EU Defence Policy: Between Functionalism, National Interests, and Transatlantic Realities

Existing insights into recent defence integration, including against the backdrop of Russia’s war, largely stem from EU governance studies. Although these studies might not explicitly delve into the EU’s politico-strategic role, when combined with the broader framework of International Relations (IR), they imply the EU’s effective progression, at least relatively, as a defence actor. However, a closer analysis of certain key developments and transatlantic dynamics suggests a persistent lack in the political and strategic dimensions of EU defence policy. This disparity arises when IR concepts are tailored to fit the EU context in integration studies

Common Security and Defence Policy as France’s Winning Strategy ? Evidence from Recent Experience

France’s status as a conventional power makes Paris an inevitable actor in the context of Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP). Insofar France is considered as a staunch protagonist of the EU/European strategic autonomy and an opponent against the US/NATO dominance in Europe, the most recent CSDP progress may be expected to belong to the merits of French decision-makers. Based on a closer analytical look, however, CSDP is not reducible to a coherent outcome of French interests. At the EU level, the French influence turns out to be limited. A strong ideological attachment of this EU Member State to sovereign politics and a consequential lack of commitment to common issues of defence and security may be viewed as an impediment to the materialisation of a more significant clout of Paris on the communitarian scale. Yet relevant limits are predominantly a structural consequence, which is a pattern enhanced by the current dynamics in global politics. This makes one consider France’s status as a “system-influencing state” more cautiously. In a sense, the paper takes issue with the literature on the recent CSDP progress as an expression of political and policy convergence and re-focuses attention on manners in which inter-European dynamics can shed light on positions of individual members

Lithuania's participation in the reconstruction process of Afghanistan: a case of a small state's engagement in the international arena

Because the international arena is too focused on the interests of big states as structuring international interactions, small states continue to appear merely as objects (versus subjects) in the eyes of a large number of researchers, sometimes unconsciously following the (neo)realist tradition of International Relations (IR). Consequently, small states appear to be devoid of any analytical interest. In fact, such a trend in the field of IR neglects the significance of ever increasing interactions between states. Moreover, these interactions need not reflect incompatible interests of different states. The article argues that the case of the reconstruction process of Afghanistan, implemented by the international community, presents a positive-sum logic. In other words, the efforts of the coalition in the Afghan territory allow the engaged states, be they big or small, to pursue their own interests. The degree of their contributions corresponds to the benefits their engagement might provide. As the analysis of the Lithuanian case demonstrates, a small state need not be a passive object trapped in the interactions of powerful states and can arrange itself in order to proceed with actively pursuing its own foreign policy

Municipal Internationalism as a Vector of Democratization. A Case Study of the Lithuanian City of Kaunas (1919-1939)

This article examines the case of the Lithuanian city of Kaunas, the country’s capital in the interwar years. This was a historic period for Lithuania, which had become independent, and more specifically for the inhabitants of Kaunas: the city developed along the lines of Western modernity and became a European city, in part thanks to the municipality’s external action. In spite of technical and disciplinary contributions, as well as a tendency to centralization, municipal internationalism allowed the city of Kaunas to develop its own democratization dynamic, illustrated by the growing importance and openness of the relationship between the municipality and the press. This evolution, even if it was not intentional, is highly significant empirically: it altered the interactions between the local authorities and the citizens, and was meant to be political

The European Security Architecture and Interregional Relations in the Context of World Order Change

The study is focused on medium-term developments of European regional security, which are empirically analysed by looking at the post-Cold War European Security Architecture (ESA). Generally, it is argued that the ESA has developed to increasingly reflect interregionalism between two different regional security orders (RSOs) – the Euro-Atlantic (democratic) one the authoritarian Eurasian RSO –, which has coincided with a broader context of a more dynamic global order. More specifically, it is argued that, before Russia’s waging war against Ukraine in February 2022, there had been significant signs of an increasingly aggressive Russia, which had been progressively using its interregional relations with the Euro-Atlantic RSO to challenge the ESA, including as regards its normative, institutional, and strategic (arms control) dimensions; furthermore, the challenge had consisted in Russia’s attempts to modify the ESA, rather than to distance itself from it, which is consistent with the thesis on the relevance of external legitimisation for authoritarian regimes, including by means of cooperation with democracies. Contrary to some prominent scholarship, the study suggests a lack of potential for regions to play a stabilising role in the international order. The study also critically revisits some recent attempts to re-design the ESA and concludes by offering a general forward-looking political perspective

Russia’s war against Ukraine: a Lithuanian perspective

In this essay, we present the Lithuanian perspective on Russia’s war against Ukraine. We discuss the facts on the ground, the attribution of responsibility, and touch upon the potential ways forward. In Lithuania’s view, it is clear that Russia is responsible for the war and all of the associated outcomes, including first and foremost the loss of life and other forms of suffering in Ukraine, the destruction of Ukraine’s economy and civil infrastructure, but also the wider repercussions for the world regarding higher prices, increased instability, and heightened political/military tensions. We refute the argument that the enlargement of NATO/EU in any way provoked or posed a threat to Russia and instead argue that this process created conditions for economic growth and stability in the admitted countries. Finally, on both moral and practical grounds, we suggest that the best course of action for creating long-lasting conditions for peace and stability is to support Ukraine in its struggle against the illegal and unprovoked invasion

Lithuania's participation in the reconstruction process of Afghanistan: a case of a small state's engagement in the international arena

Because the international arena is too focused on the interests of big states as structuring international interactions, small states continue to appear merely as objects (versus subjects) in the eyes of a large number of researchers, sometimes unconsciously following the (neo)realist tradition of International Relations (IR). Consequently, small states appear to be devoid of any analytical interest. In fact, such a trend in the field of IR neglects the significance of ever increasing interactions between states. Moreover, these interactions need not reflect incompatible interests of different states. The article argues that the case of the reconstruction process of Afghanistan, implemented by the international community, presents a positive-sum logic. In other words, the efforts of the coalition in the Afghan territory allow the engaged states, be they big or small, to pursue their own interests. The degree of their contributions corresponds to the benefits their engagement might provide. As the analysis of the Lithuanian case demonstrates, a small state need not be a passive object trapped in the interactions of powerful states and can arrange itself in order to proceed with actively pursuing its own foreign policy