to control what goes inside its own borders and keep external actors out of its territories this would be a difficult point to make given the fact that the US is a very open society and therefore highly susceptible to external influences. Another issue that arises due to a lack of methodological underpinnings is: How do certain decisions affect the sovereignty of a state? More particularly, by how much does the sovereignty of a state decrease and increase or stays the same, because of a certain decision? To return to the Iran-example above, how
57
Caitlin Talmadge, “Closing Time: Assessing the Iranian Threat to the Strait of Hormuz,” International
much more sovereign have the states that got the favorable decision in the UN become? Has their sovereignty increased by five percent or twenty percent or just one percent? In addition, is the sovereignty of each state equally increased by the favorable decision? Is it not the case that states who have large oil reserves were less affected by Iran’s decision to close down the Strait of Hormuz and therefore had a smaller gain in sovereignty by the favorable UN decision than states who did not have large oil reserves and were heavily affected by Iran’s decision to close the Strait of Hormuz in the first instance? Or does this not even matter in determining how much more sovereign one of those states has become? Furthermore, how do you compare decisions by issue area? How do you equate economic decisions against military decisions in relation to the extent that they affect the sovereignty of a state? Does a favorable decision in the issue-area of the economy do more for a state’s sovereignty than a favorable decision in the issue-area of security? For example, does a favorable decision for the US in the UN to instigate sanctions against Iran for trying to develop a nuclear weapon increase the sovereignty of the US more than a UN favorable resolution allowing the US to strike military against Iranian nuclear facilities? Finally, how would this definition of sovereignty explain the fact that the sovereignty of a state in most cases seems to be viewed as being threatened by cooperation amongst states? As an example, lately the formation of the EU bank-union has been viewed in the Netherlands as threatening Dutch sovereignty.58 Even if it were the case that Slaughter’s definition would be able to measure how favorable decisions in trans-governmental networks would strengthen the sovereignty of a state, it should also be able explain were these feelings of cooperation threatening the sovereignty of a state come from. Nowhere does she do this and that is because the methodological underpinnings of Slaughter’s definition remain underdeveloped. Hence, the definition also fails to answer all the questions asked above. Therefore, this definition is useless when trying to analyze the extent states are sovereign in today’s international society, because it cannot be used to determine to what extent sovereignty played a role in a state’s decision to pursue a certain course.59
58
Marc Peeperkorn, “Bank niet meer ‘too big to fail’,” Volkskrant, June 22, 2013, sec. Economy, 26.
59 Slaughter has not been alone in the failure to operationalize a redefinition of sovereignty. Across the debate in
International Relations Theory about how to redefine sovereignty in light of such events as; globalization, regional integration, decolonization and human rights; scholars have fallen into the trap of regarding sovereignty as something materialistic that can be measured accordingly. For instance, the same criticism given here can be leveled against Keohane’s idea of trying to find gradations of sovereignty between states in Chapter 8 of the book Humanitarian Intevention: Ethical, Legal and Political Dilemma’s, and Andersons and Goodman’s argument in favor of shared sovereignty between the EU and its member states in their article, Regions, States
and the European Union: Modernist Reaction or Postmodern Adaptation. None of them provides the
Thus, Slaughter’s definition of sovereignty falls short of providing a satisfactory new definition of the concept, because her definition is not operationalized. The methodology connected to this definition of sovereignty does not make clear how certain decisions in specific issue-areas affect the sovereignty of a state over time and in relation to other states. Moreover, it is also not able to distinguish between the effect different type of decisions affect the sovereignty of a state. Furthermore, this definition cannot account for the fact that cooperation is sometimes viewed as threatening the sovereignty of a state. The combination of these factors makes it impossible to analyze how, for instance, the intention of Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxemburg to cooperate more in matters of defense will affect their individual sovereignty, how they relate to each other and hence affects their decisions in relation to this defense cooperation initiative. Consequently, the AIV’s claim that a shared European sovereignty is preferable over national sovereignty in matters of defense has no theoretical foundation, because there is no way to empirical prove this. Hence, any analysis of defense cooperation initiatives using this definition of sovereignty as a foundation fails to answer the question what role sovereignty plays in the success or failure of its development. Second, the idea that defense cooperation would mean that a state has to give up sovereignty is from a theoretically standpoint also not possible. The same criticisms that are leveled against Slaughter’s definition of sovereignty can also be used against this idea. It is impossible to claim that a state has to give up part of its sovereignty, because it is not possible to measure sovereignty since there is no sound methodology to do so. Therefore, the question that remains is how to define sovereignty in such a way that would make it useful in analyzing the real world and, more specific, the role sovereignty plays in the development of defense cooperation initiatives in Europe.
Sovereignty as an identity
The question how to define sovereignty in such a way that would make it useful in analyzing the real world led Werner and de Wilde to make the argument in their article, The Endurance
of Sovereignty, that sovereignty is a status, which can be claimed by any actor who can make
credible that it can fulfill the rights and duties that follow from this status as a sovereign actor.60 According to them, sovereignty is a speech-act comparable to the way the concept of
60
Wouter G. Werner and Jaap H. de Wilde, “The Endurance of Sovereignty,” European Journal of International
Relations 7 (2001): 284. Werner and de Wilde are not alone these claims. F.H. Hinsley in his book Sovereignty,
page 25, and Daniel Philpott in Sohail Hashimi’s book State Sovereignty, Change and Persistence in
International Relations, on page 17, make similar claims. Moreover, even Slaughter and Krasner acknowledge
security is used in the sub-discipline of International Relations; International Security.61 Hence, sovereignty is in their view something ideational rather than materialistic, because the goal of using sovereignty in a discourse is to legitimize the exercise of power by a certain actor rather than a description of a situation that exists in the real world. Consequently, Werner and de Wilde claim that sovereignty is an existential value that can be used to legitimize extraordinary measures when it is at stake.62 As such, sovereignty is most frequently used at times when the power or legitimacy of a state is questioned or seen as diminished.63 For instance, sovereignty becomes a frequently used concept by the ruling government at times of civil unrest such as occurring in the lives of Jean Bodin and Thomas Hobbes, founding fathers of the traditional definition of sovereignty, or when a territory wants to be recognized as a sovereign state as, for instance, is happening now in the conflict between Palestine and Israel.64 Sovereignty in this context is then used as a concept for claiming the legitimate rule of the state and legitimizing extraordinary measures to defend that sovereignty.
The main function of using sovereignty in a discourse is then to establish two different spheres of authority for the state, one internal and the other external. The former to make clear that the state has the final authority over a certain population in a given territory and the latter allows the state to claim to have a special position in relation to other actors that call themselves sovereign, especially when the state deals with its own internal affairs. Hence, a state has to please two audiences before it can claim its status as sovereign, one internal and the other external. Due to this sovereignty is a take all-concept: A state is either sovereign or it is not and whether it is able to claim the status of sovereign is determined by its ability to persuade both the internal and external audiences that it is worthy of that status. What, according to Werner and de Wilde, the Peace of Westphalia, the event that is widely seen as the birth place of state sovereignty, then becomes, is to determine the constitutive rules in
61 Barry Buzan and Lene Hansen, The Evolution of International Security Studies (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2011), 215. In this book Buzan and Hansen elaborate on the theory of securitization. This theory states that the use of the world security in a particular discourse allows it only to be viewed in a threat-danger situation. This sets the debate about a particular issue in a security mind-set, which only allows certain solutions to come to the table, such as the suspension of civil and liberal rights or the use of military force.
62 Wouter G. Werner and Jaap H. de Wilde, “The Endurance of Sovereignty,” European Journal of International
Relations 7 (2001): 287.
63 Ibid., 286.
64Louis Charbonneau, “Palestinians Win Implicit U.N. Recognition of Sovereign State,” Reuters, November 29,
