10 years of EEAS - a NORTIA panel at EUSA

Submitted by Maastricht University on Thu, 07/04/2019 - 14:45

by Dr Paula Lamoso

NORTIA has been widely present during the EUSA conference that took place 9-11th May in Denver, Colorado. It was my first time in an EU studies conference in US. This experience has been particularly interesting for me as I could hear to the high level American academics, the ones that I have read thousands of times, talking about their perception of the EU and how they assess its future. Being at EUSA has also been essential to enrich my network and to consolidate the synergies already put in motion with colleagues that feel attracted by the same research areas that I am.

Thanks to NORTIA, and particularly the work of Heidi Maurer, during this EUSA conference we could enjoy six different panels where high-level colleagues chaired, presented and commented a great variety of papers mainly dealing with EU Foreign Policy. Regarding this small piece I will pay particular attention to the panel where I was pleased to take part, entitled: “Ten years of the European External Action Service: what added value for European Foreign Policy?” The main purpose of the panel was to examine the European Foreign policy from an institutional point of view. In fulfilling such purpose, the panel brought together five papers that used different approaches in order to assess if the EU foreign policy institutional framework is appropriate to deal with the increasing contestation of the EU as an international actor. I will introduce the five different papers while highlighting what was of special interest for me.

The main purpose of the fist paper presented within this panel was to assess the EEAS impact on EU security and defence policy-making. In so doing, Eleonore Heimsoeth (London School of Economics and Political Science) questions the extent to which and how the EEAS has been capable to exert ‘autonomous policy impact’ in PESCO. By ‘autonomous policy impact’ she means the capacity of shaping/steering the policy’s direction.  The paper concludes that the instrumental role as cooperative mediator of the EEAS was key in order to being able to exercise autonomous policy impact in the consolidation and implementation of the political development of PESCO. Particularly thanks to the Politico-Military Group (PMG) Chair and PESCO Secretariat’s cooperative and confident relationship with member states. Then, I feel this paper confirms that if the EEAS works closely with the member states and creates a trustful relationship it will be able to affect the development of the EU foreign and security policy.

The second paper was the one I presented. Here I aimed to explain the reasons why the biggest member states of the EU agreed to the creation of the EEAS. By looking at the process of configuration of the EEAS my major purpose was to contribute to Liberal Intergobermentalism by stressing the increasing role that the EU institutions play in Treaty change negotiations. The paper stresses the role of institutions as both: actors that have their own demands that are able to defend them on the same bargaining table as member states do. And as sets of rules and norms that establish the rules of the game by providing the available options and drafting the conclusions. As a consequence institutions are able to affect the behaviour-strategies that member states pursue in order to achieve their domestic goals. The paper concludes that the EU Parliament and the Commission, as well as the formula of the Convention and the Quadrilogue were essential for big member states in finally agreeing to the creation of the EEAS. Then, institutions matter!

Within the next paper, Daniel Schade, University of Magdeburg, and Federica Bicchi, LSE & EUI presented a deep analysis on a set of data about the European countries’ diplomatic network over the last twenty years. The major aim of this paper is not only to look at how the member states relate to each other under the EU framework but how they relate to each other directly and to the rest of the world. In so doing they highlight two key moments: the great enlargement that took place in 2004 and the creation of the EEAS. They showed how the great enlargement of 2004 dramatically boosted the number of diplomatic representations inside Europe. However, I feel that the most interesting part of the analysis relies on the fact that the creation of the EEAS, contrarily to what could be expected, did not provoke a reduction of EU member states diplomatic presence abroad. They argue that member states are not interested in reducing the number of their representations abroad. This is particularly interesting if we take into account that in the recent past years member states have reduced their foreign ministry budgets.  Without doubts here there is a fascinating niche for further research!

Regarding the fourth paper, Jost Morgenstern-Pomorski, Kent University, proposes to look at what impact leaders have on their institutional structure? In order to answer this question he confronts the two different models of executive leadership performed by the two HR/VPs to date Catherine Asthon and Federica Mogherinni. In so doing, he aims to develop a theoretically founded approach to the EEAS’ institutional development for the period of contestation that executive leadership change ought to initiate. Jost suggests that the leadership of the HR/VP will have an enormous influence on the trajectory of the EEAS. I feel that looking at the profile and leadership performance of the next HR/VP will be decisive in reaching a conclusion. Interesting times ahead!

Finally, within the last paper, Lisbeth Aggestam, University of Gothenburg, & Elsa Hedling, Lund University look at the process of leaderization in EU foreign policy. The main aim of the inquiry is particularly to answer how leaderization unfolds in the field of foreign policy? In so doing they examine the drafting and implementation of the EU Global Strategy. Throughout this research they present an original analysis of the process of ‘leaderization’ that they reveal in the drafting and implementation stages of the EU Global Strategy. They highlight that this process of leadarization is characterized by a new media logic and strategic use of public diplomacy directed at EU publics with the aim of mobilizing legitimacy for the role of the HR/VP particularly and the EU in general. Definitively, new media is a powerful tool for politicians that they can use to connect with citizens, even in Foreign Policy!

To conclude I would like to stress that this has been a fascinating panel that allowed us to look at the recent development of the EEAS and its future challenges. The EEAS relationship with the member states and the role of the HR/VP will be essential in its future capacity-power of modelling the EU foreign policy. A trustful relationship between member states and the EEAS will also have an impact on the representation of the member states abroad and in its relationship with the EU delegations. The profile of the new HR/VP will be particularly relevant in the future development of the EEAS as it could consolidate its dual character Council - Commission and its "close" relationship with the EU Parliament or, contrarily, following the nationalist dynamics, it could opt for emphasizing the role of the Council. Either way, to have a single voice from the EU in the world requires a great leader as HR/V.