Building a Stronger Eastern Partnership: Towards an EaP 2.0

The European Union has been working to deepen the economic and political relationship with its Eastern neighbouring countries over the recent years. A set of formal agreements are intended for signature between the EU and Ukraine, Moldova and the South Caucasus states at the Eastern Partnership (EaP) summit scheduled for 28-29 November 2013. These agreements have provoked a response from the Russian Federation which is seeking to offer an alternative set of economic relationship to the exclusion of the EU. In the first Policy Paper to be published, the recently created Global Europe Centre (GEC) sets out a reform agenda that the EU needs to adopt towards the EaP states to enable a more binding relationship. The paper argues that the EU needs to define a ‘next generation’ objective for the EaPas it enters the implementation phase of the current set of Association Agreements (AAs). The proposal is that the EU should set a European Partnership Community (EPC) statusas a bilateral and multilateral goal for the EaP. The paper contends that there is urgency for the EU to think more strategically vis-à-vis its neighbourhood, and create a more clear-cut place for Russia to avoid the current situation of divisive competition. Further, the EU needs to reform aspects of its current EaP policy. The EU needs to define a clearer, and measureable set of objectives for its role in the resolution of the ‘frozen’ conflicts of its Eastern neighbourhood; refresh its policy towards Belarus; speed up visa liberalisation to ease travel for citizens of the EU’s neighbouring states; and deepen and broaden civil society engagement by investing more in deep democracy, linkage and people-to-people contacts

Brexit or Bremain: What future for the UK’s European Diplomatic Strategy?

A major public debate on the costs and benefits of the United Kingdom’s membership of the European Union is presently under way. The outcome of the referendum on 23 June 2016 will be a pivotal moment in determining whether the EU has a future as a component of the UK’s European diplomatic strategy or whether there is a major recalibration of how the UK relates to Europe and more widely of its role within international relations. Since accession to the European Economic Community the UK has evolved an uncodified, multipronged European diplomatic strategy. This has involved the UK seeking to reinforce its approach of shaping the security of the continent, preserving a leading diplomatic role for the UK in managing the international relations of Europe, and to maximize British trade and investment opportunities through a broadening and deepening of Europe as an economically liberal part of the global political economy. Since accession the UK’s European diplomatic strategy has also been to use membership of the EU as facilitating the enhancement of its international influence, primarily as a vehicle for leveraging and amplifying broader national foreign and security policy objectives. The strategy has been consistent irrespective of which party has formed the government in the UK. Increasing domestic political difficulties with the process of European integration have now directly impacted on this European strategy with a referendum commitment. Whether a vote for a Brexit or a Bremain, the UK will be confronted with challenges for its future European strategy

Soft or hard Brexit? EPC Commentary, 15 July 2016

The EU is in uncharted waters when it comes to negotiating the UK’s exit from the Union. Creative and flexible thinking will be required from all parties if an orderly departure is to be managed. The alternative is a fractious, mutually damaging and disorderly Brexit. This commentary argues for a short-term, time-limited agreement to stabilise the EU-UK relationship and to allow breathing space to develop the terms of a long-term strategic partnership

The UK and EU foreign, security and defence policy after Brexit: integrated, associated or detached?

None of the existing models for the future trade policy relationship between the UK and the EU come with a predetermined foreign and security policy relationship. This article assesses how the future EU-UK foreign and security policy relationship might be organised post-Brexit. It provides evaluation of the current EU-UK interrelationship in the fields of the EU’s Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) and assesses the degree to which the UK is presently integrated into EU decision-making and implementation. It highlights that the UK needs to determine the degree to which it wants autonomy or even divergence from existing EU policies. The article concludes by rehearsing the costs and benefits of three possible future relationships between the UK and EU foreign, security and defence policy: integrated, associated or detached

The UK’s European diplomatic strategy for Brexit and beyond

The UK’s departure from the European Union (EU) is a major point of departure for the European strategy of one of Europe’s leading economic, diplomatic and security players. This article limits its focus to the UK’s European diplomatic strategy. The article argues that the UK’s future relationship with the EU will be conditioning of the UK’s broader diplomatic approach to Europe. But in exiting the EU the ambitions and modalities of the UK’s other bilateral and multilateral relationships in Europe undergo a recalibration. As the UK government has struggled since June 2016 to provide comprehensive detail on its ambitions for its future economic, political and security relationship with the EU, the development of the broader aspects of the UK’s post-Brexit European diplomatic strategy has been retarded. However, through references to key speeches, Government White Papers and other supporting documents and statements (and the experience of negotiating Brexit with the EU27) the outlines of a post-Brexit UK European diplomatic strategy can be discerned. Whether this strategy will be adequate to provide the UK with a significant degree of influence on Europe’s international relations and whether it gives the UK sufficient ability to addresses the key challenges that it will face in Europe is less certain

Missing in Action: The EU-UK foreign, security and defence policy relationship after Brexit

Brexit has transformed the EU–UK relationship into a foreign-policy challenge for both sides. The negotiations on the EU–UK future relationship have been a process in which both sides have been learning about the other as a third-party negotiator. The UK has taken a very different attitude to the Political Declaration, agreed alongside the Withdrawal Agreement (covering the terms of the UK’s departure from the EU), treating it as a guide rather than a roadmap for negotiations. And the UK has decided not to pursue negotiations with the EU on a future foreign, security and defence policy relationship. This is in a context in which the EU’s member states have committed to deepening security and defence cooperation. At present, and despite shared international challenges, a formal agreement on EU–UK foreign, security and defence policy looks set to be replaced by an approach of ‘muddling through’

The UK’s foreign and security policy: what’s at stake in the referendum?

Foreign and security policy was not an area in which Prime Minister Cameron sought to alter the relationship between the UK and the European Union (EU) in renegotiating the terms of Britain’s membership. However, security has become a key theme in the referendum debate. The airport and metro bombings in Brussels have focused particular attention on the issue of border and ‘homeland’ security, and whether the UK has its security enhanced, or compromised, through its membership of the EU. There are also broader questions about the EU’s historic role in bringing peace to the European continent and its capacity to be a capable security and defence actor. These were raised by David Cameron in what was the most passionate speech on Europe of his Premiership delivered on 9th May

Epilogue: European Security and Defence in the Shadow of Brexit

This piece provides an epilogue to the Forum on European security following the UK EU Referendum. The EU has been a centrepiece in Britain’s foreign policy. The piece argues that Brexit presents the prospect of a major rethink in the aims, ambitions and conduct of British diplomacy and defence. From the perspective of third parties – and most especially for the EU and its member states – the reaction to the prospect of Brexit has been no less clear and the impact on European security no less certain. The piece highlights how contributors to this Forum all share the assessment of an uncertain future whether discussing bilateral relationships, the impact on the EU and NATO or the political economy of European defence. This Forum illustrates that it will be a European security and defence future of considerable uncertainty. A central issue to be resolved will be whether the EU and the UK are able to build a strategic partnership that encompasses issues of foreign policy, security and defence. The UK will also need to recalibrate its key bilateral relationships in Europe and with the United States. This creates an ambitious agenda for practitioners alike