Europe as Global Actor
European Union-funded school in Myanmar, 2017
Credit: European Union / Pierre Prakash, 2017 / CC BY NC ND
Summary
Based on ever greater economic and commercial integration, the European Union has become a major actor in globalization. Even though it struggles to assert itself in the diplomatic and military fields, where the large member states are reluctant to transfer their sovereignty despite the obvious decline of their influence on the international scene—particularly in the face of emerging countries—the EU’s capacity for action on these issues is becoming established, with one proviso: it is not happening via the traditional instruments of power.
The European Union (EU) is a regional organization with a unique model of integration. Having a solid institutional framework, it benefits from important transfers of sovereignty in a variety of spheres, particularly economic and commercial. Diplomacy and military affairs essentially remain under the direction of member states. While the EU has trouble intervening in international crises (Syria, etc.) and weighing in in international power relationships (with Russia, for example), it is not actually without influence. Influence is exerted not through coercion and military power, but through the standards it promotes. This particular form of integration in international relations is explained by the very nature of the EU and its origins.
Commercial giant, political dwarf
European integration is the result of particular historical circumstances and the voluntarism of actors that prioritized the search for consensus in a multilateral framework over and above power relationships. After the devastation caused by World War II, and from 1948, when the Cold War was splitting the continent in two, Europe’s founding fathers, inspired by liberal, sought to leave behind national rivalries by fostering economic integration between former enemies. Instead of the balance of power that had shaped the continent since the Vienna Congress (1815), but which proved incapable of preventing wars, the idea was to construct a space for free movement (of goods, capital, people, etc.) by eliminating borders ; a space where interdependence would make war impossible because it would be detrimental to all concerned. Aided by the United States, which, in the face of the USSR, was working for the continent’s economic recovery (Marshall Plan, 1947-1951) and military protection (NATO [North Atlantic Treaty Organization], 1949), Franco-German reconciliation was sealed by the ECSC (European Coal and Steel Community, 1951) and then by the EEC (European Economic Community, 1957), enabling Europe to enter an era of peace and political stability. This had been unknown for centuries and was honored by the Nobel Peace Prize in 2012.
Europe’s labyrinthine intertwinings, 2018
Comment: The map shows the institutional complexity of Europe, where national territories never entirely match up. There have been extensions over time, during the course of several decades, and a recent shrinkage, followed by the addition of the euro zone (smaller), the Schengen area (which does not include all EU member states but does contain some non-members), the Council of Europe (larger), and the NATO Military Alliance (which does not include all EU member states but, again, comprises some non-members).
Peace through economics
European construction was a political undertaking whose main purpose was to bring about peace and collective security on the continent by going beyond national state interests. But the means of achieving this was economic in nature, because it was the reinforcement of economic and commercial interdependence that was to ensure its success. Since the EU’s scope of activity mainly involved the economic and commercial domains, it was logically in these areas that it could exert most influence. With an internal market of a half billion inhabitants, representing 20% of global GDP and international trade, the EU is a major economic actor in the contemporary world, particularly within bodies such as the WTO, where the European Trade Commissioner negotiates for all member states. The EU is also a recognized negotiating partner in areas where competence has been transferred to the community level, as in international climate . Finally, the EU provides over half of world development aid (76 billion euros in 2017), making it a pre-eminent actor in this area, too. As a logical expression of its prime position in the trade sector, the EU negotiates bilateral agreements directly with other states (United States, China, etc.) and regional groups (MERCOSUR [Southern Common Market], ASEAN [Association of Southeast Asian Nations], etc.), and has formed institutional relationships with most countries in the world as well as with large international bodies.
Grandes découvertes et premier partage du monde
Comment: The map was drawn up from a compilation of several historical atlases. It uses a projection showing the Atlantic area where the dividing line was situated, and arbitrated by the papacy, between the two late 15th-century colonial powers (the Spanish and Portuguese empires). It shows two different land masses: the global network of Portuguese trading posts extending as far as China on one side, and the Andean territory resulting from the Spanish conquests on the other.
Trade Agreements with the EU, 1973-2018
Comment: Over the course of the last 45 years, the European Union has signed trade agreements with many states and regional networks, with the exception of a few states (the United States, Byelorussia, Australia, etc.). Countries in Central Africa and Asia are also exceptions, but future partnerships with them are due to come into force. Historically and geographically, these partnerships were first formed with neighbors to the east then to the south of the Mediterranean, before spreading to other continents.
Diplomacy without the military
Despite the gradual, but slow, establishment of institutional structures (Common Foreign and Security Policy [CFSP, 1993], the Common Security and Defense Policy [CSDP, 1999], the European External Action Service [EEAS, 2009]), member states remain jealous of their sovereignty and continue to manage most of their external relations independently, which often leaves them powerless (Yugoslavia during the 1990s, Iraq in 2003, etc.). The pooling of military capabilities remains a fond hope, since each large state seeks to promote its own arms industry. The EU therefore adopts a humanitarian approach to diplomatic and military affairs. Since 2003, it has engaged in civil and military actions on the ground, essentially for the purpose of peacekeeping and post- conflict reconstruction, in Bosnia, Kosovo, DRC, Mali, South Sudan, Afghanistan, and so on. Through the intermediary of the , it plays an active role in certain international negotiations, as in the Iran nuclear deal of 2015.
European Union peacekeeping missions, 2018
Comment: This map shows European Union peace missions. Following a monitoring mission in Yugoslavia launched in 1991, these operations became more numerous only as of the 2000s, and their scale remained more modest than those of the UN. With the exception of an operation in Indonesia, they all take place, or have taken place in areas “close” to the EU: in Central Europe (the Balkans), in the countries of the ex-USSR (Ukraine, Caucasus, etc.), in the Near and Middle East and in Africa (Central, Sahel and Somalia).
For want of a shared political vision and willingness of states to transfer their sovereignty with regard to foreign policy, it is mainly toward its immediate neighbors (Eastern Europe, Turkey, North Africa) that the EU’s political influence makes itself felt. Thanks to the European Neighborhood Policy (ENP, 2003), the EU engaged in closer cooperation with these countries (in areas such as security, justice, trade, etc.), while encouraging respect for common European values (rule of law, market economy, etc.). It is therefore through soft power and not coercion that the EU asserts itself on the international scene and claims to be a major player in the globalization process.
- integration > Integration
- Concept with multiple uses. The opposite of “segregation,” with reference to the incorporation of foreigners within host societies, “integration” means more than just inclusion by juxtaposition (multiculturalism) but is different from assimilation. Spatial integration refers to the progressive incorporation of peripheral, marginalized spaces within a central spatial system. The problem of social disintegration occurs when groups experience multiple types of exclusion at once: economic, social, political and spatial. The globalization processes that are connecting societies but maintaining or deepening social, economic, health and cultural disparities between and within these societies, are creating and reproducing a global social integration deficit that is increasingly apparent to those excluded.
- institutional > Institutions
- The term institution refers to social structures (rules, standards, practices, actions, roles) that are long-lasting, organized in a stable and depersonalized way, and play a part in regulating social relationships. An institution can be formalized within organizations (international or otherwise). In political science, institutionalism tackles the objects of political analysis by studying their structural basis and their organizational model rather than thinking about how they relate to society.
- sovereignty > Sovereignty
- This political idea was formed in the Middle Ages in order to legitimate the independence of emerging states (France, England) from the Pope and Emperor, and taken up by many thinkers (Bodin, Grotius, Schmitt). It refers to a state’s claim to recognize no authority above itself on its own territory and serves more to justify political and legal representations than to describe existing power relations. As a fundamental notion of the international system and the principles of equality between states and non-intervention in internal affairs, it is the opposite of interference. In democratic states, it is attributed to the “sovereign” people, whose votes give legitimacy to institutions and governments. Processes of regional integration involve delegating elements of state sovereignty.
- power > Power
- Ability of political actors to impose their will on others. Comparable to the notion of authority within a nation, power is never absolute but has its existence in a relationship, since power relations are a matter of each actor’s perception of the other. Power is key to the realist approach to international relations, where it is understood in geostrategic terms (hard power is based on force and coercion, especially of a military nature). The transnationalist approach offers a more diversified vision including factors of influence (Joseph Nye’s soft power exerted in economic, cultural and other terms) and emphasizing the importance of controlling different orders of power, from hard to soft (Susan Strange’s “structural power”).
- multilateral > Multilateralism
- To see multilateralism as international cooperation involving at least three states reduces it to a mere technique. In fact, it also has a qualitative, normative aspect which has been evident since the time of the League of Nations. According to Franck Petiteville, this makes multilateralism a form of international collective action which aims to produce “norms and rules seeking to establish a cooperative international order governing international interdependencies.” The adjective “multilateral” first appeared in the late 1940s which is when awareness of the concept began to emerge.
- Cold War
- Period of ideological, geopolitical, economic and cultural confrontation between the United States and the USSR from the late 1940s through the end of the 1980s. Vigorous debate is still ongoing among historians regarding the precise dates of its beginning (the 1917 Russian Revolution? 1944? 1947?) and end (the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 or the collapse of the USSR in 1991?). These two superpowers formed two blocs of varying degrees of cohesion around them. This bipolarization of the world to some extent masked other political, economic and social dynamics.
- liberal > Liberalism
- Arising from Enlightenment philosophy, Liberalism refers to a corpus of political philosophy that places the preservation of individual rights at the center of its conception of society and the political order. Devolving from this, on the one hand, are mechanisms to safeguard the individual against the arbitrary use of state power, which mostly translate into a preference for a democratic political order; and, on the other, an emphasis on respecting private property, which leads in turn to a preference for minimal state involvement in the economy – restricting the state’s role to matters of sovereignty. Behind this consensus are many debates around the level of state involvement in the economy, or around protection of individuals vs. that of a political order and given social norms, which translate into different variants of liberalism (such as German-style ordoliberalism, libertarianism, or liberal conservatism).
- national > Nation
- Political community based on an awareness of shared characteristics and/or a will to live together. It is common practice to contrast political and cultural concepts of the nation – which in practice are mutually influential and tend to converge. In the political concept, the nation is invented and produced by a state: the territory precedes the nation and defines its contours (this is known as the French concept, based on the republican melting pot and jus soli, right of the soil). In the cultural understanding of nation, a shared common culture produces the nation. The national project consists in bringing this population together on a single territory (the cultural or romantic or German concept of the nation, based on jus sanguinis, right of blood). The latter concept intrinsically produces conflicts and can lead to ethnic cleansing or genocide (Nazi Germany, Greater Serbia, etc.).
- movement > Circulation
- People, merchandise, services, capital, information, ideas, values, and models are being transferred and exchanged in ever-increasing numbers. The expansion, diversification, and acceleration of movement typify the ongoing process of globalization. Circulation connects economic and social spaces through networks which, depending on their density, fluidity, output, and hierarchy, can differentiate them considerably. Of all types of circulation, information in the broadest sense is experiencing the most rapid growth, whereas the circulation of people is the one encountering most obstacles.
- borders > Border
- The line that marks the limit of state sovereignty, as distinct from the hazy boundary zones or limits of empires. In no way natural, these long-term historic constructs, which can be more or less endogenous and more or less subject to dispute and violence, are being profoundly altered by contemporary globalization processes. Regional integration processes are transforming and diminishing them – even erasing them, and pushing them back; transnational actors are crossing them or bypassing them; at the same time, they are being closed to migration, while new borders (social, cultural) are being constructed.
- interdependence > Interdependency
- Mode of relationship based on dense, continuous interaction between social and political entities, leading to reduced autonomy for each of them individually as they are partially reconfigured in relation to each other. Used of states primarily in the context of globalization, implying a reduction or modulation of sovereignty as well as a relativization of power: after all, interdependence goes both ways, implying a reliance of the strong on the weak just as much as of the weak on the strong.
- Marshall Plan
- Launched in 1948, the Marshall Plan was a vast program of aid for the reconstruction of Europe. At the time nearly 13 billion dollars (equivalent to some 100 billion dollars today) were distributed to the European countries that were members of the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation (OEEC). Beyond the need to help European countries rebuild their economies, the Marshall Plan also sought to provide an outlet for American industrial output (after military spending dropped with the end of the war) and to prevent the rise of communist parties in Western Europe by combating poverty (Truman’s policy of containment).
- state > State
- The state is a political system that is centralized (unlike the feudal system), differentiated (from civil society, public/private space), institutionalized (institutions are depersonalized), territorialized (a territory whose borders mark the absolute limit of its jurisdiction), that claims sovereignty (holding ultimate power) and that bears responsibility for ensuring its population’s security. In public international law, the state is defined as a population living on a territory defined by borders subject to a political authority (the national territorial state).
- negotiating > Negotiation
- Practice which aims to secure agreement between public or private actors, satisfying the participants’ material and symbolic interests by means of mutual concessions. International negotiations are one of the methods of peacefully resolving disputes and can be bilateral (between two actors) or multilateral (three or more actors). They often result in an official document (joint declaration, peace agreement, trade treaty, international convention). Collective negotiation (or collective bargaining) refers to negotiations within a company between the employer and workforce representatives (generally belonging to trade unions) regarding the application of labor law.
- peacekeeping > Peacekeeping
- The UN defines peacekeeping as “a technique designed to preserve the peace, however fragile, where fighting has been halted, and to assist in implementing agreements achieved by the peacemakers” (Capstone Doctrine, 2008). It is different from peacemaking, which relates to conflicts currently under way, and to peace enforcement, which involves coercive measures including the use of force. The concept of peacebuilding refers both to the complex process of creating the conditions for sustainable peace and to targeted measures designed to reduce the risk of a return to conflict and to lay the foundations for sustainable development. These are the principles that guide the conduct of peace missions – principles that have at times attracted criticism.
- conflict > War
- Violent confrontation between armed groups over values, status, power or scarce resources, in which the aim of each party is to neutralize, weaken or eliminate their adversaries. This organized, collective, armed violence can be undertaken by states (via their national armies) or by non-state groups; it can bring several states into opposition (interstate war) or occur within a single state (civil war). The former, progressively codified within a legal framework, have become rare, while the latter, today primarily caused by state institutional failure, are tending to become more international in scope, to last over time (sometimes decades) and to be extremely devastating, especially for civilian populations.
- ENP > European Neighborhood Policy
- This policy was launched in 2004, when the European Union was enlarged to include the countries of central Europe. It was intended to provide a framework for relationships with the new non-member neighbors to the East and South that had not plans to join (Algeria, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Egypt, Georgia, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Moldavia, Palestine, Syria, Tunisia and Ukraine). With an annual budget of some 2 billion euros, its aim is to extend European policies to these neighboring states and to promote their democratic and economic modernization, without bringing them into the institutional framework of the EU. Russia, which would like to be treated as a special partner by the EU, has refused to be part of the ENP.
- rule of law > Rule of law
- Rule of law refers to a system in which the legal standards are codified, stable and transparent, so that citizens know their rights and duties, while public authority is limited by its subjection to the law. This kind of system presupposes the existence of independent courts of law and equality of all before the law.
- market economy > Capitalism
- An economic system based on private ownership of the means of production and the free market (free enterprise, free trade, free competition, etc.; the foundations of liberalism). In this system, the capital holders (as distinct from employees who form the workforce and who, according to Marx, are exploited) seek to maximize their profits (accumulating capital). After the end of feudalism, the system took hold during the Industrial Revolution. Now adopted by all countries (with the exception of communist ones), it takes multiple forms, and still includes state intervention (to a greater or lesser extent), for the purpose of regulation (notably in the Rhineland model or the social market economy in Scandinavian countries) or as actor and planner (Japan, Singapore, France, etc.).
- globalization > Globalization
- The term globalization refers to a set of multidimensional processes (economic, cultural, political, financial, social, etc.) that are reconfiguring the global arena. These processes do not exclusively involve a generalized scale shift toward the global because they do not necessarily converge, do not impact all individuals, and do not impact everyone in the same way. Contemporary globalization means more than just an increase in trade and exchanges, an internationalization of economies and an upsurge in connectivity: it is radically transforming the spatial organization of economic, political, social and cultural relationships.