This chapter examines the position of the European Union in the global political economy (GPE). It also considers key dimensions of change and development as well as the EU's impact on the operation of the contemporary GPE. To this end, the chapter discusses central ideas in international political economy and relates these to the growth of the EU. Furthermore, it analyses the EU's role in the GPE in three areas: European integration, the EU's engagement in the GPE, and the EU's claims to be a major economic power. It concludes with an assessment of global economic governance, focusing in particular on the EU's role in the financial, economic, and sovereign debt crises.
Chapter
11. The European Union and the Global Political Economy
Amy Verdun
Chapter
13. Taking Stock of Integration Theory
Antje Wiener
This chapter takes stock of the third edition of European Integration Theory in three steps. First, it offers a comparative perspective on the distinct contributions to the mosaic of integration presented by each chapter. The assessment is framed by three sea-faring metaphors of European integration, and details the insights derived by each of the book’s contributions from addressing the kind of polity, politics, and policy based on the three types of crises (i.e. economic, refugee, and security). Second, the chapter addresses the absence of security crises in the book’s contributions. To reverse that absence, it distinguishes the impact of integration along a horizontal regional comparative dimension and a vertical normative dimension. The former builds on insights from regional integration, the latter connects normative crises in EU sub-units with global conflicts. And third, the chapter addresses the question of how integration theory fares sixty years on from the Treaty of Rome, and points out potential issues and themes for the future of European integration theory.
Chapter
20. Acting for Europe
Reassessing the European Union’s Role in International Relations
This chapter summarizes the volume's major findings and revisits the three perspectives on the European Union: as a system of international relations, as a participant in wider international processes, and as a power in the world. It also considers the usefulness of the three main theoretical approaches in international relations as applied to the EU's external relations: realism, liberalism, and constructivism. Furthermore, it emphasizes three things which it is clear the EU is not, in terms of its international role: it is not a straightforward ‘pole’ in a multipolar system; it is not merely a subordinate subsystem of Western capitalism, and/or a province of an American world empire, as claimed by both the anti-globalization movement and the jihadists; it is not a channel by which political agency is surrendering to the forces of functionalism and globalization. The chapter concludes with an assessment of the EU's positive contributions to international politics.
Chapter
1. International Relations and the European Union
Themes and Issues
This edition examines the contexts in which the European Union has reflected and affected major forces and changes in international relations (IR) by drawing on concepts such as balance of power, multipolarity, multilateralism, interdependence, and globalization. It explores the nature of policymaking in the EU's international relations and the ways in which EU policies are pursued within the international arena. Topics include the EU's role in the global political economy, how the EU has developed an environmental policy, and how it has attempted to graft a common defence policy onto its generalized foreign and security policy. This chapter discusses the volume's methodological assumptions and considers three perspectives on IR and the EU: the EU as a subsystem of IR, the EU and the processes of IR, and the EU as a power in IR. It also provides an overview of the chapters that follow.
Chapter
12. The Challenge of the Environment, Energy, and Climate Change
John Vogler
This chapter examines the European Union's external environmental policy, with particular emphasis on the challenge faced by the EU in exercising leadership in global environmental governance and in the development of the climate change regime. It first considers the international dimension of the EU environmental policy as well as the issue of sustainable development before discussing the EU's efforts to lead the negotiation of an international climate regime up until the 2015 Paris conference. It then explores how the different energy interests of the member states have been accommodated in order to sustain European credibility. It also looks at the question of climate and energy security in the EU and concludes with an assessment of the factors that determine the success or failure of the EU in climate diplomacy, including those that relate to coordination and competence problems peculiar to the EU as a climate negotiator.
Chapter
15. The European Union’s Security and Defence Policy
The Quest for Purpose
Jolyon Howorth
This chapter examines the European Union's efforts since the late 1990s to become an increasingly autonomous security and defence actor, albeit one that focused overwhelmingly on overseas missions connected with crisis management and embryonic nation building. It first provides an overview of EU security and defence in the context of international relations before discussing the theoretical approaches to the emergence of the EU security and defence policy. It then considers the factors that drove the EU to tackle new and significant security challenges, along with the implications for international relations of the EU's overseas interventions, both as a military and as a civilian crisis management entrepreneur. It also explores the ramifications of the Treaty of Lisbon, the 2016 European Global Strategy, and Brexit for the further development of Europe's security and defence policy, in the context of new and serious security threats in its Southern and Eastern neighbourhoods.
Chapter
18. The European Union, the BRICS, and Other Emerging Powers
A New World Order?
Stephan Keukeleire and Tom De Bruyn
This chapter examines how the European Union is challenged by the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) and other emerging powers, along with its implications for the world order. It first provides an overview of the nature of the BRICS phenomenon before discussing the EU's contractual and political relations, as well as ‘strategic partnership’, with the BRICS countries and other emerging powers. It then considers the EU–BRICS relationship on the basis of three key perspectives: the EU as a subsystem of international relations, the EU as a power in international relations, and the EU as part of the wider processes of international relations. In particular, it explores the EU's capacity to generate external collective action towards the BRICS countries and other emerging powers. It also analyses EU–BRICS relations within the context of shifts in multilateralism and in the global governance architecture.
Chapter
3. Engaging the World
The European Union and the Processes of International Relations
Geoffrey Edwards
This chapter examines the ways in which the European Union enters into international relations and engages with key processes in the world arena. It first provides a historical background on the interaction of an evolving EU with the rest of the world before discussing the main patterns of relationships and interactions in the areas in which Europe has been active. It then considers two centres of enduring tensions in the EU's external engagement: EU's engagement with processes of international cooperation and conflict, and with processes of global governance. It also looks at tensions that arise between the collective ‘European’ and national positions. They are between: Europeanization and national foreign policy; rhetoric and achievement; big and small member states; old and new Europe; and the concept of civilian power Europe and the EU as an international security actor with access to military forces.
Chapter
10. Critical Political Economy
Bastiaan van Apeldoorn and Laura Horn
This chapter examines European integration from the perspective of critical political economy. It first outlines a historical materialist framework for understanding European integration against a broader context of capitalist restructuring; focusing in particular on neo-Gramscian perspectives but also highlighting other strands of critical analysis. The chapter then proceeds with an integrated analysis of economic and monetary union (EMU) as a political project. With a focus on continuity and changes within the political economy of neo-liberalism, the euro crisis serves as a reference point to illustrate the strengths and contributions of critical political economy. Finally, contemporary perspectives on contestation and resistance in European integration are discussed.
Chapter
24. Trade and Development Aid
This chapter examines the European Union’s (EU’s) external trade relations in the context of the wider framework of global trade agreements, along with its related policies on development aid, particularly with the African, Caribbean, and Pacific (ACP) states. It first looks at the history of the EU’s trade and development aid, before discussing its contemporary external trade and development policies. It explains the workings of the common commercial policy, considers disputes within the World Trade Organization (WTO), especially with the United States, and explores the EU’s trading relationship with developing countries and near neighbours in the context of the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP). It then considers theoretical explanations of the EU’s external trade and development aid policies, as well as criticisms of such policies. Analysis of the EU’s external economic relations brings to the fore a number of theoretical themes, such as the tension between nationalism and supranationalism, the complexities of bargaining within multiple international forums, and the dominance of particular ideas across different forums.
Chapter
9. The European Union and the Global Political Economy
Amy Verdun
This chapter examines the position of the European Union (EU) in the global political economy (GPE). It also highlights key dimensions of change and development, and evaluates the EU’s impact on the operation of the contemporary GPE. It does this by examining key ideas in international political economy (IPE), by relating these to the growth of the EU, and by assessing the EU’s role in the GPE in three areas: European integration itself, the EU’s engagement in the GPE, and the EU’s claims to be a major economic power. The final part of the chapter brings these together with an analysis of global economic governance—in particular, the EU’s role in the financial, multilateral state system with its principles of global governance, and pays some attention to recent crises (such as the Covid-19 pandemic) and the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Chapter
18. Global Europe: A Pivot to Asia?
Stephan Keukeleire and Hai Yang
This book has so far shown that the European Union (EU) has consistently sought to exercise structural power to influence the developments of third parties and the arrangements of regional and global governance to its preferences, and the (in)effectiveness of its foreign policy is inextricably associated with the internal character of the EU. This chapter showcases that the EU’s engagement in Asia—a region with several systemically important geopolitical and economic players and one of increasing relevance to European interests—is no different. As elsewhere, the EU’s search for strategic relevance in this region has been impeded by both internal and external factors. For now, its ‘pivot’ to Asia remains elusive.
Chapter
20. The Stability of EU Policy-Making in a Turbulent World
Mark A. Pollack, Christilla Roederer-Rynning, and Alasdair R. Young
This chapter examines trends in European Union policy-making during times of multiple, overlapping challenges. It first considers the main trends in EU policy-making that emerge from policy case studies, including experimentation with new modes of policy-making, often in conjunction with more established modes, leading to hybridization; renegotiation of the role of the member states (and their domestic institutions) in the EU policy process; and erosion of traditional boundaries between internal and external policies. The chapter proceeds by discussing the issue of national governance as well as the interaction between European and global governance. Finally, it explores how the EU has responded to the challenges of Brexit, the politicization of the Union, geopolitical upheaval, and the shock of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Chapter
1. Introduction
Christian Welzel, Ronald Inglehart, Patrick Bernhangen, and Christian W. Haerpfer
This chapter introduces the new edition of Democratization against the backdrop of a new pessimism about Democracy. It anticipates the major themes pursued in the book by discussing democracy’s persistent culture-boundedness and societal pre-conditions. The chapter concludes by highlighting economic inequality as major threat to democracy while emphasizing democracy’s value for human, political, and social life.
Chapter
18. International Development
A Distinct and Challenged Policy Domain
Jan Orbie
The European Union (EU) is widely recognized to be a major actor in international development cooperation. First, this chapter discusses key issues and debates in EU development policy. These relate to the importance of the EU in this field, the different objectives that it pursues, the aid budgets at its disposal, and the legal competences vis-à-vis the member states. Secondly, the uniqueness of this policy domain, compared to other EU policies in this volume, is addressed. Specifically, it highlights three distinctive features: the availability of budgetary power outside the EU, the long historical legacy dating back to member states’ colonial past, and the key role of trade as the preferred tool for development. Thirdly, the chapter elaborates two main policy-making domains: the EU as a donor itself and as a coordinator of member states’ policies. Overall, the EU follows the regulatory and distributional modes in its role as a donor, and when it seeks to coordinate member-state policy, the policy coordination mode is to the fore. Moreover, intensive transgovernmentalist features appear in both domains. The conclusion summarizes the main trends and future challenges including the implications of Brexit, the rise of China, and the increasing politicization of aid.
Chapter
20. The Single Market
Michelle Egan
This chapter charts the evolution of the Single Market, from its original conception in the 1950s, beginning with the Treaty of Rome through to efforts to expand and enforce Single Market commitments in a climate of unfair trade practices and rising economic nationalism. The chapter highlights the tensions and trade-offs between legal and regulatory strategies to integrate markets; the challenges of creating a social market due to internal asymmetries between market integration at supranational level and social protection at national level; and the efforts to facilitate the free movement of goods, capital, services, and labour. The chapter highlights the importance of the Single Market in seeking to promote competitiveness and growth as well as the diffusion of its regulations beyond its borders. It concludes by demonstrating how both traditional international relations theories of integration and newer approaches in comparative politics and international relations, can be used to shed light on the governance of the Single Market.
Chapter
10. The Challenge of the Environment, Energy, and Climate Change
John Vogler
This chapter examines the European Union’s (EU’s) external environmental policy, with particular emphasis on the challenge faced by the EU in exercising leadership in global environmental governance and in the development of the climate change regime. It first considers the international dimension of the EU environmental policy as well as the issue of sustainable development before discussing the EU’s efforts to lead the negotiation of an international climate regime up until the 2015 Paris conference. It then explores how the different energy interests of the member states have been accommodated in order to sustain European credibility. It also looks at the question of climate and energy security in the EU and concludes with an assessment of the factors that determine the success or failure of the EU in climate diplomacy, including those that relate to coordination and competence problems peculiar to the EU as a climate negotiator.
Chapter
16. Internal Security and External Complication(s)
Sarah Wolff
After the end of the Cold War, the internal–external security nexus, which refers to the links between what used to be distinct concepts under the Westphalian approach to international relations, has become a reality of European security. This chapter reviews the development of the external dimension of Justice and Home Affairs (JHA), which manifests this internal–external nexus, covering its evolution from a side product of European economic integration to a multi-dimensional and increasingly digitalized policy area. In the last decade, multiple ‘crises’—from the Syrian refugee inflows of 2015, to Brexit, the Covid-19 pandemic, the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban in 2021, the war in Ukraine in 2022 and its ensuing refugee flows to the European Union (EU)—shaped the policy responses. From the reintroduction of internal border controls in March 2020 as a first reaction of EU member states to the Covid-19 crisis to the adoption of the temporary protection directive as an unprecedented response to the Ukrainian refugee crisis, the EU has developed new coordinating tools to adapt to this state of continuous emergency and to the proteiform nature of global security changes.
Chapter
7. The International Context
Hakan Yilmaz
This chapter examines the major theoretical approaches to the issue of the international context of democratization. In particular, it considers democratization by means of ‘convergence’, ‘system penetration’, ‘internationalization of domestic politics’, and ‘diffusion’. It also discusses the principal dimensions of the international context, namely, the democracy promotion strategies of the United States and the European Union. The term ‘conditionality’ is used to describe the democracy promotion strategy of the EU. In the case of the United States, its leverage with respect to democracy promotion has been undermined by its military intervention and violation of human rights. The chapter concludes with an analysis of the effects of globalization and the formation of a global civil society on democratization.
Chapter
18. The Europeanization of National Economies?
Vivien A. Schmidt
This chapter examines the impact of Europeanization upon the national economies of European Union member states. It considers how successful the EU has been in promoting its goal of building a single European economy out of the diverse national economies of its member states; how much convergence has occurred among EU member states, and how much divergence remains; and what impact the economic crisis beginning in 2008 has had on the EU and its member states. To answer these questions, the chapter traces the development of Europe’s national economies from the post-war period until today. It also analyses the impact of globalization and Europeanization on post-war varieties of capitalism before concluding with reflections on future patterns of political economic development in the EU in light of the economic crisis.
