Die EU-Staaten haben sich lange Zeit in die Rolle der „Vasallen“ und des „Brückenkopfs“ (Brzezinski 1999) gefügt, solange sie sich davon mehr Vor- als Nachteile versprechen konnten. Mit der Ausformung der Europäischen Union zu einem immer kompakteren wirtschaftlichen und finanzpolitischen Machtzentrum wächst auch das Bedürfnis nach einer kohärenteren und durchsetzungsfähigeren regionalen und globalen Interessenwahrnehmung in den internationalen Institutionen, gegenüber anderen Großmächten und regionalen Zusammenschlüssen sowie in gewaltsamen Konflikten, die die Interessen der EU-Staaten tangieren. Dieser Trend wird durch den unilateralen Kurs der Vereinigten Staaten zusätzlich verstärkt, der sich bereits unter der Präsidentschaft Clintons ausformte und unter der Bush-Administration eine bislang nicht gekannte Zuspitzung erfahren hat. Mit der Ablehnung des Kyoto-Protokolls und des Internationalen Strafgerichtshofs, mit der Aufkündigung des ABM-Vertrages, dem Infragestellen des Teststoppabkommens und der Rehabilitierung des Krieges als Mittel der Politik haben die Vereinigten Staaten grundlegende Interessen, Ziele und Standards der EU-Staaten negiert und mithin ihre Gegenwehr herausgefordert. / The author argues that the „Grand Strategy“ of the Bush Administration is not only challenging the international position and interests of the EU and its member states but also the European political and societal identity. In order to cope with this challenge, he suggests to elaborate a coherent and mobilising model for the Common Foreign and Security Policy. He proposes cooperative encouragement of democracy in the world through the democratisation of international relations and support of democratic regimes. The EU has to democratise its own institutions in order to preserve its international credibility. The author criticises that the European Convent has not done enough to define such a model. The „European Security Strategy“ can only be the beginning of a process of defining the strategic identity and interests of the European Union.

After experiencing World War ¢¹and ¢º, the European countries recognized that to prevent war on Europe was of necessary. They would like to inspire economic development by economic integration, and furthermore, to push Europe back to the key actor of world politics through political integration. From ¡§European Common Market¡¨, ¡§European Community¡¨ to ¡§European Union¡¨, the European countries has gone through many complex negotiations. Among the regimes in European Union, ¡§Common Foreign and Security Policy¡¨ works through ¡§Intergovernmental Cooperation¡¨, which is of much higher political meaning. It symbolizes the operation of integration theory has strode from economic to political matters. The operations of CFSP have two important contributions to Europe. First of all, it contributed to the reconciliation of European nations. Second, it demonstrates peace can be achieved through legal and institutional negations without threatening the existing political authorities. Both China and Taiwan can take lessons in the CFSP¡¦s negotiation process, especially in the aspects of how to leave aside disputes and put aside minor differences so as to seek common ground. President Chen Shui-Bian gave a talk on 31 December 2000 which indicated that the Cross-strait relation could learn from EU¡¦s integration experience and jointly seek for new framework of political integration. It could start from economic and cultural integration, build confidence step by step, and look for new framework for political integration. This kind of opinion conforms to international development experience. What norms of EU¡¦s experience should the Cross-strait refer to is the main topic of this research. How do EU¡¦s institutions make compromise between ¡§national interest¡¨ and ¡§EU¡¦s development¡¨ is another concerning point of the research.

German foreign policy is in the midst of a far-reaching transformation. Contrary to disciplinary expectations, this process is neither properly captured by descriptions in the liberal tradition („Europeanisation“, „Civilian Power“) nor by Realist expectations that Germany is doomed to „remilitarise“ and/or „renationalise“. However, the key term of foreign policy discourse, „normalisation“, is an unmistakable code, signalling a rediscovery of traditional Realpolitik practices which fit Germany’s current environment. The paper argues that rather than merely playing the role of an obedient disciple of Realpolitik socialisers, Germany ought to rehabilitate the foreign policy tradition of the Bonn Republic in support of an active Idealpolitik transformation of its environment. The article serves as a starting point for a debate on German foreign policy in the upcoming issues of WeltTrends.

Problems of coherence and effectiveness have been repeatedly mentioned by external observers as affecting European Union (EU) external action. A theory-based explanation of this state of affairs is, however, lacking in the literature. This thesis aims to address this lacuna by focusing on a particular aspect of EU external action, the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP), and by analysing CFSP actions in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) throughout the period 1991-2006. Its primary goal is to determine which factors explain different degrees of coherence and effectiveness, and, in particular, whether or not, increasing CFSP institutionalisation has promoted coherence and effectiveness. After introducing the concepts of coherence and effectiveness, the thesis sketches the political and academic debate surrounding these concepts, and three key explanatory factors are singled out: interests, identities and institutions. The latter is taken as a starting point for analysis. Drawing on a historical institutionalist theory, it explores the CFSP institutionalisation and examines how the development of institutions, path dependency, unintended consequences , learning and socialisation have affected CFSP coherence and effectiveness over time. Furthermore, it aims to find out whether changes in institutions have facilitated convergence of Member States' interests regarding EU policy towards BiH, as well as the development of the EU's broader international role. The thesis then proceeds to investigate CFSP activities in BiH, analysing coherence and effectiveness in eight case studies. It concludes that CFSP institutionalisation has partially increased levels of effectiveness over the period 1991-2006. As for coherence, greater institutionalisation has resulted in some problems of coherence in the short term, but leaming has been a significant factor correcting these in the medium and long term. While path dependency has resulted in problems of coherence and effectiveness, socialisation processes have been important in facilitating consensus among the Member States. Finally, CFSP institutionalisation is seen as having had an impact on the EU's international role moving it from a civilian to a normative power, willing to resort to military instruments when necessary.

Since the establishment of the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) in 1991, the European Union has quickly been developing as an international security and defense actor. However, the fall of Yugoslavia exposed the EU's shortcomings regarding its foreign policy initiatives. Its failure in the region became a turning point for EU foreign and security policy decision making. Since the crisis in Yugoslavia, the EU has been able to overcome national interests, political disagreements, and failed operations to establish itself as a powerful actor in the international community. It has been able to display its military capability as well as bring political stability to troubled areas around the world. This thesis explores the history of European foreign policy decision-making as well as the difficulties associated with its development. The goal of this research is to determine what effect the crisis in Yugoslavia has had on the European Union's Common Foreign and Security Policy. I analyze the policies and actions of the European Union towards the Western Balkans as well as the development of the EU's foreign and security policy since the crisis in Yugoslavia ended. This research will provide an explanation as to how the European Union was able to recover from its failure in Yugoslavia by creating its own military capability, increasing cohesiveness among its member-states, and eventually improving its status in the international community.

The aim of this essay is to explain how IR theory relates to the European Union. Thisis motivated by the extensive use of empirical and descriptive studies on the EU. Togenerate knowledge on how theory relates to the EU, two seemingly differenttheories are compared. Neorealism and social constructivism are used to generatehypotheses, which are then tested on a quantitive study on the EU’s Common Foreignand Security Policy. The study covers the years of 2003-2005 and uses a statisticalmethod to present to empirical findings, which is supplemented by previous studieson EU’s foreign policy. The theoretical framework enables comparison of the twoemployed theories’ explanatory powers. The essay concludes that none of the theoriesprovides satisfactory explanations of in regard to EU’s global power and/or influence.Nevertheless, they are able to explain different aspects of the developments of EU’sforeign policy. Further theoretical studies should be undertaken in order to highlightthe issues of theory vis-à-vis the European Union.

By adopting a multilevel approach to understanding decisions taken in security and defence policies by European member states, the paper argues that the development of the European Security and Defence Policy, the proliferation of ad-hoc coalitions of the willing, and the subcontracting of security tasks from the UN has worsened the challenge of parliamentary accountability in foreign, security and defence policies. The paper evaluates how the European Convention has sought to bridge the parliamentary accountability gap in Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and in European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP). The outcomes of the Convention on the future of Europe are not meeting its initial ambition to put foreign, security and defence policy among the priorities for the European Union¿s constitutional design. CFSP will become more integrated, on an intergovernmental rather than supranational model and under the large states¿ control. The major innovation is the creation of the position of Foreign Affairs Minister whose autonomy remains still uncertain, especially in his/her relationship with the President of the European Council. ESDP¿s operational capabilities and scope are both extended while coalitions of the willing are institutionalised and a defence core group could emerge. The contrast remains between a slower integration of CFSP and a faster progress of ESDP. Given the significance of proposals in ESDP, the new powers proposed by the European Convention to be given to national parliaments and the European Parliament in this policy area are too weak to close the existing parliamentary accountability gap.

Practitioners and academics clearly established that participation in the EU system of foreign policy-making transforms national foreign policies. Whilst there have been detailed studies of the impact of participation in EU foreign policy on the original fifteen member states there are, as yet, few academic studies that have thoroughly investigated the impact of progressive integration in the area of EU foreign and security policy on the new (i.e. those who joined since 2004) member states. This thesis aims to address this deficit by focusing on the impact of Poland's participation in the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP). It examines the processes of 'downloading', as it is argued here that involvement in CFSP has had a direct effect on both the procedures of foreign policy-making in the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) and, on the substance of Polish foreign policy as well as the impact of 'uploading' from member states to the EU level and 'crossloading' between EU member states. The thesis addresses the relevant conceptual issues and provides an outline of the academic debate regarding Europeanisation and foreign policy. It identifies three mechanisms that are responsible for change: conditionality, socialisation and learning. It suggests that a member state first adapts its national foreign policy to bring it in line with the EU's acquis politique and introduces basic changes in its institutional procedures in order to effectively participate in the EU's CFSP. Only later, does socialisation and learning result in changes to how national foreign policy is made, which then facilitates both changes to the substance of national policy and the uploading of national preferences to the EU level. A two-phase model of change is introduced which identifies April 2003, when Poland first became an active observer within the EU, as the date when Europeanisation began. The thesis provides a brief explanation of the transformation of Polish foreign policy after 1989, in order to provide contextual background for the four substantive chapters which follow: one procedural on the changes in the Polish MFA and three related to policy substance. The latter three chapters examine the Europeanisation of policy towards Poland's East European neighbours in general and policies towards Ukraine and Belarus in particular. The thesis concludes with a set of methodological and conceptual observations followed by analysis of the empirical findings.

<p>In the post Cold-War era, world politics was transforming itself through its emerging complex issues such as terrorism and influential and interdependent actors such as the European Union. In this new era, the European Union was developing its Common Foreign and Security Policy pillar both to present a coherent and unified EU policy and to prove its political potent in order to become an influential actor on world politics. On the other side, security environment was also transforming its content through emerging actors and issues. As one of the most prominent actors of the world politics, the EU was influenced by the transformation of security environment, whose economic ‘soft power’ proved necessary but insufficient for being a global power in this emerging security environment. Insufficiency of economic power in solving security problems became more visible with the terrorist attacks of September 11 and March 11 which proved the seriousness of a globalized security threat posed by terrorism. After the events took place, the EU’s security approach and threat assessment have been transformed in which the issue of terrorism occupied more profound place by ‘securitization’ of its context. The Common Foreign and Security Policy of the EU began to play more prominent role on EU policies together with incorporating the efforts on the issue of fight against terrorism both to EU’s external relations and to its security dimension. Therefore, in this study, the author analyzes the research question of the development of the CFSP of the EU together with the impact of the issue of terrorism in this transforming security environment. Since examination of such a complex security issue necessitates multidimensional approach, then liberal and realist theories are used as complementary analytical instruments guiding the theoretical framework of the study.</p>

<p>This dissertations aims to examine the EU Foreign Policy, and more precisely map the High Representative (HR) and his impact on the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) in the EU. Using two theoretical frameworks, leadership theory and institutional theory, the study tests the explanatory power of these theories to explain the HR and his impact on the CFSP. The study is limited to a period of time, from November 2002 until December 2003, when several different events took place within the framework of the CFSP. The conclusion indicates that both leadership theory and institutional theory can help explain the development and outcomes of the CFSP.</p><p>Keywords: EU foreign policy, Common Foreign and Security Policy, High Representative of the CFSP, European Security and Defence Policy, Iraq war, European Security Strategy</p>