Master of Arts Thesis
EurocultureUniversity of Groningen University of Strasbourg
August, 2018
Never Waste a Good Crisis
The Historical Institutionalization of CSDP
Submitted by: Dominick Jaime William van Rens Student number first university: S2373793 Student number second university: S21625439 Contact Details: +0031642591807, dominickvanrens@hotmail.com
Supervised by: Dr. Ine Megens Ms. Bianca Polo Del Vecchio
Place, Date: Groningen, 01-08-2018 Signature
Van Rens 1 MA Programme Euroculture
Declaration
I, Dominick Jaime William van Rens, hereby declare that this thesis, entitled “Never Waste A Good Crisis: The Historical Institutionalization of CSDP,” submitted as partial requirement for the MA Programme Euroculture, is my own original work and expressed in my own words. Any use made within this text of works of other authors in any form (e.g. ideas, figures, texts, tables, etc.) are properly acknowledged in the text as well as in the bibliography.
I declare that the written (printed and bound) and the electronic copy of the submitted MA thesis are identical.
I hereby also acknowledge that I was informed about the regulations pertaining to the assessment of the MA thesis Euroculture and about the general completion rules for the Master of Arts Programme Euroculture.
Signed ………...
Van Rens 2 Abstract and Keywords
Through a historical institutionalist analysis, this research analyzes the institutional pathway of the development of the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP), which role
exogenous shocks have played in CSDP-development, and how this consequently reflects on the (changing) role of the EU as a security actor. By taking the Kosovo crisis as the original critical juncture, this research has found that although the EU continues to develop in line with its early goals of St. Malo, CSDP-development nonetheless does not follow a self-reinforcing feedback process. After an initial acceleration of military institutional
development, the EU gradually reverted to solely developing its civilian crisis and security management tools. Nevertheless, the rapid succession of neighborhood crises since the early 2010s, has allowed the EU to overcome some of its internal obstacles and finally materialize development of its military capabilities. Ultimately, reflecting back on both Historical
Institutionalism and the role of the EU as a security actor, this research argues that in order to fully understand institutional development, scholars need to be more attentive to endogenous forces of change. Furthermore, although exogenous shocks might not form critical junctures, they can provide the push that keeps the integration of security and defense by the Member States going.
Van Rens 3 Table of Contents Abbreviations………...p.4 Preface………...p.6 Introduction………..p.7 Theoretical Framework………...p.12
Path-Dependency and Self-Reinforcing Feedback Patterns………..p.13 Critical Juncture………p.14 Institutional Change Outside of Path-Dependency………....p.15 Historical Institutionalism and CSDP-Development……….p.16 Chapter 1: The Background of European Defense Developments (1948-1998)……….p.18 Conclusion………...p.21 Chapter 2: Kosovo, St. Malo, and the European Security Strategy (1998-2003)...……p.23 The Saint Malo Declaration………...p.25 9/11 and the Rise of Global Terrorism………...p.28 The Iraq War of 2003……….p.30 The European Security Strategy……….p.31 Conclusion………..p.33 Chapter 3: The Treaty of Lisbon and the South-Ossetian Crisis (2004-2009)...………p.35 The Headline Goals 2010……….…..p.35 The South-Ossetian Crisis of 2008………...p.38 The Report on the Implementation of the European Security Strategy………….….p.40 The Treaty of Lisbon……….….p.41 Conclusion……….….p.42 Chapter 4: The Advent of Neighborhood Crises and the European Global Strategy (2009-2017)………....p.44
The Libyan Crisis of 2011………..p.45 The Crimean Crisis of 2014………...p.46 The Rise of Neighborhood Crises………..p.47 The European Union Global Strategy………...p.49 Conclusion: The Development of CSDP………p.55 Bibliography……….p.61
Van Rens 4 Abbreviations
CARD - Coordinated Annual Review on Defence CHG08 - Civilian Headline Goals of 2008
CFSP - Common Foreign Security Policy
CIVCOM - Committee for Civilian Crisis Management CPCC - Civilian Planning and Conduct Capability CSDP - Common Security and Defence Policy
EC - European Communities
EDC - European Defence Community EEC - European Economic Community EDA - European Defense Agency EDF - European Defense Fund
EDIDP - European Defence Industrial Development Programme EEAS - European External Action Service
ENP - European Neighborhood Policy EPC - European Political Community ESDI - European Security Identity
ESDP - European Security and Defence Policy ESS - European Security Strategy
EU - European Union
EUMC - European Union Military Committee EUMS - European Union Military Staff EUGS - European Union Global Strategy HG10 - Headline Goals 2010
HHG - Helsinki Headline Goals HI - Historical Institutionalism
HR - High Representative
KLA - Kosovo Liberation Army
MPCC - Military Planning and Conduct Capability NATO - North Atlantic Treaty Organization OHQ - Operational Headquarters
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PACE - Parallel and Coordinated Exercises PESCO - Permanent Structured Cooperation PSC - Political Security Committee RCI - Rational Choice Institutionalism
RIESS - Report on the Implementation of the European Security Strategy SI - Sociological Institutionalism
UN - United Nations
UNSC - United Nations Security Council WEU - Western European Union
Van Rens 6 Preface
This thesis has been the result of a long period of researching and writing. Starting in August 2017, as the research progressed, the topic changed several times. In that sense, as cliché as it sounds, writing this thesis has truly been a journey. While writing this thesis I did a research internship under Dr. Megens in the third semester on Historical Institutionalism and
transatlantic relations, and another research internship in the fourth semester at the Clingendael Institute on EU defense. In that sense, I feel that this thesis, aside from the
research, is also the result of my personal experiences during both research internships. Given the challenges that the EU currently faces in its neighborhood and concerning the increasingly insecure geopolitical environment, EU defense development has become a necessary part of the continued safety of our Union. Continuing in the analogy of a journey, in order to answer questions on the future of EU defense and “where do we go from here,” it is essential that “we” first understand where we came from. I hope that by reading this thesis, you will gain insight in the origins of this ongoing journey of CSDP-development.
I would like to leave a word of appreciation for all the advice and guidance that my
supervisors, Dr. Ine Megens and Ms. Bianca Polo Del Vecchio, have given me in writing this thesis. I would further like to thank my family, friends, and all the different people that I have met in the past two years along this journey. I could not have done it without you.
Van Rens 7 Introduction
Since 2017, the EU has launched several new defense projects, such as Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO), the European Defense Fund (EDF), and the Coordinated Annual Review on Defense (CARD), which all seek to promote the development of EU military capacities and capabilities. With these new developments the EU has started to significantly invest in its defense. However, the track record of the EU as a security and defense actor is mixed at best and has provided little clarity on the role for the EU as a security actor throughout its development in the last twenty-five years. As such, will the EU finally be able to provide actual tangible results, or will it remain a paper tiger; All talk, but no fangs or claws (Besch 2017, 3).
The unclear nature of the EU as a security actor has caused large academic debates, as scholars attempt to make sense of the role of the EU. In order to understand the role of the EU as a security actor, it must first be necessary to define “security.” As Zwolski argues, part of the problem of the debate in the literature on the EU as a security actor “is that the literature on the EU as a security actor or European foreign policy often lacks a clear conceptualization of security” (Zwolski 2009, 83). Before attempting to discuss the EU as a security actor, it is essential to know what one means with “security. Traditionally, security “is most commonly associated with the alleviation of threats to cherished values, especially those which, left unchecked, threaten the survival of a particular referent object in the near future” (Williams and McDonald 2018, 6). In classic realist theory, “security” has often been identified as the territorial and political integrity of the state. As such, security is often used in relation to an actual or a perceived threat, which threatens the interests of those involved. Nevertheless, Buzan et al. through securitization theory expanded the concept of security, as according to them “[s]ecurity is a particular type op politics’ that occurs not just in the traditional military sector, but also in four other sectors: the political, economic, environmental, and societal sectors” (Qtd. in Nyman 2018, 105). According to this definition, security encompasses a much wider range of practices that are not naturally related to the military per se. Kaunert and Leonard agree as they argue that “security concerns are increasingly triggered by challenges such as terrorism, climate change, mass migration flows and many other ‘non-traditional’ security issues” (Kaunert and Leonard 2011, 363). The emergence of these new threats request a broadening of the traditional concept of security, as diplomacy and economic sanctions become tools through which states can exercise influence. The EU reflects this diverse approach towards security through what it has termed its “comprehensive approach” (European Commission 2013, 1). As
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such, other areas of EU competences spill over in the EU domain, as these can be utilized as tools to promote EU security.
Scholars, such as Asseburg and Kempin (2009), when analyzing the EU as a security actor, have predominantly looked at the EU deployments in order to analyze the performance of the EU. As of 2016, the EU had six active military and ten civilian deployments, with eighteen previous deployments finished in several countries of Europe, Africa, and Asia. As Bickerton argues: “Each [CSDP] mission in this way serves the ontological purpose of building the EU’s international identity” (Bickerton 2010, 217). As such, it is through its deployments that scholars have sought to identify the identity of the EU as security actor. Due to the large emergence of civilian missions, the EU has often been depicted as a civilian security actor (Hettne and Soderbaum 2005, 535). However, merely focusing on the missions has simultaneously provided little clarity on what the EU provides in areas of security. As McDonagh argues: “The record of the EU as a security actor is mixed at best: the selection and commitment of missions seems to be ad hoc and devoid of an overarching strategy (McDonagh 2015, 637). As there are no clear criteria when a crisis is a CSDP-mission and when it is not, and that CSDP-missions are reactive rather than preventive, it becomes difficult to find a common strategy or direction by studying the deployments. Thus, utilizing the deployments as the primary indicator of the EU’s actorness is not a viable strategy, as through the lack of a consistent or coherent framework in the deployments, one runs the risk of overemphasizing situational circumstances, that are specific for the case-study or deployment, as characteristic for EU security actorness.
This difficulty in analyzing the EU as a security actor extends to the theoretical framework utilized to analyze the EU. As an organization that is simultaneously supranational as well as intergovernmental, the EU is difficult to analyze through traditional realist or liberal lenses that essentialize the dominance of the state in international relations. This becomes even more problematic in areas of security, where states are viewed to have full sovereignty, as at the EU-level, states will have to relinquish sovereignty in order to pool their resources in an EU framework. This constant juxtaposition between state sovereignty and EU security makes analyses difficult. Nevertheless, although EU security can be seen as originating from the Member States, it is more than the sum of its part and not solely an extension of the interests of the Member States. As such, the closest, most agreed argument consists of describing the EU as a security actor suis generis. There has been nothing that is comparable to the EU and this thus calls for the challenge to analyze the EU through old theoretical frameworks and leads to
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a search for novel theoretical perspectives that might help in analyzing the complexity of the EU.
The field of new institutionalism provides precisely such an opportunity, largely due to the institute-centric approach and its close connection to EU developments. During the 1960s and 1970s new institutionalism introduced a new way of thinking of international relations by placing the emphasis on institutions as places that shaped action, rather than tools or platforms merely utilized by actors in order to promote their own interests. Due to the diverse nature of the development of the EU and its institutional, inter-governmental nature, the usage of new institutionalism became closely intertwined within the discipline of European Studies and research on the workings and development of the several institutions of the EU (Pollack 2007, 31). This close connection between the theoretical framework and the EU consequently entails that new institutionalism also provides an opportunity to analyze the EU, in its complexity as both a supra-national and intergovernmental institution, as a security and defense actor. After all, although the EU has provided an inconsistent record in its military deployments, it has continually sought to develop its CSDP. As Benjamin Pohl argues: “At its most basic, the CSDP is less a policy than an institutional structure within the European Union for taking and implementing collective decisions pertaining to civilian and military crisis management” (Pohl 2014, 3). As such, this institutional structure stands at the basis for any potential for deployment by the EU and thus forms the core of the EU as a security actor. New Institutionalism through its emphasis on institutional development and its close connection to analyses of the EU thus forms an opportunity to analyze the EU as a security actor.
One of the strands of new institutionalism, Historical Institutionalism (HI), provides an interesting lens in the debate on the analysis of the EU as a security and defense actor. As the debate on the role of the EU as a security and defense actor is unclear and has also shifted throughout the past thirty-five years, utilizing HI and its emphasis on “history” could shed a light on the development, the direction, and ultimately, the role of the EU as a security and defense actor. By mapping the pathways of EU security and defense development, HI can simplify the complexity of the EU as a security actor through its historical trajectory. Additionally, such an analysis could also shed light on the contemporary developments in EU security and defense and see whether these novel developments such as PESCO are truly novel, or instead more of the same.
As such, this thesis seeks to bring together both the novel theory of Historical Institutionalism and the complex debate on the nature of the EU as a security and defense actor through the development of CSDP by asking the following research question: How can the role
Van Rens 10 of the EU as a security actor be explained by utilizing a historical institutionalist lens in analyzing the development of CSDP? In order to answer this research question, several sub questions shall also be discussed: 1) Has there been a critical juncture/significant geopolitical event that affected EU defense development? 2) How has this juncture or multiple junctures affected the direction of EU defense development? 3) Which institutional pathway(s) can be identified? 4) How have these developments affected the EU’s role as a security and defense actor?
In order to analyze how the development of CSDP has affected the EU’s role as a security actor, this thesis shall perform a qualitative analysis. It shall analyze landmark documents, such as the Treaties, EU Security Strategies, and Council Declarations in order to map and analyze the progress of European security development. Due to issues of scope, the main emphasis of the analysis shall be placed on the institutionalization of security and defense. This shall be done for two reasons: As there has already been written extensively on the various EU missions and their successes, these analyses do not require repetition. Instead, there has been little analysis on the full scope of CSDP-development and there has been no research yet on how this relates to the most recent security and defense developments since 2016. Analyzing the historical trajectory of CSDP through the theory of historical institutionalism allows for an extensive mapping of the development of the role and ambition of the EU as a security actor. Second, large debates and disputes often precede the institutionalization of certain developments, especially in matters of security. As such, these Declarations/Treaties can thus be seen as the moment when the member states reach consensus and act as a unified Union. If this thesis is to analyze the role of the EU as a security actor, it is important to analyze the situations where the EU converges rather than diverges. By analyzing in which situations the EU is capable of delivering a coherent security response, it becomes possible to analyze when the EU can be expected to deliver as a security actor.
The analysis section shall be divided into three chapters including a background chapter on European defense development before 1998. The first chapter analyzes the situation from the Kosovo crisis of 1998 until the European External Strategy and the creation of the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP) in 2003. 2003 forms the signature year of the launching of ESDP and the first EU-led missions. As such, the period from 1998 until 2003 can be analyzed as the preparatory work, the institutionalization, before the activation of the ESDP. The second chapter analyzes the period of 2004 until 2009, closing with an analysis of the Lisbon Treaty and the creation of CSDP. Similarly, the period from 2004 until 2009 reflects a period during which the EU actively attempted to learn from its deployments and adjust its
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policies accordingly, while still carrying the motivational growth of ESDP. The third chapter analyzes the remaining period from 2009 until 2017. The last period reflects a period of relative stagnation until suddenly in 2016 rapid achievements in capacity development were achieved. Each of these periods thus fulfills a distinct role in the development of CSDP and each chapter thus ends with a landmark development for CSDP.
Throughout the analyses, five crises shall be highlighted specifically, namely: Kosovo (1999), Iraq (2003), Georgia (2008), Libya (2011), and Ukraine (2014). Naturally, between 1998 until 2017, the EU faced several crises that required a security response. However, these five crisis have been the only crisis situations within these periods that required an extraordinary meeting of the European Council, thus highlighting the impact of these crises on the interests of the EU and the necessity for the EU to properly respond. In that sense, each crisis serves as a testing-moment to see whether the EU has succeeded in its CSDP-development and whether it improves as a security actor. Furthermore, the usage of these crisis situations provides another argument to utilize a historical institutionalist analysis, as each crisis situations provides the opportunity for a critical juncture: A moment where the EU can decide to shift to a different institutional path.
Van Rens 12 Theoretical Framework
This literature review analyzes the debate in the literature on Historical Institutionalism.1 The review shall take place in three parts: The first situates historical institutionalism within the field of new institutionalism and indicates the main differences between HI and the other strands of new institutionalism. The second part shall identify the core concepts of Historical Institutionalism. As this thesis focusses to a large extent on how crisis situations have affected CSDP institutional development, it is vital to understand the debate on the conceptualizations of “path-dependency” and “critical junctures” within the field of HI. As has often been the case, HI suffers from what has been termed “concept-stretching.” (Rixen and Viola 2015, 309). As these two concepts shall form a central role in the analysis, it is essential to create clear, workable definitions of these core-concepts. In addition, it shall identify mechanisms developed within HI that allow these concepts to be tested on CSDP-development. The final part shall explain why Historical Institutional is thus suitable as the theoretical framework for the analysis of CSDP.
During the 1960s and 1970s, the study of institutions re-emerged through the introduction of “new institutionalism.” The new institutionalism placed an increased emphasis in the role of institutions in shaping national and international politics. In their landmark article of 1996, Hall and Taylor identified three distinct approaches within this new institutionalism: Rational-Choice Institutionalism (RCI), Sociological Institutionalism (SI), and Historical Institutionalism (HI) (Hall and Taylor 1996, 940). RCI, originating from game-theory, argues that actors utilize institutions as instruments to further their own interest, while at the same time institutions keep these actors in check (Shepsle 2006, 25). SI defines institutions in terms of norms, values, and ideas and thus argues that institutions do not only change behavior, but they also shape the lens through which actors address the world (Lecours 2005, 52). Historical institutionalism argues that “history matters,” when analyzing institutions. As such, for historical institutionalists, the temporal context from which an institution emerges to a large extent dictates its functioning (Fioretos et al. 2016, 13). Understanding the historical context in which an institution was created (or through which it was shaped) thus becomes crucial in understanding the institution. As such, the historical trajectory of an institution can be utilized to explain the way an institution operates.
1 This literature review falls in line with an earlier review, “Making Sense of Historical Institutionalism: Constructing the Core Concepts,” which was written during my research internship under Dr. Ine Megens
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Although HI, in comparison to RCI and SI, has been largely overlooked within the field of International Relations, HI nonetheless offers a good midway between both RCI and SI as a synthetic approach of both theories through its focus on both the calculus (RC) and cultural approach (SI) (Katznelson and Weingast 2005, 14). As Hay and Wincott argue: HI allows for a relationship between structure and agency, where “change occurs in (and through) the same time inter-relationship between strategic action and the strategic context within which it is conceived and instantiated, and in the later unfolding of its intended and unintended consequences (Hay and Wincott 1998, 955). By bringing both agency and structure together, HI overcomes some of the shortcomings of both RCI and SI, by allowing scholars to analyze how actors influence institutions as well as how institutions influence actors.
Path-Dependency and Self-Reinforcing Feedback Patterns
As HI focuses mainly on institutional resiliency rather than institutional change, it was useful only in those cases where institutions persisted rather than cases where institutions changed. Consequently, an institution was also not necessarily equipped to respond optimally to arising situations, as it was created during a time when such a situation might not have existed. Its extensive focus on history and the context from which the institution emerged initially led HI-scholars to focus on institutional stasis or stability. This central concept was deemed path-dependency, which “characterizes specifically those historical sequences in which contingent events set into motion institutional patterns or events that have deterministic properties” (Mahoney 2000, 507). As such a contingent event forms the start of a process of institutional developments, which can be designated as a new pathway. In more recent HI-theory, path-dependency has become the primary tool to analyze how new institutional pathways are reinforced within the institution. These pathways are characterized by self-reinforcing feedback processes, which ensure that the path slowly becomes integrated as the norm within the institution. Mahoney (2000) identified three characteristics of a self-reinforcing path-dependent process: (1) causality with sensitivity to temporality; (2) a contingent event that set the sequence in motion; and (3) a deterministic causal pattern leading to a certain end-goal.
First, the self-reinforcing sequence must be a causal process of events, highly sensitive to the temporality of earlier events. When an event happens, determines how change takes place. In addition, timing and sequence play a vital role in strengthening the new paths, where events that appear early on will have a larger impact than events that happen later. As a result, events that happen “too late” will not have the same impact compared to a situation where these events had happened in the beginning of the sequence (Pierson 2011, 44). Early institutional formation
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is thus influenced by occurring events, but becomes more robust as the pathway progresses. Finally, self-reinforcing feedback processes are characterized by nonergodicity, meaning that even seemingly accidental events early in the sequence cannot be cancelled out as irrelevant, as they will feed back into future choices (Artur 1994, 15).
Second, the path-dependent process must be based on a contingent event. These contingent events are also termed “critical junctures” and shall be explained in more detail below. The resulting final outcomes that were caused by this contingent event could not have been predicted, based on the initial conditions. Instead, an unpredictable event set into motion this new path towards a new equilibrium. Furthermore, at the start of this contingent event, multiple equilibria can be designated, but the event forms the commencement of the path-dependent process towards one equilibrium.
Third, “once contingent historical events take place, path-dependent sequences are marked by relatively deterministic causal patterns or what can be thought of as “intertia.” (Mahoney 2000, 511-513). In other words, once an institution sets off on a particular pathway, these developments tend to stay in motion and continue to follow this pathway. This path-dependent process slowly stabilizes the institution into a new pathway, until the new pathway has become the institutional norm. Through increasing returns (Rixen and Viola 2015, 313) subsequent developments reinforces the new institutional pathway into the organization. As actors and institutional configurations adapt to the new path and changing directions from this path becomes more and more costly, the institution locks-in this institutional pathway.
Critical Juncture
The self-reinforcing pathway is set off by a critical juncture. Central to this idea is the concept of change within an institution as a “punctuated equilibrium” (Steinmo 2008, 126). The image of a punctuated equilibrium counters the idea of gradual institution evolution and instead frames this as a short distinctive burst of change followed by relatively stable institutional stasis. Within HI, an institution is seen to be stable for a long period in its development path, until a critical juncture disrupts the current institutional pathway and opens the opportunity for a new institutional pathway. Nevertheless, this wide definition of critical juncture requires some narrowing down. As Pierson argues, it is essential to know what makes the juncture, critical. As he states: “junctures are ‘critical,’ because they place institutional arrangements on paths or trajectories, which are then very difficult to alter” (Pierson 2011, 135). In that sense, it is not the event in itself, but the consequences of the event that determine whether a juncture is “critical” or not. This change is then embedded within the institution, where through
self-Van Rens 15
reinforcing sequences the change slowly becomes the norm within the institution. Capoccia and Keleman have provided the most clear definition by defining them “as relatively short periods of time during which there is a substantially heightened probability that agents’ choices will affect the outcome of interest” (Capoccia and Kelemen 2007, 348). Furthermore, as Bennet and Elman argue, “the event must either be exogeneous…or stochastic and irreducibly unexplainable” (Bennett and Elman 2006, 255). In that sense, the critical juncture must occur outside of the institution and unpredictable when looking at the institutional development. Adding this to Capoccia and Kelemen’s definition thus creates three essential conditions that a critical juncture must contain: 1) The event must be relatively short. 2) Substantially create the space for actors to affect the institutional pathway. 3) The event must be exogenous and inexplicable or unpredictable. This definition shall be utilized as a basis throughout the thesis when discussing critical junctures.
Aside from a narrow definition of critical junctures, several scholars have focused on developing tools which allow for greater identification of critical junctures. Slater and Simmons created the notion of the “critical antecedent,” which precedes the juncture, but “[combines] in a causal sequence with factors operating during that juncture to produce a divergent outcome” (Slater and Simmons 2010, 903). Soifer et al. argued that prior to a critical juncture, permissive conditions and productive conditions must exist, where permissive conditions create the opportunity for change, while productive conditions drive the form of change (Soifer 2012, 1574). As such, the causes that triggered the critical juncture and thus led to the development of the new institutional pathway are different from the causes of reproduction. Identifying these causes becomes a necessity in order to determine when an exogenous event can be considered a critical juncture.
Institutional Change Outside of Path-Dependency
Path-dependency provides for a rather static analysis, where institutions are operating within an institutional equilibrium, disrupted only by exogenous shocks that promote quick, disruptive institutional change, after which the institution is set on a new pathway, until through reproduction, ultimately, the new institutional equilibrium is formed. In order to refine this model of change, HI scholars have identified several mechanisms that can interfere with this pathway to a new institutional equilibrium, but which are not related to critical junctures. Also termed as unintended consequences (Hall and Taylor 1996, 941), Pierson identified four gaps that exist or emerge within the institution between its intention and its implementation: (1) Limits of institutional design: Due to cognitive or informational limits, institutional creators can
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never fully foresee by whom and how their institutional creations will be put to use; (2) Political compromise: Compromise between political actors in the institutional process leads to a balancing of conflicting goals, which can affect the institutional direction; (3) Power struggles: Although the new institutional pathway empowers some actor over others, these “losers” do not simply go away and instead find ways to circumvent the rules to pursue their own interests; and (4) Time: As institutions are created in a certain context, unforeseen events can happen that require reinterpretations of the original institutional configuration. (Pierson 2011, 106). As Thelen argues: “Changes in that context can open up tremendous space for reinterpretations that are very far from the intent of the designers…and this provides an important mechanism by which a rule over time is “clarified,” but also, in practice, modified” (Qtd. in Fioretos et al. 2016, 58). Rather than forming a quick, disruptive bursts, slow and incremental changes in the institutional context can also lead to institutional modifications. As such, these “gaps” are embedded within the institutional creation and become problematic over time, thus requiring institutional change. In addition, Orren and Skowronek further termed the concept of intercurrence: As different institutions develop in different historical contexts, these institutions, in their relations with each other, do not easily work together to fit in a coherent whole (Orren and Skowronek 1994, 321). Instead, the interactions between these different institutions often results into change, as institutional instability in one institution affect the other institution. Thus institutional tensions (intercurrence) leads to institutional evolutions. Finally, in his analysis on slow incremental change, Pierson identifies two mechanisms: cumulative change and thresholds. In the first mechanism, small changes within the institution slowly build up until they change the institutional pathway. Related, in the second mechanism, these small changes can reach a tipping point, a threshold, where suddenly this process “behind the scenes” of slow, cumulative change can trigger major change. These gradual (often endogenous) mechanisms of change can be utilized to supplement the analysis of self-reinforcing pathways and critical junctures by indicating multiple, more subtle forces of change.
Historical Institutionalism and CSDP-Development
This thesis will utilize Historical Institutionalism in analyzing CSDP development for a variety of reasons. First, through its mapping of path-dependencies, HI provides a lens that can not only analyze the development (pathway) of CSDP, but also whether the EU has been consistent in this pathway. This raises the question of whether the historical development of CSDP shows a deterministic causal pattern of developments. Through its concept of “increasing returns,” HI stipulates that the EU should see process of positive feedback that reinforces its development
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as a security actor. By mapping this pathway, HI can not only be utilized to make sense of the myriad of defense developments, but also determine whether the EU has been moving consistently towards a goal with its security and defense developments. Second, in contrast to SI and RCI, an HI-analysis of the development of CSDP/CFSP allows one to both analyze the way in which actors have sought to set the framework of the institution (agency), as well as how the institution itself has set the framework in which agents have operated (structure). Third, the emphasis on critical junctures allows to test what the effect is of external crises on CSDP developments and how or whether these crises have influenced the institutional pathway of CSDP. Fourth, if CSDP-development does not follow a clear pathway, an HI-analysis can provide clarity on which factors have prevented the EU from moving in the direction of its initial defense ambitions.
Within this thesis, Kosovo shall form the critical juncture that caused the institutional pathway of St. Malo to emerge. As such, throughout the thesis, each chapter shall continually reflect on the ambitions set out at St. Malo and whether the developments of each chapter follow along this institutional trajectory. In accordance with Capoccia and Kelemen’s definition of a critical juncture this thesis shall take the Kosovo Crisis as the critical juncture that formed the pathway for CSDP development. In 2008, at the conference on “National Interests and EU Foreign Policy,” the EU High Representative (HR) Javier Solana remarked that “the Kosovo Crisis…played a fundamental role in the creation of the European Security and Defence Policy” (Solana 2008, 2). Solana’s view is reflected in the opinions of several scholars that pinpoint the Kosovo Crisis as the tipping point for the formulation of the ESDP/CSDP (See Pond 1999; Shepherd 2009). As such, as a starting point, this thesis shall view the Kosovo Crisis (and the linked St. Malo Summit) as the critical juncture that situated the pathway for the development of CSDP. In analyzing the different periods however, the thesis shall also consider whether or how significant geopolitical crisis have changed or affected the institutional pathway of CSDP development.
Van Rens 18 Chapter 1: The Background of European Defense Development (1950-1998)
With the end of the Second World War, Europe entered into a forty year stalemate between the US and Russia during the Cold War. Throughout the whole Cold War, two security institutions sought to protect Europe, operating simultaneously. The first, the Western European Union (WEU), was formed by the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, France and the UK, in 1948 in order to coordinate the defense policies of these five countries. In 1949, these five countries together with the US, Canada, Portugal, Italy, Norway, Denmark, and Iceland, created the second institution: the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Throughout the Cold War, it was NATO that would be the primary security organization protecting Western-Europe.
Nevertheless, throughout the Cold War, there were several attempts to create a European defense organization. In 1952, the Treaty of the European Defence Community (EDC) attempted to create a European security and defense organization. As the EDC coincided with the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community, it was one of the first steps of European integration. However, as France did not ratify the Treaty in 1954, the Community ceased to exist (Koutrakos 2016, 3). A similar attempt was made in 1961 by French President Charles de Gaulle through the Fouchet Plan, which proposed the introduction of a political, defense dimension to the European Communities (EC), but which was blocked due to differing opinions of its six members on Europe’s place in the world (Taesdale 2016, 7). As such, defense continued to be primarily enacted by NATO and, to a small extent, the Western European Union. Meanwhile, after the Treaty of Rome, members of the European Economic Community (EEC) created arrangements in order to create a common foreign policy on the international scene through the development of the European Political Cooperation (EPC). The Single European Act of 1986 amended the Treaty of Rome of 1957 and for the first time embedded “security” in EEC/EU primary law, as it stated that “[member states] consider that closer co-operation on questions of European security would contribute in an essential way to European identity in external policy matters. They are ready to coordinate their positions more closely on the political and economic aspect of security” (Council of the European Community 1987, art. 30(6). Although, this development was a legal landmark for the EEC in the area of security, the vagueness of the rhetoric nonetheless meant that the text created only the possibility, but no obligations in security development. As such, although there were initial attempts to organize a European security organization/community that was distinctly European, these initiatives nonetheless failed and NATO remained the primary guarantor for European security and defense.
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The end of the Cold War in 1989-1990 brought the end of the bipolar world order that had dictated the foreign policy outline of the transatlantic partnership. The dissolution of the Soviet Union, left the United States as the sole hegemonic world power and suddenly raised questions on necessity for continuing NATO (Mearsheimer 1990, 15). At the same time, the changing security environment caused a redefinition of Western security strategy. Rising conflict in the Balkans and the US unwillingness to engage in solving the conflict, caused a lack of trust in the US and a search for an alternative security institution (Shepherd 2009, 521). However, Western-European countries differed consistently, influenced especially on whether the respective country still sought US protection or tried to build up European security without the US. As Hofmann argues, the perceptions of which action to take regarding European security was heavily depended on the ideologies of parties in the UK, France and Germany. The UK sought to reform NATO. France sought to create a more political security policy for the EC, while Germany bridged this position through its call for interlocking institutions. As such, “[i]n the end, NATO was transformed and [the Common Foreign Security Policy (CFSP] was created, but in a very vague fashion, which accommodated the competing visions of interlocking or autonomous institutions, allowing the direction of European security to be decided at a later date” (Hoffman 2013, 89). As such, the shock of the end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the threat of the Soviet Union, brought European security issues back to the forefront, but differing national interests on the direction of European security between Germany, France, and the UK prevented the creation of a coherent European foreign policy.
The Petersberg Declaration of 1992 set out the pathway of the WEU (and later the EU) as a humanitarian, peace-keeping security actor. Within the document, three tasks are outlined for the military units answerable to WEU: “Humanitarian and rescue tasks, peacekeeping tasks, [and] tasks of combat forces in crisis management, including peacekeeping” (Western European Union Council of Ministers 1992, 6). As such, with the Petersberg tasks through the WEU, the EC introduced security and defense operationalization for its members. As the document states: [The ministers of defense] discussed the progress made in developing the role of WEU as the defence component of the European Union and as the means to strengthen the European pillar of the Atlantic Alliance” (Western European Union Council of Ministers, 3). As such, although the Petersberg Tasks led to an increase in security operationalization by laying out a framework for security “tasks,” it nonetheless rooted these tasks within the larger trans-Atlantic/European security framework. The Petersberg tasks would provide “the paradigm which have conditioned both the ambitions of the ESDP and also informed the force structure deemed appropriate for realizing the EU’s military security ambitions” (Whitman 2004, 233). As such, the Petersberg
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tasks did not only signify the intention of the WEU to increase security and defense cooperation, but also provided an early framework through which such cooperation could be increased.
The establishment of the European Union under the Maastricht Treaty of 1993 led to the establishment of a three pillar system, one of which consisted out of an intergovernmental pillar related to foreign policy and security issues. The Treaty changed the EPC into CFSP and “laid down a more detailed set of rules, imposed tighter duties on Member States, and introduced specific instruments” (Koutrakos 2013, 17). As such, through the Maastricht Treaty, the EU proposed the first initial steps to a common security and defense policy. Nevertheless, the three-pillar system of the Maastricht Treaty rendered the CFSP largely ineffective. As Hofmann argues, the governments of the UK, Germany, and France had each been forced to compromise in accepting the structure, while still being unable to agree which security institution should be responsible for “multilateral use of force or on the extent to which a European security institution would impinge on their sovereignty” (Hoffman 2013, 114). As CFSP formed a compromise between the interests of the three largest member states, its scope remained modest and it lacked clearly defined security objectives. The document was “[resolved] to implement a common foreign and security policy including the framing of a common defence policy, which might in time lead to a common defence” (European Economic Community 1992, Title V Article J.4 (1). The creation of a security policy through the Maastricht Treaty was largely symbolic and this creation was the major victory of the document, rather than its implementation. Nevertheless, as CFSP did not outline clear commitments to security objectives and goals, the Maastricht treaty did little to mediate between the ideologies of the three European great powers.
The revitalization of the WEU after the Cold War reflected a felt necessity to invest in a European military component, yet this military component was only capable of acting through NATO and thus with US support. In 1991, in the Anglo-Italian Declaration on European Security and Defence, Italy and Britain agreed on the WEU functioning as the defense component of the EU and as a strengthening of NATO’s European pillar. The declaration was significant, as “[t]he British accepted in principle that the EU could develop a defense component, albeit indirectly” (Latawski and Smith 2003, 123). The creation of the European Security and Defense Identity (ESDI) at the 1996 NATO ministerial meeting cemented this new found role for the WEU as a mediating actor between the EU and NATO. The ESDI would “allow European forces, in crisis situations of little or no interest to the US, to borrow American military assets via NATO” (Howorth 2014, 56). As such, the ESDI implied that the European countries would seek its security and defense entirely under NATO framework. Nevertheless,
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this idea of the ESDI as a European pillar of NATO failed for two reasons. The first being that NATO felt the ESDI to be unsatisfactory, as crucial military assets would be borrowed from NATO only to be returned later. Second, the Western European Union would act as the mediator between the EU and NATO within this framework, but the WEU was “too weak politically, too insignificant militarily and too unwieldly institutionally to carry out the major responsibilities” (Howorth and Skeeler 2003, 48). As such, the WEU failed to act as a mediator between the EU and NATO and the ESDI failed to deliver on creating a European security structure.
Finally, as the EU was seen to be unable to intervene in the Balkan Wars, the Amsterdam Treaty of 1997 made significant changes to the Treaty of the European Union to accelerate the cooperation on security and defense. The Amsterdam Treaty created the position of the High Representative (HR) for the CFSP. The first HR was Javier Solana, a former Secretary General of NATO, thus solidifying the connection between CFSP and NATO (Pohl 2014, 30). Furthermore, as Solana was also the Secretary-General of the WEU, he connected CFSP directly to the military aspects of the WEU. The Amsterdam Treaty further amended the TEU with a strengthening of the commitment on military security. As it stated: “The common security and defence policy shall include the progressive framing of a common Union defence policy. This will lead to a common defence, when the European Council…so decides” (European Union 1997, Art 42 (1). In addition, previously neutral states within the EU (Ireland, Austria, Finland and Sweden) accepted…the inclusion of the humanitarian and peacekeeping elements of the Petersberg tasks of the WEU into the text of the [Treaty of Amsterdam]” (Whitman 2004, 435). As such, the Amsterdam Treaty provided two relevant developments: First, the position of HR created a representative and a contacting point for EU foreign and security issues. Second, the acceptance of the Petersberg Tasks into the Treaty by former neutral states showed an emerging consensus on the military security aspirations of the EU member states.
Conclusion:
The period between 1945 until 1993 saw many attempts at the creation of a European security organization. Although initially NATO was the sole provider for European security, the number of (failed) attempts at creating a common European security policy or organization nonetheless suggested a felt necessity for Europe to create a common stance on issues of security and defense. In other words, the idea of a European security and defense dimension never died out, nor did the successful push happen that would have led to the successful creation of one. As the
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EEC integrated further, these attempts become more direct, especially as the war in Yugoslavia showed the necessity for the EEC/EU to formulate a foreign security and defense policy. Nevertheless, divergence of strategic goals as well as lack of coherence and trust in other member states ultimately meant that any aspects of security or defense embedded in the Treaty remained vague, imposing little duties upon Member States to actually organize on these matters. As such, the early creations of European defense can be characterized as a putting in place the possibility for defense without trying to impose it on the Member States. The Petersberg Tasks of 1992 and the Maastricht Treaty showed a significant interest in reinforcing and institutionalizing security, but ultimately fell short due to unwillingness of the Member States/Lack of cohesion between the Member States. The advent of the Balkan War would have provided the ideal opportunity for the EC/WEU to exert itself as a security actor, but ultimately the EC failed to act and the US had to intervene.
Van Rens 23 Chapter 2: Kosovo, St. Malo, and the ESS (1998-2003)
This section shall analyze the Kosovo Crisis and how together with St. Malo, this formed the critical juncture for the start of the EU’s European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP). Afterwards, it shall continue to analyze the landmark decisions implementing the St. Malo Declaration, 9/11 and the Iraq War, and finally the European Security Strategy (ESS) of 2003.
Several developments discussed in the previous chapter reinforced the impact of the Kosovo Crisis on the EU. As Slater and Simmons argue, a critical juncture is often preceded by a critical antecedent, which are “factors or conditions preceding a critical juncture that combine in a causal sequence with factors operating during that juncture to produce a divergent outcome” (Slater and Simmons 2010, 903). As such, five crucial developments would provide the precedent for the “criticalness” of Kosovo as a juncture: (1) After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the self-evidence of NATO as the primary security institution of Europe became questionable; (2) In addition, with this loss of a direct threat to Europe, the US began to argue that Europe should start to pull its own weight; (3) The Balkan Wars created a security risk in the neighborhood of Europe, but the Member States were unable to deliver a coherent response; (4) As a result of these Balkan Wars, the Kosovo Crisis emerged out of the insurgencies that followed after the Dayton Peace Agreement of 1995. As the Bosnian Peace Talks, initiated by the US, the UK, Germany, and France thus did not stop the emergence of new conflicts in former Yugoslavia, there was a vested interest to solve the Kosovo Crisis. (5) The European states increasingly felt the need for a European response to its neighborhood crises. With the Amsterdam Treaty of 1997, the EU created the CFSP, indicating that it was willing to perform as a security actor. As such, the Kosovo Crisis of 1998 formed this chance for the EU to address a security crisis in its neighborhood through CFSP.
The Kosovo Crisis was preceded by the Kosovo insurgencies that followed after the Dayton Peace Agreement of 1995. Between 1995 until 1998, the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), consisting out of Albanian separatists, started to target Serbian law enforcement in Kosovo. After the failure of the Implementation Peace Accords in 1997, the KLA started to increase its attacks and the KLA’s actions “could be qualified as a substantial armed uprising” (The Editors of Encyclopedia Britannica N.D., 2). The Yugoslav armed forces attempted to regain control over the region. After a short ceasefire, the KLA renewed its attacks and the Serbian/Yugoslav forces responded with a counter-offensive, resulting in the ethnic cleansing of nearly 600.000 Kosovian Albanians. The United Nation Security Council (UNSC) warned of an “impeding humanitarian catastrophe” should the international community take no action
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(Haulman 2015, 8). After the Serbian government ignored repeated pleas of the international community to halt their ethnic cleansing, NATO finally intervened on 24 March 1999 with the Operation Allied Forces. Launching a series of bombings between 24 March until 10th of June 1999, the operation had the goal to act as a “coercive operation” to drive Serbia out of Kosovo through three phases of bombing: Phase one targeted Serbian air defense systems; Phase two targeted Serbian military targets along the border with Kosovo; And phase three would include airstrikes against Serbia’s capital Belgrade (Haulman 2015, 10). On June 2, Serbian president Milosevic agreed to end the conflict and on June 10, Serbia ratified the peace-agreement and finally withdrew Serbian troops from Kosovo.
In contrast to NATO, the EU was unable to provide a coherent security response and merely evoked sanctions on the Serbian government. At the onset of the crisis, on March 29, the European Council (henceforth the Council) enforced a variety of sanctions on the Serbian governments, consisting of halting arms and military equipment exports, rejected visas of concerned officials, and halted trade and investment (European Council 1998a, art 3). On May 9, as the crisis continued to escalate despite the measures, a new common position froze the assets of the Serbian government that were located abroad (European Council 1998b, art. 1). Aside from these sanctions however, the EU delegated responsibility for solving the crisis to the international community, merely expressing support for “the acceleration of work in international security organizations on a full range of options” (European Council 1998c, 4). and “immediate compliance by both sides in the Kosovo crisis with UNSC resolutions 1160, 1199, 1203 and 1207” (European Council 1998d, 3). As Latawski and Smith state: In effect, the EU was inviting NATO to sort things out, by force if necessary” (Latawski and Smith 2003, 132). The common positions of the EU were in itself clearly not enough to halt the conflict. Instead, the EU once again required the help from NATO to solve the escalation of the conflict, portraying a deep failure to act as a security actor within the crisis near its own borders. As such, the Kosovo Crisis was less of an example of what the EU did and more of what the EU did not do: Deliver a coherent military response or deployment in response to the escalating situation. Instead, France and the UK provided support in solving the situation through NATO, but not through the frameworks of the EU. As the Kosovo Crisis once again showed the inadequacy of the EU to deal with a crisis situation that emerged in its backyard, the crisis formed the critical juncture for the launch of the development of ESDP.
Van Rens 25 The St. Malo Declaration
The Kosovo Crisis provided the space for the St. Malo Declaration in December 1998. In 1998, as a result of the EU’s inability to act during the Kosovo crisis, at the Franco-British summit at St. Malo, France and Britain signed the St. Malo Declaration, which provided a radical turning point for the direction of EU security and defense policy. For the first time, it ensured the creation of a separate, autonomous EU defense policy as well as British acceptance for this necessity for a separate EU defense policy. Additionally, it stated that “the Union must have the capacity for autonomous action, backed up by credible military forces” and “the Union must be given appropriate structures and a capacity for analysis of situations, sources of intelligence, and a capability for strategic planning” (Franco-British Saint Malo Declaration 1998, 2). This further suggested the development of European forces that would be utilized within EU-frameworks, rather than as a part of NATO through the WEU. Finally, the document stated: “Europe needs strengthened armed forces that can react rapidly to the new risks, and which are supported by a strong and competitive European defence industry” (Franco-British Saint Malo Declaration 1998, 1). This industrial imperative would consolidate the European defense industries and provide an economic incentive for the development of ESDP. Thus, St. Malo introduced three concrete aspects for an EU defense policy: The development of European forces that could be utilized for deployment, development of a strategic framework to plan and support deployments, and capacity development through the consolidation of the European defense industries.
The St. Malo declaration was further revolutionary due to its proposal of a distinct autonomous security institution that would operate outside of NATO’s influence (in contrast to ESDI). As such, the declaration of St. Malo showed a clear breach with devising a European security policy with US influence; The proposal was distinctly European. The uncertainty of this new development for the US can be found in the response by US secretary of State Madeleine Albright three days later, as she pressed for avoiding “the three D’s: decoupling, duplication, and discrimination” (Albright 1998, 1). Each of these three D’s sought to ensure EU-NATO cooperation and that the EU would not develop as a competing security actor to NATO. As Howorth argues: “What is noteworthy in this initial US reaction to Saint-Malo, however, is the refusal to accept the implications of a shift from an ESDI-type capacity forged from within NATO (separable but not separate) to the autonomous aspirations of CSDP itself (Howorth 2014, 103). The Saint-Malo declaration thus presented a clear shift towards European capacity development; a shift that was not directly acknowledged by the US.
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Finally, the significance of the St. Malo Declaration lies in the fact that it was a commitment of both the French and the British leaders to work together on the area of defense, where previously the British had refused to discuss European defense outside of NATO and effectively blocked the creation of a separate European defense entity. Two developments that had affected both British and French interests shaped the decisions for both actors at St. Malo. First, for the UK, the emergence of the single currency project and UK exclusion from this project suddenly led to the UK accepting the military domain as a domain where it could still exert influence. Likewise, this coincided with a desire to emerge as an equal with France and Germany within the European Union (Matthiopoulos and Gyarmati 1999, 67). Second, for France, as the treaty of the WEU neared its end in 1998, the organization had seemingly outlived its usefulness. The failure of the project and most importantly the British role in orchestrating the impractical triangular relationship with the EU and NATO “was a supporting considering in inducing the [UK] to become more flexible about its future” (Latawski and Smith 2003, 129-130). As a result, the timing of the Kosovo crisis and the lack of a response thereof coincided with these national interests. The shock of the crisis consequently provided space for both actors to formulate a new autonomous EU defense policy.
The St. Malo Declaration formed the beginning of a sequence that focused on the creation of ESDP/CSDP. As the Declaration showed a significant and abrupt change of the direction of CSFP, turning it into a more military actor, it was a change for the institutional path of ESDP/CSDP. Several events that happened after the Declaration reinforced this new institutional pathway. “At the June 1999 Cologne Council the heads of government and state agreed that the EU must have the ability and capacity to take decisions for autonomous action on the full range of Petersberg tasks, irrespective of actions taken by NATO” (Wijk 2004, 72). This commitment of the Member States to an autonomous European defense force became further reinforced in December 1999 through the Helsinki Headline Goals. The Helsinki Headline goals were defined as follows: “By the year 2003, cooperating together voluntarily, they will be able to deploy rapidly and then sustain forces capable of the full range of Petersberg tasks as set out in the Amsterdam Treaty…in operations up to corps level (up to 15 brigades or 50.000-60.000 persons” (European Council 1999, Annex I to Annex IV). These Headline Goals showed commitment of the Member States to operational demands (in this case a clear number of available deployable personnel) and thus set out goals for the development of a common EU taskforce. Furthermore, at Helsinki, the European Council formally launched the European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP) that had been discussed prior at Cologne. As such, as a
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result of the St. Malo Summit, both Cologne and Helsinki showed a clear development in moving from the aspirations of St. Malo to the possibility of operations.
This new shift was embedded in the institutional framework through the Treaty of Nice of 2001. As the document called for ‘appropriate structures,’ the Treaty of Nice added four new institutional agencies to CFSP/CSDP. The first, the Political Security Committee (PSC), which replaced the previous Political Committee,2 and consisted out of ambassadors of the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and was created to both adept to the demanding security issues as well as combat the lack of continuity that occurred with the six month presidency of the Council and rapid rotation of ministers and foreign officials. The second, the European Military Committee (EUMC), composed of the Chiefs of Defense Staffs of the Member States, meets biannually, and delivers to the European Council, via the PSC, their unanimous advice on all matters with a military dimension as well as recommendations for action (Howorth 2014, 47). The third, the EU Military Staff (EUMS), consists out of 150 senior officers of the member states and performs the operational functions of early warning, situation assessment and strategic planning. It is also “the only permanent integrated military structure of the European Union” (Howorth 2014, 50). The fourth, the Committee for Civilian Crisis Management (CIVCOM) consists out civilian and diplomatic representatives of the member states and is responsible for the civilian, non-military EU operations. The introduction of these four committees within the Treaty of Nice after the St. Malo Summit created an institutional structure that focused on providing a coherent EU response to future security issues, by deepening consultation between the member states and increasing structures that differentiated between military and civilian deployment. Consequently, this suggested that the EU started to take its role as a security actor seriously through the institutionalization of military and crisis management capabilities.
As such, the Kosovo Crisis formed a critical juncture, which started a path-dependency through St. Malo. First, the Kosovo crisis formed an abrupt, exogenous shock to the European Union that lasted for a relatively short period of time. Second, it was unexplainable by previous developments, as it was an unexpected crisis that resulted in a large part from the inability to solve the Balkan Wars. Third, as the St. Malo Declaration showed, the Kosovo Crisis provided the space for both France and the UK to pursue their national interests within the institutional framework of the EU, effectively creating the pathway for ESDP/CSDP. As such, St. Malo created the institutional pathway for an autonomous EU defense policy, separate from NATO, with the development of credible and deployable military forces, with planning and intelligence
2 The Political Committee consisted out of the political director of the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and met monthly.
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structures necessary for deployment, and with the consolidation of the European defense industries. The Cologne 1999 Council and Helsinki Headline Goals show how this in turn created a self-reinforcing feedback process, as both events signify the implementation of the rhetoric of St. Malo into a Council agreement and the creation of policy objectives. Finally, at Nice, the first structures were created that would promote these civilian and military deployments. Thus, with the Kosovo Crisis as its critical juncture, St. Malo showed the beginning of a self-reinforcing path-dependency.
9/11 and the Rise of Global Terrorism
Although security and defense development continued after 2001 in succession of earlier developments, the attack on the twin towers on September 11, 2001 nonetheless affected the strategic outlook and perception of threats of the EU. On 11 September 2001, four passenger airlines were hijacked by nineteen al-Queda terrorists. Two of the planes crashed into the two towers of the World Trade Center. A third plane was crashed into the Pentagon. Only the fourth plane, initially destined for Washington D.C., did not reach its destination, as the passengers stopped the hijackers. The attack was the single biggest terrorist attack on US soil and the US responded by launching the War on Terror. The event formed the basis for the US invasion of Afghanistan and the Iraq War, both done in order to stop Al-Qaeda and other terrorist organizations. The event further brought terrorism to the forefront as a global security-issue, rather than a national one, and consequently required the EU to respond.
The attacks of 9/11 significantly affected the perception and focus of security threats within the EU by bringing terrorism to the forefront of EU security issues. Before 9/11, there had been various instances by European terrorist organizations, such as the Irish Republican Army. However, as attacks by these organizations had always involved domestic reasons, such as the liberation of Ireland for the IRA, the solution to these organization was also viewed to be present in the domestic rather than the international (Argomanez 2011, 7) At its extra-ordinary European Council Meeting on September 21, the Council proposed its plan of action to combat action, arguing that “The European Council has decided that the fight against terrorism will, more than ever, be a priority objective of the European Union” (European Council 2001a, 2) It further expressed military support for a counter-attack by the US on the basis of Security Council Resolution 1368. The Council further outlined five steps in its Plan of Action to combat terrorism: 1) Enhancing police and judicial cooperation, 2) Developing international legal instruments, 3) Putting an end to the funding of terrorism, 4) Strengthening air security, and 5) Coordinating the European Union’s Global Action (European Council 2001a, 3). Especially
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point 5, which tasked the General Affairs Council with further integration of the CFSP, highlighted the increased focus on combatting terrorism not just through domestic, but also external measures. Additionally, the Council argued: “It is by developing the [CFSP] and by making the [ESDP] operational at the earliest opportunity that the Union will be most effective” (European Council 2001a, 3). This suggested that ESDP would be mobilized through putting terrorism as a top priority on the list of the EU. Furthermore, for the first time, terrorism was viewed as a global phenomenon. As such, after 9/11 the EU placed global terrorism at the top of its list of security priorities.
At the European Council meeting of December 2001, the Council adopted the “Laeken Declaration on the future of the European Union.” Although the meeting had initially planned to deal with the remaining problems of the Nice Treaty, instead the meeting proposed new measures which far exceeded the competences of the initial Treaty (Teasdale and Bainbridge 2012, 5). The Declaration also provided an outline on the perception of the future security role of the EU. It mentions September 11 that year as “a rude awakening” and that “Europe needs to shoulder its responsibilities in the governance of globalization” (European Council 2001b, 20). Within the declaration, the Council outlined an envisioned leadership role for the EU in promoting democracy and human rights in the world. Additionally, it declared the EU to be capable of conducting some crisis-management operations with more demanding operations being conducted as competences develop. However, “[d]ecisions to make use of this ability will be taken in the light of circumstances of each particular situation,” which refers to the ad hoc-nature of EU-deployment (European Council 2001b, 28). Nevertheless, most importantly for ESDP, at the Laeken Summit, the Council decided to launch the European Capabilities Action Plan (ECAP) to address the capability shortfalls that were discovered in the implementation of the Helsinki Headline Goals (Schmitt 2006, 2). Under ECAP, the member states agreed to “mobilize voluntarily all efforts, investments, developments and coordination measures, both nationally and multinationally, in order to improve existing resources and progressively develop the capabilities needed for the Union’s crisis-management actions” (Schmitt 2006, 3). The Laeken Declaration showed the continuing willingness of the EU to develop its military capacities and capabilities, yet also signaled the inability of the EU to reach the Helsinki 2003 Goals in time. As participation in the ECAP was voluntary, it was up to the goodwill of the member states to join the procedures outlined by the plan. Although rapid progression was made in ESDP-development, this nonetheless showed a continued reluctance to accept clear obligations and commitments on security and defense development by the Member States.
