The European Union's New Foreign Policy

Martin Westlake

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN:
  9783030483166
• eBook ISBN:
  9783030483173
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Diplomacy & Treaties
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This volume brings together senior practitioners and academic specialists to consider how the EU's new foreign policy has been evolving and how the various actors are maintaining the holistic approach intended by the draftsmen of the 2009 Lisbon Treaty.

© The Author(s) 2020

M. Westlake (ed.)The European Union’s New Foreign PolicyThe European Union in International Affairshttps://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-48317-3_1

Begin Abstract

1. Introduction: The European Union’s New Foreign Policy

Martin Westlake^{1, 2}

(1)

European Institute, College of Europe, Bruges, Belgium

(2)

London School of Economics and Political Science, London, UK

Martin Westlake

Keywords

New foreign policyLisbon TreatyHigh RepresentativeEuropean External Action Service (EEAS)David Davies of Llandinam

End Abstract

What’s New?

That the European Union (EU) has something that can accurately be described as a foreign policy is a relatively recent phenomenon. For a long time, the European Community’s external policies were focused on trade and development. Foreign policy per se remained a jealously guarded Member State prerogative—defence was completely taboo. The story of the gradual emergence of the European Union’s foreign policy has been well-rehearsed,¹ with most commentators identifying the 1992 signing of the Maastricht Treaty, with its provisions on the Common Foreign and Security Policy, as the moment when something recognisable as a proper foreign policy first started to emerge. The question arises, given that this is such a recent phenomenon, why does the title of this book refer to a ‘new’ foreign policy, with its strong implication that there was an ‘old’ policy? The answer is a composite one, comprising a series of constitutional and institutional, political and geographical developments that have resulted in a new geopolitical environment with a series of new challenges being addressed by a combination of new instruments and actors and old instruments and actors used in new and different ways. Thus, the ‘new’ of the title refers as much, by implication, to the new environment as it does to new instruments, actors and initiatives (and old ones used in new ways). It is, in short, this ensemble that justifies the term ‘new’.

Clearly, the 2009 implementation of the Lisbon Treaty represented a major departure in this context, bringing many constitutional and institutional developments in its wake. Amongst the more important constitutional/institutional innovations were, variously: the creation of the High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy; the (2011) creation of the European External Action Service (EEAS)²; the creation of the permanent Presidency of the European Council; the implementation of the Treaty on European Union (TEU) Article 3.5³ and the concomitant establishment of a holistic overall external policy with a strong prescriptive element. Significant developments that have followed in the wake of the implementation of the Lisbon Treaty have included: the consolidation of the European Council President’s role, as the EU navigated its way through three successive and unexpected crises—namely, the eurozone crisis, the migration crisis and Brexit⁴; the consolidation of the High Representative’s role and empowerment through a series of significant achievements (perhaps most notably, the normalisation of relations with Serbia and the establishment of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action on Iran’s nuclear programme—JCPOA) that have, cumulatively, put the High Representative on the map and legitimised the role⁵; in that context, the 2014–2019 Juncker Commission’s creation of ‘teams’ of Commissioners, with one team of seven Commissioners, ‘Europe in the World’, led by the High Representative, finally realising an old ambition to encourage overall coherence in the European Commission’s external actions, and with the new European Commission of Ursula von der Leyen following the same model⁶; also, in that context, the development and adoption of the European External Action Service’s 2016 Global Strategy and its follow-ups (notably, annual reports)⁷; the 2017 activation of Permanent Structured Cooperation on security and defence matters (PESCO)⁸; the growth of the role and powers of the European Parliament⁹ and the parallel growth of parliamentary diplomacy¹⁰ and the growing potential of the euro as a foreign policy instrument.¹¹

The European Union’s new geopolitical environment would include a number of significant developments. First, Africa’s continued evolution as an economic bloc and the European Union’s recognition of this rapidly emerging reality. In March 2018, 49 of the African Union’s 55 member states signed an agreement to create an African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) which, if ratified, will represent the largest free trade area in the world in terms of participating countries since the creation of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in 1995. As Jean-Claude Juncker put it in his September 2018 ‘State of the Union’ address to the European Parliament (EP), ‘Africa is the future. By 2050, Africa’s population will number 2.5 billion. One in four people on earth will be African … Africa does not need charity, it needs true and fair partnerships. And Europe needs this partnership just as much’.¹² It was this acknowledgement of Africa’s fast-evolving emergence as a regional trade bloc that led to what this book has dubbed the ‘pivot’ to Africa. As Juncker continued, ‘I believe we should develop the numerous European-African trade agreements into a continent-to-continent free trade agreement, as an economic partnership between equals’.¹³ Second, the EU has had to come to a new understanding about its neighbourhood, and has had to elaborate a new neighbourhood policy, particularly as a function of such developments as the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea and the stalling of the EU’s previous policy of offering the prospect of future candidate status to all of the former Member States of the Soviet Union without exception. Third, in part as a function of climate change, the Arctic region has been opening up as a source of commercial exploitation and transportation, creating new geopolitical strategic considerations for the EU, as well as concerns about the degradation of the environment. Fourth, the EU has increasingly had to contend with issues arising out of EU membership itself, ranging from ‘enlargement fatigue’ through to Brexit, but also continued difficult relations with Switzerland and the management of tensions and further progress in the Western Balkans. Fifth, the EU’s world view has had to be adapted to take into account a growing number of populist and revisionist leaders who cannot be relied upon to espouse the previously broadly shared attitudes towards growth, development, trade and multilateralism.¹⁴

The European Union’s new international political environment would similarly include a number of significant developments. A first concerns the changing behaviour of the United States, formerly considered the EU’s natural partner in a multilateral world order. Developments in this context would include the 2011 US pivot to Asia under President Barack Obama¹⁵ and the post-2017 US withdrawal from the multilateral world system (including trade and monetary policy) and President Donald Trump’s neo-Westphalian foreign policy stance. A second concerns the growth of an assertive China as an economic and trade power and also as a geopolitical actor, particularly since the 2013 launch of its ‘one belt one road’ (BRI) initiative.¹⁶ The EU has had to adapt not just to China’s increasing presence in areas of geopolitical importance, including Africa,¹⁷ but also to the instability arising out of US–China relations, particularly in trade and monetary policy. A third concerns the aggressive assertiveness of the Russian Federation under an increasingly autocratic Vladimir Putin, encapsulated in such developments as the Russian Federation’s 2014–2015 military intervention in Ukraine and annexation of Crimea,¹⁸ and its role in Syria and Libya, and an aggressive, though not pugnacious, stance in the Arctic region.¹⁹ A fourth concerns the imperative for the EU to establish a new, more bilateral and regional, trade policy following the 2008 stalling of the Doha round of WTO-sponsored trade talks, a policy which must, variously, fully implement the normative approach of TEU Articles 2²⁰ and 21(1)²¹ in general and take into account the muscular trade approaches of the US and China in particular.

New and increasingly urgent challenges for the European Union include: migration and demography, with refugee flows on the one hand, but ageing populations and shrinking workforces on the other; climate change and environmental issues, and the concomitant development of energy policies; access to resources, including water and minerals; and, in an increasingly interconnected world, the rise of issues such as cybersecurity and autonomy in areas such as developing its own global satellite navigation system (Galileo).²²

In all these different contexts—constitutional and institutional developments, the new geopolitical environment, the new international political environment, new and increasingly urgent challenges—the European Union has been developing new instruments and actors and brin...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Front Matter
• 1. Introduction: The European Union’s New Foreign Policy
• Part I. Over-Arching Issues
• Part II. Some New Geo-Political Challenges
• Part III. Some New Policy Challenges
• Part IV. Conclusions
• Back Matter