The motivation of European Union mediation in civil conflicts

ABSTRACT

Since the EU has expanded its common security focus in the 1990s, this important regional organisation has become the most frequent mediator in low-level civil conflicts worldwide. Under what conditions is the European Union (EU) likely to become involved in mediation in civil conflicts? Is the participation in mediation only explained by the EU's bias toward its near abroad, or is the EU more strategic? Some scholars have suggested that the EU's regional bias for its near abroad is the key explanation for the onset of EU mediation, but we propose that the reality of EU mediation presents a more nuanced story. We posit three explanations based on mediator bias: regional bias, economic bias, and normative bias. Overall, we argue that the EU will mediate in civil conflicts that are in its near abroad, but also where the EU has economic bias and where the EU can exercise its normative power in highly intractable conflicts. We test our hypotheses using statistical analysis of the UCDP low-level civil conflicts data from 1993 to 2004 and Civil War Mediation data from 1974 to 2005. We find strong support for our hypotheses, determining key factors that reveal the EU's strategic onset of mediation.     

Fostering arms control: The role of unilateralism

Climate change has taken centre stage in European and international politics. Since the second half of the 1980s, the EU has established itself as an international leader on climate change and has considerably improved its leadership record. The Union has significantly enhanced both its external representation and its internal climate policies. However, implementation and policy coherence, coordination of EU environmental diplomacy, an evolving international agenda, EU enlargement, and a still precarious EU unity remain major challenges. Shifts in underlying driving forces and advances of EU domestic climate and energy policies nevertheless support the expectation that the EU will remain a progressive force in international climate policy for some time.     

Re‐setting the Euro‐Mediterranean security agenda

The EU’s reaction is slow; the EU is divided; the EU is unable to deliver: time and time again, newspapers depict the image of an incoherent and uncoordinated EU foreign policy. This time, the topic under discussion was the EU’s response to the Libyan crisis. Many have compared the EU’s internal divisions over Libya with those over the Iraq war, an often used example to illustrate the limits of the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP). This article aims to assess the coherence of the EU’s short- to medium-term response to the Libyan crisis. It distinguishes between the horizontal, inter-institutional, vertical and multilateral dimensions of EU coherence. The analysis shows that unilateral actions or inactions of the member states mainly account for the EU's incoherent response. The post-Lisbon institutional structure has done little to compensate for these internal divisions. While the EU cannot change the course of national foreign policies, it should increase its ‘leadership for coherence’, Europeanise its crisis response in the medium term and aim at preventing incoherence in the longer term.     

Unintended Consequences of EU Democracy Support in the European Neighbourhood

ABSTRACT

The European Union’s (EU) impact on the political governance of the European neighbourhood is varied and sometimes opposite to the declared objectives of its democracy support policies. The democracy promotion literature has to a large extent neglected the unintended consequences of EU democracy support in Eastern Europe and the Middle East and North Africa. The EU has left multiple imprints on the political trajectories of the countries in the neighbourhood and yet the dominant explanation, highlighting the EU’s security and economic interests in the two regions,cannot fully account for the unintended consequences of its policies. The literature on the ‘pathologies’ of international organisations offers an explanation, emphasizing the failures of the EU bureaucracy to anticipate, prevent or reverse the undesired effects of its democracy support in the neighbourhood.     

Somalia versus Captain ‘Hook’: assessing the EU's security actorness in countering piracy off the Horn of Africa

An internal security problem of Somalia—state failure from internal conflict resulting in increased piracy—has increasingly become an external security problem for the European Union (EU). This article contributes to analysing the role of the EU as a security actor in countering piracy off the Horn of Africa, by examining three different dimensions of the EU response to this problem: (a) the immediate EU response (the EU military mission EUNAVFOR Atalanta); (b) the medium-term EU response (the Critical Maritime Routes (CMR) programme launched by the European Commission); and (c) the long-term EU response (development and security assistance). This article concludes that the EU has been very active in addressing piracy through its naval task-force to protect maritime transport in the western Indian Ocean and the Gulf of Aden, as well as its efforts to enhance regional counter-piracy capacities and thematic and geographical financial instruments. The EU thus has taken up the fight against ‘Captain Hook’.     

Political factors affecting cooperation between Italy,Greece and Turkey

The rise of political Islam in the EU's southern neighbourhood represents a political as well as conceptual challenge to the EU as a foreign policy actor. In the past, the EU reacted to this challenge based on its essentialist perception of political Islam and its overarching interest in regional stability and security. However, the growing salience of ‘contingencist’ interpretations of political Islam and the resolution of the EU's democratisation-stabilisation dilemma in the wake of the Arab Spring have recently provided an opportunity for greater engagement and cooperation. This has enabled a switch in EU policies from a strategy of containment to a strategy of engagement. Despite this, problems remain as the EU continues to expect Islamist actors to adjust to its own discursive framework and as intra-European divisions revive as a result of the renewal of secular-religious divisions in the neighbourhood. This will complicate EU attempts to build a new partnership with Islamist democracies and will fuel old stereotypes and animosities.     

Can the EU be a serious security actor in Asia?

Following the US “pivot” to Asia, the European Union (EU) announced its own pivot to Asia in 2012 with stepped-up engagement. A flurry of high-level visits to Asia, and in particular, Southeast Asia, by the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy followed. The EU is looking for a much more comprehensive engagement of Asia, but at the same time, within Asia; there is always this nagging doubt as to whether the EU can be a serious security actor in Asia. This short brief surveys the constructive role that the EU can play in Asia and argues that the EU should stop fretting about whether it is seen as a serious security actor in Asia and instead focus on what it can do best and do its best in Asia.     

Peripheral or Powerful? The European Union's Strategy to Combat the Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons

Abstract

The European Union has since 2003 developed both a security and a Weapons of Mass Destruction strategy, and it has become the primary interlocutor of Iran in the dispute related to Iran's nuclear development. These are signs of significant policy progress. However, the fact that four years of nuclear diplomacy have brought few results invites a critical appraisal of EU strategy. This essay undertakes this appraisal, arguing that the EU is notably ambivalent regarding its underlying conception of international order. The EU wishes to be pluralist (in the tradition of sovereign equality), but is also anti-pluralist (in the liberal–democratic tradition). The essay lays out how the EU has coped with pressures for reform—arising notably from the United States—within the current international nuclear non-proliferation regime, and how this has made the EU problem apparent. The essay finally suggests that to salvage its policy of effective multilateralism the EU must acknowledge its anti-pluralist bias and promote a common transatlantic approach to nuclear non-proliferation.     

EU public diplomacy in Asia: a case study of the EU Center in Taiwan

Since 2004, the EU has created 11 EU centers and two center-modeled programs in East Asia as an integral part of its public diplomacy in order to “promote the study, understanding, and support of the EU and its policies.” All of these centers were jointly established by the EU and local universities, and more than 50 % of their funding is offered by the EU institutions. Among these centers and programs, the EU Center in Taiwan (EUTW) distinguishes itself from the others in two ways. On one hand, similar to the EU Center in Singapore, it acts as a national center rather than a university center. On the other hand, it was jointly inaugurated by a consortium of seven universities rather than one or two universities across the island. Therefore, this paper aims to evaluate the EU public diplomacy in Asia with the help of soft power theory and an in-depth case study of the EUTW. I will firstly review the development of the EU Studies and EU-related communities in Taiwan before the EUTW was formally inaugurated in May 2009. In the second part, I will present an in-depth analysis of the structure and functioning of the EUTW in terms of EU public diplomacy on the island. In the third part, the work of EUTW in the promotion of study, understanding, and even support of the EU and its policies will be evaluated with help of an institutionalist framework. In the end, I will give a balance sheet of the EUTW in terms of EU public diplomacy before drawing into some conclusions.     

New threats – different response: EU and NATO and Somali piracy

When the European Union (EU) launched its first military naval mission, EU NAVFOR Somalia, Atalanta, the states who are members of both the EU and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) made a political choice: to prioritize the EU over NATO in their multilateral military efforts to fight piracy and its consequences. Thereby, Atalanta challenges the conventional assumption that EU security cooperation will remain limited. It also challenges the widely held belief that the European states will chose to act through NATO if dealing multilaterally with international security issues. How can we explain this decision? This analysis suggests that it can be explained in two phases where different mechanisms were at work. In the first phase, which can be accounted for from a neo-realist perspective, France, who held the Presidency, used particular favorable geopolitical conditions to put an autonomous EU operation on the agenda. However, agreement on the EU option cannot be explained as a result of strategic bargaining. Instead, in a second phase and in line with an alternative hypothesis building on the theory of communicative action, the EU member states came to support the French suggestion due to legitimacy considerations regarding the legal framework of the two operations.     

The counterterrorism agreements of Europol with third countries: Data protection and power asymmetry

This article investigates empirically the impact of power asymmetry and interest formation in the European Union’s (EU) external relations with third countries in the context of the Europol data exchange and counterterrorism agreements. It focuses on three countries, namely the United States, Turkey, and Morocco, which each have a different level of counterterrorism cooperation with the EU. This article argues that the EU acts as a pragmatic actor with regard to Europol’s data exchange agreements with third countries, and that the power asymmetry between the EU and the third country under question determines the extent of the EU’s flexibility. If the power asymmetry favours the EU, then it insists on its data protection demands. Otherwise, the EU is more flexible towards its counterparts on data protection issues.     

Bureaucratic power at play? The performance of the EU in the International Atomic Energy Agency

This article examines the performance of the European Union (EU) in the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Following Barnett and Finnemore, the article argues that the EU as an intergovernmental organization (IO) possesses bureaucratic power based on high technical knowledge and rational–legal authority that it can use to gain influence in the Agency. The EU uses its technical knowledge to be a first-mover in political and technical discussions, and uses its financial support to influence the Agency's technical standards and practices for nuclear safeguards, security, and safety. Nevertheless, the analysis shows that its rational–legal authority as an international organization is limited. Being a regional IO, it does not automatically possess the impartiality and hence legitimacy that ordinarily characterize an international organization. Thus, to further improve its performance in the IAEA, the EU must look beyond internal policy issues and focus on its external legitimacy and standing as well.     

Orchestrating peace in South Sudan: exploring the effectiveness of the European Union’s mediation support

ABSTRACT

Previous research has primarily focused on the EU’s high-profile involvement as direct mediator in peace negotiations. Conversely, less attention has been devoted to the EU’s support to third parties’ mediation efforts, which is a significant component of its mediation activities. Addressing this research gap, this article develops a conceptual framework for the systematic analysis of EU mediation support, identifying key mediation support techniques and the conditions for their success. In terms of mediation support techniques, the EU may rely on “endorsement”, “coordination”, “assistance”, and “lending leverage” to empower and steer third party mediators in line with its mediation objectives and values. We illustrate the utility of the conceptual framework for the EU’s support to IGAD in mediating in South Sudan’s civil war. We find that the EU has contributed significantly to IGAD’s empowerment in terms of endorsement, coordination, assistance, and lending leverage. Simultaneously, our analysis also points to important challenges in the EU-IGAD relationship, which relate to challenges concerning strategic engagement with IGAD’s internal politics that are marked by diverging interests and ties of its member states to the conflict parties.     

The Leverage of the Gatekeeper: Power and Interdependence in the Migration Nexus between the EU and Turkey

In March 2016, the European Union and Turkey reached an agreement seeking to end the refugee flows from Turkey to Greece. This agreement is the outcome of a bargaining process in which Turkey gained considerable leverage from its position as a ‘gatekeeper’ situated between Syria and an increasingly ‘immigration-averse’ and securitised EU. More importantly, this bargaining process might have broader implications for the EU and its relations with its periphery, since Turkey has progressively reversed the asymmetries of power by demonstrating the indispensability of its continued commitment to act as gatekeeper vis-à-vis an increasingly fragmented and anxious EU.     

Dilemmas of implementation: EU democracy assistance in the Mediterranean

The article shows how and why, after having agreed upon a programme for democracy assistance under the name of European Initiative for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR), the EU fell short of its original objectives in programme implementation. This is demonstrated by close analysis of microprojects in Mediterranean countries. The scope of EU action shrank as priorities for action were defined and projects approved. As a consequence, the EU has promoted democracy less than human rights, in relatively less demanding countries, and without spending all the budgeted money. This article shows how these findings are consistent with important themes in Policy analysis and implementation research, and thus supplements other explanations of EU shortcomings. EU democracy assistance, as represented by the EIDHR, is an ambiguous and contested policy, which also suffers from an institutional setting characterized by a long chain of command. This means that there are opportunities for small decisions to gradually shift the focus and downsize the relevance of the policy initiative. The EU is thus unintentionally undermining its own policy goals, as the large number of actors interpret the EU's best interest (and their own position in relation to it) in various and divergent ways.     

The European Union’s trade and investment policy in Asia: new challenges and opportunities in a changing global environment – or: following individual roadmaps

Asia is Europe’s largest trading partner and EU-Asia trade relations have undergone a rapid change since the global financial crisis. On a global scale, the new multilateral trade agreements such as the now stalled Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) involving European Unions’ (EU) major trading partners such as Japan, Singapore and Vietnam also have the potential to change the trade equations. In this paper, we evaluate the new EU trade policy which has been designed to ensure that the EU benefits from the changing global trade scenario and also look at the steps which have been taken by the EU to promote trade relations with its major trading partners in Asia in the predicted ‘Asian century’. We look into the Free Trade Agreements, which are being negotiated with its Asian partners and seek to understand the reasons which have resulted in delays in their signing and negotiations. We evaluate new policies pushed forward by its Asian partners such as the One Belt One Road policy by China and Japan’s policy of securing a large number of trading agreements in the America. Moving ahead, we also shed light on the indirect factors that may influence the success of EU trade negotiations in Asia such as the EU policy on granting China market economy status and the commencement of the ‘Brexit’ process. Lastly, we try to present a list of immediate priorities for EU in Asia, which will ensure that it secures a toehold in trade with the region. All in all, it is shown that the EU has not one and the same approach for all Asian countries but it negotiates flexibly and individually country by country. Because of this “country by country approach” the EU is also not ready to enter into general EU-ASEAN trade negotiations again.     

Making sense of the EU’s response to the Arab uprisings: foreign policy practice at times of crisis

ABSTRACT

The Arab uprisings of 2011 put into question previously held understandings about the stability of authoritarian regimes in North Africa as well as the European Union’s (EU’s) relations with countries in its southern neighbourhood. Despite early calls on behalf of the EU to change its policies, the Union’s responses in the early stages seemed mostly characterised by continuity. This article claims that certain dispositions and background knowledge developed over several decades vis-à-vis EU’s Mediterranean policies served as a baseline from which EU officials and diplomats acted. Drawing on insights from practice approaches, the article argues that the practical understandings on what the EU can (and cannot) do vis-à-vis partner countries in North Africa create a kind of power politics of practical dispositions. The article focuses on the European Neighbourhood Policy - the EU’s flagship initiative - and builds on a unique set of data that combine policy documents and interviews with about 30 EU officials and national diplomats from before and after the Arab uprisings. In this way, it illustrates how practice relates to change in that even though the EU’s responses drew on an established repertoire of practice, enacting it in a new context opened up new possibilities for action.     

Visa liberalization processes in the EU’s Eastern neighbourhood: understanding policy outcomes

Focusing on EU visa liberalization policy with Russia and Eastern Partnership countries as a case study, this article seeks to investigate the drivers of EU external migration policy in regards to its neighbourhood. In doing so, the article seeks to understand whether policy objectives and instruments employed by the EU emphasize security or normative considerations, or both. It also scrutinizes the factors behind this emphasis. In particular, it examines the degree to which EU external migration policy is framed by intra-EU bargaining and interaction with partner countries. The hybrid nature of EU visa policy towards its neighbourhood stems first and foremost from persisting differences in the prioritization of security and values among the major EU actors involved in the policy process. Yet as the article argues, interaction with partner countries crucially shapes the outcomes of the visa liberalization policy, thereby altering the balance between normative and security considerations that results from negotiations between EU actors.     

A matter of balance: the European Union as a mediator in Yemen

The mediation efforts of the European Union (EU) Delegation in Yemen started with the uprising in 2011 which led to the conclusion of the National Dialogue Conference in 2014. This article examines the EU's understanding of mediation vis-à-vis its practice. The case of Yemen lends itself to trace EU mediation capabilities from the implementation of the “Concept on Strengthening Mediation and Dialogue Capacities” to a more systematic approach because the Mediation Support Team (MST) of the European External Action Service took office in 2011. Building on an analytical framework of mediation as a tool of EU foreign policy, this article demonstrates how EU mediation presents itself along a political and a technical dimension. The collaboration of the MST and the EU Delegation personnel in Yemen fostered an increase in mediation awareness. However, it could not develop its full potential as the UN Special Advisor sidelined the EU and other members of the Group of Ten Ambassadors through his proactive approach. Despite those difficulties of standing up to established actors in the field, this study argues that EU mediation is about balancing its political and technical dimension. For now, the political seems to outweigh the craft of mediation in the case of Yemen.     

The European Union’s common foreign and security policy reforms and its implications for Northeast Asia

The European Union (EU) is at a turning point. With the bipolar order of the Cold War fast becoming a distant memory, the European Union must quickly establish itself on the global stage before it loses the opportunity to do so. With Northeast Asia fast emerging as a new economic giant and political center for world affairs, the EU must reform its Common Foreign and Security Policy in order to develop a reputation and image as a global actor of soft power, based on its long-standing values and peaceful diplomacy. However, despite major reforms in the Lisbon Treaty (2009), the EU has not been able to form cohesion amongst its members, thus hindering its progress in achieving such international recognition. This paper therefore analyses the reforms taken place so far and suggests further reforms that will build a strong foundation for a united and cohesive foreign policy. It will then look at how the reformed framework will allow the EU to establish itself as a global actor in political affairs, in particular in Northeast Asia.