The European Union’s New Foreign Policy (original) (raw)

2020, The European Union in International Affairs

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 geo-political 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. Among 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 Treaty on European Union (TEU) Article 3.5 3 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 Brexit 4 ; the consolidation of the High Representative's role and empowerment through a series of significant achievements (perhaps most notably, the normalization 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 role 5 ; 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 model 6 ; 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