European Union Security Actorness

The Comprehensive Approach Hampered by Policy Differentiation

Autores

  • Ana Paula Brandão Assistant Professor of International Relations at the University of Minho, responsible for the courses of “EU Political System”, “Analysis of International Relations”, “International Organisations” at undergraduate level, “Multilevel Governance”, “EU Institutions” and “Debates in International Relations” at Master level, “Security Theories” at the PhD Program in Political Science and International Relations. She is researcher of the Political Science Research Centre (CICP). She integrates the Directive Board of the Portuguese Political Science Association (APCP). She is member of several Study Groups and speaker on European security at the National Defense Institute (IDN). Her research interests, publications and communications in national and international conferences focus on Security Studies (security theories, European security, Human Security) and European Studies (CFSP/CSDP, EU Internal Security, EU actorness, EU political system).

Resumo

The purpose of the article is to analyse the implications of policy differentiation for EU’s comprehensive approach in security matters. The change in the post-Cold War security environment (opportunity) favoured the explicitness of the (pillarised) security actorness of the European Union. Following the 9/11 attacks, the EU adopted an ambitious security approach that confirmed four interconnected dynamics: expansion of the security agenda, externalisation of internal security cooperation, internalisation of Common Security Defence Policy, and cross-pillarisation. It was an upgrade for the assertion of the European Union as a comprehensive and multi-functional security actor, endowed with autonomy, capability and presence. Since then, the EU narrative and practices on Comprehensive Approach have been applied to several security problems such as crises and conflicts, organised crime, piracy, cybersecurity, failed states, trafficking in human beings, radicalisation, hybrid threats. The comprehensive approach combined with a global (reach) ambition impose unique requirements on EU. A major challenge to EU’s security actorness is policy differentiation in the security domain. With the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty, the EU acquired legal personality, enabling it to conclude treaties and to assume external representation. This also means that, for the first time, external and internal security policies evolve in the framework of an International Organisation. The Treaty also overcame pillarisation, transferred the cooperation on internal security to the TFEU, introduced amendments in the continued search for the Union’s external coherence and demonstrated the dynamism of the policies of the former second and third pillars. However, the adjustments that were introduced denote a constructive ambiguity, patent in the existence of provisions enabling a comprehensive action, on the one hand, and of a hidden pillarisation, on the other hand, aggravated by the absence of an explicit concern with the coherence between the external and internal dimensions of security (‘the missing link’).

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Publicado

2024-10-03

Edição

N.º 144 (2016): The EU Comprehensive Approach

Secção

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