The International Journal of

Interdisciplinary Organizational Studies

TheSOcIalScIenceS.cOm

VOLUME 9 ISSUE 2

__________________________________________________________________________

Nationalism and the European Union

A Critique of the EU Common Security and Defense Policy

BENEDICT E. DEDOMINICIS

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Nationalism and the European Union: A Critique

of the EU Common Security and Defense Policy

Benedict E. DeDominicis, Catholic University of Korea, South Korea

Abstract: The capacity for a European Union Common Foreign and Security Policy with an integrated Common Security and Defense Policy component should be analyzed within the context of the international system, consisting of the

motivations, capabilities, and commitments of the great powers. Most important to the CFSP is the issue of the

motivations and intentions of the United States. While inheriting a long European pedigree of thought going back generations, the EU as a political project began and developed for the first forty years of its existence within the context

of the Cold War. NATO security integration was an essential contextual characteristic in which European leaders

pursued this European integration peace project. Whether or not they shared the prevailing US view that the USSR was an aggressive, expansionist threat to European and world security is another question. Yet, US Cold War hegemony

critically shaped the capabilities, opportunities, and obstacles that determined the political pathways of European

integration. The EU is therefore in part a legacy of US postwar west European supremacy. The EU has attempted to respond to the collapse of the Berlin Wall and the post September 11, 2001 US declaration of a war on terror. Yet,

coherence in the EU’s post Cold War Common Foreign and Security Policy supported by a Common Security and

Defense Policy has been notably lacking. Fundamental disagreement over the relationship of the EU to its American patron is one political source of this lack of coherence. These disagreements may derive from differing European

assumptions regarding US foreign policy motivation, as well as secondary issues regarding the relative capabilities of

the EU in relation to these perceived challenges from the US.

Keywords: Common Foreign and Security Policy, Common Security and Defense Policy, Georgia, Iran, Iraq, Russia,

Syria, Ukraine, United States, War on Terror

Introduction

he European Union was founded during the Cold War. The initial political efforts that

lead to the 1951 Treaty of Paris founding the European Coal and Steel Community began

years before the start of the Korean War. If European integration was not a product of the

Cold War, the path of its development was nevertheless critically shaped by it. Avoiding a

nuclear conflagration was the overriding imperative for all state leaders in Europe. European

integration helped create political opportunities exploited by west European leaders such as

French President Charles de Gaulle to pursue their security objectives (Wenger 2004: 26-27, 31).

For some, such as Chancellor Willy Brandt in West Germany, these included détente with East

Germany and its Moscow patrons through his Ostpolitik (Ackerman 1994). The specific

contribution of west European integration to détente in Europe is a topic of debate (Mueller

2011). Deepening and widening west European integration during the Cold War had a significant

effect on elite perceptions in the Soviet bloc. These began with perceived threat from increased

coordination of perceived American and European capitalist aggression (Cutler 1980). By the

mid-1980s, European integration came to be seen as part of the foundation of Gorbachev’s New

Thinking (Rey 2004). The violence attendant in the Balkans with the end of the Cold War was

one of a series of postwar turning points in the development of the EU. The European

Community encountered great difficulties in attempting to influence the contestants in

disintegrating Yugoslavia. It was a critical factor contributing to the inauguration of the Common

Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) in the Treaty of Maastricht agreed in 1992 (Nugent 2010,

379-80).

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Immediately prior to the global economic recession that intensified in 2008, a European

Parliament deputy declared the existence of an autonomous European Union foreign policy.1 He

inferred its existence from the ability of the EU to resist, on the one hand, US pressure to support

Georgian and Ukrainian NATO admission. On the other hand was the ability of the EU to

support an anti-ballistic missile defense installation on Czech and Polish territory. The EU also

undertook to “supervise” Kosovo’s independence declared in February 2008, both over Russia’s

objections. Subsequently, in August 2008 Russia intervened with massive military force in

Georgia on the side of South Ossetian and Abkhazian nationalist separatism.2 In September 2009,

the Obama administration publicly renounced its predecessor’s plans to base an anti-ballistic

missile shield in Poland and the Czech Republic.3 Illustrating the EU’s dependence on the US,

the Obama administration had to push the EU to act to save the Eurozone in the depths of the

world economic recession.4 Recently, media reports have noted the weak significance of the

EU’s CFSP in relation to current violent international crises.5 The EU’s “Common Security and

Defense Policy” (CSDP) was renamed from European Security and Defense Policy with the 2009

Lisbon Treaty. It was to be a focus of the December 2013 European Council meeting in Vilnius,

Lithuania.6 It was overshadowed by the refusal of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych to

sign an EU Association Agreement at a November 2013 “Eastern Partnership” summit also in

Vilnius.7 It triggered the ongoing crisis in Ukraine and in North Atlantic-Russian relations.

8

Analysis of the obstacles to the development of the EU CFSP and a concomitant CSDP

should include an explication of the assumptions behind the EU’s CSDP.9 The lack of consensus

on the relationship of the EU to United States foreign policy aims and objectives is a significant

1 Andrew Duff, MEP, “Behold a European foreign policy! At last week’s Nato summit in Bucharest (April 3-4) the European Union asserted itself under Franco-German leadership,” Financial Times (Opinion), April 9, 2008. Accessed

August 24, 2013. http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/1f233442-04a5-11dd-a2f0-000077b07658.html#ixzz2buQ9fd9d. 2 Daily Mail Reporter, “Georgia 'overrun' by Russian troops as full-scale ground invasion begins,” Mailonline.com (undated). Accessed August 14, 2013. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1043236/Georgia-overrun-Russian-

troops-scale-ground-invasion-begins.html#ixzz2bucD4Vmb. 3 Peter Baker, “White House Scraps Bush’s Approach to Missile Shield,” New York Times, September 18, 2009. Accessed on August 14, 2013. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/18/world/europe/18shield.html?_r=0 4 Tony Barber, “How Washington pushed Europe to save the euro,” Financial Times, October 10, 2010. Accessed on

October 10, 2010. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/8ed137b4-d2f0-11df-9ae9-00144feabdc0.html. 5 e.g. Judy Dempsey, “E.U. Refuses to Cooperate on Security,” New York Times, June 10, 2013. Accessed on July 11,

2013.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/11/world/europe/11iht-letter11.html?_r=0; Laurence Norman, “Foreign Policy Puts Europe on Defensive,” Wall Street Journal, May 29, 2013. Accessed on July 11, 2013.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324682204578513491521001304.html. 6 European Commission, “Towards a more competitive and efficient European defence and security sector,” European Commission>Enterprise and Industry>News [sic]. Accessed on August 30, 2013.

http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/newsroom/cf/itemdetail.cfm?item_id=6844. The Common Foreign and Security Policy had

been a focus of the July-December 2013 Lithuanian EU Presidency following EU commitments made earlier: Lietuvos

Respublikos Seimas, “Lithuanian Presidency ofthe Council of the European Union1 July — 31 December 2013,

PARLIAMENTARY DIMENSION: Upcoming key event of the parliamentary dimension of the Lithuanian Presidency of the Council of the EU,” August 19, 2013. Accessed on August 30, 2013.

http://www.lrs.lt/intl/presidency.show?theme=125&lang=2&doc=1182. 7 “The third Eastern Partnership Summit in Vilnius.” Lithuanian Presidency of the European Union Archives. 02 December 2013. Accessed January 11, 2015. http://www.eu2013.lt/en/vilnius-summit; Derek Fraser, “The Refusal of

President Yanukovych of Ukraine to sign at the EU Vilnius Summit on 28 to 29 November, the Association Agreement,

including a Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area (DCFTA) with the European Union,” December 3, 2013. Accessed on January 7, 2015. http://www.eucanet.org/. 8 Donald Tusk, President of the European Council, “Press conference after the European Council.” EUCO 269/14

PRESSE 672 PR PCE 237 Brussels, 18 December 2014. Accessed January 11, 2015. http://www.consilium.europa.eu/uedocs/cms_data/docs/pressdata/en/ec/146436.pdf 9 “ITALY'S EU PRESIDENCY - ITALY SATISFIED WITH RESULTS OF AUGUST 27 ESDP MEETING, 2003

September 2.” Accessed on August 30, 2013. http://www.wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/03ROME3976_a.html. The ESDP evolved out of the European Security and Defense Identity debate over whether to have a command-and-control

bureaucratic structure separate from NATO, which was rejected in the “Berlin Plus” agreement at the Prague 2002

European Council (Howorth 2009, esp. 103).

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DEDOMINICIS: NATIONALISM AND THE EUROPEAN UNION

source of the challenge the EU faces in developing the CFSP and CSDP (Calleo 2003, 20-23).

Clarifying these assumptions is necessary for a critique of their contribution to peace in Europe

and the world. Students of the EU have characterized European integration as a peace strategy for

Europe and its surrounding regions (e.g. Lehne 2014, 3-5). The purported challenges to this

peace need to be explicated and clarified to critique the EU and its integration promotion

policies. One of these challenges is the relationship of the EU to Russia. This relationship, in

turn, is a product of the EU’s relationship to the US if only because the Cold War political

context shaped the development of the EU (Petrovsky 2005, 67). US Marshall Plan aid helped

kick start west European policy integration (Urwin 2013, 15). The end of the Cold War witnessed

the inability of the EU to prevent the violent disintegration of Yugoslavia, a de facto Western ally

in the midst of the geographic region of Europe.10

Questions emerged regarding the post Cold

War relationship of the US to Europe and to the world.11

Specifically, the relationship of the EU

to US foreign and security policy became a focus of debate (Cogan 2011: 261-62).

This analysis aims to make a contribution to that debate by illustrating that a significant part

of it revolves around differing perceptions of the ultimate, respective motivations for US and

Russian foreign policy (Ibid. 263, 265). It highlights that political struggles over the function and

form of the CSDP are significantly contests over the definition of the global political situation

confronting the EU. These competing worldviews ultimately reflect different perceptions of the

sources of US and Russian international conduct. These disagreements, however, continue to

affect the general developmental direction of the CSDP as the security arm of the EU’s CFSP.

The EU’s policy-making process responds to and reconciles the conflicting political pressures of

varying political weight within the EU to produce its output. This analysis aims to direct some of

the attention in the debate towards questions regarding implicit assumptions about the forces

driving US and Russian foreign policy.

The lead up to and consequences of US policy in Iraq since the September 11, 2001 attacks

underlines that US foreign policy is problematic. If the EU aims to correct US foreign policy,

then it needs to develop the power capability to do so. Figure 1 (below) is a schematic

representation of the role of power in the form of diplomatic bargaining leverage in international

relations. EU leaders have a vast array of power capability resource factors at their disposal, but

they are relatively lacking in the mobilizational prerequisites to create power instruments out of

such capabilities (please see Figure 1 below). The EU demonstrated that it lacked the ability to

come to a common position on whether to support the US decision to invade Iraq in 2003. In

sum, the EU as an international actor appears still to be the European successor component of a

US-led alliance in opposition to Russia, the successor state to NATO’s Cold War Soviet

adversary. While Putin’s Russia may or may not be a continuing challenge to international peace,

the same question should be raised regarding the US. To portray the consequences of these

differing assumptions regarding US foreign policy motivation, three different ideal-type

viewpoints of the European regional situation confronting the CSDP are portrayed. The analysis

then outlines the differing policy implications of these differing views. The analysis concludes

with comparative inferences regarding what contemporary foreign policy debates as portrayed in

the media reveal regarding these assumptions.

10 Alan Riding, “Conflict in Yugoslavia; EUROPEANS SEND HIGH--LEVEL TEAM.” New York Times, June 29, 1991.

Accessed on January 9, 2015. http://www.nytimes.com/1991/06/29/world/conflict-in-yugoslavia-europeans-send-high-

level-team.html 11 Joseph Fitchett, “A Mitterrand Legacy:Fall-Off in Relations With U.S.” New York Times, January 11, 1996. Accessed

on January 9, 2015. http://www.nytimes.com/1996/01/11/news/11iht-france.t_1.html.

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Power, Policy, and Nationalism

Assumptions regarding a state’s foreign policy motivation shape interpretation of the significance

of that state’s foreign policy acts. Determining whether those assumptions are correct is

significant for the EU as a peace strategy to be successful, instead of inadvertently intensifying

conflicts (Cottam 1977, 7-12). Collective social psychological influences upon these assumptions

include the intensity of self-identification of the observer with the state actor of concern as a

form of “motivated reasoning” (Kahan 2013, 417-20). Nation state actors, i.e. communities in the

form of a sovereign state government with which the typical citizen intensely self-identifies, are

more prone to stereotype, positively or negatively, other actors (Monroe et al. 2000, 440). These

oversimplifications deemphasize the complexity of the target actor’s politics producing its

foreign policy as well as its collective foreign policy motivational drivers. A EU advantage is

that as a multinational entity, its member states’ foreign policy making processes undergo

“domestification” (Hermanm 1998, 608). “Reactive devaluation” of external actor stimuli due to

a stereotype that one EU national member state may have of a particular outgroup (e.g. Russians)

is more likely to be diluted (Ibid. 611). Twenty-eight member states, in addition to the interests

represented by the European Commission and Parliament, each input into the external policy

making process, with varying views on Russia. Sharing a superordinate EU goal requiring

cooperation, collaboration and coordination may contribute to the dilution of intra-EU national

stereotypes (Ibid. 612-14). A danger, however, is that containing a presumed expansionist post

Cold War Russia as part of the North Atlantic Alliance may be such a convenient superordinate

goal. It may be too convenient, building upon extensive political vested interests, that its

assumptions about Russian foreign policy motivation may be collectively too readily assumed to

be true. “Threat inflation” to serve domestic US political interests is a tendency that has occurred

repeatedly in US politics as the North Atlantic alliance leader since the start of the Cold War to

very recently (Cavanaugh 2007).

This same multinational characteristic means that the EU is much less politically cohesive.

EU leaders are less able to mobilize the EU’s citizens to resist external influences they identify as

problematic. Resisting external influences in order to pursue foreign policy objectives that

conflict with those of great power nation states such as the US is politically problematic, perhaps

insurmountable. EU leaders are less able to mobilize a collective political willingness to agree on

the need for such a policy, not to mention to sacrifice material utilitarian interests for an

independent EU foreign policy.

Figure 1: Schematic Representation of Actor Power and Foreign Policy Influence (Cottam and Galluci 1978, 9).

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DEDOMINICIS: NATIONALISM AND THE EUROPEAN UNION

Figure 1 portrays the capability base of an international actor. It consists of the power

potential base (including resource base and mobilization base), the power instrumental base (the

governmental and military programs for generating influence abroad), and the bargaining base

(the target government's perception of the capabilities of the agent government, which the agent

government may or may not be using. They collectively comprise the capability base of an

international actor. The capability base translates into the bargaining leverage system: the level

of diplomatic interaction.

The EU today collectively has a fairly modest prevailing capability self-image partly

because it is not a nation state and is therefore relatively weak in terms of mobilization base. As

elaborated upon below, the multinational EU alliance cannot behave nationalistically.12

On the

other hand, one benefit of European integration is that it serves to lessen suspicion that the EU as

a multinational actor is itself serving to promote particular European nationalistic interests. It

consequently has a greater potential to avoid conflicts with their source including suspicion of

pursuit of particularistic, European national advantage. Yet, to the extent that the EU is perceived

as dependent on the US for its cohesion, it may be vulnerable to suspicions that it is a

handmaiden of US national foreign policy objectives.

A nation state is a state in which the overwhelming majority of citizens show their primary

self-identification with the community delineated by the state territorial boundaries (Cottam and

Cottam 2001, 2). They demonstrate primary self-identification through allegiance to it above any

other identity group or community. Demonstrating allegiance refers to behavior manifesting a

willingness to sacrifice material and other values on the behalf of the political status of the

community, including its self-determination.

Nationalistic actors demonstrate a greater predisposition to see a greater range of

opportunistic policy options than may exist in reality. For example, the authorities of Hitlerian

Germany collectively saw Germany as having the requisite capability to pursue successfully the

policy option of establishing a German world empire. The following constitute the elements of

nationalistic behavior of a nation state, such as the US, China and Russia (but not the USSR or

the EU), according to Cottam and Cottam. First, nation states such as France, the US, Russia and

China will show a stronger inclination to see a threat from others and a greater tendency to see

the threatener in stereotypical terms which show a high degree of simplification (2001, 13).

Second, a greater likelihood exists that the leaders of a nation state will advance and consider

seriously the option to expand state influence at the expense of other actors. Third, a greater

tendency will exist among the publics of nation states to show a motivational preoccupation with

the objective of ingathering communities: irredentism. Fourth, the public in nation states will

display a greater concern with maintaining face and dignity. They will also show a greater

willingness to take action to rectify the affront that they perceive. Fifth, the public of a nation

state will show a greater likelihood to be susceptible to grandeur interests. Sixth, in order to

enhance the power of the state, effective appeals by state leaders to the citizenry to make

sacrifices may occur and leaders of nation states will show greater effectiveness in their appeals

in this regard. These sacrifices include a willingness on the part of the citizenry to become part of

the armed forces. Seventh, the commitment of the military to the defense of the state will be

more intense. Eighth, the citizenry of a nation state will demonstrate a greater likelihood to grant

state leaders greater decisional latitude in defending state interests. However, the citizenry will

show a lesser likelihood of granting them the decision latitude to accept defeats or the loss of

face (Cottam and Cottam 2001, 3-4). In sum, the governments of nation states are relatively more

likely both to see and to respond more intensely to perceived challenges in the form both of

external threats to and opportunities for the nation’s state. Concomitantly, they are also more

12 Iskra Kirova, “The European Union, A “Quiet Superpower” or a Relic of the Past?” Media Monitor Reports, March 30, 2007, University of Southern California, USC Center on Public Diplomacy. Accessed on July 3, 2009.

http://uscpublicdiplomacy.com/index.php/newsroom/specialreports_detail/the_european_union_a_quiet_superpower_or_

a_relic_of_the_past/.

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likely to oversimplify in their image perception of the sources of those perceived challenges, i.e.

to stereotype their motivations, capabilities and leaders (Cottam and Cottam 2001, 98-100).

In regard to Figure 1, few images are more long-lived and persisting than are capability

images. Although the factors comprising a state's power potential base are constantly in flux,

state leaderships examine only occasionally the alteration in capability base that they produce.

They do so mostly when the course of events produces results that state leaderships did not

expect because of the extent power imagery. The British withdrawal east of the Suez Canal in the

Middle East following the 1956 intervention there was one such event (Coles 2006: 102, 115;

McCourt 2009, 462). Often a major time lag exists between capability change and a perception of

that change. Russia’s defeat in the first Chechen war is arguably another exemplary case

demonstrating the decline of a great power (Zurcher 2007, 81-85, esp. 83). Russia’s subsequent

intervention in Georgia in August 2008 may have included the intention to reestablish its great

power image status.13

Georgia, as a small actor, has more or less significant bargaining leverage in today’s

international political environment depending upon the varying intensity of conflict between the

US, Russia and, increasingly, China. The level of conflict between these three great powers

significantly determines their respective level of their interest in third lesser power countries. A

so-called Great Power is one that the world community should consider as a central actor at the

international system level. It must have the requisite resource base to develop an exceptionally

strong set of power instruments and to generate a strong bargaining base which is not primarily

derivative from the strategies of other states. One interpretation of the CFSP and the CSDP is that

they aim to lessen EU reliance on the US for its bargaining leverage in the post Cold War

international environment. Currently, by this criterion, the EU would not be a Great Power to the

extent that its bargaining leverage system is perceived as having a primary dependency on the US

for its efficacy. EU leaders may wish to develop its own bargaining base independent of the US.

Their ability to achieve it in the short and medium term, however, is questionable; it must have

the ability to mobilize its resources quickly for power instrumental and bargaining purposes. The

EU currently lacks the requisite nationalistic mobilization base to achieve this objective. On the

other hand, it is less prone to perceive relatively more intense challenges. It is also less likely to

stereotype accordingly as a characterization of its prevailing view in its foreign policy making

process. It is less likely to show policy behavior that corresponds with the eight patterns

described above regarding a nationalistic actor, i.e. a nation state.

Americans examining exactly the same Soviet international behavior during the Cold War

era drew opposite conclusions regarding Soviet intentions. Hence these same observers implicitly

portrayed different conclusions regarding the image of the US that prevailed in the USSR. For

example, what was the nature of the challenge that Soviet decision makers perceived when they

decided in December 1979 to occupy Afghanistan and to participate in the removal, and as it

turned out, the death, of President Hafizollah Amin? Was it a move to save a friendly

Afghanistan regime from the subversive efforts of the United States and China and to do so by

helping the regime replace its unpopular leader with one more likely to attract broader support?

Or was it a first step in a move to occupy much of South Asia in pursuit of a highly aggressive

purpose?

Similar questions should be asked in relation to Russia’s intervention on behalf of Abkhaz

and South Ossetian separatists in Georgia in August 2008. For example, was Moscow’s move in

Georgia reminiscent of the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia in the late 1930s, i.e. perception

of opportunity due to a perceived lack of will of the other Great Powers to resist?14

Or, was it

13 International Crisis Group, “Russia vs. Georgia: The Fallout: Europe Report N°195 – 22 August 2008” esp. pp. 17-19,

“Russian Motivations Beyond Georgia,” Accessed June 15, 2009. http://www.crisisgroup.org/home/index.cfm?id= 5636&l=1. 14 Mart Laar, a former Estonian prime minister and adviser to the Georgian government, argued so: “Echoes of 1930s in

Russian annexation,” Financial Times, April 17, 2008. Accessed on September 23, 2008. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/

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rather motivated by perception of threat from the US and its allies, as was US intervention to

create the Republic of South Vietnam?

The case of the CFSP highlights the relationship of perception of challenge prevailing in a

political system in determining its foreign policy strategy. Perceptual “social representations”

derived from political experience regarding the relative resources available to an actor also shape

perceptions of self-identity and other (Monroe et al 2000, 437-38). In the case of the EU,

accommodation to a perceived political reality includes perceptions about the EU’s relative

bargaining leverage as portrayed in Figure 1. Those pro-EU European observers who see the

EU’s power resources as comparatively quite weak would more likely shape self-perception in an

accommodative direction to the US. If US security commitments to the EU are necessary for the

EU to exist, then such an observer is more likely to perceive US foreign policy motivation in a

positive light. Concomitantly, that same observer is more likely to see the motivations of US

opponents negatively. Another, more Euro skeptic European observer will more likely see EU

relative capabilities and bargaining leverage and motivations differently. The latter will also

more likely manifest more complex or even negative perceptions of US and Russian as well as

EU foreign policy motivation.

The EU collectively, albeit unconsciously, adopts its strategy in Eurasia and globally within

the context of the overriding global US war on terror. Assumptions about a target’s intentions

influence inferences about an agent’s appropriate foreign policy aims. Assumptions regarding

intentions generate influence over observations and inferences. Therefore, since the respective

assumptions of analysts regarding intentions of targets will inevitably differ, they are unlikely to

agree on their own government’s foreign policy objectives. Explicating one’s assumptions about

the respective intentions of the European, American and Russian diplomatic bargaining

contestants is therefore important. It sheds light on the assumptions regarding the debate on the

relationship of NATO to the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and specifically to the

Common Security and Defense Policy (CSDP). It clarifies the differences in perceived

contemporary challenges, particularly in regard to Russian intentions towards the former Soviet

republics and allies.

Many Russian elites have a predisposition in effect not to view the EU as a great power

actor.15

It is largely due to the difficulties of EU national foreign policy coordination. These

difficulties are partly the effect of differences between the worldview and values of the different

respective national elite groups and their constituencies. John Thornhill of The Financial Times

highlights the positives surrounding this diversity:

But that process has its advantages too. It leads to a robust and transparent debate

between the EU’s 27 members [now 28 with the accession of Croatia in 2013 (BD)] that

ultimately leads to a common approach. Britain, Poland and the Baltic states argue that

the EU must diversify its energy supplies. Germany, France and Italy suggest it would

be folly to isolate Russia. Russia’s leaders say they want a multi-polar world. The EU is

its embodiment in all its maddening – but often useful – complexity. 16

c4a6dfe2-0caa-11dd-86df-0000779fd2ac.html. In the light of subsequent burgeoning violence in Russian-controlled

North Caucasus, particularly Daghestan and Ingushetia, Russian intervention in Georgia in 2008 may have more parallels

with the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, “Russia's Ingushetia leader wounded by suicide bomber,” Reuters, June 22, 2009. Accessed on June 23, 2009. http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090622/wl_nm/us_russia_ ingushetia_president_7. 15 Kirsty Hughes, “The EU in a globalised world,” 15.11.2007, EuropeanVoice.com, November 15, 2007. Accessed on

July 3, 2009. http://www.europeanvoice.com/Article/58692.aspx, reporting that Rose Gottemoeller, chair of the Carnegie Endowment's Moscow Center, dismisses the “Russian rhetoric” trying “to play down the importance of the EU,”

nevertheless, Russia's political class recognises the EU's importance. “But Russia, in the last ten years, still thinks it can

gain advantage by playing off individual member states against the EU [as a whole].” 16 John Thornhill, “A Russia united by anti-westernism,” Financial Times, February 3, 2009. Accessed on June 15, 2009.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/1dc2a2e8-f213-11dd-9678-0000779fd2ac.html, notes that “Many Russians scorn the EU as a

strange animal they do not understand (they are not alone in that). In their view, the EU is overly political, cumbersome

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The EU is thus more a political club rather than an actor. A nation state such as the US and

Russia, in contrast, is more likely to have a greater capability to rely upon romantic national

symbol manipulation to control the public. It can thereby more readily extract and mobilize

societal resources for pursuing external, foreign policy objectives.

Three European Ideal-type Views of the EU’s CSDP

To reiterate, assumptions regarding intentions and relative capabilities generate influence over

observations and inferences. Since the respective assumptions of observers regarding intentions

of a target will inevitably differ, they are unlikely to agree on an actor’s foreign policy strategy.

For example, they may all agree that NATO-member Turkey’s role in the EU’s CSDP is

important (Hanbay 2011). Yet they may not agree on how likely it is to promote a more benign

security environment for the EU.17

This analysis aims to help clarify some of the sources of this

disagreement in terms of the disputants’ respective assumptions regarding motivations and aims

so as to facilitate a more effective debate. The inferences below are the author’s to create three

ideal-type viewpoints. Of course, a reader will challenge them. The author’s aim here is only to

help clarify, conceptually and empirically, what are some of the critical issues over which the

challenge may stem in order to expedite the debate. The first constructed viewpoint “A” arguably

is closest to the present-day EU CSDP in terms of its assumptions as if one hypothetical

individual were making this policy. The viewpoints “B” and “C” represent the assumptions of

two dissenting viewpoints, skeptical of the development of the CSDP. They would be closer to

those Irish voters in 2008 who rejected the Treaty of Lisbon, fearing that it threatened Ireland’s

neutrality (Church and Phinnemore 2013, 51-2). In the EU’s foreign policy making process,

actors may be placed on continua in terms of how close are far they are from these three

viewpoints regarding the world security situation confronting the EU. Each process actor has its

respective, differing degree of political influence over the output of the process in the course of

the political reconciliation of their competing preferences.

Compare the hierarchical ranking of US foreign policy objectives by three hypothetical but

arguably representative, Weberian ideal-type European portrayals of US foreign policy

motivation: European ideal-type viewpoint “A” (closest to the dominant, prevailing view) sees

the primary determinant of US foreign policy in the war on terror as a perceived intense threat to

American national security following the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks. The US’ primary

strategic objective: implement roll back against Syria and Iran and their agents to engineer

change in their regimes that currently support particular, radical militant actors. Hence: a)

stabilize the pro-US regimes in Egypt, Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan; b) maintain the security of

the state of Israel as a regional American ally against terrorism and its supporters, and therefore

oppose any Palestinian actors which receive aid from axis of evil states in any form; c) prevent

Iranian acquisition of weapons of mass destruction through whatever means necessary, and

therefore stop North Korea’s proliferation of nuclear, biochemical and ballistic missile weapons

technology to Iran and their allies; d) strengthen the status quo conservative Middle Eastern

regimes as front line states. Strengthening the US alliance with the nationalist secular authorities

in Turkey through Turkey’s EU accession is a tactical aim supporting ‘a,’ ‘b,’ ‘c,’ and ‘d’; e) ally

with Russia and China against militant political Islamic movements in Eurasia. Viewpoint “A”

assumes a close, cooperative relationship between the EU and NATO that is essential for

and obsessed with process.” Thornhill thereby portrays Russian elite disdain for the EU as less intensely opportunistic

and accommodates a view that Russian belligerence has some basis in perception of threat from a heretofore US-led Euro-Atlantic community. 17 e.g. Andrew Rettman, “EU digests Russia's South Stream announcement, EUobserver, December 3, 2014. Accessed

January 10, 2015. https://euobserver.com/foreign/126769; BBC Monitoring European “Commentary calls on EU, turkey to redefine security, defence relationship.” (2013, Jan 24). Text of report in English by Turkish newspaper Today's

Zaman website on January 24, 2013. Accessed January 10, 2015. http://search.proquest.com/docview/1272226045?

accountid=14872

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DEDOMINICIS: NATIONALISM AND THE EUROPEAN UNION

European security. The September 2014 North Atlantic Council statement articulates this

worldview.18

Viewpoint “A” shares the prevailing US government view that as a secondary challenge,

Moscow will not accept the radical diminution in its global political status. It seeks to reassert its

hegemony over the former Soviet territories in Europe and Asia. The former Soviet Baltic

republics have joined NATO and the EU along with their Russian minority populations. As a

secondary strategic concern, the US authorities will, if forced to choose, acquiesce to a re-

extension of Moscow’s authority to a significant degree into other former Soviet territories. The

US will do so in return for Russian assistance against pan-Shia and pan-Sunni political Islam in

the Greater Middle East and elsewhere, serving the US’ primary strategic objective. Pro-NATO

Turkey plays a critical role in these areas. It is an ally against militant political Islam and a

bargaining leverage base for projecting Euro-Atlantic power into the Caucasus, the Central Asian

republics and in the Middle East.

European ideal-type viewpoint “B” sees the primary interest of US foreign policy as being

pursuit of national grandeur due to an intensely perceived opportunity for assertion of global

American dominance (Cottam 1977, 31-53). The US’ primary strategic objective: establish

global American predominance through a global “war on terror.” Hence, use the opportunity to

fight militant political Islam and pan-Arab nationalism wherever they challenge US regional

political influence to expand this influence. Requisite tactical requirements therefore include

installing and strengthening pro-US regimes in Egypt, Pakistan, Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and

Iran. They also include support to Israel as the closest regional US ally to permit her maximal

policy option range. This last requires establishing a cooperative Palestinian authority on the

West Bank that acquiesces to Israeli control over Judea, Samaria, and Jerusalem. A secondary

strategic general aim is to extend American hegemony further in the Middle East to include

Central Asia and the other areas of the former Soviet Union through the expansion of Euro-

Atlantic structures and their influence more generally.

Viewpoint “B” would also identify a set of US secondary strategic objectives towards the

former Eurasian territories of the Soviet Union and traditional Russian allies in the Near and

Middle East. These objectives are similar to those of “A.” Viewpoint “B” assumes they serve an

ultimately different high level strategic US aim. However, “B” relative to “A” assumes the US as

having a self-image of its comparative capability level that is sufficiently great to allow less

compromise with Russia. Russia expects recognition of its privileged interests in the former

Soviet territories in return for it to isolate Iran.19

This US capability self-image corresponds with

the perceived policy option range that includes establishing global US hegemony. “B” assumes

US foreign policy motivation in the direction of national grandeur as partly a consequence of

American prevailing view estimations. These estimates assume that US relative power

capabilities and bargaining leverage including the North Atlantic Alliance are sufficiently

superior to pursue and maintain global hegemony. These capabilities stem from the estimation

that other actors lack the political bargaining leverage necessary to resist ultimate inclusion into

US benign hegemony. Again, pro-NATO Turkey plays a critical role in both areas as an ally

against militant political Islam and pan-Arabism in the Middle East. It is a bargaining leverage

foundation for projecting Euro-Atlantic influence into the Caucasus and the Central Asian

republics. Consequently, the tactical aims in traditional Russian areas of influence which

determine the CFSP and CSDP: a) integrate the Balkans and eastern Europe into Euro-Atlantic

18 “Wales Summit Declaration: Issued by the Heads of State and Government participating in the meeting of the North

Atlantic Council in Wales,” Press Release (2014) 120, Issued on 05 Sept. 2014. Accessed on September 30, 2014. http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/official_texts_112964.htm, esp. para. 19, 25, 27, 33, 102-4.. 19 Globalsecurity.org, “Russian Privileged Interests,” Accessed on August 29, 2013. http://www.globalsecurity.

org/military/world/russia/privileged-interests.htm, critiquing Russian President Dimitri Medvedev’s comments, “Meetings with Representatives of various Communities: Transcript of the Meeting with the Participants in the

International Club Valdai,” September 12, 2008, GUM Exhibition Centre, Moscow. Accessed on August 29, 2013.

http://archive.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2008/09/12/1644_type82912type82917type84779_ 206409.shtml.

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THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF INTERDISCIPLINARY ORGANIZATIONAL STUDIES

structures; b) support the stability of the secular regimes in the former Soviet republics in Central

Asia and the Caucasus as the first step towards their eventual Euro-Atlantic accession; c)

overturn the pan-Shia Syrian and Iranian regimes. Stabilizing NATO ally Turkey through EU

integration supports these aims as Turkey faces a challenge from pan-Kurdish nationalism

encouraged by disintegration of Syria and Iraq.

European ideal-type viewpoint “C” assumes the primary determinant of US foreign policy

as the product of capitalistic forces that see an opportunity to advance their corporate interests.

Therefore, the US’ primary strategic objective is to remove any challenges to the predominance

of US capitalist influence and profit making. This strategic aim requires, in turn, ensuring US

corporate ready access to fossil fuel reserves in the Middle East and Central Asia. A component

of this high level tactical commitment would be to maintain de facto US control over Arabian

Peninsula fossil fuel reserves. To do so, the US counters threats to traditional regimes from pan-

Islamist and pan-Arab nationalist actors.

Viewpoint “C” assumes a set of US primary tactical aims that appear the same as those that

“A” and “B” identify. Viewpoint “C” infers the same set of derivative secondary strategic

objectives of the CFSP and the CSDP for the former Soviet territories and pro-Russian allies in

the Balkans as viewpoint “B.” These objectives are due to US political economic hegemony that

the US victory in the Second World War and the Cold War established. European Marxian

viewpoint “C” assumes the American political economy has colonized the European political

economy. “C,” however, assumes these objectives serve a different high level strategic US aim.

Like “B,” “C” assumes the US as less willing to compromise with Russia in favor of Russia’s

proclamation of privileged interests in the former Soviet territories in return for Russian

cooperation to isolate Iran. Iranian isolation lessens the threat to America’s pro-business

traditional elite allies in the Middle East. Similar to “B,” viewpoint “C” assumes Russia as more

of a long term challenge to American capitalistic political economic expansion throughout

Eurasia. Predominantly Shiite Iran constitutes a challenge to American profit expansion interests

but it is a limited one in comparison with Moscow. European viewpoint “C” is therefore more

likely to see the EU’s CFSP and CSDP as a handmaiden of North Atlantic corporate business

interests. The CFSP and CSDP will help challenge Moscow’s claim to a privileged sphere of

influence in the former Soviet territories and their bordering regions. Russia will be circumspect

in allying with political Islamic actors against the US. Moscow faces its own challenge from

political Islam in the Caucasus, the Central Asian republics, and among the other millions of

Muslims in Russia itself. As in Georgia and Ukraine, for example, Russia will therefore be more

willing to rely upon use of force. On the other hand, Shiite Iran also has great trade potential for

Russia (and China) to exploit as a consequence. Russia remains primarily an aggressive

competitor for profits with European and American oligopolists and will only cooperate insofar

as it calculates that cooperation serves its corporate profit interests.

European viewpoints “A,” “B,” and “C” all see Euro-Atlantic tactical objectives towards the

former Soviet territories which generate the closely similar immediate behavior patterns. They

disagree on the ultimate strategy aims that they serve. They in turn derive from differences in

interpretation regarding US foreign policy motivation. “B” and “C” however, assume a greater

danger from the outcome of US-Russian interaction producing violently conflictual outcomes

than “A.”

These same three European viewpoints see the strategic and tactical set of aims constituting

the European Union’s nascent CSDP accordingly. European ideal-type viewpoint “A” sees the

primary determinant of EU CFSP being support of European integration trends through

counteracting threats of disruption in a stable North Atlantic alliance. Hence, the EU’s primary

strategic aim is to maintain US predominance within the North Atlantic Alliance framework. US

benign hegemony via NATO permits European integration. To achieve this strategic aim, the EU

supports the Common Security and Defense Policy (CSDP) to reinforce continuing US external

10

DEDOMINICIS: NATIONALISM AND THE EUROPEAN UNION

engagement. The CSDP demonstrates the EU ability to assume responsibility for security in

regions closest to home (i.e. Southeastern Europe and other regions bordering Europe).

European viewpoint “A” sees a secondary strategic objective of the EU’s CFSP to include

counteraction of destabilization of pro-Western alliance, status quo Middle East regimes. This

destabilization stems from militant political Islam and pan-Arab nationalism. This objective

requires, in order of political priority, a) supporting nationalist reformers in the Iranian regime in

their struggle with conservative hardliners, i.e. pan-Shia Islamists, and opposing a rash, US or

Israeli-led military assault on Iran which may lead to regional destabilization; and b)

counterbalancing to the extent feasible the intensification of US support for Israel so as to

promote establishment of a semi-sovereign Palestinian state on the West Bank in confederation

with Jordan. The latter aims thereby to help counteract destabilizing Arab nationalist and

political Islamic discontent which threaten destabilization of political regimes in the Middle East.

Viewpoint “A” also sees policy towards Russia within the framework of the US primary

perception of threat from political Islam as more determinative of the CFSP and the CSDP than

“B” and “C.” This predisposition reflects the stronger foundational role of perception of threat

from a supposedly aggressive, imperialist USSR during the Cold War. Russia, however, is on the

frontline of confronting political Islam, and consequently shares certain cooperative interests

with the US. While maintaining this more complex worldview, the CFSP and CSDP serve the

attractive, soft power aspect of stabilization and extension of North Atlantic hegemony into the

former Soviet territories. It aims to do so while confronting a Russian government that would

inevitably seek to reassert its regional hegemony as it recovers from the collapse of state

socialism. Consequently, the tactical aims in traditional Russian areas of influence which

determine the CFSP and CSDP: a) Integrate into Euro-Atlantic structures the young pro-Western

regimes among traditionally pro-Moscow actors (Ukraine, Serbia, Bulgaria) in the Balkans and

the Mediterranean littoral more broadly; b) Support the sovereignty and stability of the former

Soviet republics in the Caucasus and the secular regimes in Central Asia; c) stabilize US ally

Turkey through EU integration. In sum, strategy towards the former Soviet territories would be

more in accordance with a modus vivendi approach, which the US leads and the EU supports. A

Russia integrated into global capitalist trade and financial flows may receive some concession

over its sphere of influence in the former Soviet territories in return for cooperation in combating

pan-Shia and pan-Sunni political Islam.

European ideal-type viewpoint “B,” in contrast, sees the primary determinant of EU CFSP

being the perception of a threat from global American national grandeur aspirations. These

aspirations are evident in the trend of US unilateralism including threat and use of force. Hence,

a primary strategic objective for developing a cohesive CFSP with an effective CSDP is to

reduce EU dependency on NATO. The aim is to increase EU bargaining leverage in negotiations

with the US over a wide range of issues. This primary objective arguably requires incorporating

Russia as a prospective EU ally, as French President Francois Mitterrand suggested at one point

(Cogan 2011, 261-63). The secondary strategic objectives with regard to the Middle East as a

main area of conflict are similar to those of viewpoint “A.”

Viewpoint “B” is therefore more likely to see Russia as a potential strategic partner, if not an

ally, against a unilateralist USA. However, due to a very strong self-awareness of the power

limitations of the EU, the EU authorities are likely to be quite circumspect in adopting a

containment policy towards the US. This policy is well beyond the policy option range of the EU

and consequently not worth attempting. The ease with which the US polarized the member and

applicant member nation states of the EU in seeking allies for its March 2003 Iraq invasion was a

clear “feedback” warning (see figure 1).20

On the other hand, the EU may seek to avoid being a

20 Craig S. Smith, “Chirac Upsets East Europe by Telling It to ‘Shut Up’ on Iraq,” New York Times, February 18, 2003.

Accessed on August 27, 2013. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/18/international/europe/18CND-CHIRAC.html

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handmaiden for US imperial expansion by resisting the further expansion of NATO.21

From this

perspective, EU policies would appear to conform with a view that Russian policy is motivated

by a perception of threat from the United States. The EU would act as a mediator towards Russia

to achieve the more modest objective of avoiding Europe becoming a space for political

competition between the US and Russia. The CFSP and the CSDP, therefore, should not appear

as a servant towards NATO policies. Inferring that the prevailing view of Moscow is perception

of threat implies that correctly or incorrectly, Moscow views the US as seeing opportunity. In

this view, Moscow assumes Washington views it as politically unable to resist its perceived

overwhelming bargaining leverage advantage. The critical point is therefore is to prove to

Moscow that the EU is an autonomous, politically significant actor (albeit not a Great Power),

and which is not under the control of Washington. Therefore, the CFSP and its CSDP should

establish a clearly separate command and control system autonomous from NATO. It may avoid

US exploitation of EU resources as a trans-state bargaining lever as part of US influence

expansion into the former Soviet territories. The EU would pursue a strategy more in accordance

with Ostpolitik with Russia rather than modus vivendi.

European ideal-type viewpoint “C” sees the primary determinant of EU CFSP and its CSDP

being to advance the interests of European corporate and financial actors. Hence, the EU’s

primary strategic objective is to create and exploit trade opportunities for European corporate and

financial actors in the Middle East and in the world without damaging US-EU economic ties.

Therefore, a) stabilize pro-business, status quo conservative oil sheikhdoms through establishing

a semi-sovereign Palestinian state on the West Bank in confederation with Jordan; b) oppose US

efforts to isolate Iran economically, so support nationalist, pro-investment reformers in the

Iranian regime in their struggle with conservative hardliners, i.e. pan-Shia Islamists. Also reach

agreements with Iran and Russia to permit ease of exploitation of fossil fuel reserves in the

Caspian Sea basin; c) ensure that European corporations have access to reopened Iraqi resources.

A secondary EU strategic objective is to develop a cohesive CFSP with a CSDP to reduce EU

dependency on NATO. Thereby the EU may increase its bargaining leverage towards the US to

permit the expansion of European capitalist corporate investment.

Viewpoint “C” sees the CFSP and CSDP as providing opportunities for monopoly capitalists

in the EU to win contracts for defense procurement expenditure which have until now gone to

US suppliers. As with the development of the US Boeing Corporation, Airbus is the civilian

counterpart to the effort to develop a complete European aerospace industry. The pan-European

“Eurofighter Typhoon” fighter project also seeks to develop European military aerospace

capabilities and profits in this regard.22

The CSDP would have a particular focus on areas in

which European demand for natural commodities like fossil fuels would be the strongest focus of

concern, including North Africa and Central Asia. The Balkans and the former Soviet territories

are also important insofar as they are necessary transit routes for Caspian Sea littoral oil and gas.

EU political strategy would appear more in accordance with a modus vivendi strategic approach

towards both the US and Russia. Meanwhile, EU monopoly capital seeks to exploit profit

opportunities in competition with American and Russian capital. Again, EU capability self-image

is not at a point to go beyond efforts to maintain EU autonomy in US and Russia competition for

global influence.

All three ideal-type European viewpoints see the EU lacking the power potential base to

challenge or supplant the US directly due to poor mobilization base at this stage. All three

viewpoints see Europe either supporting or resigning itself at present to second place status

21 John Thornhill, “It is time for the west and Ukraine to offer Putin a deal,” Financial Times, November 23, 2014.

Accessed on January 10, 2015. http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/b828fec6-6b30-11e4-be68-00144feabdc0.html#axzz3

ORTQUABf 22 e.g. Tamir Eshel, “Boeing F-15SE Silent Eagle to be Seoul’s Next Generation Fighter,” August 19, 2013. Accessed on

August 30, 2013, http://defense-update.com/20130819_boeing-f-15se-silent-eagle-for-korea.html. The F-15SE beat out

the Eurofighter “Typhoon Tranch 3” offered by the European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company (EADS).

12

DEDOMINICIS: NATIONALISM AND THE EUROPEAN UNION

regarding US global preeminence. According to viewpoint “A,” failure of the EU to demonstrate

the will and determination to play its appropriate role for security in the Mediterranean littoral

risks encouraging isolationist-nationalist American sentiments. These sentiments claim European

free riding on American security largesse. Meanwhile, an overly assertive US defensive response

will destabilize the Mediterranean region at greater cost to the EU as a consequence, for example,

of an increase in illegal immigration.

European viewpoints “B” and “C” are more likely to see the US as a source of challenge to

the needs of the EU. The more intense the threat which this viewpoint assumes from the US, the

more intense will be the demands for a major commitment of European resources to establish an

autonomous and effective EU CSDP. The aim would be to reduce the EU’s dependency on

NATO. Effective EU policy in creating an operative CSDP as well as a cohesive justice and

home affairs (JHA) policy autonomous from North Atlantic Alliance objectives would be

necessary. Success would reduce US bargaining leverage advantage over the EU in negotiations

over a wide range of issues. These issues include global climate and trade tariffs disputes, as well

as towards Middle Eastern actors. More recently, they include how to deal with Moscow’s claim

to privileged interests in the former Soviet territories.23

An implicit discussion not only of US intentions but also Russian motivations is evident in

the concern with regard to the US policy attitude showing tendencies towards unilateralism.24

An

explicit analytic effort to link this policy attitude to a set of motivations and values would be

useful. Those values include US national security, prestige and grandeur as well as economic

private and governmental organizational interests. The debate is really over their relative

prominence in the motivational mix driving US external behavior. European ideal-type viewpiont

“B” sees American national grandeur as most important. “A” sees national security as most

important. “C” sees economic interests as most important. These differing interpretations of US

intentions lead to differing interpretations of the political motivations and strategic aims for

developing the CSDP of the European Union. All three strands have input into the EU foreign

policy making process to produce a result that has elements of all three while “A” is by far

predominant. They change in preeminence depending upon the changing domestic political

strength of the political constituencies within the EU carrying elements of these three different

worldviews.

Conclusion

How the EU deals with a third actor such as Georgia or Ukraine will depend primarily upon the

prevailing view in the capital centers of the EU regarding the ultimate intentions of the US and

Russia.25

If European ideal-type viewpoint “A” prevails politically, then the EU’s policy towards

the Caucasus and Ukraine will be derivative of EU’s support role for the US in the war on terror.

It will do so primarily as it necessitates accommodation with Russia to secure its cooperation in

the Greater Middle East. If viewpoint “B” prevails, then the EU will likely more willing to

cooperate with Russian hegemony in the former Soviet territories in return for Russian

cooperation to prevent crisis escalation over Iran’s nuclear program. If viewpoint “C” prevails

then EU foreign policy will cooperate with Russia on a low tactical level when necessary to

exploit profit opportunities in the Greater Middle East. But the overall thrust will be in

23 See, for example, Gareth Evans, “European Geopolitics After the Russia-Georgia War: The Security Role of the

OSCE,” Keynote Address by Gareth Evans, President, International Crisis Group, to OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, The

OSCE in an Open World: Trade, Security and Migration, Toronto, Canada, 18 September 2008. Accessed July 3, 2009. http://www.crisisgroup.org/home/index.cfm?id=5686&l=1 24 Sergey Lavrov, Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, "Containing Russia: Back to the Future?"

Global Research, 20 July 2007. Accessed July 3, 2009. http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=6373. 25 With the agreement of Russia and Georgia, the EU established in September 2008 a civilian monitor peacekeeping

mission in Georgia to monitor the ceasefire between all parties as well as promoting cooperation: “European Union

Monitoring Mission in Georgia.” Accessed August 31, 2013. http://www.eumm.eu/en/about_eumm.

13

THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF INTERDISCIPLINARY ORGANIZATIONAL STUDIES

conformity with the North Atlantic political economy primarily directed from Washington

against Russian efforts to reassert its former regional economic hegemony. Prevailing EU self-

images and therefore the nature and intensity of EU policy towards third countries will be

derivative of prevailing EU views regarding ultimate US and Russian intentions and capabilities.

This critique of the EU as a strategy for peace promotion in the European and surrounding

regions focuses on assumptions regarding foreign policy motivations and relative power

capabilities of self and other. This analysis aimed to help explicate those assumptions to facilitate

critical debate. It did so by applying a conceptual framework suggesting nationalism, defense,

and economic interests as sources of foreign policy. It hypothesized their respective implications

for the foreign policy strategies of the member states within the North Atlantic alliance as well as

Russia. It offered a critique of the EU’s CSDP in terms of its fundamental assumptions. While

the foundations of European integration were laid during the Cold War and the latter’s

assumption of an imperialist USSR, the post Cold War challenges to European security may

include the US. To the extent that the latter is in fact the case, then the EU’s CSDP should avoid

promoting the perception globally purposefully or inadvertently that the CSDP is indivisible

from NATO.

Acknowledgement

This article was produced through the support of the research fund of the Catholic University of

Korea. The author would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers for their thoughtful

critiques. The author would also like to thank the students at the American University in Bulgaria

and the Catholic University of Korea whom the author had the privilege to teach for their insights

and comments. Any errors are solely the author’s.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Benedict E. DeDominicis: Assistant Professor, International Studies Department, Catholic

University of Korea, Seoul, South Korea

16

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