The aim of this paper is to uncover what has changed in the EU security field that caused the EU to decide that their new military treaty, PESCO, should be the first treaty that excludes NATO from its constitution. The purpose for this aim is to understand if a paradigm shift has occurred in EU’s security rhetoric in order to understand the general picture of the EU security research field on the day PESCO was officially welcomed. The European Council will be the main actor and subject of the thesis, where the press statements of select EU members along with the Council President will be analysed as data. The context behind their statements will be brought forth based on the content that they deliver in the statements, which will by default deepen the comprehension of the EU security situation on the day that those statements were made.

The thesis explores the use of the term European Strategic Autonomy in the Common Security and Defence Policy (CFSP) of the European Union. The security environment around Europe has become increasingly unstable in the last 15 years. The EU Commission has tried to take account of the deteriorating geopolitical landscape by publishing an EU Global Strategy document in 2016 to share its vision for a stronger Europe. The document calls for strategic autonomy without properly defining it. Since then, many policy papers have captured the term and used it as a popular buzzword. Because it has not been properly defined on the political level, European Strategy Autonomy (ESA) was subject to speculations and national interpretations which did not help to advance the debate. Based on an extensive literature review the paper provides a comprehensive understanding by giving an historic overview and presenting different configurations of ESA in the contemporary context. A comparative case study, including France, Germany, and the Czech Republic has been conducted to assess their interpretation of the notion. The result of the case studies showed inherently different perceptions underlaid by different motivations and identifies the political layer to be the biggest challenge for moving forward with the topic....

The master's thesis focuses on the potential of two recently launched initiatives, The Permanent Structured Cooperation and The European Intervention Initiative, to serve as preludes of the single European army. Both initiatives shared high expectations as vehicles for a relaunch of integration in defence domain in Europe, but do they really move the efforts in this respect forward? To study the two projects, we establish a unique theoretical measurement of defence and security integration, based on the realist concept of the alliance and constructivist concept of the security community. We then ask what constructivist theoretical model for the study of defence integration fits The Permanent Structured Cooperation best, and analogically, which archetype is the most suitable for The European Intervention Initiative. Based on the theoretical underpinnings, we carry out an empirical analysis of both initiatives to find out what novelties they bring to the area of defence. We focused mainly on their governance, institutional fabric and funding. Special attention was paid to varying level of pooled sovereignty. The thesis is built on the content analysis of primary sources and where appropriate on relevant secondary literature.