The Actors in Europe's Foreign Policy

Christopher Hill

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9780415122221
• eBook ISBN: 9781134827572
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Five years ago observers might have doubted that national foreign policies would continue to be of importance: it seemed inevitable that collective European positions were becoming ever more common and effective. Now the pendulum has swung back with a vengeance. The divided European responses to the prospect of war with Iraq in 1990-91, and to the war in the Balkans have made what happens in the national capitals seem divisive.
The Actors in Europe's Foreign Policy is a timely survey of the interplay between the European Union's Common Foreign and Security Policy and the long-established national foreign policies of the Union's Member-States. The book contains a chapter on each country in the Union as well as a chapter on the United States in its role as the `thirteenth seat at the table'. There is also a chapter on the European Commission, whose role in the external relations of the Community steadily grew during the 1980's.
This book will be invaluable for students and scholars of the European Union and of international politics. It will also be of great interest to practitioners in all countries concerned with Europe's role in international affairs.

Part I The major actors

Chapter 1 France The impact of François Mitterrand

Françoise de La Serre

The gradual development of European Political Cooperation (EPC) during the 1970s had at the same time sanctioned French preferences with regard to European foreign policy and testified to a significant erosion of the ambitions once displayed by General de Gaulle during the successive Fouchet plans.

By the end of Valéry Giscard d’Estaing’s period in office, the experience of harmonization of national foreign policies on the basis of the reports which had shaped European cooperation had somehow presented France with the best of both worlds: it had enhanced the power of French diplomacy while removing any constraints on what was left of international ambitions and will to independence. The start of a European foreign policy proper did not question any of those attributes of power which allowed France, among the middle-ranking powers, to remain ‘great’: namely, an independent nuclear force and the status conferred by permanent membership of the Security Council.¹

Ten years later the treaty on European Union, following joint initiatives by France and Germany, includes the setting up of a Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) the scope of which does not in the long term exclude a common defence policy. In comparison with the situation which previously prevailed, this surely suggests a qualitative leap.

It is therefore legitimate to raise the question of the role played during the 1980s by successive French governments in the genesis of the CFSP without however losing sight of the fact that the 1958 Constitution—and above all the practices adhered to throughout the Fifth Republic—have firmly established foreign policy as the exclusive preserve of the President. Thus François Mitterrand, even during the ‘cohabitation’ period of 1986–8, has been the decisive actor in the conduct of European policy. Indeed he has claimed responsibility for this function on more than one occasion. Be it in the selection of actors (Foreign Affairs Ministers, senior civil servants, personal representatives, envoys) or the setting out of positions, the grip of the Elysée on European affairs intensified as the construction of Europe became the defining issue of the seven-year presidential term.² Foreign Affairs and European Affairs Ministers have remained under close surveillance from the Elysée. The contribution of the Socialist Party to the definition of European foreign policy has been insignificant. Parliamentary and public debate has remained virtually non-existent. In so far as it characterizes the decision-making process in the field of foreign policy this situation has been analysed in a work eloquently entitled La monarchie nucléaire.³ It also justifies the title of this chapter.

However it is not always easy within this evolution to distinguish what part is played by convictions and what by circumstances; what derives from a philosophy and a vision of European construction and what has been imposed by the end of the Cold War and German reunification. Should the observed evolution be analysed within the framework of continuity, under the dead hand of traditions which affect French foreign policy, or does it signal a genuine will to change? Are we being presented with an old politics dressed up in new clothes or are we witnessing a true conversion to the idea of a common foreign and security policy?

THE GAULLO-SOCIALIST INTERLUDE

‘Foreign policy revolves around some simple ideas: national independence, balance of the great military powers, construction of Europe, the right to self-determination, the development of poor countries.’ Thus François Mitterrand expresses himself in the introduction to the various speeches on foreign policy published in 1986.⁴ This suggests that the necessity of a great European policy had imposed itself from the very beginning of the first seven-year term. However, such a necessity does not seem to have constituted the priority of priorities which in the beginning appeared to be located elsewhere: a new economic world order, East-West relations, the strategic balance and the problems of Euro-missiles, the Middle East and Latin America.

To be sure, from their accession to power, both the President of the Republic and the Prime Minister, Pierre Mauroy, insisted on underlining their commitment to Europe, a commitment to which—for the sake of the 1979 European election—the Socialist Party, once profoundly divided on the subject, had finally rallied. But this European commitment has to be seen within the terms of the general philosophy that inspired the new foreign policy defined by the Foreign Affairs Minister, Claude Cheysson: ‘There is no foreign policy for a country like France, but a translation to the exterior of its interior politics, an integration of internal demands and priorities into international politics.’⁵

From the outset therefore the problem arose of the consequences for French European policy of the radical changes announced in economic policy, and of the priorities declared in foreign policy. The impact on the way the French government deals with Community business was immediate. The subordination of the external to the internal produced a policy which tended, by endowing the EEC with adequate policies in the social, regional and industrial fields, to correct or to fill the lacunae of a European construction perceived as excessively liberal in economic terms. Thus as early as the European Council meeting of 29–30 June 1981, François Mitterrand proposed to his partners an ambitious programme for economic recovery through consumption, the issuing of bonds aimed at supporting investment and above all, the creation of a ‘European social space’. Inspired by ‘the idea that Europe will be socialist or nothing’, these proposals were developed in the Memorandum presented by the Minister for European Affairs, André Chandernagor, in October 1981. They aimed to have France’s choices endorsed by her European partners and to make the Community the support and extension of national policies. The point, under the guise of boosting European construction, was to give the Mauroy government the means to pursue its national economic and social agenda without at the same time positioning itself outside the Common Market.

Was this logic extended to foreign policy? Now that the Left had come to power, what significance would the advent of what some had foreseen as ‘Gaullo-socialism’⁶ have for European Political Cooperation? Rather than an effective conduit for national ambitions and objectives, could it constitute an obstacle to new French ambitions in the field of international policy?

Objectives and procedures: an acceptance in principle

In formal terms Paris has never had any objection in principle to the Cooperation of the Ten in the field of foreign policy. By her unreserved adoption of the Third Report on EPC—the so-called London Report—in October 1981, France subscribed to the various innovations meant to improve the harmonization of the foreign policies of the various member states: a mechanism allowing for a crisis meeting to be called at the request of only three member states, the association of the Commission with all the groups and mechanisms of EPC. The first point would more than likely have been approved by the previous government, though hardly the second. A continuity of policy is evidenced however, both in the refusal to accede to the proposal by London that a Political Secretariat be set up and the acceptance only of a reinforcement of the EC Presidency.

Behind the formal position however, the spirit in which EPC had to take place indicated a return to a more orthodox position. Indeed all approaches which might privilege the conduct of Europe’s external actions, including the concepts of ‘principal nation’ and ‘Directoire’ (both notions enter-tained by Valéry Giscard d’Estaing towards the end of his mandate) were rejected.⁷ As André Chandernagor states, ‘France has no “small partners”, it just has “partners”’, sentiments echoed by Claude Cheysson: ‘There will be no Paris- Bonn axis; there will be a privileged relationship between France and West Germany, but it will not exclude bilateral relations with other states whether on Community or non-Community problems.⁸

The procedures shaped by the London Report however, represented the most to which France was prepared to consent. Indeed the Mitterrand government was not at all receptive to the concerns voiced throughout 1981 by Hans-Dietrich Genscher, the German Foreign Affairs Minister, about a European foreign policy capable of lending its weight to the East-West dialogue and of playing a part in the field of security. The draft European Act, jointly presented by Germany and Italy in November 1981 (the ‘Genscher-Colombo Plan’) did not provoke any official comment and was met with an obvious lack of enthusiasm. Messrs Colombo’s and Genschers’s ambition was to resuscitate the objective of Political Union, particularly through the setting up of a common foreign policy which would allow member states to act together in world affairs. They also expressed the wish for ‘the coordination of security policy and the adoption of common European positions in this sphere’.⁹ To this statement of political objectives was added a more properly institutional section considering the possible participation of Defence Ministers in the work of EPC and the setting up of a Secretariat for Political Cooperation.

The discussions which took place among the partners in 1982 and which, within the framework of the solemn Statement on European Union, led to a significant reduction of the initial ambitions, confirm the lack of any French interest in a relaunching of Political Union that would imply the development of a common foreign and security policy. In fact rather than putting questions of security on the EPC agenda, since the very beginning of Mitterrand’s term of office, Paris had favoured a revival of the WEU.

The speech made at the WEU Assembly on 1 December 1981 by the Secretary of State, M Lemoine, testifies to this, as do comments made by Cheysson on the following day to the effect that, ‘the WEU must be revived’.¹⁰ In 1982 the solicitude of the French government towards this organization was successively to lead the Foreign Minister, Claude Cheysson, the Prime Minister, Pierre Mauroy and the Defence Minister, Charles Hernu, to address the WEU Assembly. From these interventions a very clear message emerges: given that the European Community has no competence with regard to defence it is necessary, despite the diversity of national situations, to resort to the WEU to debate, solely among Europeans, the European dimension of security and to promote cooperation with respect to armaments. ‘All this must be done most delicately since nothing should be attempted which would threaten to uncouple the defence of Europe from that of the [North Atlantic] Alliance in general’,¹¹ and in the recognition that such an endeavour should not be rushed into.

A selective approach to the ‘acquis politique’¹²

Thus, locked into a specific framework and well-defined procedures and, despite the theoretical support it enjoys, EPC varied in the weight it carried in the formulation of French external policy during the first years of Mitterrand’s term of office.

It is obvious that in the crisis between Argentina and the UK over the Falkland Islands, membership of the Community provoked an immediate reaction of solidarity with the UK This recalls the attitude once taken by De Gaulle in similar circumstances towards the USA and Cuba in 1962. Convinced that the Community ‘has its positive and negative aspects and that one should help our partners when they are in difficulties’, within the framework of the EPC the French government demonstrated unfailing support for the UK, regardless of whatever second thoughts François Mitterrand might have had on the substance of the respective claims and on the cost of such a policy in terms of the image of France in Latin America¹³

But such feelings of constraint, born out of an obligation of solidarity and respect for international law, constitute an exception in relation to EPC. In general the obligation to consult one’s partners before any important initiative of national diplomacy does not seem to have been of major concern for the French government. Indeed France’s partners have often voiced their astonishment at not having been informed—let alone consulted —before the launching of a number of such initiatives. Examples are the Franco-Mexican statement of 28 August 1981 on El Salvador, in which the representative status of the Democratic Revolutionary Front was recognized, or the decision—announced in January 1982—to sell arms to the Sandinista regime in Nicaragua. Similarly, the challenge issued by Paris to some aspects of the ‘acquis politique’, particularly in the Middle East, resembled the politics of the ‘fait accompli’.

Indeed it was in regard to the Arab-Israeli conflict that France insisted most strongly on differentiating her position. As early as the Luxembourg meeting of the European Council, and even more explicitly during the subsequent press conference, Mitterrand challenged the Venice Declaration issued after the European Council of 13 June 1980, acceding only to those principles within the text which he considered would serve as a basis for a settlement of the conflict. The document in question, with its insistence on a ‘global settlement’, was considered too favourable to the Arab position, too critical of Camp David and, in envisaging a ‘European initiative’ which had been impugned in advance by one of the parties to the conflict, too presumptuous. French policy was henceforth defined in the following way: a reminder of the principles which were to serve as the basis for the settlement, such as appeared in the Venice text and in the statement of the Ten on 23 November on the participation of four European countries, including France, in the observation force based in the Sinai; acceptance of a Palestinian state; concern for balanced relations with both conflicting parties; preference for a policy of small incremental gains which would take into account the insufficient but on the whole positive contribution of the Camp David agreement.

On 7 December, during his visit to Israel, the French Minister for External Relations, Claude Cheysson, having confirmed the outmoded character of the Venice text, added to these various points France’s refusal to join any initiative which was not expressly undertaken at the request of the conflicting parties. Thus contrasting the ‘initiative’ planned in Venice to the responses produced by the Egyptian requests over the Sinai force and to the interest expressed in the Fahd plan, he said: ‘Not being a country of the region we have, in ourselves, neither project nor initiatives to offer. There will be no French project, there will be no French initiative, there will be, as long as we are in Government, no European project, no European initiative.’¹⁴

Whatever the relative impasse in which the Venice-planned initiative found itself after the subsequent developments in the region, the statement by France, without consultation of or warning to her partners, that there would be no more European initiatives, caused surprise by its abrupt and uncompromising tone. Not only did it mark a change from official French policy as defined by President Mitterrand in his September press conference (far from contrasting Camp David and Venice, he had declared on that occasion, ‘I will take both’). But it also contradicted the 23 November statement in which the Ten had made explicit reference to the June 1980 text. Above all it questioned both the spirit and the results of Political Cooperation by undermining a process initiated ten years earlier, which had allowed for a harmonization of European foreign policies on an issue over which they had hitherto been profoundly divided.

In terms of East-West relations, by contrast, French diplomacy had accommodated previous European stances even if this meant inflecting them with a sense of greater intransigence toward Moscow. Thus during the Luxembourg meeting of the European Council held in June 1981, Paris subscribed to the plan suggested for Afghanistan and during the Madrid Conference on the aftermath of the CSCE took a very firm line. The range of attitudes within the Community concerning events in Poland allowed French policy to situate itself within the European framework without too much difficulty. After the ‘of course we will do nothing’, uttered by Claude Cheysson at the onset of the crisis, the compromise adopted by the Ten on 4 January 1982 suited the French demand for firmness on principles and for a low profile on possible sanctions. The conclusion a few days later of an agreement providing for the delivery to France by the USSR of important quantities of gas confirms the minimalist approach adopted by France to the proposed imposition of sanctions on the Soviet Union.

The convergence among Europeans on the subject of East-West relat...

Table of contents

• COVER PAGE
• TITLE PAGE
• COPYRIGHT PAGE
• CONTRIBUTORS
• PREFACE
• INTRODUCTION ACTORS AND ACTIONS
• PART I THE MAJOR ACTORS
• PART II THE SMALLER COUNTRIES