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In the excerpts below from the 2015 book the assumption that the EU cannot respond to crisis is challenged. The fact that European leaders were ready to guarantee the euro on an enormous level (500 billion euros) is a case in point. But there are also areas where the perception of joint interest has been much weaker. In the last years seven legislative proposals related to migration have been prepared by the European Commission. But none of them have passed the Council and the EU Parliament. A very serious question for the future is whether in the next decade a crisis will occur which will lead to the mobilisation of unprecedented joint resources also for defence - far beyond what the EDF (the European Defence Fund) may contain. Swift EU reaction to crisis European action after 9/11 challenged the view that the EU is a slow-reacting bureaucracy, unable to respond to new requirements. As was also proven later, during the financial crisis from 2008, the European Council swiftly adopted a cross-institutional terrorism action plan comprising 69 points. The European institutions were closely examined to see what was already going on and what could be brought forward as potential European contributions to the fight against terrorism.[1] One can therefore expect that if there is another major attack in the EU area or seriously affecting the Union, the attention to these issues will rise to the top of the agenda and questions will be asked about how the 9/11, Madrid and London attacks were followed up on the EU level. This development on the one hand illustrates the importance of crisis to catalyse European integration. On the other hand it continues to illustrate that, very soon after or even during a crisis, senses are dulled and resistance to change starts to build up. - - - Crisis as a catalyst for new forms of EU cooperation Crises may break new ground in terms of perceived needs for cooperation on the EU level. Some of these forms of cooperation are very sensitive, touching on the domestic political debate about subsidiarity. A case in point is consular cooperation. The consequences of globalization are likely to stretch the limits of what is perceived to be acceptable in this regard, notably in areas such as health security related to pandemics, etc. [1] European Commission, ‘EU Plan of Action on Combating Terrorism (revised)’, 10010/3/04, 2004, ; J Wouters, & F Naert, ‘Of Arrest Warrants, Terrorist Offences and Extradition Deals An Appraisal of the EU’s Main Criminal Law Measures against Terrorism after ‘11 September’’, 2004, ; de Vries, G ‘The European Union’s role in the fight against terrorism’, Irish studies in international affairs 16, no. 1, 2005, pp. 3-9; Bossong, R ‘The action plan on combating terrorism: a flawed instrument of EU security governance’, JCMS: journal of common market studies 46, no. 1, 2008, pp. 27-48. [2] see EEAS, ‘EEAS Review’, 2013, [3] Lundin, L-E ‘From A European Security Strategy to a European Global Strategy Strategy:Ten Content-Related Issues’, UI Occasional Papers 11, 2012, ; Lundin, L-E ‘From a European Security Strategy to a European Global Strategy: Take II: Policy options’, UI Occasional Papers 13, 2013, [4] Views expressed by several respondents during interviews in EEAS 2012-2013 When the text below was written around 2014 for my book on EU and security some of the most sobering experiences for EU Member States were still ahead of them, notably the migration and Brexit crises. So some of these thoughts need to be put on the table, most likely with even more humility and self criticism than before. Because some of them were actually taught EU Member States by some of the colleagues convinced of their foresight, including the Brits during their EU Presidency in 2005.
E and R: Evaluation and Re-evaluationLessons learned must be an inbuilt process in each endeavour, be it a project or a CSDP mission. It needs to take the overall measures of success into account and should be combined with evaluations over the longer term of Community programmes and ad hoc Council decisions. There is no joined up approach to this in the EU that can provide decision makers with relevant evaluations before important decisions are made. On the Community side, evaluations are often so voluminous and cover such a long period (a decade of assistance or more) that they are difficult to digest for those who need to read and digest them. At the other end, political evaluations of a string of Council decisions in the CFSP area are not often made or are partly confidential. Still, those responsible for these policies need to face the fact that outside evaluations are often critical. They need to evaluate the amount of effort deployed, including money and risk to staff, without sufficiently careful consideration beforehand. Re-evaluation is a different process altogether. In science, as documented by Thomas Kuhn, it is a process often leading to new discovery through agonizing reappraisals.[1] In the EU, it is an effort typically required in crisis and difficult to animate in the normal situation. However, as discussed in the context of the Arab Spring, re-evaluation is key, as a part of the continuous political dialogue within and outside the EU. [1] Kuhn, TS, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 2nd edn., University of Chicago Press, 1970. See also for a discussion of Kuhn’s critique of the positivist school: Buzan, B, & L Hansen, The Evolution of International Security Studies, 1 edn., Cambridge University Press, 2009. |
Lars-Erik LundinNever too late to learn for anyone - more obvious than ever after 9/11, Iraq, Fukushima, the Arab Spring, the financial crisis, Ukraine, not to mention Brexit.. Archives
June 2019
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