transaction costs and security institutions: unravelling the esdp (transformations of the state)

Transformations of the State

Series Editors Achim Hurrelmann Carleton University Canada Stephan Leibfried University of Bremen Germany Kerstin Martens University of Bremen Germany Peter Mayer University of Bremen Germany

Titles include

Outline of the themes of the series

Achim Hurrelmann Stephan Leibfried Kerstin Martens and Peter Mayer (editors)TRANSFORMING THE GOLDEN-AGE NATION STATE

Michael DobbinsHIGHER EDUCATION POLICIES IN CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPEConvergence Towards a Common Model

Moritz WeissTRANSACTIONS COSTS AND SECURITY INSTITUTIONSUnravelling the ESDP

Heinz Rothgang Mirella Cacace Simone Grimmeisen Uwe Helmert Claus WendtTHE STATE AND HEALTHCAREComparing OECD Countries

Anna HolzscheiterCHILDRENrsquoS RIGHTS IN INTERNATIONAL POLITICSThe Transformative Power of Transnational Discourse

Kerstin Martens Alexander-Kenneth Nagel Michael Windzio and Ansgar Weymann (editors)TRANSFORMATION OF EDUCATION POLICY

Steffen Schneider Achim Hurrelmann Zuzana Krell-Laluhovaacute Frank Nullmeier and Achim WiesnerDEMOCRACYrsquoS DEEP ROOTSWhy the Nation State Remains Legitimate

Anja P JakobiINTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS AND LIFELONG LEARNINGFrom Global Agendas to Policy Diffusion

Michael J WarningTRANSNATIONAL PUBLIC GOVERNANCENetworks Law and Legitimacy

Thomas RixenTHE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF INTERNATIONAL TAX GOVERNANCE

Hartmut Wessler (editor)PUBLIC DELIBERATION AND PUBLIC CULTUREThe Writings of Bernhard Peters 1993ndash2005

Hartmut Wessler Bernhard Peters Michael Bruumlggemann Katharina Kleinen-von Koumlnigsloumlw and Stefanie SifftTRANSNATIONALIZATION OF PUBLIC SPHERES

Jochen Zimmerman Joumlrg R Werner and Philipp B Volmer GLOBAL GOVERNANCE IN ACCOUNTINGPublic Power and Private Commitment

Peter StarkeRADICAL WELFARE STATE RETRENCHMENTA Comparative Analysis

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd i9780230_280120_01_prexivindd i 1192011 65913 PM1192011 65913 PM

This illustration is taken from the original etching in Thomas Hobbesrsquo Leviathan of 1651 Palgrave Macmillan and the editors are grateful to Lucila Muntildeoz-Sanchez and Monika Sniegs for their help in redesigning the original to illustrate what ldquotransfor-mations of the staterdquo might mean The inscription at the top of the original frontis-piece reads ldquonon est potestas Super Terram quae Comparetur eirdquo (Job 4133) ldquothere is no power on earth which can be compared to himrdquo In the Bible this refers to the sea-monster Leviathan (Original Leviathan image reprinted courtesy of the British Library)

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd ii9780230_280120_01_prexivindd ii 1192011 65913 PM1192011 65913 PM

Transaction Costs and Security InstitutionsUnravelling the ESDP

Moritz WeissSenior Fellow and Lecturer Centre for Security Economics and Technology Institute of Political Science University of St Gallen Switzerland

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd iii9780230_280120_01_prexivindd iii 1192011 65916 PM1192011 65916 PM

copy Moritz Weiss 2011

All rights reserved No reproduction copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission

No portion of this publication may be reproduced copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency Saffron House 6-10 Kirby Street London EC1N 8TS

Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages

The author has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988

First published 2011 byPALGRAVE MACMILLAN

Palgrave Macmillan in the UK is an imprint of Macmillan Publishers Limitedregistered in England company number 785998 of Houndmills Basingstoke Hampshire RG21 6XS

Palgrave Macmillan in the US is a division of St Martinrsquos Press LLC 175 Fifth Avenue New York NY 10010

Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world

Palgravereg and Macmillanreg are registered trademarks in the United Statesthe United Kingdom Europe and other countries

ISBN 978ndash0ndash230ndash28012ndash0 hardback

This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources Logging pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 120 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11

Printed and bound in Great Britain byCPI Antony Rowe Chippenham and Eastbourne

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd iv9780230_280120_01_prexivindd iv 1192011 65917 PM1192011 65917 PM

v

Contents

List of Tables viii

List of Figures ix

List of Acronyms x

Series Editorsrsquo Preface xi

Acknowledgements xii

Part I Preferences Security Institutions and Transaction Costs in World Politics

1 Introduction 3

Two puzzles in ESDP 4 ESDP and the internationalisation of the use of force 6 The argument transaction costs and security institutions 7 The main findings transaction costs and the emergence of the ESDP 11 The research design 15 The plan of the book 17

2 Theorising Preference Formation for Institution-Building in European Security 19

Realism anarchy and power 20 Liberal Intergovernmentalism (LI) market and domestic interest groups 22 Constructivism socialisation and culture 24 Theory practice and the necessity of an innovative approach 26

3 Transaction Costs and Security Institutions 29

Transaction costs and preference formation in European security an analytical framework 29

Transaction costs for the provision of European security 38 Transaction costs within the ESDP 40 The causal pathways 41 Transaction costs and preference formation in European

security the empirical link 43

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd v9780230_280120_01_prexivindd v 1192011 65917 PM1192011 65917 PM

vi Contents

Part II Unravelling the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP)

4 The Demand for a Security Institution German British and French Perceptions of the Environment in the 1990s 53

Germany and the gradual rise of risks in the 1990s 53 The United Kingdomrsquos adaptation to a new environment in

the 1990s 55 France and the increasing instabilities of the 1990s 56 A demand for a security institution German British and French perceptions in perspective 58

5 Germany ndash From Defending the Alliancersquos Territory to Crisis Management for the Union 60

German preferences on substantive scope 60 Explaining German preferences on substance facing more risks while relying less on the United States 67

6 Great Britain ndash From Opposing the Union towards a Subordinated ESDP 79

British preferences on substantive scope 79 Explaining British preferences on substance lsquoItrsquos Time to Repay America the Soldierrsquo 86

7 France ndash From Gradual WEU Integration to Full-Scale ESDP 97

French preferences on substantive scope 97 Explaining French preferences on substance providing security in a highly uncertain environment 102

8 Germany ndash An Incrementally Decreasing Willingness to Bind the Country 114

German preferences on institutional depth 114 Explaining German preferences on depth uncertainty asset specificity and the institutional path of ESDP 120

9 Great Britain ndash From No EU Security Policy to a Purely Intergovernmental ESDP 135

British preferences on institutional depth 135 Explaining British preferences on depth modest uncertainty and the opportunities of non-specific assets 140

10 France ndash A Consistently Intergovernmental Approach towards ESDP 152

French preferences on institutional depth 152 Explaining French preferences on depth maintaining residual rights of control 157

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd vi9780230_280120_01_prexivindd vi 1192011 65917 PM1192011 65917 PM

Contents vii

Part III Transaction Costs and Security Institutions ESDP Unravelled

11 Alternative Explanations and Theoretical Scope of the Transaction Costs Framework 173

Testing the plausibility of a transaction costs framework 173 Defining the scope of the transaction costs argument 181

12 Conclusion ndash Theory-Development in the European Security and Defence Policy 189

Transaction costs security institutions and unravelling the ESDP 190 The principal conclusions filling the gap with a new conceptual lens 203 Transforming Europersquos governance of defence without replacing the state 206

Notes 211

References 237

Index 263

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd vii9780230_280120_01_prexivindd vii 1192011 65917 PM1192011 65917 PM

viii

Tables

31 The lsquoexplanandumrsquo preferences for institution-building in European security 30

32 Analytical dimensions of preferences on substantive scope 44 33 Analytical dimensions of preferences on institutional depth 45 41 The demand for a European security institution German

British and French perceptions in perspective 58 51 Detailed overview of German preferences on substantive scope 67 52 Germany and its lsquosignallingrsquo with the United States 75 53 German transaction costs for the provision of European security

and its resulting choice of the institutional context 78 61 Detailed overview of British preferences on substantive scope 86 62 The United Kingdom and its lsquosignallingrsquo with the United States 93 63 British transaction costs for the provision of European

security and its resulting choice of the institutional context 95 71 Detailed overview of French preferences on substantive scope 101 72 France and its lsquosignallingrsquo with the United States 110 73 French transaction costs for the provision of European

security and its resulting choice of the institutional context 112 81 Detailed overview of German preferences on institutional depth 120 82 German uncertainty within the ESDP 124 83 Germany and asset specificity in the ESDP 129 84 German transaction costs within the ESDP and institutional depth 132 91 Detailed overview of British preferences on institutional depth 140 92 British uncertainty within the ESDP 143 93 Great Britain and asset specificity in the ESDP 148 94 British transaction costs within the ESDP and institutional depth 150101 Detailed overview of French preferences on institutional depth 157102 French uncertainty within the ESDP 161103 France and asset specificity in the ESDP 166104 French transaction costs within the ESDP and institutional depth 168

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd viii9780230_280120_01_prexivindd viii 1192011 65917 PM1192011 65917 PM

ix

Figures

11 The analytical framework transaction costs and security institutions 10

21 Sources and mechanisms of security preferences in International Relations theory 27

31 Four basic assumptions of a transaction costs framework 33 32 Motivational premises of a transaction costs framework 35121 Overview of German British and French preferences on the institutionalisation of European security from the I) Amsterdam-IGC towards the II) Convention-IGC 196

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd ix9780230_280120_01_prexivindd ix 1192011 65917 PM1192011 65917 PM

x

Acronyms

A-400M Airbus Military Transport PlaneCFSP Common Foreign and Security PolicyCoW Correlates of WarCIMC Composite Index of Material Capabilities DG Directorate General ECAP European Capabilities Action PlanEDA European Defence AgencyEP European Parliament ERRF European Rapid Reaction ForceESDP EUrsquos European Security and Defence PolicyESDU European Security and Defence UnionEU European UnionEUMS European Union Military StaffGDP Gross Domestic ProductHQ HeadquartersIGC Intergovernmental ConferenceIISS International Institute for Strategic Studies (London)IR International Relations as a disciplineLI Liberal IntergovernmentalismMoD Ministry of DefenceNATO North Atlantic Treaty OrganisationNRF NATO Response ForceNMD National Missile DefenceOCCAR Organisation for Joint Armament CooperationOSCE Organisation for Security and Cooperation in EuropePfP NATOrsquos lsquoPartnership for PeacersquoPolSec EUrsquos Political and Security CommitteeQMV Qualified Majority VotingRampD Research and DevelopmentSACEUR Supreme Allied Commander Europe (NATO)SHAPE Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (NATO)UK United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandUN United Nations (Organisation)US United States of AmericaWEAO Western European Armaments Organisation 911 Terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 in New York and

Washington DC (USA)

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd x9780230_280120_01_prexivindd x 1192011 65917 PM1192011 65917 PM

xi

Series Editorsrsquo Preface

Over the past four centuries the nation state has emerged as the worldrsquos most effective means of organizing society but its current status and future are decidedly uncertain Some scholars predict the total demise of the nation state as we know it its powers eroded by a dynamic global economy on the one hand and on the other by the transfer of political decision-making to supranational bodies Other analysts point out the remarkable resilience of the statersquos core institutions and assert that even in the age of global markets and politics the state remains the ultimate guarantor of security democracy welfare and the rule of law Do either of these interpretations describe the fu-ture of the OECD worldrsquos modern liberal nation-state Will the state soon be as obsolete and irrelevant as an outdated computer Should it be scrapped for some new invention or can it be overhauled and rejuvenated Or is the state actually thriving and still fit to serve just in need of a few minor reforms

In an attempt to address these questions the analyses in the Transforma-tions of the State series separate the complex tangle of tasks and functions that comprise the state into four manageable dimensions

the monopolization of the means of force

the rule of law as prescribed and safeguarded by the constitution

the guarantee of democratic self-governance and

the provision of welfare and the assurance of social cohesion

In the OECD world of the 1960s and 1970s these four dimensions formed a synergetic constellation that emerged as the central defining characteristic of the modern state Books in the series report the results of both empirical and theoretical studies of the transformations experienced in each of these dimensions over the past few decades

Transformations of the State (Stephan Leibfried and Michael Zuumlrn (eds) Cambridge 2005) and Transforming the Golden-Age National State (Achim Hurrelmann Stephan Leibfried Kerstin Martens and Peter Mayer (eds) Basingstoke 2007) define the basic concepts of state transformation employed in all of these studies and provide an overview of the issues addressed Written by political scientists lawyers economists and sociolo-gists the series tracks the development of the post-World War II OECD state Here at last is an up-to-date series of reports on the state of the state and a crystal-ball glimpse into its future

ACHIM HURRELMANN STEPHAN LEIBFRIEDKERSTIN MARTENS AND PETER MAYER

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd xi9780230_280120_01_prexivindd xi 1192011 65918 PM1192011 65918 PM

xii

Acknowledgements

Since the British sea change of St Malo scholarship on European security and defence institutions has been en vogue from a variety of perspectives Meanwhile a community of European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP) researchers has emerged bringing together scholars from the distinct domains of Public Policy European Studies and International Relations Theory From my point of view several factors came together to prompt this dramatically increased interest (1) After the failure of the European Defence Community in the 1950s the ESDP is the first serious attempt to deal with military issues within a European Union framework The market has been established the currency has been introduced so mili-tary planning is one of the few functions that the EU has not provided so far (2) The EUrsquos defence pillar is a genuine security institution rather than a classical alliance as the prototype of security cooperation in an anarchical world As a result the ESDP is also about the deliberate inter-nationalisation of the use of force and therefore about the transform-ation of the modern state as a genuine form of political organization (3) In some ways the ESDP is an act of emancipation from the United States partly even an opposition to US policies in other ways it represents the perennial desire of Washington that Europeans should invest in more and better military capabilities In short it is a highly ambivalent (and politically contested) institution

Finally when I began to work on this subject there were relatively few approaches that went beyond ad hoc explanations This has changed Today more policy-oriented researchers like Robert Hunter or Jolyon Howorth and increasingly scholars in International Relations such as Christoph Meyer Seth Jones Adrian Hyde-Price Freacutedeacuteric Meacuterand and Dirk Peters have pub-lished important monographs on the subject Fortunately these debates still lack a contribution applying theories of political economy linked to historical-institutionalist thinking In combination with the focus on pref-erence formation this will be precisely the analytical lens and hopefully the added value that this study provides

This book started out as a completely different project Being strongly influenced by my first International Relations professors Friedrich Kratochwil and James Davis my proposal set out to apply sociological notions of risk to the emergence of the ESDP However my plans as originally envisaged rap-idly turned out to be premature After changing my institutional affiliation to Jacobs University Bremen I gradually modified my research plans Markus Jachtenfuchs strongly shaped my thinking on European integration and

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd xii9780230_280120_01_prexivindd xii 1192011 65918 PM1192011 65918 PM

Acknowledgements xiii

how to approach the ESDP He asked those pointed questions that obliged me to re-examine my ideas and evidence He also lsquoforcedrsquo me to continu-ously submit parts of the eventual thesis and always reminded me to view it through the lens of the ultimate lsquoproductrsquo Bernhard Zangl challenged me on numerous occasions to refine my argument and was the person with whom I had the hardest contests over my study Despite my willingness to lose ndash without exception ndash all the squash matches I played against him he frequently disagreed with important parts of my study However our argu-ments were ndash also without exception ndash constructive and therefore this study (and I personally) profited a great deal from his supervision Finally Philipp Genschel made a vital contribution to this book He made numerous highly constructive comments so the book has gained significantly from his per-spective This combination of intellectual and personal inputs substantially supported my personal work on this topic

Before I thank my fellow colleagues two lsquogrand seigneursrsquo must be men-tioned Max Kaase was extremely supportive in bringing me to Bremen in the first place and Stephan Leibfried helped me with the publication pro-cess I owe a great debt to both of them Like any such project this study would have been very different without the contributions and support of many friends and colleagues Michael Blauberger Simon Dalferth Marc DeVore Julian Eckl Katharina Kleinen-vKoumlnigsloumlw Sibylle Lang Stephanie Rhinehart Ingo Rohlfing and Margit Schreier In addition I would like to thank the ESDP unit of the German Ministry of Defence The staff not only gave me the opportunity of several (iterated) interviews they also helped me to contact their colleagues in France and the United Kingdom Thanks also to several anonymous reviewers for their input and to Liz Blackmore and Alexandra Webster at Palgrave Macmillan for seeing through the pub-lication process with great care and enthusiasm Moreover I am greatly in-debted to two institutions While Jacobs University generously supported me over the whole period of my PhD work the Centre for Security Economics and Technology (C SET) of the University of St Gallen provided me with a postdoctoral fellowship which among other things allowed me to write this monograph

Finally my greatest thanks go to my family a handful of very close friends and to Kaija Landsberg for their continuous support over the past years and decades Writing the book would have been much more painful without their friendship and encouragement and I promise not to repeat it too often in the future

MORITZ WEISS ST GALLEN

October 2010

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd xiii9780230_280120_01_prexivindd xiii 1192011 65918 PM1192011 65918 PM

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd xiv9780230_280120_01_prexivindd xiv 1192011 65918 PM1192011 65918 PM

Part I

Preferences Security Institutions and Transaction Costs in World Politics

9780230_280120_02_cha01indd 19780230_280120_02_cha01indd 1 162011 62304 PM162011 62304 PM


3

1Introduction

This book examines cooperation and institution- building in European secu-rity by building on analytical insights from transaction cost economics The creation of the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP) constitutes one of the most significant transformations in recent world politics Given the statersquos monopoly on the legitimate use of force the governance of security in general and military planning in particular are constitutive activities of the modern nation state (Leibfried and Zuumlrn 2005 Mayer and Weinlich 2007) Despite or rather because of the great importance of these transformations there is widespread disagreement among scholars and practitioners as to the why and how of the emergence of the European Unionrsquos (EU) defence pillar (eg Posen 2006 Meyer 2006 Jones 2007 Meacuterand 2010 Peters 2010) This book addresses the most basic puzzle in this context namely the sources of the member statesrsquo institutional preferences it explains why the governments wanted what they wanted when they entered into negotiations for security and defence institutions with their partners Why did they want to interna-tionalise parts of their security and defence policy More specifically which functional tasks were to be included in the ESDP and how binding should the arrangements be In other words this book unravels preference forma-tion in the emergence of the ESDP as a security institution

First of all I argue that the relative magnitude of transaction costs was the primary determinant of the member statesrsquo preferences for institution- building in the field of security and defence In general these costs ndash equiv-alent to ldquofrictions in mechanical systemsrdquo (Williamson 1985 1) ndash emerge from the cooperative exchanges of the main actors within the European security setting More specifically the EU governmentsrsquo ex ante and ex post assessments of both the risks of opportunism and governance costs are shown to be decisive for a comprehensive understanding of institution- building in the ESDP (Lake 1999 2001) The book builds broadly upon historical- institutionalist thought which regards a reduction in the costs of cooperation as the most vital effect of institutions It takes the reverse of this idea as a point of departure and traces back the impact of transaction


4 Transaction Costs and Security Institutions

costs on preferences for building the ESDP in the first place Consequently the study argues that the EU governments preferred precisely those insti-tutional arrangements that were best adapted to their transactions which differed individually in terms of uncertainty and asset specificity In other words preference formation was lsquodrivenrsquo by the governmentsrsquo attempts to adjust the rules of the ESDP to their existing and anticipated transaction costs

In addition the book contributes to current debates on the transforma-tions of the state by examining the hard case that is national security and defence policy Given the fact that military planning and the legitimate use of force are normally regarded as constitutive elements of the state the emergence of the ESDP poses one central puzzle to scholars and practition-ers alike Why and under what conditions do great powers with a substantial independent military capacity deliberately seek to create institutions which will limit their autonomous military planning in the medium- to long- term The analysis below reveals two important answers First of all I argue that there is not a single linear trend towards the internationalisation of security policy not even within the highly integrated European Union As Andrew Moravcsik has demonstrated for economic integration (Moravcsik 1998) I will show that an exclusive focus on national variation neglects important facets of internationalisation of the defence function Instead cross- issue variation ndash for instance Germany preferring some selected embedding of the monopoly of force while vehemently opposing others ndash provides a more differentiated and thus more comprehensive approach to the current transformations of the state (see also Genschel and Zangl 2008 Genschel and Leibfried 2008) Second I argue that owing largely to functionalist logic the internationalisation of the monopoly of force can be primarily explained in terms of national levels of transaction costs Just as the monop-oly of force can be regarded as a means of resolving functional problems (that is protection from outside military threats) state preferences for inter-nationalising parts of this function might follow a similar logic reducing the present and anticipated transaction costs that arise from the provision of European security

Two puzzles in ESDP

This book tackles two puzzling developments in both the practice and the-ory of European security governance While the former refers to the real- world expansion of the EUrsquos activities in this issue- area as well as its timing the latter is theoretical in the sense that the empirical record insufficiently corresponds to the expectations of the main research programmes that International Relations (IR) as a discipline suggests

Firstly the political developments under investigation represent a puzzle of empirical logic (eg Whitman 1999) because the observable expansion in


Introduction 5

European security policy can be regarded as very surprising the significant progress made towards a European security and defence pillar within the EU rather than NATO (Talbott 1999 50) as all commentators had expected A retrospective view of the two most important players in the mid- 1990s illus-trates not only the puzzling nature of ESDP but also the surprising timing of its emergence

On the one hand it was evident for several reasons that the United Kingdom (UK) would never opt for a genuinely European solution for defence issues Instead it would always stick to the special relationship with the United States (eg McInnes 1998 835) If a European pillar in secu-rity and defence issues were to be strengthened it would be located within NATO This had been American policy since Kennedy British policy even before that German policy most of the time and would have to become French policy as well In other words there were some uncontested param-eters to European security architecture On the other hand France had just elected Jacques Chirac as its new President1 He immediately began one of the most prestigious projects in French politics namely a massive transfor-mation of the armed forces coupled with a new defence policy Apart from the end of the Cold War two developments in particular made French defence reforms seem inevitable first the quasi- failure to project their own forces into the Gulf region in 1991 second their close cooperation with the United Kingdom on the ground in Bosnia What could we expect from these two developments emerging at the same time The answer is clear French rapprochement with the Atlantic Alliance (Grant 1996)

Thus at first glance a strengthened European pillar within NATO would have appeared to be the obvious path to European security and defence policy However the actual development differed significantly to the extent that the pillar exists in fact outside the Alliance and inside the EU in Henry Kissingerrsquos words ldquothe distinctive feature of the European Union mili-tary force ( ) is to create a capacity to act outside the NATO frameworkrdquo (Kissinger 2001 34) In retrospective the ESDP might be rationalised as natural for policy- makers and commentators at the time it was not Due to the primarily intergovernmental nature of the EUrsquos security and defence pol-icy and the resulting predominance of the national governments (Howorth 2007 1) the most basic starting point for an analysis of its emergence is thus the member statesrsquo institutional preferences

Secondly the significant extension of the ESDP during the previous decade represents a puzzle in the theoretical sense Although all scholars acknowledge the central importance of governments as the key actors in the ESDP standard research programmes in IR do not provide a persuasive explanation of why they wanted what they wanted (eg Smith 2004 201ndash6 Jones 2007 4ndash5) In a recent attempt to set the research agenda Tuomas Forsberg concluded that the ldquolittle theoretical work that exists on European defence either pre- dates the emergence of the ESDP or does not attempt to



contribute to explanatory theorisingrdquo (Forsberg 2007 1) To briefly illustrate this point conventional Realist thought is confronted with the challenge of why similarly positioned states want significantly distinct ndash sometimes even opposite ndash things (eg Waltz 1979 Posen 2006 Jones 2007) Secondly Liberalism faces the difficulty of how to develop an explanation of state pref-erences in the absence of a pluralist market of domestic interest groups that struggle for adequate representation at the inter- state level (eg Moravcsik 1998 Moravcsik and Nicolaidis 1999 Dover 2005) Finally (bottom- up) Constructivist approaches are better equipped to explain differences among states but their weaknesses become evident when they are faced with non- incremental changes (eg Tonra 2003 Meyer 2006 Meacuterand 2008)

Despite providing some singular insights the three research programmes encounter difficulty when asked to explain both the similarities and varia-tions between the member states as well as the continuities and changes of the individual preferences Put differently the real- world developments in the ESDP are largely incompatible with the predominant approaches in IR (Howorth 2007 24) Why did the EU members want to build a ESDP at all and why did they prefer a specific institutional design for accomplishing the security tasks

This bookrsquos guiding research question is therefore how can we explain the member statesrsquo preference formation with respect to the institutionali-sation of the ESDP More specifically the analysis focuses on the prefer-ences of the lsquoBig Threersquo Germany Britain and France with respect to the common build- up of political- military structures2 When and in particular why did the Big Threersquos preferences change or remain stable How do we account for similarity and for variation While a systematic answer to these questions alludes to a range of distinct debates in political science the ana-lytical scope is limited to the extent that two objectives predominate a con-tribution to the problematique of preferences and security cooperation in International Relations (eg Pollack 2001 Smith 2004 177)3 and based on the results of this analysis a qualified input to debates on the transforma-tions of the state (eg Leibfried and Zuumlrn 2005 Hurrelmann et al 2007)

ESDP and the internationalisation of the use of force

The emergence of the ESDP challenges traditional conceptions of state-hood because it is ultimately about the deliberate institutionalisation of military planning at the European level which substantially affects statesrsquo lsquoexclusiversquo control of the armed forces As a consequence when govern-ments were negotiating the establishment of the ESDP in the previous decade the internationalisation of the use of force was at stake It is Max Weber who has most prominently argued that the monopoly of the legiti-mate use of physical force differentiates the modern state from all previ-ous forms of political organisation (Weber 1978 54ndash55) Historically the


Introduction 7

rise of the modern state and its establishment of the exclusive means of force (the police and the military) went hand in hand Charles Tilly has emphasised that based on the statersquos success in the competition against rival forms of political organisation the use of force can be regarded as the first ndash and probably foremost ndash attribute of modern statehood (Tilly 1992 see also Spruyt 1994)4 Among the most important corollaries of exclu-sive control of the means of force is the supposed indivisibility of mili-tary planning Thomas Hobbes forcefully argued that the sovereign must not delegate or pool these means of force to a sub- or supranational level (Hobbes 2008 216) Such a policy would undermine the statersquos authority and certainly destroy it in the long term

However developments in Europe after the end of the Cold War seem to ignore these reservations While the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) survived the disappearance of its raison drsquoecirctre and went lsquoout of arearsquo rather than lsquoout of businessrsquo (eg Haftendorn et al 1999) the increased activ-ities of other international organisations such as the EU inspired commen-tators to speak of a ldquosystem of interlocking institutionsrdquo in Europe (Woumlrner 1992) These developments can be broadly understood as an internationalisa-tion of the use of force whereby military planning is gradually shifted from the national to the international (or European) level (Jachtenfuchs 2005 Mayer and Weinlich 2007) Even though these increased forms of coopera-tion do not suggest that governments have given up control over military planning the question arises of what this internationalisation ultimately implies for the statersquos monopoly of force In other words if we observed change within this key dimension of modern statehood this might have significant implications for the questions of to what extent the state is about to be transformed and why These issues will be the subject of the bookrsquos concluding chapter

The argument transaction costs and security institutions

Douglass North once summarised Ronald Coasersquos seminal message as fol-lows ldquowhen it is costly to transact institutions matterrdquo (North 1990b 12) As a point of departure I simply turn this message on its head when institutions in the ESDP exist I may find that costly transactions precede and determine the actorsrsquo preferences for building these institutions in the first place The major argument of this book therefore is that the relative magnitude of transaction costs primarily determines the EU member statesrsquo preferences for institution- building in security and defence issues Oliver Williamson once compared transaction costs in social relationships to lsquofric-tionsrsquo in mechanical systems (Williamson 1985 1) Cooperative exchanges between the main actors in the European security order entail ndash either ex post or ex ante ndash lsquofrictionsrsquo which can lead to malfunctions and conflicts From this perspective transaction costs originate in this context from the



general provision of European security as well as from transactions exclusively within the ESDP

The studyrsquos underlying logic is therefore that of dealing with a famil-iar topic from an unfamiliar perspective Prominent concepts of political economy are systematically adapted to the analysis of European security While the lsquoexplanandumrsquo ndash preferences ndash is frequently applied to questions of economic integration (eg Moravcsik 1998) it is most of the time consid-ered only implicitly by scholars of the ESDP (eg Smith 2004 Jones 2007) Similarly the main explanatory building- block ndash transaction costs ndash is well established in political economy but had never been systematically applied to preferences for institution- building in security issues

The bookrsquos framework for studying (non- ) cooperative exchanges between the actors in their search for security at acceptable costs draws heavily on theories of political economy (eg Williamson 1985 North 1990b Lake 1999 Wallander 2000 Weber 2000) Accordingly the EU member states are largely treated as if they were firms The market is the European secu-rity order in which governments aim to produce security Viewed through the lens of transaction cost economics the political actors are engaged in relational contracting In security policy too the cooperative exchange agree-ments between the EU members are necessarily incomplete and therefore problems of credible commitments arise The contracting parties provide information and establish safeguards that positively or negatively sanction certain behaviours In other words the governments want to build institu-tions to structure future state interactions However cooperation may be pursued at very different levels of substantive scope and institutional depth Therefore the real challenge is determining the impact of transaction costs on a member statersquos decision to cooperate on a substantive issue based on a certain institutional form As I will show the respective magnitude of transaction costs is to a large extent determined by the attributes of asset specificity on the one hand and uncertainty on the other

The lsquoexplanandumrsquo builds on the well- established distinction between scope and depth (Lindberg and Scheingold 1970 65ndash98) While preferences may refer to those functional problems that the member states want to be subsumed within the European framework the (un)willingness on the part of the state to increase coordination efforts and to partly bind itself also need to be examined Therefore I combine the two analytical dimensions ndash sub-stantive scope and institutional depth ndash to create a typology of preferences for institution- building in European security (Chapter 3) Following Jeffry Frieden security preferences are understood as the EU membersrsquo lsquodesired ordering of potential outcomesrsquo of a deliberationnegotiation over the insti-tutionalisation of security issues at the EU level (Frieden 1999 42)

The lsquoexplanansrsquo namely transaction costs is based on the premise that obtaining information about other actorsrsquo behaviour in the European secu-rity setting is costly The governments not only have to assess ex ante the


Introduction 9

valuable attributes of their exchanges they must also safeguard compliance ex post due to the inherent incompleteness of all contracts Building on the work of Oliver Williamson transaction costs are understood as the ldquocompara-tive costs of planning adapting and monitoring task completion under alternative governance structuresrdquo (Williamson 1985 2) The focus is thus on two dimen-sions uncertainty addresses the question of how other main actors will act in the near future with respect to security problems asset specificity describes the governmentsrsquo investments in political- military structures that can or can-not be redeployed for alternative purposes While security is broadly defined ldquoas a low probability of damage to acquired valuesrdquo (Baldwin 1997 13) the two principal motivations behind institution- building in this issue- area are assumed to be (1) greater protection from threats and risks (2) at acceptable costs (Lake 1999) The corollary is that the pooling of resources shapes the initial incentives used by governments when considering cooperation in this domain As previously indicated the resulting transactions with other states also entail costs

The analytical framework of security cooperation distinguishes between two kinds of transaction costs Firstly lsquorisks of opportunismrsquo raise the problem of credible commitments and enhance the costs of cooperation Governments are faced with three kinds of expected costs of opportun-istic behaviour in security arrangements abandonment entrapment and exploitation (Lake 1999 52ndash8) An EU member state may be concerned about being lsquoabandonedrsquo left out of further steps towards integration This thinking is for example highly influential within all debates on so- called flexible arrangements At the same time a state could also be lsquoentrappedrsquo subject to undesired conflicts This sort of consideration is particularly prominent among neutral states in the EU characterised by highly restrain-ing national traditions Finally there is the possibility of being exploited For instance France and the UK are the two main leaders with regard to the military aspects of the ESDP Both were at some point worried about the extent to which the half- hearted efforts of other members could thwart the objective of improving military capabilities while at the same time hav-ing a say in essentially all ESDP decisions In short they complained about being exploited The extent of all of these risks of opportunism depends on two interrelated dimensions of transactions namely uncertainty about the future behaviour of the cooperation partners and the specificity of the assets to be exchanged (Williamson 1985 52ndash60)

Secondly in contrast to opportunism increasingly hierarchical structures may reduce these risks but lead inversely to so- called governance costs which can be understood as the costs of making and enforcing agreements (Williamson 1985 90ndash1)5 It costs money and often raises the political stakes when a government chooses to build a security institution instead of deal-ing with the problem unilaterally In particular the states participating in a security arrangement have to give up some degree of autonomy which has



always been a desired asset in world politics Flexible answers to problems that sufficiently take the national context into account simply become more difficult and thus more costly It would be difficult for instance for an EU member state to renege on its contribution to a multinational battlegroup (Lindstrom 2007) The loss of reputation at the very least would be tremen-dous Therefore subscription to the battlegroup concept implies governance costs for the participating governments The member states must commit to keeping their promises and in this way establish safeguards of credible com-mitment (Lake 1999 58ndash9) Again uncertainty and asset specificity are the critical attributes of transactions The more hierarchical the security institu-tion the smaller the member statesrsquo residual rights of control and thus the higher the potential governance costs

Finally the focus of this study is on the EU member statesrsquo policies on providing European security More specifically I distinguish between those transactions that address the general provision of European security and those that occur exclusively within the ESDP While the United States plays a major role in the former the latter refers exclusively to the EU member states Accordingly the question of why the governments wanted to build the ESDP at all is primarily explained by the transactions for general provi-sion of European security In this context the ex post comparative assess-ment of existing institutions is critical In contrast the transactions within the ESDP explain how the governments wanted to design the new institu-tion so the anticipation of future transaction costs is vital The transaction costs framework may be summarised as shown in Figure 11

Figure 11 The analytical framework transaction costs and security institutions

bull ∆ Uncertainty about future behaviour of cooperation partners

bull ∆ Asset Specificity (jointly produced goods are [not] redeployable to other purposes)

Attributes oftransactions

bull ∆ Risks of Opportunism (eg entrapment abandonment exploitation)

bull ∆ Governance costs (eg potential loss of national control)

Transactioncosts

∆ Transaction costs for theprovision of Europeansecurity

∆ Preferences onsubstantive scope

∆ Transaction costs withinthe ESDP

∆ Preferences oninstitutional depth

Transactioncostsframework ofanalysis


Introduction 11

This is mid- range theory- building where I begin with some general propo-sitions about preferences security cooperation and institution- building and move to more specific processes and mechanisms of institutional choice and development in political- military issues The underlying assumption is that EU member states faced with high transaction costs ndash ex ante andor ex post ndash will prefer far- reaching institution- building in terms of substantive scope and institutional depth From this perspective causes are primarily explained in terms of their effects An investment may temporally be the cause of a profit as the latter follows from the former Building on functionalist logic however the causal path is reversed effect explains cause (Keohane 1984) A government prefers to invest in an institutional arrangement because it expects the latter to reduce transaction costs or to provide alternative profits Taken together this suggests that governments internationalise a part of their monopoly on the legitimate use of force for primarily functionalist reasons European security will be jointly provided and the ESDP will increase problem- solving capac-ity while maintaining maximum policy autonomy (see also Lepgold 1998) In other words it is primarily security problems combined with the (expected) behaviour of other actors that drive preferences for ESDP whereby the state as a particular form of political organisation is sustainably transformed (though Finally the theoretical contributions of this study only gain persuasiveness and plausibility once confronted with the hardest possible challenge at the empirical level The objective is to resolve one of the central puzzles of security cooperation ldquoHow states develop interests () that permit them to jump into security cooperation is the challenge that all explanations are facingrdquo (Muumlller 2002 371) Thus the research design establishes strong variances of national preferences whereby the proposed framework must account not only for differ-ences and similarities but at the same time continuities and changes

The main findings transaction costs and the emergence of the ESDP

Both the structured focused comparison of the lsquoBig Threersquo as well as the con-sideration of alternative explanations suggest a systematic impact of trans-action costs on preferences in European security When we want to find out why Germany Britain and France preferred (not) to cooperate within the EU we first need to analyse their respective assessments of how to provide European security Thus a comprehensive understanding of why a govern-ment wanted certain security tasks (not) to be executed by the European Union requires a comparative assessment of NATO and the EU as the two main institutions that can provide the public good of European security This costndashbenefit analysis is in turn vitally shaped by the organisationsrsquo capacity to reduce the transaction costs involved in European security

As an underlying condition all EU governments were increasingly con-cerned about instability in their own backyard They faced the problem



of how to establish order on a multilateral basis In short they needed to transact This kind of demand however does not tell us where such an arrangement should be established As a result the governments assessed on a comparative basis whether the EU or NATO would effectively contribute to a reduction of those risks of opportunism that emerged from the provision of European security (without escalating governance costs) Since NATO had been traditionally the default option the question was first and foremost whether the United Statesrsquo commitment to all kinds of European security problems was still credible

Both the lsquoisolationistrsquo and lsquounilateralistrsquo concerns about the United States and the resulting uncertainty had an enduring impact on all three coun-triesrsquo assessment of how to provide European security NATO had progres-sively become more costly to the EU members and the risks of opportunism had increased as well This encouraged the governments to consider new institutional options and therefore accounts not only for some of the simi-lar preferences but in particular for the overall trend in the ESDPrsquos crea-tion At the same time the latter hardly explains the nontrivial differences between the Big Threersquos preferences This was first and foremost based on their very different bilateral relationships with Washington After all the hegemon ndash being apparently tired of providing the public good of European stability ndash overtly opposed some of the EUrsquos increased responsibilities for military planning and instead wanted to see them continue within NATO Put differently it indirectly threatened its European partners with further disengagement from Europe if certain conditions were not met In this way the attempts made to reduce some of the uncertainties might result in even more uncertainty should the US withdraw Since the Big Three differed sig-nificantly in their assessment of the desirability of this the member statesrsquo took very different views as to which outcomes were preferable

For instance the evolution of British preferences represented a particu-lar challenge for the transaction costs framework The shift of St Malo was not only the most drastic change but also the most consequential since it opened up the road to Cologne and Helsinki in 1999 In general Great Britain wanted to strengthen the EUrsquos responsibilities for military planning while at the same time regarding the ESDPrsquos compatibility with NATO a pri-ority The primary driving force behind the British approach was then the increase of transaction costs in the course of the 1990s The process- tracing of the signalling between the United States and Britain demonstrates that the latter was increasingly concerned about US isolationism which was par-ticularly strong on Capitol Hill Full- scale American commitment to all vari-eties of European security problems was partly questioned in London This dramatically increased British uncertainty about NATO and thus the risks of opportunism the UK faced for the provision of European security

At the same time Washingtonrsquos red lines were still taken seriously and constrained British support for extending the EUrsquos responsibilities in


Introduction 13

military planning Thus London faced the question of how to provide secu-rity within Europe if the United States became increasingly reluctant to assume this role A viable lsquoEU- only optionrsquo represented a promising point of departure for gradually providing security for Europe At the same time this required compatibility with NATO as high- intensity combat missions would not for a considerable amount of time be feasible without the US Therefore incompatibility could produce new uncertainties and risks of opportunism The comparative institutional assessment of NATO and the EU in terms of their capacities to reduce transaction costs for the provision of European security in the medium- to long- term encouraged the Blair administration to support the establishment of an ESDP In sum the tradeoff between mak-ing functionally reasonable investments in the ESDP while at the same time retaining the special partnership with the US is the key to understanding the development of British preferences regarding substantive scope

To further examine why the EU members preferred a specific design for structuring their future interactions we need to analyse the transaction costs that emerged exclusively within the ESDP For that purpose this part of the analysis concentrates on the ex ante anticipation of future institutions More specifically a governmentrsquos assessment of uncertainty about the part-nersrsquo commitments was just as important as the specificity of those assets in the areas where the EU member states cooperated The interaction between these two dimensions determined then the magnitude of transaction costs within the ESDP This in turn explains the governmentsrsquo (un)willingness to bind themselves within the EUrsquos institutional arrangements

While all governments wanted some safeguards for their investments they jointly backed away from establishing more binding agreements In part this can be traced back to the need to create an institution compatible with NATO and was thus primarily based on the unwillingness to lose resid-ual rights of control In fact most of the ESDPrsquos military assets were general rather than specific It was thus rather to avoid rising governance costs than risks of opportunism which drove most governmentsrsquo approaches Again this explains the similarities between the EU membersrsquo preferences to the extent that the planned degree of specificity had an impact on each of them This also accounts for the incremental convergence that could be observed with respect to preferences of institutional depth All members wanted some safeguards for their contributions to ESDP and to provide some information which enhanced the efforts of coordination between the member states Nevertheless I found important differences between the Big Three which require separate explanations

For example the French government initially promoted an approach similar to the UKrsquos but in the course of the analysis it moved gradually closer to Germany This did not however imply that France had given up its consistently intergovernmental approach to the ESDP In particular it opposed interference from EU institutions and thus wanted to enhance



the institutional capacity through lsquoflexible arrangementsrsquo with a dominant role for governments In short the objective was improved coordination rather than integration The analysis traces these preferences back to the modest magnitude of French transaction costs within the ESDP In the mid- 1990s this could be derived from its low uncertainty about Germany and the marginal extent of asset specificity Neither the risks of opportunism nor the governance costs were high for Paris although both factors gradu-ally increased and thus accounted for Francersquos slightly greater willingness to bind itself since the end of the 1990s

In contrast to Great Britain and Germany however Francersquos desired out-comes were driven neither by the concept of general military assets (as was the UK) nor by the necessity of establishing primarily efficient solutions to military shortfalls (as was Germany) Not only were its military forces in good shape but the general nature of these assets served primarily as a kind of assurance rather than an initial trigger After all the French government was confronted neither with extremely high political nor with unbearable financial costs with respect to ESDP Indeed when the ESDP was launched the government was somewhat uncertain about the potential exploitation of Germany and abandonment of the UK which would ultimately side with the US rather than Europe6 The French like the British therefore wanted to create safeguards for their investments in ESDP Aside from the general nature of most military assets that substantially reduced governance costs flexible arrangements could limit some of these risks of opportunism in the future and were therefore strongly promoted by the French government In terms of transaction costs both these safeguards should make the mutual commitments more credible Others were simply not required Hence France was relatively immune to opportunism and its main objective was to retain permanent control in military affairs It consequently regarded the potential governance costs of more hierarchical structures as more costly compared to the continuing risks of opportunism In this respect the analysis dem-onstrates not only why the EU members initiated the ESDP process but also why they were so hesitant about investing into genuinely specific assets

In sum a transaction costs framework can systematically explain the why and how of the EUrsquos defence pillar it unravels the ESDP The trigger for the Big Threersquos willingness to enhance cooperation on security issues was the increas-ing extent of uncertainty they were faced with ndash albeit to different degrees7 The risks of opportunism in NATO had increased The underlying logic was to create an institutional arrangement that provided information to all mem-bers and thus facilitated improved coordination The transaction costs that then emerged within the ESDP determined the member statesrsquo assessment of the details of how to build the institution Bearing this in mind it is in fact the inversion of the transaction costs argument that may best account for the rapid emergence of an ESDP It was basically the redeployability of the EUrsquos assets that brought the British into the ESDP This institutional design


Introduction 15

of general military assets facilitated the reduction of some of the emerging uncertainties without creating new ones through a possible American disen-gagement In terms of transaction costs the limitation of asset specificity was actually the key and thus explains preferences for institutional depth8

Finally these findings suggest that for the transformations of the state gov-ernments did not all follow the same route to internationalising their security and defence functions It varied from country to country and from issue- area to issue- area For example the UK strove in some issue- areas for even more internationalisation than Germany In addition the analysis demonstrates that the monopoly of force is by no means delegated or transferred to the European Union (see Mayer and Weinlich 2007) Instead the EU member states provide information for their partners in military planning thereby pooling some of their sovereignty and embed the monopoly of force into the ESDP (see also Jachtenfuchs 2005) Interestingly the empirical record clearly points out that governments prefer to internationalise the means of using force (their military capabilities) rather than their operational responsibili-ties In other words it was preferences in defence planning rather than oper-ational preferences that were more far- reaching in the ESDP In particular France and the UK jointly promoted the establishment of European capabili-ties Based largely on a functionalist logic this study demonstrates that the member statesrsquo willingness to internationalise the use of force to a certain extent was ultimately dependent on the ex post reduction or ex ante limita-tion of transaction costs for providing European security In conclusion we arrive at a somewhat ambivalent result The analysis shows how the interna-tionalisation of the defence function through ESDP might change the role of the government but does not replace the state While the ideal- typical differentiation between hierarchy and anarchy appears as anachronistic for an examination of contemporary security politics (Waltz 1979) lsquogovernance by governmentsrsquo nonetheless remains indispensable for the provision of European security In this sense the results closely correspond to the thesis by Philipp Genschel and Bernhard Zangl The state is transformed from the exclusive holder of the monopoly of force to the principal manager of the use of force and this is increasingly dealt with at the international level as will be shown in this book (Genschel and Zangl 2008 430ndash1)

The research design

The research design is based closely on Alexander George and Andrew Bennettrsquos propositions on case studies and theory- building Although a transaction costs framework is firmly established in political economy it has not been applied to security preferences This suggests in turn that

in the early stages of a research programme selection on the depend-ent variable can serve the heuristic purpose of identifying the potential



causal paths and variables leading to the dependent variable of interest (George and Bennett 2005 23)

The sampling procedure is therefore targeted at establishing differences (George and Bennett 2005 153ndash60) The issue at stake is determining which EU member states to select and how to limit the time period (eg Geddes 1990)

Andrew Moravcsik argued in the most thorough analysis of preference formation to date that there were three distinct groups in the negotiations of security and defence issues at Maastricht in 1991 namely the pro- NATO group the compromise group and the autonomy group (Moravcsik 1998 451 see also Forster 1999 111ndash22) I therefore selected the leading mem-ber of each group since the ldquopreferences of the most powerful actors will be accorded the greatest weightrdquo (Keohane 1984 71) The result of this sampling procedure is the selection of Germany the United Kingdom and France9 The advantage of choosing the most powerful countries is that they explicitly formulated their preferences In contrast states that did not expect to achieve everything they wanted from the bargaining proc-ess are much more hesitant in their formulation in order not to leave the Intergovernmental Conference (IGC) with a clear defeat Hence the data is not only easier to gather but is also more reliable This is not a sine qua non but is nevertheless helpful In order to obtain variation over time I again refer mainly to the dependent variable It should be noted that there was a major shift in the institutionalisation of EU security policy in 1998ndash9 so the analysis starts before that shift and compares that period to the time after it In a nutshell this combination of establishing variation over time and space suggests limiting the empirical analysis to the Big Three and to examine both the time before St Malo and afterwards (for example the Amsterdam- IGC vs the Convention- IGC)

In addition the explanatory strategy refers to a processual perspective of preference formation and institution- building in European security (Pierson 2004 George and Bennett 2005) Therefore a ldquostructured focused comparisonrdquo10 systematically analyses the institutional development accord-ing to a ldquoprocess- tracing logicrdquo (George and McKeown 1985 George and Bennett 2005) The main point of this kind of comparison is that the qualitatively analysed cases are not arbitrarily combined with each other but compared in a formal and systematic way According to Paul Pierson ldquo[i]t makes good sense to begin [any study of institutionalisation] with the prospect that actors choose institutions because they believe that doing so will benefit themrdquo (Pierson 2004 106) However it may be insufficient to rely exclusively on rationalndashfunctionalist accounts (Pierson 2004 109ndash31) Hence the study is supplemented and weighed against nonfunctionalist sources of institutions by integrating some systematic modifications into the framework In particular several of the components of the envisaged


Introduction 17

costs and benefits are derived from cognitivist or interpretative concepts (eg Rathbun 2007 541ndash9) The methods used in the study as well as the attention paid to path dependence sunk costs etc basically make the inves-tigations historical- institutionalist Using this procedure I can empirically examine the political context and based on this the rationalndashfunctionalist models help to explain the outcome This provides a great advantage for the-orising security institutions I can bridge the gap (Checkel and Zuumlrn 2005) between liberal theories which essentially neglect the effect of institutions on preferences (eg Moravcsik 1997 1998) and institutionalist theories which merely assume rather than investigate state preferences (eg Keohane 1984 Haftendorn et al 1999)

Finally the primary empirical evidence consists of documentary sources Firstly it includes strategies position papers reports speeches and other official sources11 secondly a comprehensive newspaper survey12 thirdly some policy papers and secondary literature of historians and political sci-entists For secondary evidence I used publicly available data sets such as the Eurobarometer opinion polls or the Composite Index of Material Capabilities (CIMC) of the Correlates of War Project (CoW) Finally I con-ducted numerous structured open- ended interviews with several sen-ior officials and policy experts13 A qualitative content analysis examined this broad range of data according to theoretically derived or inductively explored categories

The plan of the book

This book is divided into three main parts The first begins by reviewing scholarship on security institutions in general and the ESDP in particular As a result of several deficiencies of the literature and building on theories of political economy the bookrsquos analytical framework is developed and how it applies to the empirical study is explained This study ndash a structured focused comparison of the Big Three ndash comprises the second part of the book Following a parallel analysis of a demand for security institutions two chapters for each of the Big Three explore and explain preferences for substantive scope and institutional depth respectively Finally the last part of the book focuses on the theoretical and empirical implications of the analysis and evaluates these results from the perspective of the transforma-tions of the modern nation state

The starting point of Chapter 2 begins by examining the three standard approaches within International Relations for their contribution to the research questions and their underlying puzzles Due to the largely dis-satisfactory results its final section addresses the lsquonew institutionalismrsquo (Powell and DiMaggio 1991 Hall and Taylor 1996) which provides a bridge to the bookrsquos own framework This framework is set out in Chapter 3 By building on historical- institutionalist thought and transaction cost



economics the analytical building blocks for the study of security prefer-ences are developed The second step of the third chapter comprises the empirical link to preferences and the ESDP in order to clarify precisely how the empirical analysis is conducted

Based on these theoretical foundations the preferences of Germany Britain and Francersquos for institution- building in European security are exam-ined according to a process- tracing logic After analysing the Big Threersquos perception of the security environment and thereby identifying a gen-eral demand for institution- building the structured focused comparison systematically addresses why the EU rather than NATO was increasingly given the responsibility of military planning for European security The first three chapters focus on the exploration and explanation of preferences with regard to substantive scope between the mid- 1990s and the Convention in 2003ndash4 The underlying puzzle is why the EU members began to set up ESDP at all The studyrsquos transaction costs framework serves as the theoretical lens for the explanation The second part of the comparison analyses the prefer-ences of Germany Britain and France for institutional depth The guiding question of these three chapters is how the governments wanted to design ESDP Again the exploration of the development of these preferences is fol-lowed by a transaction costs explanation

The final part of the book addresses the explanatory leverage of the trans-action costs framework and discusses the implications for examining both security institutions and the transformations of the state First of all based on the construction of some mostly-likely cases (Eckstein 1975 108ndash13) Chapter 11 provides alternative explanations for substantive scope and insti-tutional depth Due to the fact that the empirical analysis was biased to the extent that only powerful and allied states were examined the scope of the argument is considered further For that purpose a lsquoplausibility probersquo of Irish preferences within the parallel time span is conducted Furthermore some of the desiderata of the structured focused comparison are discussed The final chapter then summarises the main theoretical and empirical results and concludes that Germany Britain and Francersquos preferences for ESDP are primarily triggered by transaction costs On that basis it attempts to close the circle that was opened up by this introduction Building on the empirical and theoretical results it answers the puzzles formulated above and addresses the studyrsquos contributions to theory concepts and substance in International Relations Finally it concludes by considering the contested issue of what the results of this study imply for the transformation of mod-ern statehood


19

2Theorising Preference Formation for Institution- Building in European Security

The introductory chapter has addressed the bookrsquos focus on cooperation and institution- building in European security from the perspective of International Relations Hence this chapter discusses the various ideas this discipline suggests for tackling the research puzzles Some of these explana-tions exist explicitly (eg Posen 2004 2006 Smith 2004 Meyer 2006 Jones 2007 Meacuterand 2008) others are derived from broader research programmes (eg Moravcsik 1993a 1998 Moravcsik and Nicolaidis 1999) This studyrsquos approach to the existing literature builds strongly on Imre Lakatosrsquo notion of lsquosophisticated falsificationismrsquo of research programmes1 The reason is that Lakatos refuted simplistic notions about testing theories by replacing them with a more differentiated perspective Crucially however he maintained the importance of evaluating existing theories (Waltz 2003 viindashx) Lakatos argued that a research programme should be ldquocheckedrdquo in two ways (Lakatos 1970 116) Firstly the question of internal consistency is tackled by this chap-ter which is about the problem of logical contradictions at an abstract theo-retical level Secondly the question of external consistency with observable facts will be selectively considered at the beginning of part three of the book that is following the empirical analysis It will refer to real- world develop-ments that may contradict theoretical expectations derived from the specific approaches2 The outcome of both checks determines to what extent we may ultimately speak of a progressive or degenerative research programme (or lsquoproblemshiftrsquo) (Lakatos 1970 116ndash22 133ndash4) As a result we may have some indications of which theoretical approaches we should reject for the subject of this study which to confirm and which to modify

The primary objective of this study is to contribute to International Relationsrsquo theories of cooperation and institution- building in security issues The following section therefore confines itself to the most relevant approaches from this perspective (1) Realism or a power- based account (2) Liberal Intergovernmentalism or an interest- based approach and (3)



Constructivism or a culture- based explanation (Hasenclever et al 1997 Zangl and Zuumlrn 2003 125ndash48 Hix 2005 374ndash8) The aim is to extract as much explanatory leverage as possible rather than simply refuting the approach in question what are the supposed lsquodriversrsquo of preference for-mation and what the potential lsquotracksrsquo How would the main research programmes explain the European Union (EU) member statesrsquo security pref-erences in European security What lsquoexplanansrsquo do they focus on and what are the causal mechanisms

Realism anarchy and power

This section explicates Realist predictions for preference formation in secu-rity and assesses the power- based contribution to the research question Realist thought still dominates thinking about security in International Relations3 This is particularly applicable to American Political Science which has increasingly become interested in the EUrsquos recent efforts to insti-tutionalise security and defence more strongly during the past few years (Art 1996 Art et al 20056 Jones 2003 2007 Posen 2004 2006 see also Hyde- Price 2007 Peters 2010) Although there are some major differences among Realist approaches to security cooperation ndash ranging from offensive (eg Mearsheimer) and defensive (eg Waltz and Jervis) to neoclassical (eg Wolforth Schweller Kydd) variants we can nonetheless map a common ground that neorealist accounts share (eg Mearsheimer 2001 17ndash22) that is anarchy and the distribution of material capabilities (ie power) deter-mine the polarity of the international system The relative position of an indi-vidual state in this system in turn induces its security preferences ndash more precisely to maintain or increase its power4 This represents the most fun-damental lsquoexplanansrsquo of the statersquos security preferences from a Neorealist perspective

At a general level Realists would predict that this study would find three interrelationships (1) Similarly positioned states are expected to have simi-lar preferences (Koenig- Archibugi 2004 144ndash5) (2) Changes in preferences are preceded by changes in the statersquos relative position in the system (Posen 2004 6ndash9) (3) The more powerful a state is the less it wants to bind itself but strives instead for autonomy (Waltz 1979 107ndash16) Furthermore we can discern different variables intervening between the systemrsquos structure and an individual statersquos preference formation So- called neoclassical ldquoreal-ists for instance introduced mediating factors such as the national leadersrdquo threat perception (eg Christensen 1996) or domestic structure (eg Zakaria 1998)5 Realist scholars such as Barry Posen and Seth Jones who explicitly attempted to explain the emergence of the ESDP relied on a mixture of the international and the European system Firstly the shift from bi- to unipolarity accounts for the fact that the ESDP emerged at all (Posen 2004 10ndash12 2006) The EU states wanted to project power abroad and become


Theorising Preferences in European Security 21

more autonomous from the United States (Jones 2007 24ndash32) Secondly ldquostructural shifts in Europe at the end of the Cold War triggered an increase in security cooperation through the EU Cooperation allowed European states to bind Germany and ensure long- term peace on the continentrdquo (Jones 2007 11)

Accordingly we can formulate specific predictions for the studyrsquos research question Firstly the EU member states will prefer closer security cooper-ation to establish power projection capabilities They will organise these cooperative efforts independently from the United States This striving for autonomy among the EU members would be reinforced over time between the mid- 1990s and 2003ndash4 Secondly Germanyrsquos neighbours wanted to lsquobindrsquo the reunified country The EU represented the logical long- term solu-tion for such a lsquobinding strategyrsquo This would only be possible if Germany were to pursue a status quo policy Accordingly Britain and France would be expected to have a similar preference order that is a cooperative arrange-ment that binds Germany This would be expected to be stronger in the mid- 1990s than in 2003ndash4 since fears of German hegemony and the consequent necessity to bind it had gradually decreased Germany itself would support these initiatives as long as it generally stuck to its status quo objectives

After this overview of Realist thought on this studyrsquos research question(s) I now examine those ideas in the light of the Lakatosian criterion of inter-nal consistency Two problems in particular must be tackled the consist-ency between the general and specific expectations and the issue of lsquo(soft) balancingrsquo vs lsquobandwagoningrsquo vs lsquobindingrsquo First of all the more specific expectations can be derived with certainty from the more general interrela-tionships but some important questions emerge For instance the descrip-tion of Germany as a status quo power appears empirically plausible but is difficult to trace back to Realist premises Furthermore it is unclear why states should prefer more autonomy from the US while at the same time entering into binding arrangements among themselves Although the latter are not directed against the US they nonetheless concern the Americans In more general terms when does a state want autonomy when does it want to bind another state (and thereby itself) and how does this relate to the statersquos relative position in the international system

These ambivalences in Realist thought lead us directly to the second set of inconsistencies namely the debate on lsquobalancingrsquo (eg Vasquez 1997 Baumann et al 2000 Pape 2005 Howorth and Menon 2009) In the context of this study the problematique can be broken down into two questions What precisely can we expect from the relative positions of Britain France and Germany with respect to their preferences for security cooperation bal-ancing bandwagoning buckpassing or binding If states choose to balance Waltz et al are right if states choose to bandwagon Schweller et al are con-firmed and so on John Vazquez most prominently argued that it is exactly this vagueness of Realism that qualifies it as degenerative in a Lakatosian



sense (Vasquez 1997) This kind of internal inconsistency is primarily based on the criticism that the research programme cannot be falsified

This brings us directly to the question of what can in fact be regarded as an instance of balancing Realismrsquos vagueness finds its ultimate pinna-cle in the literature on soft balancing (eg Pape 2005 Paul 2005) Since none of the well- known forms of security policy were directly observable some scholars proposed the concept of soft balancing that is ldquoconstraining US power by other (diplomatic) meansrdquo (Paul 2005 58ndash9) ldquoWhile the US does not present a military threat to Europe it is the structural condition of unipolarity that has caused European states to aggregate power This is not quite balancing as conventionally defined since European states do not view America as a military threatrdquo (Jones 2007 24 see also Posen 2004 24 Art et al 20056 184) These modifying shifts may adjust the research pro-gramme to external consistency but at the clear expense of internal coher-ence Therefore the research programme does not unambiguously suggest what should be regarded as an instance of for example (soft) balancing or bandwagoning

In sum the Realist research programme is faced with considerable inter-nal inconsistencies This is primarily reflected in attempts to adjust the programmersquos lsquoprotection beltrsquo to empirical reality whereby incompatibility with its lsquohard corersquo is created The consequence is ndash at least the peril of ndash non- falsifiability While the highly complex institutional arrangements of the ESDP may be regarded as a moderate balancing act they are simulta-neously an attempt to sustain the American commitment to Europe ndash in other words bandwagoning The Realist categories therefore appear as prob-lematic even though the underlying premise of lsquopower driving preferencesrsquo may be heuristically promising (eg Peters 2010)6 After this rather critical assessment of Realismrsquos explanatory leverage Chapter 11 examines in more detail the external consistency of the research programme by applying it to a lsquomost likely casersquo The combination of both checks ultimately represents an appropriate foundation for assessing its explanatory qualities

Liberal Intergovernmentalism (LI) market and domestic interest groups

While Realism still dominates scholarship on security cooperation LI is the dominant research programme for the study of European integration (Moravcsik 1993b 1998 Wallace et al 1999 Pollack 2001 222 Choi and Caporaso 2002 487ndash8) The structure of this section is similar to the previ-ous one I present the theoretical argument and derive expectations for the practice of preference formation in the ESDP

In general Liberal Intergovernmentalists expect that the preferences of the respective member state will by and large represent those of the most power-ful and best- organised domestic interest group The governmentrsquos lsquodesired



ordering of possible outcomesrsquo ultimately depends on what this group or groups want In short proponents of this theoretical strand derive prefer-ences from a pluralistically organised market of domestic interest groups However two caveats are called for On the one hand the constituency behind security and defence policy is normally weak and diffuse particu-larly in questions of institution- building (Moravcsik 1998 35 50 Moravcsik and Nicolaidis 1999 61 64) The most affected group is supposedly the political- military establishment who can accordingly be regarded as the most important stake- holder On the other hand there is a high degree of uncertainty about cause- effect relationships in this issue- area (Zuumlrn 1997 300) This makes attempts to influence the government more complex and thus the promotion of particularistic interests is difficult

At a more specific level Liberal Intergovernmentalists first assume that the role of geopolitical ideas is greater than in economic issues (Moravcsik 1998 430) As a consequence the theoretical expectations do not differ significantly from those of approaches that emphasise the role of strategic culture some ideas may enable preferences for more institution- building (eg Germanyrsquos lsquoreflexive multilateralismrsquo) others may instead act as a con-straint (eg aspects of French Gaullism) ldquoSince issue- specific interests pre-vail lsquohigh politicsrsquo concerns will dominate [security and defence policy]rdquo (Moravcsik 1998 50) Secondly ideologically motivated elites so- called dramatic- political actors supposedly have a relatively high degree of free-dom to act (Moravcsik 1993a 494) If that is the case a member statersquos pref-erences will largely correspond to those of the most important stake- holders in this domain namely the military establishment and the large companies that produce weaponry (Moravcsik 1993b Dover 2005) When these actors want more institution- building for primarily economic reasons the gov-ernment represents these interests at the international level

From the perspective of Lakatosrsquo criteria for internal consistency there is one main aspect that appears problematic for LIrsquos application to the studyrsquos research question That is the reliance on ideas and dramatic- political actors These more specific expectations are basically not derived from the general ones whereby the argument appears lsquoad hocrsquo If the programmersquos initial mechanism does not work LI will refer to another one That is however theoretically largely independent from the original explanation In Andrew Moravcsikrsquos case lsquogeopolitical ideasrsquo serve normally as the main competi-tor (Moravcsik 1998 27ndash35) This kind of modification may facilitate con-sistency with the real world but at the expense of theoretical clarity and falsifiability It ultimately affects the programmersquos lsquohard corersquo and is thus problematic In short LI is faced with remarkable difficulties when applied to issues other than economic ones

In sum LI remains an important point of reference because it represents a powerful tool for the explanation of external issues that function accord-ing to an economic logic such as the armaments market (DeVore and Weiss



2010) However it is faced with unbridgeable difficulties when it applied to political or security issues Put differently in the absence of a pluralistically organised market of domestic interest groups LI fails to offer a coherent explanation and can only be saved by conceptual stretching and ad hoc modifications in the programmersquos lsquoprotection beltrsquo This is dealt with in more detail in Chapter 11 when LIrsquos lsquoexternal consistencyrsquo will be under investigation

Constructivism socialisation and culture

While the two previous approaches rely on a rationalist logic Constructivism can at least partly be understood as an answer to the problems and anoma-lies left unresolved by these approaches (eg Kratochwil and Ruggie 1986)7 This does not refer to a merely regulative impact on behaviour instead constitutive effects on identities are now at stake (Ruggie 1998 22ndash5 Wendt 1999 171ndash8) Constructivists situate international institutions in their social context They emphasise the mutually constitutive relationship between institutions and the identities of political actors (Simmons and Martin 2002 197ndash8) Accordingly they oppose a pure instrumentalist perspective They can be differentiated from the rest of the literature insofar as they question the linear impact of objective structures on subjective preferences Instead the environmental structure is not seen solely as posing constraints or opportunities for states but Constructivism emphasises the degree to which social environments and actors penetrate one another (eg Wendt 1987 Carlsnaes 1992) In short Constructivist approaches derive prefer-ences in security issues from socialising effects that the political actors learn through their interactions

Top- down approaches mainly focus on intersubjectively shared role con-ceptions and cultures which are reproduced or changed by interactions These cultures either affect the preference formation of states directly or have constitutive effects on the statesrsquo identities and subsequently on their preferences (Meyer et al 1997 Adler and Barnett 1998 Wendt 1999 Smith 2004) In contrast the much more widespread empirical research taking a bottom- up perspective focuses either on strategic or organisational cultures (eg Johnston 1995 Legro 1996 Katzenstein 1996) These constitute the cultural- institutional context creating norms and thereby influencing the statesrsquo preferences in security matters Constructivist theorising is particu-larly prevalent among European scholars Since very recently they also play a prominent role in the debate on European security While the top- down view is primarily reflected in the literature on lsquoEuropeanisationrsquo(Tonra 2001 1ndash41 Meyer 2006 112ndash37)8 strategic culture approaches normally argue from the bottom- up (eg Miskimmon 2004 Breuer 2006)

At a general level Constructivists would predict the following interrela-tionships for this study (1) The emphasis is on deeper effects of norms and



culture not only on state preferences but also on identities (2) Identities and the resulting interests are learned through interactions by responding to how an actor is treated by others The causal mechanism is socialisation in various forms (eg Johnston 2001 Checkel and Zuumlrn 2005) (3) There is a mutually reinforcing interaction process of uploading and downloading between the national and the European levels In the long term at least this should lead to some degree of convergence among the member statesrsquo security preferences (eg Meyer 2006)

When we apply these analytical concepts to the studyrsquos puzzles we can formulate the following two specific predictions9 Firstly a member statersquos security culture and identity form the main explanatory building block Beliefs on security issues that are widely held within a state are expected to lsquodriversquo the governmentrsquos preference formation for institution- building Secondly the relatively high degree of variation to be expected from dis-tinct cultures seems to suggest an analysis of similarities and differences Nevertheless the main challenge is to trace back the causal significance to the socialising effects of norms and culture in this respect (Hooghe 2005) Therefore I largely expect continuity over the relatively brief period of anal-ysis Belief systems are supposed to be resilient Hence an analysis with a short time span is certainly biased in this regard whereas it seems nonethe-less legitimate to expect at least some indications of change10

This brief overview of Constructivist propositions again serves as a foun-dation for confronting it with the Lakatosian criteria To a large extent Constructivist thought on this research question is internally consistent This is based on the simple fact that a broad congruence between what a state lsquobelievesrsquo and what it accordingly wants does not represent a par-ticularly provocative statement Nevertheless two problems frequently emerge First of all the relatively general nature of a statersquos security culture may generate indeterminate expectations with respect to issues of institution- building Similarly widely held beliefs will be unclear as what to expect if one half believes A and the other B This can produce contradictory results and requires a very precise definition of thresholds For these reasons some propositions have been made in the literature for reducing indeterminacy For instance three causal mechanisms of how the political- military culture affects security preferences may be expected to be at work (1) the supply of fundamental goals of politi-cal actors (eg the ESDP as part of the broader European project) (2) the impact on the actorrsquos assessment of the international situation (eg necessity for the EU to control its own backyard) and (3) conditioning of the political actorsrsquo ability to mobilise national resources for military policies (eg lsquoEuropafaumlhigkeitrsquo in Germany) (Berger 1998 16) Such a pro-cedure may make Constructivist expectations slightly more determinate but can hardly remedy the approachrsquos ultimate problem in the context of this study



That is secondly the question of where exactly change originates and how we can explain it This is even more problematic when we observe non- incremental shifts After all political actors are believed to behave on the basis of their identities and interests they interact with others and so become socialised this ultimately contributes to their identities and inter-ests and so on However how is it possible to integrate drivers of change into such a circular framework In this context the Constructivist reply often refers to so- called norm entrepreneurs (Finnemore and Sikkink 1998) However it is not clear either where they suddenly appear from or under exactly what conditions they are successful in promoting change ldquoActivists beyond bordersrdquo are relatively often unsuccessful (Keck and Sikkink 1998) Due to the structural nature of the research programme (ie norms and culture) the incorporation of norm entrepreneurs into the protection belt appears not to be fully compatible with its lsquohard corersquo

In sum (moderate) Constructivism does promise important though incomplete insights into the studyrsquos puzzles It is primarily expected to be suitable for explaining how to deal comprehensively with the nexus of similaritiesdifferences between member states In contrast it appears less successful with respect to timing and the general challenge of continuity and change of individual preferences However these questions of external consistency are subject of Chapter 11 when alternative explanations of the bookrsquos framework are addressed in more detail

Theory practice and the necessity of an innovative approach

The previous sections reviewed the suggestions of IR theory from the per-spective of internal consistency I indicated that the research programmes primarily rely upon structural mechanisms that are derived from power plenty or interactions (Zuumlrn 1997 299 Weiss 2005) (see figure 21)

The results however were at best mixed Firstly anarchy as the sole deter-minant of security preferences was not particularly persuasive11 Secondly LIrsquos approach in the absence of a clearly identifiable market of domestic interest groups was problematic to the extent that it shifted the explanatory burden to factors outside the programmersquos initial hard core Finally sociali-sation ndash as an isolated mechanism ndash does not provide a comprehensive expla-nation of security preferences In particular the idea that EU member states were faced by sudden changes in their domestic cultures does not seems to be a persuasive argument when dealing with the question of change This critical review of internal consistency however does not suggest that prefer-ences should be examined solely on a case- by- case basis as in the work of historians (Frieden 1999 57ndash61)

Instead I draw two different conclusions First of all the three research programmes are consulted again as alternative explanations of the bookrsquos own approach to check in addition their external consistency Since these



results may differ I will ultimately arrive at a qualified assessment of these approaches with respect to their explanatory power Secondly the objective of the next chapter is to construct ldquosometimes true theoriesrdquo (Scharpf 1997 22) or ldquomid- range ideal- typical explanationsrdquo (George and Bennett 2005 233ndash62 see also Zuumlrn 1997) I will turn to analytical concepts from the ldquonew institutionalismsrdquo (eg Powell and DiMaggio 1991 Hall and Taylor 1996) because this scholarship particularly in its historical form is capa-ble of reconciling seemingly unbridgeable differences when examining the emergence of institutions It is shown how

actors select new institutions for instrumental purposes much as rational choice analysis would predict but draw them from a menu of alternatives that is made historically available through the mechanisms specified by sociological institutionalism (Hall and Taylor 1996 957)

Accordingly I begin with general propositions about preferences secu-rity cooperation and institution- building and then gradually move towards more specific processes and mechanisms of the emergence of the ESDP In short I develop a transaction costs framework of preference formation in security based on historical- institutionalist thought (Hall and Taylor 1996 937ndash42 Keohane 1984 Williamson 1985 North 1990b Lake 1999) In a sense the focus on preferences and transaction costs corroborates primarily rational- choice institutionalism (eg Riker 1990 Scharpf 1997) The way the study is then conducted as well as the attention paid to path dependence sunk costs etc basically make the investigations historical- institutionalist (eg North 1990a Pierson 2004)12

The point of departure is the ldquocontention that conflict among rival groups for scarce resources lies at the heart of politicsrdquo (Hall and Taylor 1996 937 see also Gourevitch 1999) Hence the cooperation problem in European secu-rity primarily encompasses a series of collective action dilemmas (eg Hall

SecurityPreferences

MARKET-Interest groups

INTERACTIONS-Socialisation

ANARCHY-Power

Figure 21 Sources and mechanisms of security preferences in International Relations theory



and Taylor 1996 945 Lepgold 1998) I will build on rational- choice ideas derived from the assertion that the member statesrsquo preferences are primarily determined by cost- benefit calculations (Keohane 1984 Williamson 1985 Riker 1990 Lake 1999) However it is crucial to note that not all solutions to these collective action problems are solely functional (Pierson 2004 108ndash9) The causal path of lsquoform follows functionrsquo is important but is not the only one available For that reason some systematic modifications are built into the framework Crucially the envisaged costs and benefits of institution- building draw on cognitivist or interpretative concepts (eg Carlsnaes 2002 341ndash4 Rathbun 2007 541ndash9) Finally this line of argument is reflected by the studyrsquos research design because it examines processes of preference for-mation and institutional development rather than focusing exclusively insti-tutional choice (Jervis 1997 155ndash61 Pierson 2004 130ndash53)


29

3Transaction Costs and Security Institutions

The framework of this book builds on historical- institutionalist thought which regards institutions as based on their capacity to reduce the costs of cooperation It takes virtually the reverse of this idea as a point of departure and conceptualises the impact of transaction costs on preferences for build-ing the institutions in the first place I demonstrate how governments prefer precisely those institutional arrangements that adapt best to the different transactions in which they are engaged in European security architecture In other words preferences are lsquodrivenrsquo by governmentsrsquo attempt to adjust institutions to transactions which differ principally in their attributes (that is uncertainty and asset specificity) I then develop a mid- range theo-retical explanation which builds on but modifies liberalndashinstitutionalist thought While the study of security preferences can be seen as an input to liberal theorising the chosen perspective through the lenses of transaction costs contributes directly to the institutionalist research programme (eg Moravcsik 1997 537)1

This chapter sets out a transaction costs framework to explain the two- fold challenge of (1) why the EU member states did (not) prefer to build institutions in European security and (2) how they did (not) prefer to design possible institutional arrangements It proceeds in two steps The main ana-lytical building blocks are first introduced at a theoretical level and they are then applied to preference formation for institution- building in European security after the end of the Cold War

Transaction costs and preference formation in European security an analytical framework

Before turning to the theoretical details of the lsquoexplanansrsquo some concep-tual remarks on the lsquoexplanandumrsquo are required Preferences are the way an actor ldquoorders the possible outcomes of an interactionrdquo (Frieden 1999 42) lsquoAn interactionrsquo is primarily the deliberations and negotiations between governments about the institutionalisation of security and defence issues at



the EU level More specifically it encompasses two analytical dimensions (Lindberg and Scheingold 1970 65ndash98)

Firstly preferences for substantive scope refer to those problems the member states want to be subsumed within the EU This encompasses the whole nexus of military planning and the Unionrsquos potential responsibilities for these tasks (Rynning 2003 54) Secondly preferences for institutional depth mainly reflect the member statesrsquo willingness to increase coordina-tion efforts and to partly bind themselves within the institution (Weber 1997 324 2000) As indicated above these two dimensions are combined to create different types of preferences for institution- building in European security (see table 31)

This typology facilitates a differentiated perspective on whether the EU members wanted to internationalise parts of their monopoly of force To what extent did they want to embed the governance of European security within an intergovernmental or even supranational framework A govern-ment that wants the EU to perform collective defence responsibilities as well as high- intensity crisis management would be situated at the maximal level of military planning In such an instance the member states would guar-antee mutual assistance in case of armed attack and would develop high- intensity combat instruments to intervene militarily in crises throughout the world Similarly a state willing to give up its veto position on substantial issues and allow the European institutions to accomplish powerful tasks would have a strong willingness to be highly binding When these two pref-erences come together the government would fall into quadrant I) In the-ory at least such a preference would be tantamount to the preference for a full- scale and relatively centralised European Army In contrast to this type

Table 31 The lsquoexplanandumrsquo preferences for institution-building in European security

Preferences for Institutional Depth

Highly binding Non-binding

Preferences for Substantive Scope

Maximal military planning at the EU level

I) EU as a full-scale and dominant security and defence institution based on strongly binding rules

II) EU as a full-scale and dominant security and defence institution based on nonndashbinding coordination mechanisms

Minimal military planning at the EU level

III) EU as a (low-intensity) crisis management institution but based on strongly binding rules

IV) EU as a (low-intensity) crisis management institution based on non-binding coordination mechanisms


Transaction Costs and Security Institutions 31

of state would be one with a preference for the EU to be exclusively respon-sible for economic issues It would even oppose the proposition to grant the EU responsibility for humanitarian relief assistance operations and would be keen to prevent any EU involvement in its national security policy This type of state would fall into the opposite quadrant (IV)

In practice when it comes to preferences for institution- building in the ESDP all EU governments can be located somewhere in between these two extremes Hence most EU member states neither want to supranationalise the monopoly on the use of force nor do they want to maintain all of the resulting rights and obligations at the national level The ESDP does trans-form the state but it is not a one- way street (see also Jachtenfuchs 2005 Genschel and Zangl 2008) As indicated above this book argues that these types of preferences depend on the relative magnitude of both ex ante and ex post transaction costs The bottom- line assumption is that when transac-tion costs are high governments will have a stronger preference towards institution- building and would tend so to speak towards quadrant I)

The following sections introduce the studyrsquos lsquoexplanansrsquo transaction costs An analytical framework is developed for explaining the different types of preferences set out above This framework departs from some gen-eral propositions about institution- building and security provision in inter-national politics and then specifies the transaction costs that governments are faced with when they engage in security cooperation (that is the risks of opportunism and governance costs) Ultimately it arrives at the specifica-tion of combining uncertainty with asset specificity as the key triggers of preference formation for institution- building in European security

The prerequisites of a transaction costs framework

The framework builds on four main assumptions of which two define human behaviour and two the environmental conditions Firstly the starting point for transaction costs theorists is always the concept of bounded rationality which was most prominently promoted by Herbert Simon (Williamson 1985 30 North 1990b 17ndash26 1990c 182ndash3)

This refers to behaviour that is intendedly rational but only limitedly so it is a condition of limited cognitive competence to receive store retrieve and process information All complex contracts are unavoidably incomplete because of bounds of rationality (Williamson 1996 377)

When applied to this study this suggests that states as well as their gov-ernments are subject to bounded rationality Without this assumption institutional arrangements between the EU members would simply be a problem of planning (Williamson 1985 31) Instead this book regards these exchanges as incomplete contracts or as a governance problem (Gourevitch 1999 143) Secondly the opportunistic nature of human behaviour implies



that these contractual relations are always faced with the problem of cred-ible commitments (eg Scharpf 1997 117ndash24 Moravcsik 1998 73ndash7 Lake 1999 52ndash8) In contrast to situations of pure coordination this is particu-larly critical for the creation of public goods as those agreements are not self- enforcing Opportunism is not merely self- interest but implies rational efforts to ldquomislead deceive obfuscate and otherwise confuserdquo (Williamson 1996 378)2

Thirdly transaction cost economics abandoned the view that the organi-sational boundaries of a firm are technologically determined Instead the market and the firm are conceptualised as distinct modes of economic organisation or lsquogovernance structuresrsquo (eg Williamson 1985 North 1990b) While the business firm is hierarchical the market is in a sense anarchical or less institutionalised in which autonomous parties engage in exchanges In contrast a hierarchically organised firm places exchanges under unified control (Williamson 1996 378) The level of transaction costs determines the particular choice between the two forms the more negligible the trans-action costs the better suited the market as an allocative mechanism and vice versa In politics however the vast majority of transactions take place within so- called hybrid forms such as regimes or networks (Scharpf 1997 141ndash5 Williamson 1996 378) This has predominantly been the institutional setting of European security and defence policy since the mid- 1990s

Finally transaction cost economics builds on the assumption that actors start considering the establishment of hybrid or even hierarchical gov-ernance structures when they are faced with some sort of market failure Exchanges within the anarchical market have led to sub- optimal results from the perspective of the actorsrsquo preferences However transaction cost economics assumes that this is not so much rooted in dysfunctional behav-iour on the part of the actors but rather can be attributed to the institu-tional setting itself (Keohane 1984 82ndash3) Thus actors aim to make the market work by building institutions that reduce factors such as uncertainty (North 1990b) In this context however this book emphasises one critical difference from conventional regime theory that has pervasively built upon this condition (Keohane 1984 Haftendorn et al 1998)

While a market failure implies to a certain extent that all EU member states were confronted with the same conditions I merely treat this environ-mental condition as a basis for developing the transaction costs framework Market failure reflects the existence of extraordinarily high transaction costs The fundamental difference is that I regard market failures not as abso-lute (Williamson 1985 8) Therefore the market as an objective force does not automatically select the best- suited institution to accommodate its dysfunc-tion (Zuumlrn 1997 298ndash9 Jachtenfuchs 2002 214ndash9) Instead the marketrsquos impact on the EU member states ndash or its entailed transaction costs ndash varies Therefore the studyrsquos focus on transaction costs rather than on market fail-ures facilitates an examination of the differences between the EU members



as they are confronted with varying magnitudes of these costs3 In other words a market failure as a structural pre- condition may drive the overall project of the ESDP but the key trigger of the member statesrsquo preferences is the individual level of relative transaction costs they are faced with Figure 31 encapsulates these four basic assumptions

I therefore need to clarify the expected costs and benefits of institution- building for the member states While this book understands security as a sort of public good (eg Bruumlck 2005 376ndash7) it ultimately remains an empirical question whether something is a private club or collective good (Hirschman 1970 101ndash2 Keohane 1984 180 Lepgold 1998 97) For exam-ple Katja Weber conceptualises collective defence as an lsquoimpure public goodrsquo (Weber 2000 16) Similarly David Lake defines security as an ldquoinelas-tic primary goodrdquo (Lake 1999 24) In contrast Kenneth Waltz understands security as something similar to a commodity or private good something that a state can possess For him the stability of the system is consequently the public good (Waltz 1979 161ndash3)

First of all I define security ldquoas a low probability of damage to acquired valuesrdquo (Baldwin 1997 13) More specifically this book follows David Lakersquos proposition which emphasises the two faces of security The first is essen-tially about physical survival ldquoThe lower the risk from intentional violence the more secure ndash or the less threatened ndash is the individual or the polityrdquo (Lake 1999 21) Secondly security also relates closely to wealth costs and core values ldquoa polity is more secure ndash or again less threatened ndash to the extent that its wealth cannot be coerced or otherwise extorted from it by some out-side partyrdquo (Lake 1999 21) From this I infer two major motivations behind institution- building in security greater protection from threats and risks

Bounded rationality Opportunism

Basicassumptions of alsquotransaction costs

frameworkrsquo

Market failure affectsultimate outcomes ndash buttransaction costs affectpreferences

Hybrid governancestructures betweenthe market and the firm

Figure 31 Four basic assumptions of a transaction costs framework



on the one hand and reduced costs on the other (see also Weber 2000 17)4 These two potential benefits represent the main objectives for institutional-ising security policy It follows from this that security is predominantly pro-vided by exchanges with partners Because pure survival is of diminishing relevance in the contemporary security environment many governments in Europe increasingly focus on how to produce security as a cooperative undertaking (eg Jervis 2005 Brooks 2005 see also French Government 1994 Government of the UK 1998 German Ministry of Defence 2003)

The cost of producing security can be enormous ( ) As polities employ technologies that lower the costs of projecting force over distance enter into a division of labour or create positive externalities that are lsquointer-nalisedrsquo in a security relationship the factors of production that are nec-essary to produce any given level of security decline It is the desire to capture these joint economies that motivates all cooperation (Lake 1999 44)5

These so- called joint production economies determine ldquothe gains from pooling resources and efforts with others and thus shape the incentives of polities to cooperaterdquo (Lake 1999 35) As an important prerequisite I do generally assume that the higher the expected benefits from cooperation the more strongly a state will prefer institution- building in the ESDP (Lake 1999 51ndash2 Weber 2000 16ndash20)

Joint production economies in security policy are triggered by three main beneficial mechanisms Firstly institutions in the ESDP allow member states to take advantage of expected economies of scale (eg Keohane 1984 90) These are understood as the interrelationship between investment and out-put They aim to achieve increasing returns (Hildebrandt 1999) However it is crucial to acknowledge that scale ldquoeconomies promote cooperation but they do not dictate particular security relationshipsrdquo (Lake 1999 47) The clearest example in the context of this study would be the procurement of common weapons such as strategic transport aircraft

Secondly functional differentiation or the division of labour facilitates an increase in potential gains (Wallander and Keohane 1999 24) However it can also give rise to lsquobilateral dependencyrsquo which makes cooperation more complex ldquoAccordingly such investments would never be made except to contribute to prospective reductions in production costs or additions to rev-enuerdquo (Williamson 1996 377) For example multinational forces such as some lsquoEU battlegroupsrsquo pursue a relatively strict division of labour with one state providing the actual combat troops another logistical support and the last back- up facilities (eg Lindstrom 2007) As will be discussed in more detail below this division of labour provides revenues to the members but also engenders frictions or transaction costs



Finally positive externalities can also contribute to joint production econo-mies They are established by one or more of the cooperating partners but create benefits for all EU members (eg Lake 1999 49ndash51) This component is less directly related to financial gains but often delivers political benefits For instance the Big Threersquos efforts with respect to Iranian nuclear activi-ties may contribute to the security of the Union as a whole The immediate costs however are primarily carried by France Germany and the United Kingdom

In sum these joint production economies serve as the point of departure of a transaction costs framework as the pooling of resources in European security shapes the incentives essential for the EU governments to even con-sider cooperation in this domain Their underlying objective is to reduce the production costs of security In other words these mechanisms point to efficiency gains that the political actors want to achieve through coopera-tive efforts greater protection from threats and risks at an acceptable cost Figure 32 summarises these interrelationships In short the governments want to build institutions to structure their future interactions (North 1990b 6) Ultimately the efficiency gains or reduction of production costs require transacting with other states This entails costs as well which are expanded upon in the following section

A transaction costs framework of security cooperation

So far I have explicitly stated this studyrsquos basic assumptions conceptualised security as a kind of public good and presented the benefits that the politi-cal actors aim to achieve through institution- building This section intro-duces the genuine framework of how to study (non- )cooperative exchanges between the actors in their search for protection from threats and risks at acceptable costs It draws on theories of political economy (eg Williamson 1985 North 1990b Lake 1999 Wallander 2000 Weber 2000)

The Motivation to Build Security Institutions

Greater protectionfrom threats andriskshellip

hellip at anacceptable cost

lsquoJoint productioneconomiesrsquo

Beneficial mechanisms

- economies of scale- lsquofunct differentiation- positive externalities

Benefits from institutionalised security policy

Figure 32 Motivational premises of a transaction costs framework



As indicated above governments are engaged in contracting with each other (Williamson 1985 30ndash2 North 1990c 189ndash91) However the coop-erative exchange agreements between the EU members remain necessar-ily incomplete and as a result problems of credible commitments emerge Hence the contracting parties establish certain safeguards that define appro-priate behaviour and suggest positive and negative sanctions (Milgrom and Roberts 1990 61ndash2) However both the substantive scope and institutional depth of cooperative arrangements vary greatly Therefore the main chal-lenge for this analysis is to trace back the impact of transaction costs on a member statersquos choice for (non- )cooperation on a substantive issue based on a certain institutional form It is shown below that the magnitude of transaction costs is largely dependent on the attributes of the transactions at stake asset specificity on the one hand and uncertainty on the other (eg Williamson 1985 18ndash23 Weber 2000 16ndash27)6

Transaction costs are the ldquocomparative costs of planning adapting and moni-toring task completion under alternative governance structuresrdquo (Williamson 1985 2)7 More specifically the analytical framework of security coopera-tion distinguishes between two kinds of transaction costs Firstly the risks of opportunism reflect the problem of credible commitments which increase the costs of cooperation More specifically the governments need to antici-pate whether the cooperation partners will comply with their obligations that result from the (incomplete) contract In addition the completion of tasks also needs to be monitored by the exchange partners The individual magnitude of the risk of opportunism depends on two interrelated dimen-sions of transactions namely uncertainty and asset specificity While the former refers to incomplete information and interpretation of the partnersrsquo preferences and behaviour (Williamson 1985 57ndash9 Rathbun 2007 541ndash9) the latter can be defined as a ldquospecialized investment that cannot be rede-ployed to alternative uses or by alternative users except at a loss of produc-tive valuerdquo (Williamson 1996 377 see also Lake 1999 8 Weber 2000 22- 5 Pierson 2004 147ndash53) In short how reliable is my partner and how difficult is the jointly produced good to be substituted As indicated above there are three kinds of expected costs of opportunistic behaviour that states are faced with in security arrangements abandonment entrapment and exploi-tation (Lake 1999 53)

Secondly increasingly hierarchial forms of arrangements may reduce most of these risks of opportunism yet at the same time lead to governance costs (North 1990b 32ndash3 Lake 1999 58ndash9) A binding commitment to an international institution is not cost- free but incurs a variety of expenses In general it costs money and there is often a political price to pay when a government chooses to build a security institution instead of dealing with the problem unilaterally The more hierarchical and thus more binding the security institution the less the member states maintain residual rights of control and thus the higher the governance costs they face Crucially



the potential loss of autonomy is regarded as interfering with national sov-ereignty when institutions are to be built (eg Waltz 1979 126) Again uncertainty and asset specificity are the dispositive attributes of transac-tions (Williamson 1985 47ndash9 90- 5 Lake 1999 52ndash71)

To illustrate the tradeoffs between the risks of opportunism and govern-ance costs in security arrangements I assume that country A cooperates with country B in a United Nations peacekeeping mission They are con-sequently faced with the costs of planning adapting and monitoring the completion of the approved task After some deliberations between the two about how to proceed in an efficient way they agree that A will deploy the troops that directly enter the targetrsquos territory and B will provide the logistics from a neighbouring country (in other words contract) In such a hypothetical situation it is crucial that both countries can rely on the credibility of the mutual commitments in particular country A which could become lsquoentrappedrsquo For the same reason the government of A insists on a common operational planning facility This operational headquarters will not only cost resources to both partners but also limit the options of both countries For example suppose country B is confronted with some shortfalls in strategic air transport and thus wants to use shipping facili-ties Country A only learns about this because it has established certain monitoring mechanisms Accordingly country A opposes these plans and wants to have the material on short notice without delays Country B must therefore charter expensive air transport facilities from another country In other words entering agreements and thus obligations offers several ben-efits but also involves costs ndash not only financial costs but also in terms of political autonomy While the risks of opportunism constantly lurk behind cooperative arrangements the corollary of building hierarchical institu-tions involves costs as well in particular the loss of control rights Hence the advice from a transaction costs perspective would be in this situation ldquoOrganize transactions so as to economize on bounded rationality while simul-taneously safeguarding them against the hazards of opportunismrdquo (Williamson 1985 32 see also North 1990c) This way of addressing both the costs and the benefits of social organisation goes beyond simplistic statements of profit maximisation and will be subsequently applied to preferences for security cooperation

The policies of the EU member statesrsquo for providing European security are the transactions under investigation They are primarily conducted within so- called hybrid governance structures which represent ldquolong- term contrac-tual relations that preserve autonomy but provide added transaction- specific safeguards compared with the marketrdquo (Williamson 1996 378) The ana-lytical framework distinguishes between those transactions that focus on the general provision of European security and those that occur exclusively within the EU While for historical and power- related reasons the United States plays a prominent role in providing European security transactions



within the ESDP are conducted exclusively among the EU member states In transactions related to European security in general the ex post comparative assessment of existing institutions ndash first and foremost NATO ndash is of utmost importance In contrast the anticipation of future transaction costs is vital for specifically designing the ESDP and thus for the explanation of prefer-ences relating to institutional depth Although this book proceeds accord-ing to this two- stage analysis the political actors must address both kinds of transaction costs simultaneously not sequentially (Williamson 1985 20ndash22)

Taken as a whole this analytical framework understands and explains security preferences first and foremost through the lenses of costs and ben-efits with a specific focus on transaction costs (Williamson 1985 90ndash95 North 1990c 183 Muumlller 2002 370ndash1) It is important to note that this framework departs from the bulk of the literature which exclusively exam-ines questions of institutional design (eg Abbott and Snidal 2000 Koremnos et al 2001) These scholars aim to explain the form or depth of institutional arrangements but completely neglect the scope of these agreements This is primarily based on the logic of form follows function The result is largely an explanation of the degree of hierarchy needed to govern questions of security (eg Weber 1997 Lake 1999 Koenig- Archibugi 2004) The func-tion or substance of security however has so far remained neglected Thus the frameworkrsquos explicit integration of comparative institutional arrange-ments provides a conceptual angle from which to tackle the question of sub-stantive scope from a transaction costs perspective It gives us a theoretical access point to the question of why the EU member states wanted to build the ESDP at all For that purpose the chosen perspective has to be much broader It considers primarily uncertainty and thus the problem of credible commitments The overall objective however is to explain both the desired substantive scope of the agreement and the preferred institutional depth to deal with the issue

Transaction costs for the provision of European security

From a comparative institutional perspective the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and the European Union represent the main options for most European states to organise the provision of security on a multilateral basis Broadly speaking a government may either invest in a particular institution or (threaten to) disengage from its activities This logic is reflected in Albert Hirschmanrsquos typology of lsquoexitrsquo and lsquovoicersquo (Hirschman 1970) lsquoExitrsquo refers to the possibility that ldquomembers of an organisation or customers can leave or stop buying a productrdquo (Hirschman 1970 4) In contrast we may speak of lsquovoicersquo if ldquomembers of an organisation or customers can express their dis-satisfactionrdquo (ibid)8 The transaction costs framework assumes that govern-ments assess the respective capacity of both institutions in order to reduce



the risks of opportunism and the governance costs for their joint activities in European security they either engage more strongly in a particular insti-tution (that is voice) or they disengage from it (that is exit) At this stage of the analysis the primary determinant of transaction costs is uncertainty and opportunism and thus the question of credible commitments9

A state considers not only whether a certain institution should execute a certain function but also whether another institution could perform that function better ldquocomparative institutional assessments of the adaptive attributes of alternative governance structures must necessarily be maderdquo (Williamson 1985 57) When we apply this to the study of European secu-rity in the post- Cold War era we see that it has often been described as a ldquosystem of interlocking institutionsrdquo (Woumlrner 1992) Therefore it is very important to ask in which institutional arrangement does a government want to deal with certain substantive issues Preferences for the substantive scope of the ESDP were not formulated in a vacuum In the words of one of the leading experts on European security

The decisions taken in St Malo Cologne and Helsinki were all designed to take into account the concerns expressed by the United States and other non- EU Allies In fact the United States was the invisible guest at the table of each of these meetings (Sloan 2000 19 emphasis added)

However the United States has an impact not only on decisions at the inter- state level but also in the stages of the individual formation of prefer-ences ndash albeit to different degrees Therefore the question of which func-tional task the EU should execute is inextricably linked to ex ante and in particular ex post assessments of NATO A member state does not assess the transaction costs of its cooperative exchanges in an absolute way but instead compares it to the ability of NATO to reduce the costs of the provi-sion of European security ldquoit is the difference between rather than the abso-lute magnitude of transaction costs that mattersrdquo (Williamson 1985 22)

In particular the governments consider the risks of opportunism from a comparative perspective When the risks increase to unacceptable levels within one institutional arrangement governments are assumed to seek alternative ways to provide for European security For example they might assign certain responsibilities to other institutions or create new ones which are expected to reduce the risks of opportunism to a sustainable level In Williamsonrsquos terminology the lsquocompletion of tasks under alternative gov-ernance structuresrsquo is at stake Although the options of exit and voice should be understood as ideal types they suggest that the mechanisms of both disengagement and engagement are at work within the European security setting Hence a state may participate continuously within NATO but con-sider whether some of its tasks may be better performed within the EU



In sum the question of preferences for substantive scope cannot be con-fined to the EU itself Instead I also need to consider the comparative assess-ment of other security institutions since it is the relative level of transaction costs of cooperative security exchanges that determine a statersquos preferences ldquothe decision whether to exit will often be taken in the light of the pros-pects for the effective use of voicerdquo (Hirschman 1970 37) While the studyrsquos analytical framework so far has been exclusively about questions of substan-tive scope I next turn to institutional depth as the second dimension of the analysis

Transaction costs within the ESDP

The initial contribution of transaction cost economics emphasised that gov-ernance structure was based on a choice between different degrees of hierar-chy or institutionalisation (eg Keohane 1984 Williamson 1985 cf Pierson 2004 103ndash32) Thus not only is the literature much more elaborate in this respect but we also need to narrow down the perspective of this study It is not so much about the relatively general provision of European secu-rity Instead the focus is exclusively on the transaction costs of cooperative exchanges that occur ndash ex ante and ex post ndash between the members of ESDP

On the one hand uncertainty determines the magnitude of transaction costs within the ESDP (Williamson 1985 56ndash60 North 1990b 25 Rathbun 2007 536)10 From a rationalndashfunctionalist perspective preferences for insti-tutions primarily stem from the desire to reduce current and future uncer-tainties In other words the anticipated effects of the institution account for the preferences of a government when designing it (Keohane 1984 88 North 1990b 3) As uncertainty is constantly involved in all human interac-tions the study examines both behavioural and non- strategic uncertainty (Williamson 1985 57ndash9 Rathbun 2007 541ndash9) Broadly speaking the higher the uncertainty about the cooperating partners the more costly the measurement and enforcement involved

On the other hand asset specificity designates the level of transaction costs within the ESDP It refers to the question of to what extent the coop-eration partnersrsquo investments can be redeployed to other purposes11 It was shown above that specific assets promise significant gains by the ben-eficial mechanisms of economies of scale functional differentiation and positive externalities In contrast general assets ldquoare useful in a variety of transactions They have the advantage of flexibility and potential effi-ciency across a broad range of activities but without specialization they are unlikely to be as effective for a particular transactionrdquo (Wallander 2000 707) The crucial criterion of whether to assess an asset as specific or general is the question of redeployability (Williamson 1985 54) The more specific it is the more difficult and costly it becomes to redeploy it to other uses or users



The combination of both dimensions of transactions namely asset specif-icity and uncertainty ultimately determines the nature of the transactions at stake and consequently corresponds to the risks of opportunism and gov-ernance costs Thus there is substantial space for interaction effects between uncertainty and asset specificity which makes it difficult but not impos-sible to determine them at an empirical level (Williamson 1985 59ndash60)

While investments into specific assets offer great opportunities to increase the benefits from cooperation they simultaneously contain important dan-gers under the condition of uncertainty Therefore

[n]onspecialization is a form of insurance when the costs and uncer-tainties of transacting are high The greater the specialization and the number and variability of valuable attributes the more weight must be put on reliable institutions that allow individuals [or composite actors such as governments] to engage in complex contracting with a minimum of uncertainty about whether the terms of the contract can be realized (North 1990b 34)

Hence the anticipated limitation of future transaction costs may lead to preferences for general rather than specific assets In turn if specialisation is promoted this will require strong and therefore binding institutions

In other words the high risks of opportunism can be avoided by two strat-egies which determine a governmentrsquos preferences for institutional depth either to establish binding mechanisms which prevent (anticipated) cheat-ing or to build general non- specific assets which decreases the potential losses if cheating does occur In contrast high governance costs can merely be mitigated by less binding or non- binding future institutions Ultimately it is the interaction between these two kinds of costs which determines the size of the transaction costs a state faces within the ESDP The willingness to keep these costs to a minimum while profiting from efficiency gains of security cooperation triggers the governmentsrsquo preferences for how to design the ESDP as a security institution (Milgrom and Roberts 1990 72ndash86 Lake 1999 52ndash65)

The causal pathways

The explanatory logic of the framework refers to one predominant causal pathway Rationalndashfunctionalism primarily accounts for causes in terms of their effects For instance profit explains an investment ndashHowever in a strictly temporal sense an investment causes profit This kind of functional explanation reverses the causal path lsquoeffect explains causersquo (Keohane 1984 80) When we apply rationalndashfunctionalist reasoning to this studyrsquos research subject the member states first prefer to reduce uncertainty Secondly they want assurance for their investments in European security



The study argues that EU member states faced with high transaction costs will prefer relatively far- reaching institution- building in European security Accordingly the individual level of transaction costs determines the govern-mentrsquos preferences for or against institution- building and more specifically the desired institutional design Thus the analytical framework proposes the following causal pathway

The more costly a state assesses the transactions with respect to the provision of European security the more it will prefer to build institutions in this domain

Firstly based on the studyrsquos premise that the choice of a specific security institution is dependent on the statersquos comparitive assessment of the relative magnitude of transaction costs the following hypothesis can be formulated

H- I) The more a state regards the EU as a relatively effective institution for the provision of European security the larger the substantive scope it will prefer for it in military planning (given the statersquos membership in both NATO and the EU)

Secondly preferences for the specific design of a security institution are driven by a combination of uncertainty and the asset specificity of the transactions at stake This interrelationship is best expressed by the tradeoff between the risks of opportunistic behaviour and governance costs

H- II) For a state the higher the combination of uncertainty and involved asset specificity within the ESDP the more depth and thus bindingness it will prefer with respect to the institutional arrangement

The underlying logic for the analysis of both dimensions is similar Since information about both the environment and the partnersrsquo future actions is costly institution- building should facilitate the exchange of information about the substantive issue and other forms of coordination However the governments want to have some sort of assurance for the investment in a specific asset

Whenever assets are specific in a nontrivial degree increasing the degree of uncertainty makes it more imperative that the parties devise a machin-ery to lsquowork things outrsquo ndash since contractual gaps will be larger and the occasions for sequential adaptations will increase in number and impor-tance as the degree of uncertainty increases (Williamson 1985 60)

In other words if great uncertainty and high asset specificity come together their interaction would dramatically increase the magnitude of transaction costs and thus the stronger preferences will be with respect



to both substantive scope and institutional depth (eg Williamson 1985 59ndash60 Weber 1997 331 Jervis 1997 34ndash9) In contrast uncertainty plays a lesser role as long as the assets are general

One major caveat however is required This is the problematique of the lsquofunctionalist fallacyrsquo (eg Mayntz 2004) This study directly tackles the charge of ex post rationalising the member statesrsquo desired outcomes by ref-erence to an alleged profit (eg Pierson 2004 108ndash29) In retrospect insti-tutional arrangements often appear as functional answers to a societal difficulty that may be based on a collective action problem According to Renate Mayntz this is particularly widespread within liberalndashinstitutional theories of International Relations (Mayntz 2004 8) I therefore employ two strategies to explicitly confront this challenge

Crucially I invest serious efforts in operationalising transaction costs ex ante (Williamson 1985 4) This will steer the empirical analysis It will be demonstrated that transaction costs do not represent the lsquohammer that makes the world look like nailsrsquo However they do constitute the primary determinant of preferences for institution- building in European security Secondly I contrast the transaction costs approach with competing expla-nations in order to strengthen this studyrsquos line of reasoning (George and Bennett 2005 117ndash9) Ultimately theoretical explanations can hardly be tested against the real world but merely against alternative theoretical expla-nations (Davis 2005 99)12

Transaction costs and preference formation in European security the empirical link

The previous section showed that first and foremost a transaction costs approach represents a promising framework to explore and explain pref-erences for institution- building in European security However neither preferences nor transaction costs have been sufficiently specified or opera-tionalised with more precise empirical measurements This is the objective of the next section The analytical building blocks must be conceptualised in order to make them observable and to confront them systematically with the empirical record of the comparative analysis

Preferences for institution- building in the ESDP

The conceptualisation of preferences is based on a mixture of inductive investigation and theoretically inferred building blocks from the litera-ture on international security cooperation13 The methodology builds on Michael Zuumlrnrsquos proposals for how to lsquoassess preferencesrsquo applying theories using documents and (partly) asking experts (Zuumlrn 1997 298ndash302 see also Frieden 1999 47ndash53)

As indicated above I distinguish between substantive scope and insti-tutional depth a distinction that will structure the whole analysis It is



therefore necessary to first explain why certain member states preferred the institutionalisation of security and defence policy in the EU and oth-ers did not That is undertaken through the analysis of substantive scope Afterwards I turn to the question of how the member states wanted to cooperate in the ESDP or not (in other words institutional depth) In the following scope and depth are conceptualised according to measurable sub- dimensions This differentiation of the dependent variable serves the pur-pose of providing an empirical link

Firstly the substantive scope dimension builds on a documentary analy-sis and thus primarily on induction I basically analyse two dimensions of military planning operational and defence planning

Military planning can be broken down into the two categories of defence plan-ning and operational planning The nexus is composed of a strategic assess-ment of the types of conflicts that one is likely to be involved in Operational planning then consists of defining scenarios that vary in intensity duration geographical distance and so on In turn operational scenarios provide the rationale for defence planning which essentially consists of preparing forces for the operations In short operational planning is about scenarios defence planning about preparing the hardware (Rynning 2003 54)

For the empirical analysis this differentiation suggests that the possible outcomes of whether the EU should be responsible for certain components of the military planning process are as shown in Table 32

Table 32 Analytical dimensions of preferences on substantive scope

EU Responsible for Military Planning

Operational planning Defence planning

A1) Collective defencemutual assistance

A2) Coordinated preparation of forces and military hardware (eg integrated command and control multinational territorial defence troops)

B1) High intensity crisis management(including robust peacendashmaking)

B2) Coordinated preparation of forces and military hardware (eg Rapid Reaction Force with operational headquarters air strike capability satellite reconnaissance)

C1) Low intensity crisis management(including classical peacekeeping humanitarian relief actionsassistance)

C2) Coordinated preparation of forces and military hardware (eg strategic airlift coordination of command and control issues civilian specialists medical service)

D1) No responsibilites for the EU D2) No responsibilites for the EU



Roughly speaking one can distinguish between the operational scenarios of collective territorial defence expeditionary warfare with distinct intensi-ties and the rejection of any substantive responsibilities in military plan-ning For example a member state could prefer the EU to become engaged in some modest peacekeeping for the United Nations but not Chapter VII peace enforcement nor mutual assistance if an EU member is the victim of an armed attack For this functional task it could additionally support com-mon defence planning in order to provide the required military hardware (that is C1 + C2)

Secondly theories on institutional design are generally more elaborate There exists a sophisticated debate on institutional choice (eg Weber 2000 Koremnos et al 2001 Simmons and Martin 2002) Building on this litera-ture I empirically analyse the two main dimensions of rules and functional differentiation (eg Wallander and Keohane 1999 24) They broadly corre-spond to ideas about pooling and delegation but are less demanding with respect to sovereignty rights and are thus better suited for the analysis of traditional lsquohigh politicsrsquo issues such as security and defence (eg Moravcsik 1998 67ndash8) The focus on rules stems from legal theory (H L A Hart) and refers primarily to the issue of how decisions are made (for example una-nimity and voting) In contrast functional differentiation touches upon the issue of to what extent a governments prefers a division of labour between itself and the genuine European institutions (eg Commission EU Military Staff) The overarching concept behind both analytical categories is the question of lsquobindingnessrsquo (Weber 1997 324)

An EU member state could for example insist on unanimity with respect to sending troops but allow for some modifications such as constructive abstentions At the same time it could prefer to finance ESDP missions from a common budget In addition the Commission should participate within the policymaking process to strengthen the coherence with its lsquoExternal Relationsrsquo so it should be granted some agenda- setting and implementa-tion powers Such an approach could be located between B1 and A2 of the overview in Table 33

Table 33 Analytical dimensions of preferences on institutional depth

lsquoBindingnessrsquo of ESDP agreements

How demanding are the rules (eg decisionndashmaking)

How is labour divided between the EU and the national level

A1) Highly demanding and binding rules A2) High degree of division of labour

B1) Some demanding and binding rules B2) Some division of labour

C1) No demanding rules C2) No division of labour



At this juncture it is important to point out one difficult aspect of the analysis of institutional depth In security and defence issues in particular there has been a continuous and lively debate on lsquoflexible arrangementsrsquo This is hard to assess from the perspective of the proposed dimensions A state does not want to bind itself to for example collective decision- making while at the same time increasing the division of labour with some EU mem-bers and wanting more demanding rules Accordingly a preference for flex-ible arrangements has not always but has most of the time been treated as an instance of lsquomore bindingnessrsquo because such proposals have normally been promoted with the purpose of preventing unwilling governments hindering the integrational aims of other states In a further step this two- dimensional conceptualisation of preferences for institution- building in European secu-rity must be operationalised what are the appropriate indicators and what are the more precise questions guiding the documentary analysis

The issue of military planning can be tackled in a straightforward man-ner by analysing strategic documents such as position papers security strat-egies defence reviews and speeches and searching for direct statements on the question of which functional tasks the EU is desired to accomplish in the near future (Moravcsik 1998 10ndash13 Jachtenfuchs 2002 220ndash4)14 In case of possible contradictions additional evidence is incorporated such as material from media sources and interviews with experts or senior officials A position is only counted as a preference when we can detect it in more than a single statement (see also Moravcsik 1997 544)

Whereas the documentary sources and assessment procedures are identi-cal to those used for substantive scope the analysis of preferences for insti-tutional depth is more complex The more specific questions are

a) How demanding does a member state want the EU to be when dealing with a substantive issue What should member states be obliged to do or not to do

b) How can these rules be changed What veto positions does the member state want to maintain

The issue of functional differentiation is mainly about role allocation The more strongly a member state favours an explicit division of labour the more willing it is to coordinate efforts and even bind itself Applied to the studyrsquos research question I askHow much functional differentiation does a member state want

a) among the member states andb) between the member states and the EU institutions

Finally the empirical analysis will adjust the measurement criteria to the agenda of the ESDP that differs in time (that is the possible outcomes of the



interaction) The governments which have supported the most far- reaching ambitions are regarded as those with a preference for wide substantive scope and institutional depth In contrast the governments which have opposed all reforms or even the negotiation of reforms are at the opposite low end of the spectrum The political contest and thus the governance problem is negotiated between these two extremes (Gourevitch 1999 137)

Specifying the transaction costs framework for the ESDP

According to rationalndashfunctionalist thought it is first of all necessary that the lsquodemandrsquo be examined as it represents the sine qua non for considering institution- building from a governmentrsquos perspective Hence the focus is on the governmentrsquos perception of the security environment (1) What kind of security problems predominate threats or risks (2) Have they decreased or increased The distinction between threats and risks is important here because it may give rise to distinct policies and thus to different political- military assets (see also Lepgold 1998)

Coping with deliberate threats requires political- military strategies of defense and deterrence ndash in short counterthreats Coping with instabil-ity and mistrust requires political strategies of assurance mediation and conflict prevention (that is integration and engagement) and military strategies for cooperative intervention (such as humanitarian assistance or peacekeeping) using a variety of smaller scale and more diverse mili-tary contingencies than the kind of national defense used for dealing with invasion or coercion (Wallander 2000 710)

This demand however is indeterminate to the extent that it does not pro-vide evidence for a more specific institutional arrangement which should deal with threats and risks where should it be located and who should par-ticipate The answer is given by the bookrsquos transaction costs framework but one major caveat should be kept in mind

Empirical research on transaction cost matters almost never attempts to measure such costs directly Instead the question is whether organi-zational relations (contracting practices governance structures) line up with the attributes of transaction costs predicted by transaction cost rea-soning or not (Williamson 1985 22)

Therefore the empirical analysis focuses primarily on the attributes of transaction costs rather than measuring them directly The result is an assessment of their magnitude rather than a numerical value

At the most general level the ESDP is concerned with the EUrsquos creation of a political- military instrument to deal multilaterally with emerging security problems More specifically we can distinguish between two types of assets



that such an instrument might possess Firstly there is the creation of insti-tutional structures within the Council of the European Union for develop-ing a common political approach to address the worldrsquos security problems (eg Political and Security Committee the European Union Military Staff DG 9 in the Council Secretariat) Secondly there is the military domain (eg the European Rapid Reaction Force battlegroups) In particular the focus is on the establishment of military troops earmarked by national gov-ernments to conduct EU crisis management from humanitarian to high- intensity combat operations (in other words the Petersberg Tasks) Closely related to this is the aspect of military hardware or capability generation Here we can observe defence cooperation among the EU members in certain weapons procurement projects This is particularly the case with respect to strategic transport as well as some command and control issues In order to increase the efficiency of these efforts the EU established a European Defence Agency (EDA) during the Convention deliberations As indicated above the gains which states seek from cooperation are comprised of econ-omies of scale functional differentiation and positive externalities (Lake 1999 44ndash52)

Having clarified the demand for security institutions the assessment ndash rather than measurement ndash of transaction costs and the ESDP as a pub-lic good in terms of two sets of assets the empirical link to the specific choice of an institutional context is firstly provided by the general provi-sion of European security The focus is on the risks of opportunism so the primary determinant in this context is uncertainty that is the question of how other states will act in the near future with respect to the perceived security problems (eg Morrow 1999 82ndash3 Rathbun 2007 541ndash9) This is the realm of behavioural uncertainty Based on the fear of opportunistic behaviour there is again a lack of information whether about partnersrsquo compliance or about their defection (Williamson 1985 58ndash9) According to James Morrow uncertainty about the motivations of cooperation partners raises some distinct problems in politics This study only needs to integrate one of them into the empirical analysis ldquocan the parties commit themselves in ways that are credible to others who do not know their precise motiva-tionsrdquo (Morrow 1999 79)

This is answered in terms of the lsquosignalling processesrsquo between the main actors (eg Kydd 1997 see also Morrow 1999 112ndash3) Thus I analyse the interactions between the proponents of European security building on Andrew Kyddrsquos signalling model and search the available documents for the answers to two specific questions (1) What are the main playersrsquo general security interests both now and as they are expected to be in the future (2) What are the main playersrsquo specific positions on the EUrsquos security policies This enables an answer to the question of to what extent the government may expect compliance or defection from its partners It sheds light on the assessment of the risks of opportunism that a government is faced with



Coupled with the usual diplomatic practices the policymaking process of modern democracies is sufficiently transparent to allow the gathering of reliable information about another statersquos motivation (Kydd 1997 130ndash8)

To hypothetically illustrate this empirical dimension I assume that a member state perceives an increasingly risky security environment and thus wants to cooperate with its partners The signalling process however is characterised by numerous tensions The government of one of the main partners is constantly weakened by a strong opposition electoral campaign against investment in power projection forces and another government wants increasingly to focus on domestic problems rather than European security for resource reasons Under these circumstances uncertainty and thus the risks of opportunism would be high for the government since there would be severe doubts about credibility of the partnersrsquo commitments

Taken as a whole the documentary analysis of transaction costs for the provision of European security focuses on a governmentrsquos assessment with respect to two interrelated issues (1) To what extent do other institutions provide for the public good of European security (in other words mainly NATO) What is the governmentrsquos assessment of the respective risks of opportunism (2) Does the government pursue a strategy of voice or rather of exit within the respective institutional context

Secondly the focus of transaction costs within the ESDP is on the inter-action between uncertainty and asset specificity The combination of these two dimensions then determines the risks of opportunism that face a government and thus its individual level of transaction costs within the ESDP Uncertainty is examined by the same procedure described above whereas only EU members (and not the US) are considered The second important dimension is asset specificity which is investigated along two dimensions (1) the costs of investments and (2) the redeployability of those investments The difficult question then arises of how to meas-ure the degree of asset specificity and the resulting costs In the context of this study assets refer to the political- military structures of the EUrsquos defence pillar namely political institutions and a catalogue of different power projection forces

a) What are the financial and political costs associated with each of these assets

Here we point to the financial costs and in particular to political costs such as domestic opposition or support for the potential loss of autonomy

b) To what extent can the assets be redeployed to other international organisations or national capacities

Here the focus is primarily on NATO since it is the most likely candidate for redeploying the assets This procedure enables us to determine for each



member state under investigation its level of asset specificity (low medium or high)

To illustrate this with extreme examples we could assume that a member statersquos power projection forces were in a relatively modern shape and that there was widespread domestic unease about the potential integration of the national forces into multilateral structures At the same time the EUrsquos military assets would be organised according to the rule that there should always be some power projection forces available which could however be organised at a strictly national level (such as one of the UKrsquos national bat-tlegroups) In this instance asset specificity for the member state would be low the costs would not be excessive and it would not be difficult to rede-ploy their own forces for other purposes At the other extreme let us assume that the participation of a member state within the EUrsquos military structures would be costly for both financial and political reasons Depending on the institutional arrangement it could provide logistic support for combat groups that are specialised in small- scale maritime warfare This situation would suggest a substantial level of asset specificity not only because it is costly to the government but also because it is unlikely that it could easily redeploy highly specialised logistic support for other purposes

In sum this study argues that a member statersquos preference formation is primarily driven by the transaction costs of its cooperative efforts to provide security If it assesses the EU as relatively capable to reduce these costs it will prefer to grant it some responsibilities for military planning If this govern-ment is then confronted with a combination of high uncertainty and asset specificity within the ESDP it will insist on credible commitments by the EU partners In other words it wants a binding institutional arrangement In contrast when asset specificity and uncertainty remain modest increas-ing the bindingness is not necessary Thus this studyrsquos framework suggests not only why the EU members have set up the ESDP process but also why they were so hesitant to invest in genuinely specific assets In short it offers a differentiated approach to a complex institutional arrangement


Part II

Unravelling the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP)



53

4The Demand for a Security Institution German British and French Perceptions of the Environment in the 1990s

The main conclusions we can draw from the first part of this book are (1) the theoretical approaches in International Relations offer competing though not fully persuasive explanations of preferences for institution- building in security issues (2) a transaction costs perspective based on historical- institutionalist thought has so far been neglected but appears to be a promising point of departure and (3) finally the greatest challenge for a theoretical approach is to explain the nexus of lsquosimilaritiesdifferencesrsquo as well as lsquocontinuitieschangesrsquo The empirical analysis therefore compares Germany Britain and France between the mid- 1990s and the Convention on the Future of Europe in 2003ndash4 This period covers the time before and after the actual establishment of the ESDP in 1999 Finally competing expla-nations inferred from the main IR research programmes are consulted after we have concluded the empirical analysis in terms of the transaction costs framework The objective is not only to confront the lsquofunctionalist fallacyrsquo head- on but also to ldquoidentify which variables are not necessary or sufficient conditions for the selected outcomerdquo (George and Bennett 2005 23)

The first empirical step of a transaction costs framework must consider the demand for institutions (Keohane 1984 65ndash109) Building on the studyrsquos prerequisite that the states aim to protect their values at an acceptable cost this chapter explores the governmentsrsquo perception of the security environ-ment How are classical threats assessed To what extent did the govern-ments perceive an increase or decrease in security risks such as instabilities in the neighbourhood 1

Germany and the gradual rise of risks in the 1990s

The most striking feature of German perceptions in this period was the emphasis on the novelty of risks The frequently repeated dictum was that



the security environment had dramatically changed after the end of the Cold War and that new risks were on the rise This was as much the case during the mid- 1990s as it was at the time of the Convention on the Future of Europe While we may thus assess the German perceptions as largely sta-ble in emphasising shifts I have nonetheless identified some incremental changes The trend was a gradual increase in the perceived security risks both at a quantitative and a qualitative level

First the German assessment of the security environment occurred within a transformation process that began in the early 1990s The situation in the Balkans in particular bluntly illustrated to contemporary policy- makers that there might be not much left of the expected peace dividend of the post- Cold War era Classical territorial defence was said to be losing relevance and was being replaced by risks and thus other forms of uncer-tainty This diagnosis had however no obvious implications Military forces remained focused on defending their territory While the German govern-ment also considered terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction to be severe risks the focus was in this regard more strongly on instabilities in their lsquobackyardrsquo such as gross violations of human rights and refugee flows (German Ministry of Defence 1994 Kinkel 1996e German Government 1996 Ruumlhe 1996c)

While the former period was dominated by coming to terms at a concep-tual level with the Bosnian wars the next phase was similarly character-ised by the unfolding of the Kosovo crisis and NATOrsquos air war against the former Yugoslavia In fact the analysis suggests a slightly enhanced sensi-tivity on the part of the German government towards the new security risks because it was more strongly affected by them due to its increased involve-ment (Scharping 1999a 1999c) The German foreign policy terminology was extended to place greater emphasis on lsquoresponsibilityrsquo On this basis the government not only spoke of the new risks but also implied that it was about to act upon them The general reform of the Bundeswehr and the specific establishment of planning facilities in Potsdam has to be seen in this context (eg Becher 2000 Breuer 2006) In short the German govern-ment continuously perceived increased security risks whereas its protracted actions were aimed at attenuating the situation

Finally this trend reinforced itself during the last phase of this study The German government concentrated particularly upon the problem of transnational terrorism (Scharping 2002 Schroumlder 2004) The link between instability abroad and insecurity at home was further strengthened (eg German Ministry of Defence 2003) After 911 one could even say that the general problem of insecurity was increasingly replaced by a sense of gen-eral uncertainty

In sum this section has shown that over the course of the time periods investigated the German government not only perceived more security risks


Examining the Demand for a European Security Institution 55

(a quantitative increase) but also more severe ones (a qualitative increase) This process was largely incremental in nature Its causal impact on German preferences for institution- building however can hardly be inferred from this development alone It merely became effective through the interac-tion with German transaction costs for the provision of European security Before turning explicitly to this issue however it is necessary to examine the United Kingdomrsquos perceptions

The United Kingdomrsquos adaptation to a new environment in the 1990s

As in the German case a striking regularity revealed by the analysis was policy- makersrsquo emphasis on the novelty of risks The end of the Cold War did not encourage the Conservative government to initiate a for-mal defence review However the defence costs study lsquoFront Line Firstrsquo in 1994 came close to a comprehensive reassessment by the government (Government of the UK 1994) As we saw with its partners the end of the Cold War and the end of the Soviet threat led the British government to cut the defence budget while maintaining a military capability that would regularly make a difference in crises such as the Gulf War or Bosnia (Portillo 1997) Territorial defence which had always played a lesser role for Britain became even less of a priority among policy- makers while at the same time instabilities and risks were on the rise In particular Bosnia was regarded as such an instance which simultaneously demonstrated the importance of NATO as the ldquosecurity organisation of choicerdquo (McInnes 1998 824ndash7 Maumlder 2004 48ndash77) In short new risks were rising gradually on the rise though this had not yet had a significant impact on British defence planning

In scontrast to its predecessor the new Labour administration immedi-ately began with a Strategic Defence Review intended to serve as the basis of British security policy in subsequent years This document clearly set out the governmentrsquos view of the security environment and the risks inherent in it and is thus quoted at length

The strategic environment we face today is very different to that of the previous fifty years The risks and challenges we face are not sim-ply those of the Cold War minus the threat from the Warsaw Pact It is both better and worse than that On the positive side the collapse of Communism and the emergence of democratic states throughout Eastern Europe and in Russia means that there is today no direct mili-tary threat to the United Kingdom or Western Europe ( ) On the nega-tive side however there are new risks to our security and our way of life Instability inside Europe as in Bosnia and now Kosovo threatens our



security Instability elsewhere ndash for example in Africa ndash may not always appear to threaten us directly But it can do indirectly and we cannot stand aside when it leads to massive human suffering (Government of the UK 1998 8ndash9 No 2- 7)

Accordingly it is possible to observe a certain change in the British per-ception of the security environment For the first time at least in such an explicit way the government defined the security problems that the country would be confronted with in the subsequent years ldquoThe military challenges we face are increasingly about crisis prevention peacemak-ing and peacekeeping ndash about humanitarian operations rather than the collective defense of territoryrdquo (Blair 1998c) In other words risks and uncertainties have increased which requires new solutions to todayrsquos problems

Finally two White Papers from 2003 illustrated the British governmentrsquos perception of risks in the studyrsquos last phase Together with a chapter added to the Strategic Defence Review they gave a comprehensive account of the UK after 911 (Government of the UK 2003b 2003c) In short these strate-gic documents reinforced the trend that had been observable since 1998 Even the possibility of the re- emergence of a conventional threat was now excluded and fully replaced by the priority of expeditionary tasks All the risks that had already been emphasised in 1998 were still rising ndash in par-ticular the link between terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (see also Sawers 2004)

France and the increasing instabilities of the 1990s

The analysis of this dimension indicates a high degree of convergence among the EU members that culminated in the European Security Strategy of 2003 In France too the politicians emphasised the rise and novelty of new security risks (eg Utley 2001 138)2 Firstly the end of the Cold War prompted the government to review its defence efforts which led to the first White Paper since 1972 (French Government 1994) This lsquolivre blancrsquo served as the central French assessment of the security environment while the resulting military programme law was soon reformed due to the funda-mental transformation of the French forces in the Chirac years Although territorial defence was not ruled out per se its prominence ndash like that of nuclear deterrence ndash clearly diminished (French Government 1994 94)3 Instead the French perceived an increase in security risks such as regional instabilities the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and terror-ism (French Government 1994 7ndash23 107ndash18) While the perception of a changing security environment evolved as a gradual process the conclu-sions drawn from it were a drastic departure from previous policy Francersquos



experiences in the Gulf War and in the former Yugoslavia encouraged it to reconsider some of the parameters of its military policy In particular the non- integration of French forces limited opportunities and influence in the post- Cold War environment and was thus subject to a dramatic transformation4 Besides it was inherently costly In the beginning the focus was on rapprochement with NATO (eg Balladur 1994 Grant 1996 Chirac 1996a)5 as was indicated by the new governmentrsquos first military programme law

The analysis of the risks and threats of the future shows that we must be capable of projecting ourselves jointly with our European and Allied partners towards distant and varied theatres both within and outside Europe (Projet de loi de programmation militaire 7 cited from Howorth 1997 34)

The second phase was characterised by a very similar assessment of the environment influenced particularly by the Kosovo crisis at the end of the millennium According to the assessment the traditional threats continued to decrease in significance and were replaced by new security risks The only difference from the previous phase was the governmentrsquos focus which shifted from NATO to the EUrsquos ESDP (Chirac 1999a 2000 Veacutedrine 1999 see also Rynning 2002 162 166ndash7)

Finally the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 reinforced the trends already under way with respect to French perception of the security envi-ronment (de Villepin 2002 Chirac 2002b) While the political leaders of both France and the UK drew different conclusions from that situation in the studyrsquos last phase their perception of the environment as such was highly similar (Malici 2005 100ndash8)

Today there are numerous new security challenges beginning with the daily threat of terrorism () At the same time lsquotraditionalrsquo war is still plaguing many areas although the threats now come in various forms In the absence of a cold war- era global confrontation armed conflicts in numerous countries no longer fit a coherent pattern (Alliot- Marie 2005)

Taken together the French focal points were instabilities and crises where military intervention was required6 This examination pointed towards a solid perception of increased risks looming in the security envi-ronment Despite some subtle differences the French perceptions were highly similar to those of Germany and the UK Taking this into con-sideration what conclusions should be drawn from this first part of the comparative analysis



A demand for a security institution German British and French perceptions in perspective

The Big Threersquos perception of the security environment is convergent although the timing differs to some extent From their perspective the pri-mary demand is reflected by the perception of increased risks and instabili-ties in the environment Referring again to Celeste Wallander (Wallander 2000 710) there is consequently a need for integration and engagement to intervene on a multilateral basis In contrast the demand for institutions to deal with large- scale invasion and coercion has dramatically decreased as Table 41 shows

Up to this point the analysis suggests that the gradually increasing demand might have triggered the Big Threersquos preferences for stronger institution- building It provides a plausible approach to the explanatory task of change In a classical functionalist sense increased problems entail prefer-ences for building institutions that tackle these challenges In short form follows function This brief analysis also indicates that the three large states linked the perception of new problems with the proposal for an interna-tional solution Therefore a functionalist perspective will serve as the start-ing point for explaining the willingness of governments to internationalise their security and defence function

Nevertheless there are two major weaknesses of such a simplistic approach lsquoForm follows functionrsquo might make the existence of the ESDP plausible but it can explain neither the differences between the three states nor why the EU rather than NATO was the desired institution for a European defence pillar For instance we have no indication yet why the British government preferred to invest major efforts into setting up the ESD rather than to building further on NATOrsquos lsquoBerlin Plusrsquo arrangements7 In other words

Table 41 The demand for a European security institution German British and French perceptions in perspective

A Demand for a Security Institution

The Big Threersquos perceptions of security problems since the 1990s

Concerns about territorial integrity

Concerns about instabilities in the security environment

Germany Slow but stable decrease Some gradual increase

United Kingdom Strong and permanent decrease

Sudden and sustainable increase

France Permanent decrease Sustainable increase



the demand alone is an important prerequisite but does not provide a com-prehensive explanation of preferences for institution- building in European security This challenge is subsequently met by combining the general demand for a security institution with the specific transaction costs of the individual states At the same time such an analysis contributes to a better understanding of the triggers behind the internationalisation of the use of force and therefore provides important insights into the transformation of the state


60

5Germany ndash From Defending the Alliancersquos Territory to Crisis Management for the Union

This chapter comprises two major steps I explore German preferences relat-ing to substantive scope and then trace their emergence and explain them by applying the studyrsquos transaction costs framework

German preferences on substantive scope

The guiding question is to what extent the German government pre-ferred the EU to be responsible for different aspects of military planning The most important result of the investigation is the gradual but clear increase in the scope of the EU desired by German policy- makers In short German preferences gradually moved towards the EU as a full- scale security institution In the mid- 1990s Germanyrsquos preferences with respect to the EUrsquos substantive scope were quite restrained (eg German Ministry of Foreign Affairs 1996 Kinkel and de Charette 1996) Nevertheless the government strongly favoured the inclusion of security and defence issues in the Amsterdam negotiations While it was aware of the changing security environment and new requirements for opera-tional planning it had not changed yet its own military objectives and outlook The priority was still territorial defence whereby power projec-tion was subordinated although its slowly increasing importance was acknowledged (German Government 1996 Kohl 1996c) Accordingly the government ordered the desired outcomes of the Intergovernmental Conference in so far as the EU should play quite a prominent but still secondary role in several aspects of military planning By the time of the Convention deliberations this position had been altered European efforts in security matters were to contribute increasingly to global secu-rity The raison drsquoecirctre of the ESDP was therefore not only to function as an indirect lsquoforce generatorrsquo for NATO but also to strengthen the EUrsquos capacity to act on the world stage and to contribute to the progress


Germany and Preferences on Substantive Scope 61

of the European project (Fischer 2003c European Defence Meeting 2003) This was prominently reflected in the lsquoDefence Policy Guidelinesrsquo of 2003 which could be read as a re- structuring of Germanyrsquos main interests1

Defence as it is understood today means more however than traditional defensive operations at the national borders against a conventional attack It includes the prevention of conflicts and crises the common management of crises and post- crisis rehabilitation ( ) Armaments cooperation within a European and transatlantic framework is to be given precedence over the realization of projects under national responsibil-ity ( ) German defence policy is determined to a large extent by three factors multinational integration of the Bundeswehr ( ) the changed operational spectrum ( ) available resources (German Ministry of Defence 2003 5 10 13)

This strategic document again stressed the importance of the transatlantic relationship but at the same time re- interpreted the meaning of Berlin Plus whereby NATOrsquos primacy was questioned the ESDP was to be based on a lsquostrategic partnership with NATOrsquo it ldquoenables Europeans to act independently where NATO as a whole is not willing or there is no need for NATO to become involvedrdquo (German Ministry of Defence 2003 9 [No 40] emphasis added) This does not suggest that the Alliance should be replaced by a strengthened ESDP (Struck 2003b)2 The former remained the primary institution respon-sible for collective territorial defence although Germany preferred to facili-tate mutual assistance under lsquostructured cooperationrsquo within the EU too The government emphasised however that NATO had meanwhile evolved as lsquoone of the cornerstonesrsquo of European security rather than the primary or even the only one as it was in Cold War times (Fischer 2003c)

Amsterdam and NATO as default

Firstly because it wished to integrate the functions of the Western European Union (WEU) the German government indirectly supported the incorpora-tion of a collective defence clause into the Union (Kinkel 1996a 1996e Kohl 1996a)3 The preferred way of achieving this was by introducing a Treaty of the European Union (TEU) article The other option would be a protocol with lsquoopt- inoutrsquo options4 Nevertheless collective defence should also remain NATOrsquos domain In short the EUrsquos preferred defence function would resemble the previous WEU rules and would thus by no means compete with NATO

Germanyrsquos position with respect to high- intensity crisis management was ambivalent While the government clearly wanted to incorporate the WEUrsquos Petersberg Tasks and thus peacemaking into the EU treaty (Kohl 1996a Ruumlhe 1996a Kohl and Chirac 1996) it reluctantly preferred to increase the Unionrsquos power projection capabilities (CDUCSUFDP 1994 Ruumlhe 1997)



This suggested a German awareness that high- intensity operations would not work for quite some time due to the lack of capabilities and would thus remain with NATO Nevertheless this would offer the EU opportunities for the future (Ruumlhe 1996a)5 In contrast to some of the previous ambiguities the German government foresaw a strong EU role in low- intensity crisis management and humanitarian assistance It made it implicitly clear that the EU should focus on this lower end of the Petersberg spectrum (Kinkel 1996a)

Secondly in the mid- 1990s the German position on defence planning envisaged a relatively strong but complementary role for the EU in the future Germany wanted a comprehensive common defence policy encom-passing in the long- term a common export policy (Kinkel and de Charette 1996) Then- defence minister Volker Ruumlhe had energetically pushed forward plans to increase European efficiency in military hardware (Ruumlhe 1997) The foundation of German defence planning would however remain organised within NATO At that time it was predominantly cooperation with France that was critical for Germany in European defence planning (eg so- called intended interdependencies) (Kohl 1996b German Government 1996) This cooperation which essentially encompassed all areas of planning was intended to be the nucleus for future European- wide integration possibly under a lsquoflexible arrangementrsquo6

The German government was then faced with the problem that its most important partner was increasingly transforming its military into a power projection force This had straightforward consequences in terms of a different demand for military hardware7 Nevertheless Germany not only maintained the draft but almost its whole military organisation was to focus further on defending the Alliancersquos territory (Kohl 1996b) These divergent views of military priorities led for example to highly complex Franco- German projects such as the TIGER helicopter ldquoThe guiding con-cept philosophy of the program is the design of a common basic helicop-ter which allows utilizing different mission equipment items in its varied rolesrdquo (Schymanietz 1992 37) The German version was planned exclu-sively for large- scale territorial defence whereas the French procured a TIGER that can also be used in high- or low- intensity crisis management8 Finally Germany also supported multilateral EU efforts in defence plan-ning for the lower Petersberg end The focus of the common weapons procurement was to be on information technology transport capacities deployment logistics and personal equipment (Kohl 1996a 1996c Ruumlhe 1997)

In sum the German government was a moderate adherent to the idea of granting the EU some responsibilities in military planning but at the same time it supported NATOrsquos uncontested primacy in European security It ordered the possible outcomes of the Amsterdam- IGC to the extent that the (W)EUrsquos focus should be on the lower end of the Petersberg Tasks Due to



its obvious lack of capability the German government wanted to cooperate at most levels of defence planning

St Malo and lsquohaving it both waysrsquo

When we compare the Amsterdam- IGC with the Convention- IGC with regard to security questions the most striking difference is the dis-tinct possible outcomes of those interactions (EU Reflection Group 1995 European Convention 2002a 2002b) Due to primarily British opposition in Amsterdam combined with unanimity requirements the German gov-ernment did not actually reach many of its set objectives It was merely the Petersberg Tasks that were incorporated into the treaty framework after Britainrsquos new Prime Minister Tony Blair had given up his veto in this regard The WEU however remained basically separate from EU affairs This situ-ation however altered dramatically by the lsquosea changersquo of St Malo and the subsequent European Councils in Cologne and Helsinki (eg Dover 2005 Heisbourg 2000a Howorth 2004) The institutional basis of the ESDP was shaped in this period Although Germany was surprised by the St Malo developments it rapidly began to welcome them (Scharping 1999a 1999b Hellmann et al 2005 157) This reaction was mainly based on the strategic framework that had already guided its Amsterdam negotiations The German government ldquostarted to work on the issue on the basis of the assumption of continuity in Germanyrsquos European policy and took as a basis the two years old six nations proposal for a merger of WEU with the EU in three phasesrdquo (Jopp 1999 6 see also Schroumlder 1998 1999a)

Firstly Germany would have preferred a complete merger with the WEU and thus collective defence in the EU However this did not appear to be one of its most urgent priorities particularly given that it was faced with problems for the neutral member states and Britain (Scharping 1999c Fischer 1999a 1999b) Thus the German Presidency attempted to avoid a time- consuming discussion on this and instead focused on crisis manage-ment (Jopp 1999 19)9 This functional task was to become the main priority of the new ESDP (Fischer 1999a 2001a) At the same time this indirectly implied a certain change from clear subordination of the EU under NATO towards a complementary division of labour The ESDP was not intended to replace NATO but rather to become a potential instrument for international crises (Scharping 1999a 1999b 1999c) Germany even publicly supported French ideas about a potential lsquoEurope puissancersquo (Schroumlder 1999b)

Secondly the question of defence planning was dominated by a domestic discourse about the function and equipment of the lsquoBundeswehrrsquo Several reports on its future were issued in this period (Becher 2000) What should be the priorities in German defence planning providing the means for cri-sis management or primarily maintaining territorial defence In particu-lar the lsquoWeizsaumlcker Commissionrsquo recommended that the ldquologic of force planning shall be reversed instead of preparing for common defence first



and foremost future efforts should be geared primarily towards the most likely operations described as multinational crisis prevention and crisis managementrdquo (cited from Becher 2000 165) Despite this call for reforms defence planning for territorial defence remained the first priority for the lsquoBundeswehrrsquo in this period That was emphasised by both the centre- right and centre- left governments (Kohl 1998 Scharping 2000) The fundamen-tal tension between a military force initially designed for the defence of ter-ritory that was meanwhile expected to function as a kind of rapid reaction force had however not been resolved (Scharping 1999a) At least it was possible to observe a shift in focus because the inherent contradictions were increasingly materialising in practice (Scharping 2000)

For example the transformation of the lsquoEurocorpsrsquo into a rapid reaction force for crisis management operations reflected Germanyrsquos willingness to increase the EUrsquos military capacities in this functional dimension of security (Schroumlder 1999a)10 The lsquoEurocorpsrsquo were to represent the nucleus of a European rapid reaction force set- up in Helsinki in 1999 Hence pref-erences for increased crisis management capabilities went hand in hand with the willingness to organise them from the very beginning at a multi-lateral level (Scharping 1999c) In addition these new German out- of- area activities necessitated a national headquarters as a direct link to forces in the field For historical reasons the lsquoBundeswehrrsquo had so far refused to acquire national facilities for planning military operations Therefore new military requirements and the beginnings of the ESDP emerged in parallel Germany established a Permanent Joint Headquarters in Potsdam which could simultaneously serve as a national and EU operational head-quarters This strengthened its role as a potential lead nation for the ESDP (Scharping 1999c Becher 2000 167)11 The traditional German objective to be lsquobuumlndnisfaumlhigrsquo was now increasingly accompanied by the necessity to be lsquoeuropafaumlhigrsquo (Schroumlder 1999a) Finally the German government was more strongly engaged in new prestigious procurement projects In particular it concentrated its investment efforts on intelligence and strategic transport capabilities (Becher 2000 167) Germany supported increasing cooperation with respect to airlift capabilities (A- 400M) and the establishment of a European satellite system (Galileo and Global Monitoring for Environment and Security) (Schroumlder 1999a Scharping 1999c Lindstrom 2003)

The Convention and a capable ESDP

The Convention debate was dominated by the tasks of organising both the catalogue system and subsequently the new battlegroups in an efficient way The issue of operational planning came close to NATOrsquos core missions namely the questions of solidarity and high- intensity crisis management The German government wanted the EU to play a complementary but increasingly prominent role in both defence and operational planning



Firstly the Convention deliberated on different forms of solidarity clauses Germany supported a quite broad and all- encompassing lsquogeneral clause on solidarity and common securityrsquo with special reference to terrorist threats and including military means Since it was aware of the major problems that these proposals caused for some governments it regarded lsquoflexible arrangementsrsquo as an appropriate compromise that reflected all membersrsquo concerns (Schroumlder 2003a Schaumlfer 2004)12 Updating the Petersberg Tasks was largely uncontested during the IGC in 2003 Germany supported the ultimate formulation of ldquotasks of combat forces in crisis management including peacemaking and post- conflict stabilizationrdquo (German Ministry of Defence 2003) The government emphasised that the EUrsquos efforts should be directed particularly towards the higher Petersberg end (in other words the most demanding missions) This represented a considerable departure from previous German preferences on that issue (Scharping 2002 Fischer and de Villepin 2002) In addition the government continued to prefer the more specific definition of Petersbergrsquos lower end (Scharping 2002 Schroumlder 2003b German Government 2004) Germanyrsquos view closely corresponded to the broad and comprehensive approach of the European Security Strategy in 2003 (European Council 2003 Fischer 2003a)

Secondly the German government adjusted its position in operational planning towards defence planning Thus it also preferred a relatively high degree of institutionalisation of these processes The objective was to make the EU militarily capable of carrying out the operational tasks assigned to it by the member states (Fischer and de Villepin 2002) Hence Germany pre-ferred to have the EUrsquos Capabilities Action Plan (ECAP) developed in close coordination with NATO represent the basis of its defence planning efforts Solutions to the shortfalls in military capabilities should be developed within the EU context (European Defence Meeting 2003 Rynning 2003 55ndash7)13 Moreover Germany supported close cooperation with the Alliance to coordinate the Helsinki Headline Goal and NATOrsquos Defence Capabilities Initiative that had been reformed in Prague 2002 The EU Military Staff (EUMS) in cooperation with NATO bodies were to be assigned a prominent role The aim was to limit unnecessary duplications between the European Rapid Reaction Force and the new NATO Response Force (Fischer 2002 European Defence Meeting 2003 Schaumlfer 2004)

Defence planning continued to give less attention to classical territo-rial defence but instead aimed to project power (Schroumlder 2003a) Here Germanyrsquos new focus was on the lsquoEU- onlyrsquo option (German Ministry of Defence 2003) For this scenario the most important shortfalls to be tackled were strategic airlift and intelligence capabilities and operative command and control facilities (German Government 2002 Schaumlfer 2004)14 Most of these resources were required for both high- and low- intensity operations The government wanted to build upon the cooperation projects outside the treaty framework and gradually integrate them (German Bundestag 2002



Struck 2003b) For example it energetically sought the leadership of the lsquoGalileorsquo project In 2002 it increased its funding for research programmes to underline its own ambitions (Lindstrom 2003 17) Moreover there were plans to establish a common tactical training unit for A- 400M crews and other training centres (Schroumlder 2003a European Defence Meeting 2003)

In the course of the Convention deliberations a growing number of voices criticised the set- up of the EUrsquos initial headline goal It was regarded as too large and difficult to deploy Instead there would be demand for rapidly deployable small units that could not however perform any reconstruction work because their deployment would last for only a short time The EUrsquos first mission ARTEMIS in the Democractic Republic of Congo (DRC) served as a sort of blueprint for these proposals (Meiers 2005 121ndash2)15 This initia-tive the so- called battlegroups was developed separately by the Big Three and then confirmed by the rest of the Union in April 2004 (Struck 2003c Schmitt 2004 98ndash9)16 After some hesitant reactions in the beginning the German government promoted the establishment of these additional instruments but made two requests vis- agrave- vis the UK and France who had initiated the concept17 Firstly there was to be no explicit reference made to the planned geographical range (that is mainly Africa) and secondly no explicit numbers of soldiers were to be specified within the agreement (that is about 1500)18 The underlying objectives however were fully supported by the German government

Finally Germany preferred a gradual opening of the European defence market and stronger competition in order to increase the efficiency of defence spending Nevertheless the separateness of this domain was to be maintained Thus it should not immediately become part of the single mar-ket but remain within the sole competence of the member states The newly established and intergovernmentally organised European Defence Agency (EDA) was thereby intended to function as a facilitator (and not as an initia-tor) Germany accordingly preferred better coordination but not integration (European Defence Meeting 2003 German Ministry of Defence 2003)

Taken as a whole the government ordered the possible outcomes of the Convention as follows not only was the whole spectrum of crisis manage-ment fully supported but a form of collective defence was also to be inte-grated into the Union albeit on a voluntary basis In other words the EU should essentially be put on equal footing with NATO Table 51 summarises the discussion

In sum preference formation undoubtedly points towards an increase in the EUrsquos desired responsibilities in military planning These changes were incremental and partly uneven Although the lsquosea changersquo of St Malo brought about new opportunities and can thus be regarded as a sort of critical juncture at the level of outcomes Germany did not suddenly adopt a new approach to military planning19 The government did not have to change its position in 1998ndash9 because overall development had moved in



the direction that had been originally preferred by the Germans for many years However their reaction was not simply to welcome these new trends but instead to gradually promote an even greater responsibility for the EU in military planning during the Convention deliberations Hence the empirical investigation of German preferences confronts a comprehensive explanation with two broad challenges First I need to explain why the German government preferred substantive security cooperation in Europe at all Second I have to account for the incremental but steady increase of German preferences with respect to the desired substantive scope of the EU in military planning

Explaining German preferences on substance facing more risks while relying less on the United States

The central argument of the following sections is that ndash in combination with the perceived demand ndash German transaction costs for the provi-sion of European security gradually increased and thus drove the govern-ment to expand the EUrsquos scope in military planning This institution was to provide information about both the environment and the partnersrsquo future actions in order to improve coordination The German government

Table 51 Detailed overview of German preferences on substantive scope

Germany and Preferences on Substantive Scope

EUrsquos desired responsibilities in military planning

Peace-keeping and Humanitarian

AssistanceHigh-Intensity Crisis

Management Collective Defence

operational planning

defence planning


defence planning


defence planning

Amsterdam(19956)

+ + ndash + +

Cologne Helsinki(1999)

++ + + + ndash

Convention(20034)

++ ++ + ++ + ndash

Explanation++ = fully present+ = present to some extent = neither present nor absent (or both and)ndash = absent to some extentndash ndash = fully absent



conducted comparative institutional assessments of NATO and the EU and the potential interrelationship between the two security institutions While Berlin regarded them as essentially complementary the growing American reluctance toward European security reinforced the government in its preference to strengthen primarily the lsquoEU- onlyrsquo option In short the risks of opportunism within NATO had significantly grown In the course of the ESDPrsquos further institutional development the German government regarded the EU as increasingly capable of successfully reducing the uncer-tainties stemming from the provision of European security In turn it pre-ferred to grant the Union stronger responsibilities for military planning Accordingly what we observed was some sort of disengagement ndash not an exit ndash from NATO This was accompanied by increased engagement and thus lsquovoicersquo within the ESDP

Germany the United States and the provision of European Security

Because this study regards the institutional path as highly important the analysis needs to depart from the one institution that had predominated European security for decades namely NATO Thus we need to find out how the German government assessed the Alliance and the United States in terms of providing European security which (un)certainties emerged among the two partners that ultimately contributed to German risks of opportunism This section demonstrates that the signals sent by the US were increasingly perceived as ambivalent by the German government It relied decreasingly on Washington for the provision of European security or at least its commitment to all security problems In short Germanyrsquos risks of opportunism were slowly but gradually rising The hegemonrsquos pro-vision of certain public goods in the European security market could no longer be taken for granted Therefore the government increasingly pro-moted the building of European institutions to provide these goods in a coordinated way As indicated above the point of departure for the empiri-cal analysis of the signalling processes is the United Statesrsquo general secu-rity interests after the end of the Cold War and then its position towards European security initiatives20

The security interests of the United States after the Cold War21

The formulation of US national interests had an impact on Germanyrsquos assess-ment of how to provide European security in two ways On the one hand the government was concerned about the increasingly isolationist trends that began in the mid- 1990s and on the other hand Washingtonrsquos unilat-eralist shift in the new millennium contributed to and reinforced some of these anxious assessments on the part of its allies

Firstly for many observers on both sides of the Atlantic the end of the Cold War implied that US security policy would gradually turn away from Europe and move more strongly towards for example Asia (eg Jones 2007 198ndash9)22



While new humanitarian concerns had temporarily led to active support for UN peacekeeping missions the evident failure of the Somalia intervention shifted the US position back to the belief that humanitarian disasters as such are an insufficient condition for deploying US ground forces Among the most significant trends was the Presidential Decision Directive ldquoClinton Administration Policy on Reforming Multilateral Peace Operationsrdquo (PDD- 25) It clearly stated that the US should only become involved in a crisis if vital American interests were at stake The Republican Congress in particular played a prominent role in drafting the more demanding criteria of PDD- 25 (MacKinnon 2000)23 In short the criteria for when to send American forces into a crisis were decisively sharpened (see also White House 1996 2002) The growing American reluctance to become involved particularly with respect to ground forces became apparent during the crisis in the Balkans Crucially American non- involvement combined with demand to lsquolift and strikersquo during the Bosnian War ndash while British and French troops were on the ground ndash provoked some serious debates within European security cir-cles about the future of the American commitment (Hunter 2002 4)24 It became evident that the US would be increasingly hesitant to deploy its forces in European crises (Clark 2001 164ndash6 Bozo 2003)25

At the same time isolationist trends in the US Congress had gradu-ally gained importance since the mid- 1990s (Berger 1999) The call to the European allies was constantly one of greater lsquoburden- sharingrsquo Due to the budgetary powers of Congress in military affairs this was capable of hav-ing tremendous effects on European security Joe Biden then an influential Democratic Senator stated

A crucial test arose in May 2000 when the Senate narrowly defeated the so- called Byrd- Warner amendment to the military construction appro-priations bill If passed the amendment would likely have led to a with-drawal of US ground troops from Kosovo by July 2001 Expecting a close vote Vice President Al Gore sat as president of the Senate prepared to cast his vote against the amendment in the event of a 50ndash50 tie In the end 15 Republicans joined 38 of the 45 Senate Democrats to give the internationalists a thin 53ndash47 vote victory (Biden 2000 7)

Despite this narrow success and some calming statements by the new administration (Rumsfeld 2001a) isolationist voices became louder and more influential after George W Bushrsquos election During the presidential campaigns the foreign policy protagonists of the new administration had already shown that only the lsquopromotion of the national interestrsquo would justify the deployment of US military forces (Rice 2000 see also Zoellick 2000) The focus in national security was instead to be National Missile Defence (NMD) This was widely understood as a form of lsquodecouplingrsquo from European security26 More specifically the Bush team postulated a clear lsquoexit



strategyrsquo from the Balkans as a contribution to fairer burden- sharing In addition most of the running peacekeeping missions were dealing with the notion of nation- building which was vehemently opposed by the incoming administration (Jervis 2005 54)

Germanyrsquos interpretation of the signals sent by the US was highly instruc-tive Although American behaviour during the war in Bosnia represented a substantial problem for the French and the British who had forces on the ground it had less effect on Germany which had no troops deployed in those theatres At that time its security policy was still highly restrained (eg Ruumlhe 1997 Kinkel 1998) Due to Germanyrsquos increasing involvement in European security however American isolationism developed from a vague concern into a severe problem (Schmalz 2005 47)27 For example after NATOrsquos Kosovo intervention in 1999 the German government stated ldquoAmerican politicians not only in the Senate but in public discussion gen-erally have to make big efforts to explain to the public why they should be engaged in Kosovo with billions of dollars and thousands of soldiers even though their vital interests are not in the least involvedrdquo28 The American assurance could not be taken for granted anymore in each instance of an unfolding crisis in Europersquos backyard (eg Scharping 1999c Fischer 2003c German Ministry of Defence 2003) As Joschka Fischer the German Foreign Minister stated in Parliament the ldquomost dangerous situation in world politics would be a withdrawal rather than active engagement of the USrdquo (Fischer 2001a translation by the author) In short Germanyrsquos risks of opportunism were rising (eg Scharping 2002 Fischer 2003c)

Secondly another German concern about potentially opportunistic behav-iour can be subsumed under the fear of unilateralism Robert Jervis stated that it ldquowould be an exaggeration to say that unilateralism is the American way of foreign policy but there certainly is a strong pull in this directionrdquo (Jervis 2005 92) The question then is how strong the unilateral pull was over the period considered in this study Even though the mid- 1990s had clearly witnessed a more multilateral outlook by the US (Jervis 2005 54) the option of also pursuing preferred policies unilaterally had never been ruled out29 This ambivalence was also reflected in the US actions surround-ing NATOrsquos Kosovo intervention While the preparatory phase was charac-terised by a US administration that took European concerns seriously the military campaign was ultimately conducted with as little interference from the allies as possible (eg Clark 2001 see also House of Commons 1999)

Although one could dispute the real nature of American uni- or multi-lateralism under the Clinton administration its important aspect for this study is Germanyrsquos perception In fact the German reading of the signals sent by the US was inherently friendly so the multilateral dimension of US policies received more emphasis (Schmalz 2005)30 As then- Minister of Defence Volker Ruumlhe once stated in reference to US President Clinton ldquotogether the United States and Europe have little to fear but a lot to



gainrdquo (Ruumlhe 1996c) This was also based on the much more accommodat-ing tone coming from Washington For example the US government had changed the terminology from burden- to responsibility- sharing and had consequently incorporated distinct European efforts such as development aid into the transatlantic burden calculation (US Department of Defense 1995 Pickering 1998)

However that basically positive perception gradually changed with the new administration George W Bushrsquos increased emphasis on unilateral initiatives entail Germany to consider new institutional arrangements that were more independent from the US (Jervis 2005 86ndash9) This referred first of all to issue- areas such as the Kyoto protocol or the International Criminal Court This trend then manifested itself after the terrorist attacks of September 11 2001 when the US bypassed NATO for its military inter-vention in Afghanistan and used its national Central Command rather than NATOrsquos Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE)31 The Iraq crisis and the subsequent transatlantic tensions ultimately represented the peak of this trend (Struck 2003a)32 The new pre- emptive and partly uni-lateral approach put forward by the American administration (eg White House 2002) was assessed as highly problematic (Fischer 2002) The growing frictions had also played a prominent role during the Conventionrsquos delibera-tions33 This had a lasting impact on Germany since the government overtly opposed American lsquopoliciesrsquo and was indirectly lsquopunishedrsquo for that early on (Schroumlder 2003b)34

In sum this process- tracing analysis of German- American interactions since the mid- 1990s revealed two main findings The German government was incrementally more concerned about both isolationist and unilateral-ist trends in US security policy This did not however lead to a direct effect such as balancing against the lonely superpower as Realism suggests (Jones 2007 24ndash32 Posen 2006 24) Instead the provision of certain public goods that the hegemon had previously guaranteed was increasingly questioned so the transaction costs of providing European security were rising The problem for Germany was in fact lsquotoo little and not too much Americarsquo in the European security architecture35

The ambivalent US position towards the ESDP

Having identified the two most important trends in US general security interests and how they contributed to German risks of opportunism I will now focus more specifically on the American position towards European security initiatives The American approach had always moved on a con-tinuum between support for increased burden- sharing and opposition to greater European autonomy While the main finding may be described as conditional support (see also Sloan 2000) the precise form differed and thereby affected Germanyrsquos assessment of uncertainty about how to provide European security



Until the mid- 1990s the primacy of NATO under American leadership remained unquestioned (White House 1991 Sloan 2000 6ndash9)36 While President Bush Sr was generally sympathetic to strengthening NATOrsquos European pillar it was supposed to be strictly within the Alliance37 This reflected the American commitment to European security whereas both a lsquoEuropean caucusrsquo and lsquobackdoor guaranteesrsquo had to be avoided (US Department of Defense 1995 Hunter 1998) In contrast the European Union was mainly regarded as an economic partner and competitor The actual implementation of NATOrsquos European pillar was pushed forward during the first term of the Clinton administration at NATO meetings in Brussels (1994) and Berlin (1996) ldquothe agreements ratified the essential links across the Atlantic and it can be argued the implicit concept of ldquoNATO firstrdquo ndash although this concept was never formally agreed tordquo (Hunter 2002 18 see also Rumsfeld 2001b) The corollary of the lsquoBerlin Plusrsquo agreement for the level of military planning was the principle of ldquoseparable but not separate forcesrdquo (Christopher 1993)

In the mid- 1990s European security was essentially synonymous with the issue of a European pillar within NATO (Christopher 1993 Hunter 2002 13ndash28) The Americans supported this to achieve a more favour-able burden- sharing The red line of lsquono European caucusrsquo however had to remain untouched (White House 1996 Sloan 2000 6ndash9 Cohen 2000d) The Clinton administration therefore promoted NATOrsquos new lsquoCombined Joint Task Forcesrsquo and the lsquoBerlin Plusrsquo arrangements while lsquobackdoor secu-rity guaranteesrsquo resulting from different memberships had to be avoided (Pickering 1998 US Department of Defense 1995)38 Consequently Madeleine Albrightrsquos lsquo3 Drsquosrsquo as an immediate reaction to the St Malo initia-tive neatly corresponded to the established pattern of lsquoconditional supportrsquo no duplication no decoupling and no discrimination (Albright 1998 see also Talbott 1999 Cohen 1999 2000a) The same conditions were forcefully repeated by the Secretary of Defence William Cohen during the finalisa-tion stages of the Nice Treaty in 2000 (Cohen 2000d)39 However a media survey at this stage of the process- tracing generated a somewhat divergent perspective40

The Clinton administration although more relaxed about a nascent European lsquodefense identityrsquo than its Republican predecessors praises European efforts in official public statements but then briefs journalists about the risks of Europersquos going it alone (Pond 2000 11)

Put differently the US was strongly concerned about the autonomy emphasis of Cologne and Helsinki in 1999 and was consequently afraid that the lsquo3 Drsquosrsquo could not be met A good indicator of how seriously the US took the EUrsquos autonomy plans was their initiative of persuading Turkey to agree not to veto a NATOndashEU agreement which was fragile but still within the



context of lsquoBerlin Plusrsquo After all if Turkey maintained its veto this would open up the path to independent military planning through separate EU institutions The US pressed really hard for this agreement The objective was evidently to keep military planning within NATO41 Another indicator was the American proposals to organise defence planning within a so- called Model 23 According to that proposal the US was even willing to incorpo-rate the four non- NATO EU members into NATOrsquos defence planning process The previous suspicions of having lsquofree- rider through the back doorrsquo were set aside in order to facilitate an agreement with the EU and not drive it into autonomy (Cohen 2000c) In contrast to these concerns the ESDP was very much appreciated from a burden - sharing position This suggested a kind of built- in ambiguity for the question of US policy towards the establishment of the ESDP On the one hand the official position was explicit support (eg Cohen 1999 US Department of Defense 2000) while on the other the US government made it clear ndash often indirectly ndash that its specific postulations must be met42 In short there was substantial space for uncertainty43

At the start of the incoming George W Bush administration in 2000 the US position towards the ESDP was essentially unaltered (Rumsfeld 2001a 2001b see also Zoellick 2000 74) The new team however included many senior officials who had vehemently opposed lsquoEuropean- onlyrsquo security ini-tiatives in the 1990s This faction was most prominently represented in the Pentagon by policy- makers such as Paul Wolfowitz Richard Perle and Peter Rodman as well as John Bolton in the State Department44 The notion of competition with a potentially unified Europe was reflected in some of the administrationrsquos statements (eg US Department of Defense 2002a) The most severe frictions between the US and Germany however emerged dur-ing the unfolding of the Iraq crisis in 2002ndash345 They became particularly evident both in Secretary Rumsfeldrsquos thoughts of dividing lsquooldrsquo from lsquonewrsquo Europe and the lsquoLetter of the Eightrsquo and the lsquoLetter of the Vilnius Tenrsquo The peak of these tensions was reached when Washington set red lines around what the EU was (not) permitted to build within the ESDP first no mili-tary headquarters because this could duplicate NATOrsquos SHAPE46 second no particularly far- reaching agreements on lsquostructured cooperationrsquo because this could also be used to circumvent NATO47 third no strong Defence Agency48 and finally no collective defence clauses within the EU treaty (US Department of Defense 2003) In doing this the US opposed virtu-ally all proposals made by Germany France Belgium and Luxembourg and thus large parts of the Franco- German contribution to the Convention (Fischer and de Villepin 2002) The relative ambiguity of the American posi-tion became apparent however when the administration simultaneously supported initiatives that would strengthen European capabilities (Cohen 2000c Rumsfeld 2001b US Department of Defense 2002b Jones 2004)

On the one hand it promoted a stronger European pillar ultimately within NATO For example at the Prague Summit in 2002 the Alliancersquos defence



planning was transformed into the Prague Capabilities Commitment (Clarke and Cornish 2002) Its core was a 21000- strong NATO Response Force that was set- up without the US and that Washington regarded as a mechanism for ensuring a European increase in and modernisation of critical military capabilities These developments were not only proposed but very much favoured by the US because they effectively strengthened NATOrsquos defence planning capacities and would secure them for the future Implementation however has often been problematic (Bell 2006) On the other hand the blunt reality of the European Unionrsquos ESDP could no longer be ignored These difficulties were sharpened by the institutional arrangement of sov-ereign states having a lsquosingle set of forcesrsquo that could serve under either the NATO or EU flag Washingtonrsquos conditional support for European security initiatives aimed to have well- equipped forces for the former and subordi-nated forces for the latter

What did this imply to the German government To what extent did these ambivalences have an impact on its transaction costs for the provision of European security The empirical evidence points to a German govern-ment that was increasingly aware of and sensitive to these developments The trend over time among American policy- makers to oppose European attempts for greater autonomy more strongly while remaining generally supportive of all contributions to more equal burden- sharing was observed by the German government with some concern (Fischer 2001a) The result-ing constraints in the form of US conditions for the ESDP led Germany to send conciliatory signals across the Atlantic (eg German Government 2004) For instance after the US had made clear that a standing EU head-quarters would seriously harm NATO (US Department of Defense 2003) the German government backed down and followed the British compromise proposals49 The government did not want to increase further its risks of opportunism within NATO by decoupling from the sole superpower Hence it was willing to make concessions rather than further estrange itself from the hegemon (eg Fischer 2002) The overall support for NATO was par-ticularly strong among MoD officials who had grown up with the Alliance defending the country but also the highest political levels left no doubt that NATO belongs to the German raison drsquoeacutetat (eg German Ministry of Defence 2003 Schroumlder 2005 see also Rudolf 2004)50

Taken together the signals sent in this context implied that the crossing of certain red lines set by the US government could ultimately cause the hegemon to further disengage from European security problems This con-sequence would not merely represent an incremental growth of the risks of opportunism but would entail the need for a European provision of certain public goods that the hegemon had previously guaranteed Such a scenario was never favourably envisaged by any German government (Weiss 2009 330ndash8) In short the signalling process between the US and Germany with respect to the actual establishment of the ESDP contributed to its transaction



costs merely to the extent that a scenario was anticipated that could increase uncertainty exponentially The German government was permanently aware of this risk and formulated its preferences accordingly The analysis of those signalling processes may be summarised as shown in Table 52

Based on these results of the process- tracing the final section turns to the task of establishing a causal link between the transaction costs that the German government was confronted with in its attempts to provide European security and its preferences for institution- building in the ESDP

The German choice of the institutional context

The theoretical framework of this study suggested two ideal- typical policies that member states have at their disposal when they transact through insti-tutions namely either to exit or to engage with voice (Hirschman 1970) Against that background Germany had four broad options for institution- building in European security

I) NATO as a whole II) NATO with a strong lsquoEuropean pillarrsquo (that could act independently)III) The EU as an independent security institution highly compatible with

NATO andIV) The EU as a security institution fully detached from NATO

We have seen that the point of departure for the German government was between I) and II) While there was a belief that the EU should gain responsibilities for military planning preferences with regard to substan-tive scope were subordinated to NATO Therefore Germany fully supported only peacekeeping tasks for the EU whereas collective defence and high-

Table 52 Germany and its lsquosignallingrsquo with the United States

Germanythe United States and European Security

Signals sent by the superpower

US security interests US position on the ESDP

Amsterdam(1995ndash6)

Support for NATO lsquoBerlin Plusrsquo and basically no risks of opportunism

European pillar within NATO

CologneHelsinki(1999)

Isolationist concern and slow increase in risks of opportunism

Conditional support for ESDP

Convention(2003ndash4)

Isolationist concern combined with new unilateralism and increase in risks of opportunism

Still conditional support (but threat of increased risks of opportunism if conditions were not met)



intensity crisis management were less desired outcomes The analysis of German- American interactions suggests however that Berlin was increas-ingly concerned about both isolationist and unilateralist trends in US security policy This is precisely what Oliver Williamson described as lsquonon- strategic uncertaintyrsquo (Williamson 1985 57ndash9) The actions of the US were not intended to mislead rather there was simply a lack of information about the hegemonrsquos future behaviour The German risks of opportunism within NATO were consequently rising This made option I) less attractive in terms of transaction costs since uncertainty about the US made its commitment less credible and thus the whole arrangement problematic In this respect we could think of a pre- Kosovo situation with an American administration unwilling to deploy either ground or air forces Even option II) was costly to the extent that Washington maintained a veto position in each crisis and at the same time did not allow a European caucus within the Alliance The risks of opportunism which emerged from the American signals increased and made options I) and II) uncertain in terms of transaction costs The pro-vision of European security by NATO had become gradually more costly and made the German government consider new institutional arrangements It therefore changed the orderings of its preferred outcomes of the EUrsquos nego-tiations Not only low- intensity but also high- intensity crisis management was now supported by the German government

At the same time the US administration promoted what I call a lsquobuilt- in ambiguityrsquo towards European security initiatives The conditions of approval set by Washington were demanding on the German government and had a straightforward impact on its formulation of preferences They suggested that the crossing of some of the red lines might cause a complete US with-drawal from Europersquos security risks It was precisely this kind of worst- case scenario that the German government wanted to avoid namely to have to live up to the requirement of providing the public good of European secu-rity by itself and without any assistance from the hegemon Here we clearly see the functionalist origins of the studyrsquos argument While the retrospective assessment of NATO entailed the turn to the ESDP the anticipated costs of US withdrawal explain the more moderate approach the German govern-ment took to finding a compatible arrangement with both NATO and the EU In other words option IV) was foreclosed or at least made extremely costly We have thus arrived at the paradoxical result that the risks of oppor-tunism stemming from the uncertainty about the American commitment triggered a German preference for investing more strongly in EU arrange-ments but at the same time limited the option of fully exiting NATOrsquos pro-vision of certain public goods51

In transaction costs terms the German government expected future secu-rity policies to be uncertain in Europe and therefore wanted to increase the scope of the ESDP The latter was intended to facilitate information exchanges about such matters as crisis management in Europersquos backyard



or in neglected areas such as Africa The ESDP was expected to function in the medium- to long- term as a sort of substitute for the previous provision of European stability by the US and therefore decrease the emerged risks of opportunism to a significant degree That encouraged the government to consider and plan more strongly for EU- only scenarios (see also Aggestam 2000 74) At the same time the threat of being faced with rapidly increasing degrees of uncertainty made the government anxious about formulating its position too vehemently Instead it returned to its more traditional position of mediating between NATO and the EU Accordingly German preferences gradually moved from option II) towards option III) as a higher priority (eg Fischer 2001a 2002 Schaumlfer 2004) This explains why the government pro-moted high- intensity crisis management and to a certain degree collective defence as the desired substantive scope of ESDP at the Convention on the Future of Europe

In conclusion this chapter has pointed to the gradual increase of German risks of opportunism involved in the provision of European security This was primarily based on the mutually reinforcing development of a perceived growth of security risks linked to growing uncertainty about Americarsquos commitment to European security Therefore I also demonstrated why the German government invested most of its efforts in the EU rather than the Alliance The interaction between isolationist and unilateralist concerns encouraged Germany to strengthen EU- only options These could however only be carried out by taking Washingtonrsquos red lines into account In other words neither the worsened security environment as such nor the ambigu-ous American policies alone persuasively explain Germanyrsquos preference for increasing EU responsibility for military planning Instead the interaction between a demanding environment and a hegemon that was allegedly tired of providing the goods primarily determined the magnitude of Germanyrsquos transaction costs in its cooperative exchanges on providing European secu-rity In short it wanted to reduce uncertainties without producing too many new uncertainties This constitutes the key to the German approach towards the substantive scope of institution- building in European security and can be summarised as shown in Table 53

When we return to the causal pathways of the transaction costs frame-work we see that the German government increasingly envisaged rising costs with respect to the provision of European security From that we may infer the overall preference to increase institution- building in that domain The question was thus why the German government preferred to strengthen the EUrsquos responsibilities in security and defence questions Based on the importance of the relativity of transaction costs the Union increasingly emerged as a viable and effective institution for reducing the transaction costs to a sustainable extent In other words Germanyrsquos assessment of the decreased American commitment was the driving force behind the prefer-ence seen over the course of the analysis for a more capable ESDP Therefore



the governmentrsquos evaluation that NATO would entail a relatively high degree of transaction costs in the long- term in order to continue providing European security encouraged it to gradually enlarge the substantive scope of ESDP Since exit had never been an option for a German government a compatible arrangement with NATO was promoted The next step of this lsquostructured focused comparisonrsquo addresses ndash analogously to this chapter ndash the United Kingdomrsquos preferences for substantive scope

Table 53 German transaction costs for the provision of European security and its resulting choice of the institutional context

Germany and transaction costs for the provision of European security

∆ Demand for a security institution

Germanyrsquos resulting choice of institutional context

∆ Signalling with the United States


Constant increase Preference for option II) No severe risks of opportunism


Constant increase Preference moving towards option III)

Increasing isolationist concern


Further increase Clear preference for option III)

Plus increasing unilateralist concern


79

6Great Britain ndash From Opposing the Union towards a Subordinated ESDP

This chapter focuses on the overall question of to what extent the British government preferred the EU to be responsible for different aspects of mil-itary planning The United Kingdom represents a great challenge in this context since there was a tremendous shift between the mid- 1990s and the Convention While France and to some degree Germany maintained their traditional positions it was the UKrsquos subscription to the ESDP that made the declaration of St Malo in 1998 such a lsquosea changersquo (Whitman 1999 5ndash9 Heisbourg 2000a 8ndash9 Posen 2006 167ndash8) Its underlying aim was to increase Europersquos military capability for different forms of crisis management

British preferences on substantive scope

In the mid- 1990s the Conservative government had the clearest ndash so to speak ndash anti- EU position in security matters The administration wanted to avoid almost any involvement in the EU The incorporation of the WEUrsquos Petersberg Tasks only became acceptable because of firstly the blunt real-ity that NATO involvement remained an implicit requirement and sec-ondly because of the change in government to a slightly more lsquoEuropeanrsquo Labour leadership Although Tony Blair had demanded more substance for a Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) he had never elabo-rated what this would entail After coming into power the new govern-ment could accept that the EU ndashnot the WEU as initially planned ndash should deal with some lower- end Petersberg operations However the WEU was to be kept separate and developed into a forum where the Europeans could build up a pillar within and subordinated to NATO (Government of the UK 1995a 1995b 1997)

Despite the high level of continuity that the new Labour government had initially promoted in the Amsterdam negotiations it indicated in the course of the subsequent year that security and defence questions should be increasingly considered in the EU context and that Britain should play a leading role in these initiatives This shift in British preferences



set in motion the whole process of ESDP from St Malo through Cologne Helsinki and Sintra to the reform treaty of Nice at the end of 20001 Although the preference change was stronger with respect to defence plan-ning the UK also envisaged an increasing EU responsibility for military operations Before and during the deliberations of the Convention on the Future of Europe Britain made clear that the EU should increasingly play a pivotal role lsquowhere the Alliance as a whole was not engagedrsquo This pri-marily referred to the lower- end Petersberg Tasks Collective defence was to be continuously excluded from the EUrsquos functions since it was satis-factorily performed by NATO Nevertheless in defence planning the EU was still preferred in order to increase Europersquos overall power projection capabilities

Outright opposition in Amsterdam

Firstly the British government vehemently opposed the incorporation of collective defence into the EUrsquos functional scope Instead the UK had shaped and thus supported the idea of the WEU as the European pillar of NATO that would remain strictly separate from the EU and at the same time subordinate to the Alliance Independent of party affiliation British policy- makers made unambiguously clear that NATO was the cornerstone of European security (eg George 1996 56) Particularly in territorial defence the Alliance was to maintain exclusive responsibility (Government of the UK 1995a Rifkind 1995a Blair 1996)2

At the Amsterdam- IGC the UK agreed to the incorporation of the Petersberg Tasks but nonetheless we cannot speak of a genuine British preference for engaging the EU in military planning for crisis management (Government of the UK 1995a) Although the EU might deal with some of these issues the UK saw them as belonging to the lower rather than the high end ndash for technical (lack of capabilities) and political reasons (US and NATOrsquos primacy) Strengthened links between the WEU and the EU were welcomed In opposition to Franco- German proposals however no political control of the latter over the former was envisaged Instead NATO was to remain the primary forum of consultation for all security and defence questions (Rifkind 1995b Labour Party 1996 Blair 1997 EP- Briefing 1997b) Finally the British government wanted the WEU to concentrate on low- intensity crisis man-agement (Government of the UK 1996 House of Lords 1995)3

Secondly the UK undoubtedly saw the need to increase European mili-tary capabilities Therefore it supported to a certain extent improved coor-dination in defence planning between the member states (Government of the UK 1995a) This was to be achieved either through NATO and the WEU or on the basis of bilateral and multilateral cooperation In contrast it was not envisaged that the EU would play an active role in these defence plan-ning and armaments cooperation activities In other words the British per-spective was genuinely transatlantic and its close military relationship with


Great Britain and Preferences on Substantive Scope 81

the US had to be maintained (eg IISS 1995 40 Rifkind 1996a EP- Briefing 1997b McInnes 1998 824ndash9)4

Besides the UK was prominently involved in shaping NATOrsquos Combined Joint Task Forces concept and therefore the lsquoBerlin Plusrsquo agreement (Hunter 2002 13ndash9) The Alliance therefore represented the only viable option for preparing the hardware for high- intensity crisis management (Government of the UK 1995a EP- Briefing 1997b) Finally the UK proposed that the European governments should begin with a realistic analysis of what they were capable of doing which would probably encourage them to focus on defence planning for low- intensity crisis management This was an area where the UK also wanted to see increased (W)EU involvement (Government of the UK 1995b 1996 House of Commons 1998)5

In sum the outcome the British most desired would have essentially been no EU responsibilities for military planning Although the incoming Labour administration ultimately agreed to incorporate the WEUrsquos Petersberg Tasks into the treaty it did not genuinely support a strong role for the EU within the European security architecture Instead virtually all British policy- makers strongly insisted on NATOrsquos primacy in all respects Nevertheless low- intensity crisis management was ultimately accepted

The shift of St Malo

The famous St Malo declaration by France and the UK represented a sig-nificant point of departure since it was the first time the UK subscribed to the necessity of an autonomous European defence force At the same time however the importance of NATO was emphasised which points to the two main principles that had so far divided the EU into lsquoEuropeanistsrsquo and lsquoAtlanticistsrsquo6 The declaration was a compromise combining both positions within one document While the UKrsquos Secretary of Defence had reconfirmed the prototypical NATO position in Spring 1998 (Robertson 1998) the British Prime Minister Tony Blair announced his new approach to European security during a European Council meeting in Poumlrtschach (Austria) in the Autumn of the same year the EU military force should be militarily credible politically intergovernmental and compatible with NATO (Blair 1998a)7

Firstly the point of departure for the British government was NATOrsquos lsquoBerlin Plusrsquo agreement that foresaw three types of military operations (1) NATO alone (2) the (W)EU applying NATO assets (3) the (W)EU alone Building on former British positions the Blair administration considered the last option an unlikely operational scenario Instead it focused on opportunities to strengthen the second The precise procedure however was to be debated ldquoWe should be prepared to think more boldly and more imaginatively about how we do thatrdquo8 Autonomous operational planning was accepted by a British government for the first time but the first two options were generally the desired procedures This also implied that the



UK still strongly opposed introducing a collective defence function into the EUrsquos treaty framework This scenario was to be exclusively the responsibility of the Alliance (Blair 1998c Cook 2000) Building on the recently intro-duced Petersberg Tasks the British government now preferred the EU to have some responsibility for military planning for crisis management opera-tions9 Its approach was to give the EU a role in crisis management in cases where NATO as a whole chooses not to be engaged This referred primarily to the lower Petersberg end but envisaged for the first time the opportunity of gradually moving towards more demanding military operations (McInnes 1998 834ndash5)

[N]o artificial boundaries should be set as to whether the EU may or may not act ( ) [W]e have agreed to work on the assumption that within the agreed range of missions the most demanding will occur in and around Europe But we believe that the EU should have the potential to respond to crises on a wider basis ( ) [T]he spectrum of missions which could be envisaged under the broad headings of the Petersberg Tasks is consider-able It could range from a straightforward humanitarian operation to a demanding peacemaking operation (Cook 2000)

While the governmentrsquos position came very close to the German approach in terms of NATO Berlin Plus and the EUrsquos desired scope the main difference was still the issue of an WEUndashEU merger and thus collective defence10

Secondly the issue of defence planning was dominated at that time by the British debate on the countryrsquos defence review (eg Government of the UK 1998 McInnes 1998) In contrast to Germany which was discuss-ing whether to acquire power projection capabilities at all the United Kingdom had a long tradition of sending expeditionary forces and thus focused on different aspects (eg Freedman 1999 Maumlder 2004) ldquoThe range of contingencies which may arise from the new- style risks and chal-lenges described earlier require a different form of military response to the territorial defence of the Cold Warrdquo (Government of the UK 1998 32) The government therefore strongly opposed any additional spend-ing on territorial defence but wanted instead to enhance cooperation in order to create capabilities for the Petersberg Tasks11 The primary partner of choice was France although the special relationship with the United States was in no way questioned The Prime Minister emphasised the huge potential of Franco- British cooperation based on a great variety of over-lapping interests Since the UKrsquos contemporary Strategic Defence Review conjoined with French efforts to professionalise its forces the Prime Minister speaking before the French National Assembly asked how ldquowe can create a capacity to deploy forces rapidly on a joint basis in future crises where both countries agreerdquo (Blair 1998a)12 This demonstrates the strong British emphasis on capability generation and thus the desire for



a larger substantive scope in defence rather than operational planning This was clearly expressed by the Defence Secretary Lord Robertson

We should encourage further the development of combined military capabilities in particular the operational effectiveness of the vari-ous existing European multinational forces Let us not engage in false debate over whether these forces are primarily for NATO operations or primarily for European operations In both cases they are serving European interests13

In terms of transaction costs these statements make clear the general nature of the UKrsquos preferences for the establishment of military forces in the EU context They were not to be too specific but rather capable of being redeployed for different purposes and organisations This did not come as much of a surprise since military capabilities were lsquoat the heartrsquo of Blairrsquos initiatives (eg Cook 2000)

Before we move finally to the Convention on the Future of Europe it is necessary to at least briefly address the question of continuity and change in British preferences because there has been a lively debate on this issue Some scholars argued that the UKrsquos initiatives at the end of 1998 represented merely a ldquoshift of government policies rather than core preferencesrdquo (Dover 2005 510ndash3) or more generally ldquofixed strat-egy changing tacticsrdquo (Howorth 2000c 377) In contrast others empha-sised more strongly the transformative nature of the British approach (eg Whitman 1999 5ndash9 Heisbourg 2000a 8ndash9) This debate ultimately corresponds to what some referred to as the problem of a lsquomeansndashends chainrsquo ldquomeans at a more fundamental level in the chain are ends at a less fundamental levelrdquo (Wallander et al 1999 11) Is the UKrsquos subscrip-tion to an autonomous force a means to create more European capabili-ties for NATO or an end in itself to establish a stronger Europe This studyrsquos remedy for this non- resolvable problematique is to rely on Jeffry Friedenrsquos notion of preferences as ldquodesired orderings of possible out-comesrdquo (Frieden 1999 42) This enables a relatively precise measurement and thus facilitates a qualified statement on continuity and change at two points in time From this perspective British preferences had quali-tatively and quantitatively changed between the mid- 1990s and 200014 To what extent the government viewed this as an end or as a means to different aims ndash as either tactics or strategy ndash is not from the perspective of this study significant Instead we can put on record that within the framework of this study they represent changed orderings of possible out-comes the substantive scope of the ESDP was to comprise active crisis management with respect to defence as well as operational planning For the first time there was a desire for an autonomous defence capacity That was novel



Minor adjustments at the Convention

This drastic change was followed by gradual adjustments in the British approach to the ESDP The UK was largely satisfied with the status quo ante which was reconfirmed by the Nice Treaty in 2000 The desired substan-tive scope still referred primarily to the lower Petersberg end whereas high- intensity combat operations were intentionally not excluded per se Thus the EU was meant to play a prominent role as a sort of lsquoforce generatorrsquo in defence planning and strengthen the member statesrsquo armaments coopera-tion as long the US remained included in this domain Collective defence in contrast was to remain outside of the EUrsquos military planning activities (eg Blair 2000 Blair 2002 Government of the UK 2003b)

Firstly the governmentrsquos lsquoordering of possible outcomesrsquo with respect to the question of solidarity clauses was straightforward While the UK opposed any proposals that could duplicate NATOrsquos Art 5 even under lsquostructured cooperationrsquo the government supported the idea of introducing a solidarity clause with respect to terrorist attacks and natural disasters (Government of the UK 2003c 5ndash6) Accordingly the UK wanted to prevent the EU from performing any kind of collective defence but nevertheless wanted some sense of political solidarity to be institutionalised (Straw 2003c Blair 2003 Government of the UK 2003a) The exclusion of Art 5 arrangements repre-sented one of the UKrsquos red lines during the Convention- IGC (Straw 2003b see also Menon 2003 977)

Britain supported the relatively uncontested updating of the Petersberg Tasks Like the German government the UK was slightly ambivalent about the most demanding missions being part of the EUrsquos responsibility in mili-tary planning (House of Lords 2002) On the one hand the government made clear that the EU should become active in all kinds of crisis man-agement (eg Blair 2002 Blair and Chirac 2003 see already Cook 2000) On the other hand the administration implicitly emphasised that NATO represented the European security institution of choice and hence the EU would not be involved in highly profile crises This was particularly empha-sised vis- agrave- vis the domestic audience (Straw 2001 Government of the UK 2004 Hoon 2005) Finally the British government fully supported the EUrsquos responsibility for humanitarian and peacekeeping tasks ndash the lower Petersberg end (eg Blair 2001 Straw 2002b)

Secondly the UK continued with the approach it had adopted during the set- up phase of the ESDP Although operational and defence planning were related the latter played the more prominent role (eg Government of the UK 2003a Hoon 2005) The UK therefore also supported a gradual open-ing of the European defence market and stronger competition in order to increase the efficiency of defence spending However arms production was not to become part of the single market but rather remain within the sole competence of the member states The newly established EDA was intended



to function as a facilitator rather than as an initiator It was important that progress in this should not endanger Britainrsquos strong industrial links with the United States (eg Government of the UK 2005)15 In addition London opposed any additional expenditure on hardware for territorial defence Instead Europe was to enhance its crisis management and thus its power projection capabilities Faster deployment and better intelligence were to be the main priorities of the EUrsquos defence planning process Besides the UK was rather critical of multinational troops so its emphasis was always on the improvement of its own national capabilities (eg Straw 2002b Government of the UK 2003c)

Finally the British government preferred and thus initiated the EUrsquos Headline Goal 2010 which represented the reformed Helsinki objectives from 1999 in defence planning16 The Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon had announced the battlegroups initiative in Munich in 2004 (Hoon 2004)17 Building on its experience particularly in Africa (for example in Sierra Leone and DRC) France and the UK advanced the plan that rapid deployment could be the military asset that might give the EU a comparative advan-tage in crisis management In contrast to for example Germany the British government emphasised the battlegroupsrsquo principle of lsquoeffectivenessrsquo rather than lsquomultinationalityrsquo18 As a result Great Britain offered one battlegroup consisting solely of British soldiers and another one based on bilateral coop-eration with the Netherlands (eg Lindstrom 2007) The British approach to the new battlegroups but also its overall preference to grant the EU a prominent role in defence planning is illustrated well by a statement from the Defence Secretary about the new initiative

The most important factor is that it must be for Member States to produce complete Battlegroup packages either nationally or in small multina-tional groups That means small countries providing niche contributions must ensure they are integrated into full Battlegroups and not simply placed on the table The UK is therefore opposed to any heavily central-ised force generation process which would allow countries to offer small incoherent contributions relying on the EU Military Staff to bind them into groups and reducing the incentive of this initiative to drive national capability improvement (Hoon 2005 see also Webb 2004)

In other words Great Britain had a politically pragmatic approach to achiev-ing a lsquobigger bang for its buckrsquo This could also be applied to the planned European Defence Agency The lsquoUK has promoted a European defence capa-bilities agency in the draft EU Treaty to energise the development of capa-bilities and coordinate associated acquisition policiesrsquo (Government of the UK 2003c 6 see also Government of the UK 2005) There is no reference to the ESDP as a political project Instead Europe should coordinate its capa-bility building19 According to these examinations the British government



ordered the desired outcomes of the Convention- IGC in a similar way to the previous phase It was merely the battlegroup concept that was to supple-ment the new defence planning processes Table 61 provides a comprehen-sive overview of this chapterrsquos empirical investigation

In sum this exploration of British preferences reveals one major and one minor finding (1) the greatest challenge is definitely the dramatic increase in the UKrsquos desire for the EU to have responsibility for military planning Next we could only observe some minor adjustments to the new approach (2) the minor but nonetheless illuminating finding was a lack of congruence between operational and defence planning They were still sufficiently close to each other so we can reasonably assume the seriousness of the British commitments However the UKrsquos desired outcomes for operational planning always lagged behind its approach to the common provision of the military hardware This clearly distinguishes this case from the other two

Explaining British preferences on substance lsquoItrsquos Time to Repay America the Soldierrsquo20

The central argument of the process- tracing analysis is that the UKrsquos trans-action costs for the provision of European security increased significantly

Table 61 Detailed overview of British preferences on substantive scope

Great Britain and Preferences Regarding Substantive Scope

EUrsquos desired responsibilities for military planning

Peace-keeping and Humanitarian Assistance

High-Intensity Crisis Management Collective Defence


defence planning


defence planning


defence planning


+ ndashndash ndashndash ndashndash ndash


+ + + + + + + ndashndash ndashndash



Explanation++ = fully present+ = present to some extent = neither present nor absent (or both and)ndash = absent to some extentndashndash = fully absent



over the course of the 1990s and then remained largely stable This growth led to fresh thinking within the new government and ultimately resulted in the formulation of a novel approach to EU security policy expanding the EUrsquos scope in military planning Tony Blair defined the parameters by stating that he had an ldquoopen mind about what this might mean institutionally But we are not talking about a European armyrdquo (Blair 1998b)21 Although the shift came suddenly at the end of 1998 there had been a steady move in this direc-tion where some important factors conjoined In- depth analysis shows that the most considerable causal effect was the interaction between the perceived demand for a security institution linked to increased risks of opportunism within the European setting This interaction effect was particularly salient at the end of the 1990s but did not increase further thereafter Finally the examination demonstrates that the British government pursued a two- fold strategy of voice it not only increased its weight within the ESDP but also uti-lised the new European capabilities so as to be better heard in Washington

Great Britain the United States and the provision of European security

Like the German case study this section begins with the British assess-ment of NATOrsquos capacity to provide European security to what extent did the lsquosignallingrsquo between London and Washington give rise to uncertainty and thus British risks of opportunism It is demonstrated that the signals sent by the United States were perceived with growing concern by British policy- makers since the American commitment could no longer be taken for granted in all situations This perception of growing ambivalence con-siderably increased Britainrsquos risks of opportunism The hegemonrsquos provision of basically all public goods in the European security setting was therefore questioned Institution- building became part of the political agenda On that basis an EU security and defence pillar represented a viable alterna-tive while a full lsquoexitrsquo from NATO was never considered Instead a mixture of functional solutions to emerging problems and the idea of strengthen-ing Europersquos lsquovoicersquo in Washington determined the British approach to the problematique This constellation also remained stable when bilateral rela-tions with the United States were re- intensified after 91122

The security interests of the United States after the Cold War

Like Germany the United Kingdom was concerned about the isolationist trend on the other side of the Atlantic that had begun in the mid- 1990s but was definitely less worried about a unilateralist shift in US security policy The former found a tentative expression during the Balkan crises The US was not willing to deploy troops themselves and behaved in a relatively reluctant way during the crisis23 For the UK this presented a problem since it had to lsquosquare the circlersquo between an incapable Europe and a reluctant United States (Howorth 2000c 385 House of Commons 2000) Britain was



becoming increasingly aware that the time when Washington would con-tinue to write ldquoblank cheques in favour of European securityrdquo might be gone (Howorth 2000 23 see also Rynning 2003 60 Posen 2004 15) The most plausible option was therefore to promote French rapprochement with the Alliance in order to establish a capable European pillar This would have undoubtedly been the most desired possible outcome from a British perspec-tive In particular the Ministry of Defence was committed to this course of action Despite some promising prospects at the start however these plans rapidly deteriorated due to disagreements between Paris and Washington As a consequence British risks of opportunism within NATO rose While the Conservative government drew the lesson from Bosnia that it should con-centrate its efforts on further binding the Americans to Europe24 the new Labour Prime Minister drew a different conclusion ldquoWe Europeans should not expect the United States to have to play a part in every disorder in our own back yardrdquo25 This view was then strongly reinforced by NATOrsquos Kosovo campaign in 1999 ldquobecause the United States may not want to get entangled in the next Kosovo British and other European military officials sayrdquo26

In addition this growing uncertainty about US willingness to deploy mil-itary force was accompanied and thus reinforced by an American Congress that insisted on greater burden- sharing within NATO Some Congressmen regularly tabled amendments to pressure Europe on all sorts of burden- sharing questions After the Republican takeover of Congress in 1994 these propositions came very close to winning a majority ldquoThe fear in Whitehall was that unless the EU began to respond to these pressures the Alliance would collapserdquo (eg Howorth 2000c 385 see also Major 1996 Albright and Cook 2000 Hoon 2005) After severe transatlantic disagreements about NATOrsquos eastern enlargement27 these concerns had become steadily stronger since Europe had invested neither in military capabilities nor had new majorities in Congress changed in such a way as to mitigate the fears of defence planners The new administration therefore formulated its posi-tion overtly

I know that some feel that being close with the United States is an inhi-bition on closer European cooperation On the contrary I believe it is essential that the isolationist voices in the United States are kept at bay and we encourage our American allies to be our partners in issues of world peace and security (Blair 1998a emphasis added)

In contrast to its predecessors the Blair government drew the conclu-sion from these isolationist trends in Congress that the UK should invest more into European capabilities which would strengthen the EUrsquos voice in Washington It therefore preferred a larger substantive scope for defence rather than operational planning Capability generation without alienating the special partner was at the heart of Blairrsquos initiative



Finally British concerns about isolationist trends in the US were rein-forced by the new administrationrsquos announcement that it would withdraw peacekeeping forces from Bosnia and close other military bases in Europe

The United Statesrsquo strategic priorities have also evolved rapidly A pro-gressive reduction of their commitment from parts of Europe is now under active consideration The announcement of Donald Rumsfeld US Defense Secretary that US forces might withdraw from Bosnia indicate that European governments will need to do more to provide for their own security especially on the borders of Europe where US interests are not directly engaged (House of Lords 2002)

This sceptical perception was strengthened by the Bush administrationrsquos signals opposing current British security policy The Blair government was indirectly punished by Donald Rumsfeld who met with Tory representative Iain Duncan Smith before the Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon28 Nevertheless BritishndashAmerican interactions rapidly improved and while the risk of oppor-tunism constantly lurked in the background it clearly lost significance for the British government (Government of the UK 2003c 5ndash6)

The German case study has pointed towards two phases of American sig-nals indicating unilateralist trends first during the Clinton years and then during George W Bushrsquos new administration of 2001 This unilateralism was only a minor problem for the British government The UK perceived the signals sent by the Clinton administration as generally non- unilateralist Even when Washington decided to respond unilaterally to the terrorist attacks on American embassies in Africa in August 1998 (Clinton 1998) the official British reaction was fairly supportive in emphasising the USrsquos right to self- defence29 Similarly both NATOrsquos Kosovo campaign and the USrsquos plans for national missile defence gave rise to some concerns in London but it was always clear that it was the UK that would be consulted most often among Americarsquos allies (US Department of Defense 1995 House of Commons 1999)30 In short American unilateralist policies did not notice-ably increase uncertainty in British cooperative exchanges related to the provision of European security during these years

In contrast to most of its continental partners this perception did not change significantly with the allegedly more unilateralist approach of the new Bush administration The special relationship in general and the shared world view in particular were continuously emphasised especially by Tony Blair ldquoI think most of all we have the same perception of the worldrdquo (Bush and Blair 2001a 2001b) Britain therefore regarded itself again as bridging the emerging gaps between the US and continental Europe31 This unilateral-ist trend was significantly reinforced after the terrorist attacks of September 11 2001 and the subsequent military interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq From the very beginning the British government made clear that it would



broadly follow the United States32 Although the Blair administration had initially been opposed to expanding the lsquowar on terrorrsquo to include Iraq it eventually followed its lsquospecial partnerrsquo33 The government made clear that large- scale military operations without the US represented nothing more than a theoretical option (Hoon 2003 Government of the UK 2003c) The idea was thus to bring the EU closer to the United States rather than vice versa (Hain 2003b 955)

In sum the isolationist signals sent by the US increased British risks of opportunism and thus transaction costs in the provision of European secu-rity Due to the dependence on military cooperation with the US isolation-ist fears weighed heavily on the British government but at the same time unilateral concerns were largely absent From a comparative perspective the transaction costs differ from the German case study to the extent that the isolationism and unilateralism did not reinforce each other over time Therefore it was primarily the former concern that increased British uncer-tainty and thus transaction costs and consequently triggered its preference formation The ESDP needed to establish a politicalndashmilitary option in order to be taken seriously should the US choose not to be engaged in a specific crisis


In the following section I will build on the German case study and supple-ment it with an account of the specific interactions between Washington and London While we have seen that the USrsquos general security interests sig-nificantly increased British transaction costs for the provision of European security at the same time the American administration determined certain prerequisites for its conditional support Its position moved back and forth between support for better transatlantic burden- sharing and opposition to increased European autonomy The US administration made an effort on its own behalf to influence the UKrsquos desired outcomes to the ESDP negotia-tions While it had to accept the overall policy shift it always attempted to define boundaries that the UK should not cross if it wanted to maintain both NATO and the special relationship Here we see as in the German case how the US constrained its European partners it made clear that uncertainty and thus the risks of opportunism would dramatically increase for the EU members if they did not adhere to the American principles The threat consisted of potential withdrawal from Europe or at least from most of its security problems (see also Weiss 2009)

The Clinton administration supported a potential strengthening of the European pillar within the Alliance in the mid- 1990s (eg Christopher 1993 US Department of Defense 1995) The implicit support for NATOrsquos primacy within the Berlin Plus agreement satisfied Washington The British govern-ment was among the main architects of this agreement so the US position was not yet a source of uncertainty for the government (Sloan 2000 12)34



In fact you could even state the opposite the close cooperation between the two countries on these issues increased the certainty that this would be the appropriate design for the European security setting When the French rapprochement with the Alliance failed however the Clinton governmentrsquos position on the establishment of the ESDP was ambiguous (Albright 1998 Cohen 2000d) Hence the interactions between Washington and London intensified to avoid the emergence of further irritations35 Even as Tony Blair announced the British shift that would lead to the ESDP he reassured Washington of the UKrsquos firm belief in the future of the special relation-ship More specifically he left no doubt about his resolve to join in pun-ishing Iraq for its offences against international agreements This resulted in high- intensity air strikes against Saddam Hussein It clearly signalled to the superpower the UKrsquos commitment and that the European defence initiative would remain compatible with NATO36 During the actual set- up phase ldquoBritish officials came to Washington regularly prior to each major stage of negotiations with France and the other EU members to reassure US officials that they agreed completely with American perspectivesrdquo (Sloan 2000 17ndash8)37 This was not directly translated into the British position but was nevertheless intended to lend transparency to the whole process and thereby reduce unintentional uncertainties38

When the new institutional arrangements were to be finalised in Nice at the end of 2000 the UK and the US again cooperated closely to provide each other with information This resulted in a common approach formulated by the foreign ministers which emphasised the restrained scope of the ESDP

What does European defence involve It means that European contribu-tions to NATO operations in the Balkans now and perhaps elsewhere in the future will be stronger and more effective It means that where NATO as a whole chooses not to become engaged the EU will be able to act in response to humanitarian crises to provide disaster relief and also undertake peacekeeping tasks (Albright and Cook 2000)

At the same time the American Secretary of Defence William Cohen reiterated his countryrsquos conditions and indirectly threatened that NATO could become a lsquorelic of the pastrsquo (Cohen 2000a 2000b 2000d) This was highly effective with respect to the British administration which conse-quently introduced some changes into its final position accommodating American requests39

The new force will have its own military staff But in keeping with US wishes it will number fewer than 100 most of them acting as advisers based at EU headquarters in Brussels and will have no planning logistics or operational capability of its own ( ) By giving NATO the right of first refusal over military operations and relying on NATO planning and forces



from its command headquarters in Mons Belgium the Europeans have implicitly decided to give the United States veto power over European military operations officials said40

In other words the American administration largely succeeded in influ-encing its special partner in this phase of the study This suggests from a transaction costs perspective that the prospect of enormously high risks of opportunism (that is weakened US commitment) constrained the British government to the extent that some of the functionally reasonable rules ndash such as facilities for military planning ndash had to be subordinated to the American position

Finally the incoming George W Bush administration was critical of the ESDP but did not yet directly interfere in London The interactions between both administrations started with a telling departure from protocol when the new Secretary of Defence first issued an invitation to the Conservative defence spokesman Iain Duncan Smith

The Bush administration signalled its dismay at Tony Blairrsquos willingness to sign Britain up to the European Rapid Reaction force yesterday when Donald Rumsfeld the new defence secretary summoned the Conservative defence spokesman for talks at the Pentagon ( ) Mr Blair will be con-cerned that such a passionate opponent of the force has briefed the US Defence Secretary a week ahead of his own visit41

However the Prime Minister was able to alleviate American concerns about the new force and build trust between the two governments during their first consultations (Bush and Blair 2001a 2001b) The terrorist attacks of 911 and the subsequent military interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq brought the two countries even closer together

Just as with the Nice negotiations in 2000 the US administration inter-fered when Tony Blair began to make concessions to France and Germany at the Convention42 The critical point was again the question of military planning facilities and the headquarters issue At the end of 2003 when the Big Three were about to reach agreement on this question the US was con-cerned about whether its interests were being sufficiently taken into account The administration and the US President therefore personally intervened in London again to safeguard its position within the Convention negotiations among the EU members (US Department of Defense 2003) Again Tony Blair was able to calm American concerns and the headquarters compromise of the lsquocivilianndashmilitary cellrsquo was acceptable to the Americans (Bush 2003a 2003b)

The main difference from the previous phase was that the overwhelm-ingly close security cooperation since the autumn of 2001 had reduced the importance of British isolationist concerns In other words the initial



trigger was missing at the Convention or had at least lost prominence The previous British position had been locked in it wanted to develop the ESDP further but largely in a way that was fully compatible with the American position In conclusion Table 62 summarises the results of the process- tracing analysis from this chapter

Broadly speaking the British Conservative government of the mid- 1990s did not emphasise a changed European security environment even though it had to intervene for instance in the Balkans This hesitant view was not accompanied by substantial risks of opportunism because ndash from a British perspective ndash Washington had ultimately been willing to resolve European conflicts such as in Bosnia In the aftermath of that conflict however the UK also perceived a decreasing interest and even commitment to Europersquos case among the American political class Thus isolationist and burden- sharing signals from the US emerged as a severe problem for the government Similar to the previous analysis of Germany the United Kingdom was increasingly concerned about the hegemonrsquos provision of certain public goods in the European security market It even fully agreed with Americarsquos complaints about Europersquos unwilling-ness to invest more strongly in military assets In contrast to Germany then the unilateralist pull of the United States in the new millennium was less problematic for two main reasons firstly the UK was normally consulted in advance secondly it often participated and thus became closer to Washington Therefore its transaction costs for the provision of European security did not increase further as they did for Germany

Table 62 The United Kingdom and its lsquosignallingrsquo with the United States

Great Britainthe United States and European Security


US security interests US position on ESDP


Support for NATOBerlin Plus and basically no risks of opportunism



Isolationist concern and strong increase in risks of opportunism

Conditional support for the ESDP(but threat of increased risks of opportunism if conditions were not met)


Reduced isolationist concern and stable level of risks of opportunism

Still conditional support(but threat of massive risks of opportunism maintained)



because no mutually enforcing interaction effect emerged Instead the risks of opportunism and thus transaction costs remained largely con-stant This accounts for the status quo approach chosen by the UK in the course of the Convention deliberations in 2003ndash4

The British choice of the institutional context

The British government had never considered exiting NATO Instead it was the prototypical case where we could observe serious attempts to gain a stronger voice in Washington through a capable ESDP The idea was that only a militarily strong Europe would be taken seriously both at the White House and on Capitol Hill While for Paris and Berlin this was seen merely as a positive side- effect it triggered the approach of the Blair administra-tion (eg Blair 1998a 1998c) This contributes not only to the explanation of the UKrsquos preference for establishing the ESDP but also to the differences between its desired scope of operational vs defence planning The United Kingdom also had four institution- building options in European security

I) NATO as a wholeII) NATO with a strong lsquoEuropean pillarrsquo (that could act independently)III) The EU as an independent security institution highly compatible with


As the main architect of Berlin Plus Great Britainrsquos point of departure was clearly between the alternatives I) and II) Like its German partner then the risks of opportunism in terms of the uncertain American commitment to provide security in an increasingly dangerous environment triggered British preferences on substantive scope By the end of the 1990s the government perceived a lack of credible information about the hegemonrsquos future secu-rity policies in Europe For instance numerous commentators mentioned the occasion when politicalndashmilitary advisers presented Europersquos military options to Tony Blair during the 1998 Kosovo crisis In essence there were no options and the newly elected Prime Minister was not amused This coincided with increasingly strong isolationist currents in the United States It was not so much the immediate engagement (this was relatively assured) as the long- term engagement that was questioned In other words British uncertainty about Americarsquos commitment to Europersquos backyard crises sig-nificantly increased the transaction costs of options I) and II) Accordingly the provision of European security was assessed as increasingly costly so alternatives entered the political agenda

The UK government however made clear from the very beginning that option IV) would under no realistic circumstances be considered American signals contributed to the UKrsquos assessment that the acceptance of the red lines would more effectively reduce transaction costs while option IV)



would indirectly accelerate an American withdrawal Just as in the German case study then the somewhat paradoxical result is that the risks of oppor-tunism stemming from the future capacity of NATO to supply European security drove the British shift at St Malo It entailed the establishment of a security and defence pillar within the EU while at the same time avoid-ing its full exit The objective was thus to find a politically acceptable and military capable institutional arrangement for option III) which would at the same time offer opportunities for an improved voice in Washington and Brussels In transaction costs terms the British government wanted to strengthen the EUrsquos responsibilities for military planning to improve the information exchanges and coordination on the security risks lurking in the background There was to be a viable lsquoEU- only optionrsquo that was never-theless compatible with NATO This was aimed at reducing existing uncer-tainties without producing new ones (see table 63)

The process- tracing analysis of the signals sent between the UK and the US has provided a good illustration of the mutually reinforcing triggers of British preference formation transaction costs for the provision of European security increased over the course of the 1990s due primarily to the interrelationship between a perceived demand for a security institution linked to an isolation-ist concern by the British government how should security be provided in the European security setting if the United States was reluctant to perform this task In other words the relative magnitude of transaction costs provides the most fundamental explanation of the UKrsquos shift in 1998 and thus of this bookrsquos major finding The government ordered the desired outcomes accord-ing to the opportunities they offered for reducing transaction costs for the provision of European security The prospect of having no credible options

Table 63 British transaction costs for the provision of European security and its resulting choice of the institutional context

Great Britain and transaction costs for the provision of European security


Great Britainrsquos resulting choice of the institutional context



Some increase Preference for optionsI) andor II)

No risks of opportunism


Strong increase Preference for II) and in particular III)



Further increase Stable preference for options II) andor III)

No unilateralist and decreased isolationist concern



without recourse to uncertain American capabilities led to the assessment that its traditional cooperative exchanges entailed high transaction costs Therefore Great Britain preferred crisis management as a functional task for the ESDP while maintaining its opposition to collective defence

At the same time the relative magnitude of transaction costs also explained the fairly lsquostatus quorsquo nature of the approach that the Blair administration took during the Convention deliberations In contrast to Germany the risks of opportunism based on the isolationist concern were not combined with unilateralist worries Although the UK might remain the junior partner it was still the one being consulted by the lonely superpower According to that this interaction effect that was so critical for Germanyrsquos increased transaction costs and thus its preferences was largely absent in the British case Moreover Washingtonrsquos direct interference set the conditions that needed to be met to ensure a continuing American commitment ndash or in terms of transaction costs a threatening scenario of extremely severe risks of opportunism This tradeoff between functionally reasonable investments in the ESDP without scaring away the lsquospecial partnerrsquo constitutes the key to British preferences

Finally the British case study also suggested the heuristic value of dis-tinguishing between operational and defence planning which was the minor finding of the study The increased risks of opportunism at the end of the 1990s encouraged the government to take a significant step forward with respect to operations while at the same time the overall approach still implied focusing primarily on enhanced defence planning The American red lines influenced British preferences to the extent that they determined when the special partner would turn away The analysis demonstrated that this would be applied primarily with respect to operational planning In contrast capabilities that would also have a utility for NATO were much easier to tolerate In other words progressive steps in defence planning did not risk the rise of new transaction costs for the UK while a larger sub-stantive scope for operational planning did The government ordered the outcomes it desired from the EU negotiations accordingly so because trans-action costs decreased or at least remained stable there was no need for further reforms Thus the government maintained its status quo approach and wanted merely to improve European capabilities in the course of the Convention negotiations Again the UK preferred a stronger EU responsibil-ity for defence than for operational planning


97

7France ndash From Gradual WEU Integration to Full- Scale ESDP

French preferences on substantive scope

France differed from both preceding case studies to the extent that it was characterised by a high degree of consistency over time The government preferred far- reaching proposals for the EUrsquos substantive scope in the mid- 1990s even more so during the Convention- IGC almost a decade later At a simplistic level one could say that France continuously wanted a great deal The second major difference was that the government consequently focused on both high- intensity crisis management and the lsquoEU- only optionrsquo While neither Germany nor the UK completely opposed these functional tasks for the EU at least after 1998 both placed a stronger emphasis on low- intensity crisis management and Berlin Plus arrangements Francersquos view was that the Union should be essentially responsible for all functional tasks and thus evolve as a full- scale and dominant security institution

Amsterdam and the integration of the WEU

At the beginning of the Maastricht reform deliberations Francersquos propos-als for institutional reforms were fairly unspecific (Howorth 1997 35) At that time it strongly favoured far- reaching responsibilities for the EU in security and defence The overall objective was a merger of the WEU and the EU Firstly the EU was to become engaged in collective defence For that purpose the non- aligned members needed to give up their neutral-ity If this was not possible collective defence could enter the treaties via flexible arrangements Thus the French supported the establishment of a European capacity for military action ndash without requiring all to participate At the same time the government emphasised its willingness to supple-ment rather than replace NATO (Juppeacute 1996 de Charette 1996)1 France also wanted to incorporate the Petersberg Tasks into the EU The WEUrsquos and thus the EUrsquos operational capabilities were to be strengthened so that the Union could acquire a credible intervention instrument in political crises The EU was to have unlimited recourse to the WEUrsquos assets (Balladur 1994



Chirac 1996a French Government 1996c) The precise procedure needed to be established as rapidly as possible in order to give the European Council the political authority to deal more effectively with international crises In addition the French government correspondingly preferred the EU to have responsibility for all kinds of crisis management (Barnier 1996 de Charette and Dini 1997)

Secondly France clearly supported common defence planning at the EU level (Howorth 1997 41ndash3) This should be applied to all functional areas Even coordination of nuclear policies was considered2 Future cooperation in European defence planning was to build on the Eurocorps experience which represented Francersquos most far- reaching integration since the country did not participate in NATOrsquos integrated command structure France advanced the idea of establishing a European Peace Corps consisting mainly of the large EU members (French Government 1996c see also EP- Briefing 1997b)3 This was the most extensive demand made in the mid- 1990s With respect to the establishment of a European defence market the French government was more cautious or even protectionist ndash especially when it came to competi-tion with the large US companies Nevertheless it basically supported the objective (IISS 1995 38ndash9) Due to the fact that France was fundamentally transforming its military into a power projection force the government supported increasing cooperation in defence planning Franco- German coordination was thereby intended to serve as the nucleus of Europe- wide institution- building (Chirac 1996b French Ministry of Defence 1996) The government wanted to create more European power projection capabilities (such as strategic reconnaissance and transforming the Eurocorps into a cri-sis management capability) (Barnier 1996 Kinkel and de Charette 1996) Finally common defence planning should also encompass military assets for low- intensity crisis management In particular the government empha-sised the importance of improved strategic transport capacities for the EU members (eg Juppeacute 1996 see also EP- Briefing 1997a)

In sum France was the clearest supporter of bringing the whole spectrum of military planning into the EU It ordered the possible outcomes of the Amsterdam negotiation according to the idea that the EU should evolve as a full- scale security institution in basically all respects This was however not automatically directed against NATO ndash at least from an official point of view After all it was at this time that France seriously considered returning to the Alliancersquos military structures (eg Millon 1996)4

The breakthrough of St Malo

By the declaration of St Malo the United Kingdom subscribed to one of Francersquos longest- standing desired outcomes in European security namely that the ldquoUnion must have the capacity for autonomous action backed up by credible military forcesrdquo5 At the same time the French had to acknowledge not only NATOrsquos de facto primacy but the Alliancersquos active involvement in


France and Preferences on Substantive Scope 99

the EUrsquos security and defence policy That was the initial point of the ESDP and the government needed to adjust its approach to European security accordingly Firstly Francersquos consistently preferred mechanism would have been a comprehensive integration of the WEU into the EU In other words it still preferred a collective defence function for the EU whereas this was at that time ndash as for Germany ndash not such a salient issue and could thus be reasonably postponed6 This would not be targeted at NATO However most EU members were not totally persuaded by these statements (eg Chirac 2000 Goulard 2000 17ndash9) The French government unambiguously pre-ferred the incorporation of high- intensity crisis management into the EUrsquos tasks There was to be no division of labour between an lsquoAmerica that does the cookingrsquo and a lsquoEurope that does the dishesrsquo The French President there-fore strove to maintain the momentum of the Cologne European Council and made ambitious proposals for the ESDP which further framed the debate (Chirac 1999b) In this respect France was the clearest proponent of a high- intensity combat role for the EU while both Germany and Great Britain were more hesitant The French government was therefore commit-ted to excluding NATO as far as possible from the establishment of the ESDP in this phase because it feared that it might ldquosteamroller the infant ESDP into adopting structures procedures and policies which would be unduly influenced by Washington and would therefore be likely simply to replicate NATO practicerdquo (Howorth 2000 56) Not surprisingly the French govern-ment also wanted the EU to engage in military planning for low- intensity crisis management the earlier the better (Chirac 1999b)7

Secondly when it came to the actual military build- up France was very close to British beliefs about appropriate defence planning within the EU It wanted the EU to build military forces for power projection rather than territorial defence This regularly brought the government up against its German partner For instance France wanted to transform the Eurocorps into a rapid reaction capability which also corresponded much more closely to its ambitious national defence reforms (eg Chirac 1999a Rynning 1999 2002 137ndash73) In short the French supported cooperation in all areas of defence planning but wanted to focus on one clear priority namely power projection Even though France accepted Berlin Plus it preferred the EUrsquos defence planning to focus on EU- only operations (Chirac 1999a Veacutedrine 1999) That was the most significant difference from Britain in this domain The government therefore wanted to improve the strategic lifting capacities to gain some independence from the United States (eg Richard 2000a) For example it planned some sealift jointly with the Netherlands and initiated a procurement initiative for battlefield- surveillance and target- acquisition capabilities with its main European partners (IISS 2002 288ndash294) The EU should carry responsibilities in defence planning for both high- and low- intensity crisis management (Franco- German Defence and Security Council 1999a Jospin 1999) Taken as a whole France had promoted ambitious



proposals since the end of the Cold War and had largely maintained them over the course of the period of analysis

The Convention and full- scale ESDP

As with President Chiracrsquos attempts to maintain the momentum after St Malo with his lsquoAction Planrsquo (Chirac 1999b) the French government addressed the Convention deliberations with ambitious aims Not only was the intro-duction of solidarity clauses promoted but the EU was also to become a viable actor with respect to rapid crisis management and gradually decrease its dependence on NATOrsquos assets Accordingly the EU members were to increase their power projection capabilities by jointly making their weapons procurement more efficient and by spending more on military equipment France therefore supported strengthened armaments cooperation as long as it remained under national control (eg Jospin 2001 Chirac 2001a Franco- German Defence and Security Council 2002)

Firstly the French government still supported mutual assistance clauses Its preferences were linked not only to terrorist threats or natural disas-ters and it argued that lsquoanything that happens to one member state affects allrsquo Thus France advanced the dual principle of solidarity and common security (de Villepin 2002 2003)8 It supported furthermore updating the Petersberg Tasks and wanted to strengthen the EUrsquos capacities particularly in terms of the most demanding missions The lsquoEU- only optionrsquo should gradually become more capable and thus more likely to be applied (Chirac 2001a 2001b Franco- German Defence and Security Council 2003) As a result the EU was to develop into one of the main regional organisations conducting military operations upon request by the UN In this context the Franco- British lsquobattlegroup conceptrsquo emerged In short Paris preferred responsibilities for the EUrsquos military planning along the whole spectrum of contemporary crisis management (Chirac 2002b de Villepin and Fischer 2002 European Defence Meeting 2003 see also Kempin 2004)

Secondly like the United Kingdom France regarded the ESDP as a kind of force generator While the former however identified new capabilities as primarily useful for NATO Francersquos focus was undoubtedly on the lsquoEU- only optionrsquo to decrease the long- standing dependence on the United States With this in mind the French government preferred a strong role for the EU in defence planning This process should be guided by the EU Military Staff on a strictly intergovernmental basis (de Villepin and Fischer 2002)9 Furthermore it supported strengthened European armaments coopera-tion while this domain was not to become integrated into the single mar-ket where the EU Commission held a strong position (European Defence Meeting 2003 see also Becker and Kempin 2005)10 French defence planning was decreasingly directed towards classical territorial defence and instead towards projecting power This crucial shift had taken root in the mid- 1990s and thus should be applied to most of the EUrsquos defence efforts (eg French



Ministry of Defence 2002 Rynning 2002 157ndash9)11 In this context the gov-ernment also saw the necessity to duplicate some of NATOrsquos processes since it often did not participate in the Alliancersquos defence planning (eg Chirac 2002a 2002b) In addition the French government strongly preferred to tackle the main shortfalls at the lower Petersberg end immediately12 The A- 400M project in particular aimed at creating a European capability for strategic air transport was a priority Thus it also supported a common tactical training unit for A- 400M crews and other training centres (eg de Villepin and Fischer 2002 de Villepin 2002 European Defence Meeting 2003)

As indicated above the French government also initiated the lsquobattlegroup conceptrsquo of the EUrsquos Headline Goal 2010 which represented the reformed Helsinki objectives from 1999 in defence planning (EU- ISS 2005 10ndash6) While France was actively participating in NATOrsquos Response Force it simul-taneously promoted this similar though less demanding instrument For the battlegroups Paris and London primarily built on their experiences in Africa (Kempin 2004)13 The French in this sense much closer to Britain regarded lsquomilitary effectivenessrsquo as the driving force behind this project In conclusion the investigation of French preferences on substantive scope can be summarised as shown in Table 71

Table 71 Detailed overview of French preferences on substantive scope

France and Preferences Regarding Substantive Scope






defence planning


defence planning


defence planning


+ + + + + + + +


+ + + + + + + + + +


+ + + + ++ + + + +




In sum this investigation has identified two main findings From a com-parative perspective it was France of the three countries examined that preferred the greatest substantive scope of the ESDP Its ordering of pos-sible outcomes referred to the whole range of military planning In addi-tion from a temporal point of view French preferences were characterised by a high degree of continuity The main challenge is now the issue of to what extent the studyrsquos transaction costs framework which successfully explained change within the previous cases is similarly suitable for explain-ing the pronounced continuity of the French case

Explaining French preferences on substance providing security in a highly uncertain environment

This section argues once again that the transaction costs of the provi-sion of European security drove French preferences on substantive scope Even though the ultimate results differ greatly from the previous cases the mechanism behind Francersquos preferences was essentially identical The inter-action between a perceived demand for a security institution and the risks of opportunism linked to providing European security represents the key to French preferences on substantive scope The government saw a need for a political- military instrument to tackle future instabilities in Europe and beyond The French case however differed in two important respects Firstly the interaction effect was not constrained by ex ante transaction costs stemming from the threat of a potential American withdrawal Secondly the French non- integration into most of NATOrsquos military planning proc-esses further contributed to the fact that the transaction costs of Francersquos cooperative exchanges for the provision of security were consistently the highest among the Big Three

France the United States and the provision of European security

As in the previous cases I focus on French interactions with the United States even though the latter was not Francersquos most desired partner for the provision of European security Nevertheless France had to deal with the superpower due simply to its weight in most issues of importance for this study14 Again I trace back the lsquosignallingrsquo processes between Washington and Paris to determine the latterrsquos comparative assessment of NATOrsquos and the EUrsquos capacity to provide European security In short what were the risks of opportunism that emerged from this process that ultimately contributed to French transaction costs

Crucially Francersquos few opportunities to access and influence the United States reinforced its isolationist concerns and thus contributed to its high level of risks of opportunism from the outset While the United Kingdom could ultimately build on its special relationship with the superpower Germany was in the beginning of the analysis much less involved in those exchanges



that were to actively provide the public good of European security When the latter began to engage more strongly the case study demonstrated that German risks of opportunism also increased Due to its generally good rela-tionship with the United States however some assurances remained that were absent in the French case

It is important to note in this context that French concerns about US isolationism were based much more on concrete policies such as the Balkans than on questions of institution- building (such as NATO) During the Bosnian and to some degree the Kosovo crisis Europe had to wait for the superpower The problem for France was thus not so much a complete withdrawal of America but the fact that it retained a significant say in all questions of European security In this regard France was indeed uncer-tain about the credibility of the American commitment The constraining impact of US conditions for the ESDP which functioned as an important constraint for Germany and the UK essentially did not play a role in the French case Finally the government was concerned when the unilateralist pull in American foreign policy became enhanced after George W Bush entered office This overall constellation of signals continuously determined Francersquos preference for granting the EU ndash rather than NATO ndash full- scale responsibilities for military planning


At this stage I return to the two- fold problem of many European coun-tries in their transatlantic relations isolationist trends on the one hand and growing unilateralism on the other While the United Statesrsquo inter-ests were obviously the same as in both the previous case studies there was an important difference in the Franco- American interactions Most sig-nificantly French perceptions of the signals were somewhat different Two developments were the main cause of Francersquos uncertainty about the US commitment to European security Washingtonrsquos hesitancy about deploy-ing military forces to the Balkans in combination with concerns that George W Bushrsquos administration was staffed with many senior officials who held to a straightforward lsquoAmerica Firstrsquo position

Firstly the Bosnian experience was constitutive for French security policy in many regards (eg Gnesotto 1996 Greacutegoire 2002 7 16)16 Its impact was even clearer than in the British case The government interpreted it pri-marily as a manifestation of European inability combined with an American unwillingness to provide security in Europersquos backyard (Gallis 2006 14) As one of the most influential contributions argued

The French were dismayed at US reaction to the Bosnian crisis and the nature of the French anxieties over US policy began to shift Rather than fearing a continuing US hegemony in Western Europe that the end of the Cold War had rendered unjustifiable France started to worry more about



US disengagement an outcome that would be all the more alarming in light of the limitations of Europersquos intervention in Bosnia (Grant 1996 64)

At that point in time Francersquos efforts were concentrated on rapprochement with the Alliance This would not only increase Europersquos military ability but could also decrease Washingtonrsquos unwillingness In other words it was a strategy of voice Thus the government still planned for a strengthened European pillar within NATO In the words of then- Minister of Defence Charles Millon

Cumbersome structures and force of habit have weighed heavily on the planning and implementation for the Bosnian operation () There are lessons that must be learned here France means to contribute to this process by proposing two priority lines of action strengthening politi-cal control and consolidating the European identity within the Alliance (Millon 1996 Web- Edition)

In addition the French view of US signals sent during the Bosnian crisis was regarded not so much as an unfortunate incident but as clear evidence of diverging interests between Europe and the United States a divergence that was expected to increase in the future From a French perspective the country had offered as many concessions as possible to the Alliance dur-ing the negotiations about its re- integration In particular French forces operated not only under NATO procedures but even under its command (Gloannec 1997 86) so French reservations about both integrated military structures and American dominance needed to be overcome Nevertheless after French rapprochement with the Alliance had failed (eg Tiersky 1997 Utley 2001 142ndash6) the government drew one central conclusion while the provision of European security required non- American solutions (in other words exit) military operations would evolve further on a multilateral basis (Howorth 1997 34 see also Menon 2000 120ndash30) This was made apparent in retrospect by a report from the French Parliament about the relationship between the United States and Europe

In the first place there is no longer an automatic connection between European security and US intervention during the Cold War a crisis within Europe had consequences internationally and directly affected American interests These days however crises within Europe such as the conflicts which shook the Balkans during the last decade are part of a regional problem and do not automatically affect the United States Certainly the US did intervene somewhat late in the day in Bosnia and at the beginning of the Kosovo crisis realistically however it has to be said that it is more a question of the inability of Europeans to deal with



these situations on their own rather than the interests of the United States that prompts US intervention (French National Assembly 2005 13 of 60)

Uncertainty about the satisfactory provision of European security had grown significantly due to the conjunction of instabilities in its backyard Francersquos ambitions to do something to counter them and Americarsquos hesi-tance about committing itself In other words France was confronted with significant risks of opportunism At the same time voice opportunities within NATOrsquos military structures were basically locked and French forces had nonetheless to adjust to the Alliancersquos procedures in the field In short Francersquos transaction costs for the provision of European security were at comparatively high levels

This isolationist concern among French officials was further reinforced by signals from the US Congress (Gloannec 1997 Gallis 2006 30) The American domestic situation was believed to create substantial problems with respect to the deployment of US ground troops in the medium- or even short- term These prerequisites ndash linked to the expectation that further crises would certainly evolve ndash were a cause of serious concern within the French government As the United States was thought to have been gradu-ally disengaging from European security since the mid- 1990s it should also have given up the claims to its leadership position This latter point in particular led to tensions between French and American officials (Menon 2000 69ndash71)17 Furthermore many members of George W Bushrsquos admin-istration saw Francersquos ambitions as some sort of challenge to the American leadership18 They therefore advocated lsquoAmerica Firstrsquo even more strongly More specifically notions such as lsquohyperpuissancersquo lsquograndeurrsquo or lsquomonde multipolairersquo (Chirac 1999a Veacutedrine 1999) were primarily understood as French efforts to mobilise international opposition to American initiatives (eg Berger 1999)

Some US observers characterize France as an antagonist The current French ambassador reportedly has charged that some US officials have deliberately spread lsquolies and disinformationrsquo about French policies in order to undercut Paris (Gallis 2006 2)

This highly suspicious attitude towards the French was held across the political specturm from moderate voices such as Condoleezza Rice to the neo- conservatives who were particularly hostile19 These tensions finally culminated when the French foreign minister overtly opposed the US in the UN Security Council in March 2003 (eg Hofmann and Kempin 2007 3ndash6)

Secondly the French government was somewhat concerned about unilat-eralist trends in American foreign policy This had already been perceived



at the end of the 1990s but gained greater relevance after George W Bush entered office in Washington France had always wanted to have some voice in US security policy but at the same time it accepted Americarsquos special status as a superpower Nevertheless the French President vehemently rep-rimanded the US Congress for not ratifying the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty in 1999

The French president said that he ldquodeplored the current American disen-gagement on several major issues as a result of congressional decisionsrdquo ( ) Mr Chirac focused his anger on Congress saying that it ldquoall too often succumbs to the temptations of unilateralism and isolationismrdquo20

This fear of unilateralism was also the fundamental building block of the whole idea of lsquomultipolarityrsquo that France had so often promoted (eg Chirac 1999a) Both the French foreign minister and the President ldquocalled for lsquoa multipolar worldrsquo in which the United States would have decreasing weight internationally starting with growing US absence from European securityrdquo21 In plain contrast to Britain and Germany France was in this regard the only country that interpreted the unipolar world order as a sort of threat to its interests The French Foreign Minister Hubert Veacutedrine referred to the United States as a lsquohyperpuissancersquo and said ldquoLa France qui est lrsquoheacuteritiegravere drsquoune histoire prestigieuse est potentiellement menaceacutee par cette eacutevolution du monderdquo (Veacutedrine 1997)22 This clearly did not imply that France was con-cerned about its territorial integrity in the classical understanding of lsquothreatsrsquo in International Relations but instead that its interests as a global power were from time to time threatened when they diverged from the American ones In other words French concerns pointed towards a qualitatively differ-ent relationship between Paris and Washington (Serfaty 2005) These worries were relatively constant within the French political class even though they became rather more prominent after the United States declared the lsquowar on terrorrsquo in late 2001 (eg French National Assembly 2005 14 of 60)

France perceived the war on terror as a predominantly unilateral enter-prise that indirectly weakened European security The government argued that France wanted to remain a reliable and responsible partner of the US while avoiding becoming a blind ally (eg de Villepin 2002)23 The American intervention in Afghanistan with minimal assistance from its allies had already been criticised and the war against Iraq was then subject to overt opposition from the French government (Gallis 2006 2) The traditionally problematic bilateral relationship severely worsened over these frictions about Americarsquos unilateral actions as the French saw them (Chirac 2003a) and only gradually improved afterwards24 ldquoEurope and the United States are so different that it would be useless to pretend that they share exactly the same vision of the world they nevertheless share fundamental values and numerous interestsrdquo (French National Assembly 2005 36)



Like the German case the USrsquos security interests and the concomitant signals it sent inspired a mutually reinforcing trend among Francersquos politi-cal actors While the isolationist concern was based primarily on concrete crisis management such as in the Balkans it was reinforced by the overall French assessment that Washington did not take other powers sufficiently into account This was enhanced by the new unilateralism that found its expression in the American war on terror25

In sum French preferences for strengthening the EUrsquos responsibilities for military planning were driven by the American signals sent from the start of the 1990s and their bilateral relations The problem was that the government had essentially no voice opportunity to encourage further American commitment and thereby reduce its risks of opportunism This process remained overwhelmingly stable during the period of analysis and thus contributed to the continually high transaction costs of Francersquos coop-erative exchanges for the provision of European security The conclusion drawn was in the words of President Chirac that a credible Europe ldquomeans acquiring the military capabilities to be able to decide and act without relying on choices made elsewhererdquo (Chirac 2000 emphasis added)


As indicated above the US administration swung between opposition to European autonomy and support for better transatlantic burden- sharing Most of the time it was suspicious towards the French because the latter was regarded as a permanent problem for NATOrsquos unity (eg Sloan 2000 6ndash9) Accordingly the US also set certain conditions but focused less on France since its own influence could regularly be expected to be higher in London or in Berlin As a consequence Francersquos voice opportunities were limited Furthermore the militariesrsquo common experiences in NATOrsquos integrated command structures were lacking in the French case which further com-plicated the signalling processes Therefore what primarily differentiated the French case from both of the previous cases was the conjunction of two aspects while French non- participation in SHAPE increased its transaction costs with respect to ongoing multilateral crisis management the shadow of a potential US withdrawal from Europe weighed significantly less for Paris It is shown below how this configuration of differences had a major impact on the French governmentrsquos comparative institutional assessment

Firstly the US administration of the 1990s allowed for some steps towards European autonomy in defence issues ndash or a greater say as long as it would remain within NATO structures One of the main rationales was in fact to bring the militarily capable France back into the Alliancersquos structures Therefore this period was characterised by increasing trust between the two long- standing antagonists (Grant 1996 64 Hunter 2002 xvi)26 France indi-rectly strove for some sort of division of labour between NATO and Europe the former for territorial defence and the latter for crisis management In the



words of French Foreign Minister Herveacute de Charette the Petersberg Tasks were of ldquoreal importance because in practice they are the ones which in future have every chance of being carried outrdquo (de Charette 1996 cited from Howorth 1997 35) This sort of deacutetente somewhat reduced French uncer-tainty about the superpowerrsquos commitment which had risen recently due to the experiences in Bosnia When French rapprochement failed because of disagreements about NATOrsquos military command posts and enlargement however the mistrust re- emerged rapidly (eg Tiersky 1997) By the end of the 1990s the two- fold French efforts for a European defence identity had proved futile

The EU- based approach had shown significant limitations as Francersquos partners were reluctant to countenance the creation of a European secu-rity and defence stance independent of the United States The alterna-tive approach working to construct such a position within the Alliance had proved equally limited as French and US interests collided (Utley 2001 145)

In terms of transaction costs the French government was faced with high risks of opportunism in its attempts to provide European security However the threat of a potential US withdrawal if the Europeans did not comply with certain conditions did not affect the French government in the same way as some of its European partners In other words the worst case sce-nario of exponentially rising uncertainty of further American disengage-ment was largely absent because France expected enhanced efforts by the Europeans under this potential condition

Secondly after the relatively surprising breakthrough of St Malo the French government wanted to accommodate American concerns (Albright 1998) However its status as the main proponent of the European autonomy approach frequently brought it into direct confrontation with Washington27 That was particularly observable during the treaty negotiations in Nice in 2000 While the French President tried to strengthen the EUrsquos responsibility for military planning the Americans pressured the UK and provoked seri-ous tensions with Paris over these questions28

By responding to US concerns the Europeans moved away from Francersquos desire for a European defense identity separate from NATO and not sub-servient to the United States Just Thursday French President Jacques Chirac seemed again to be pressing for a European military force sepa-rate from NATO lsquoCoordinated but independentrsquo Chirac said at a news conference29

In contrast to its EU partners the French government primarily wanted to reduce transaction costs among the EU members since its lsquochoicersquo of an



institution was basically decided After all permanently adjusting to NATO procedures was inherently expensive for France in terms of transaction costs In contrast the threat of a potential withdrawal was assessed as clearly less relevant and thus costly ndash as one senior official stated after Nice

There were lsquodifferent sensibilitiesrsquo between France whose military forces are not integrated within the NATO command and other allies ldquosome people want to do everything within NATO We want to keep real auton-omy for the EUrdquo he said30

As a result the principal difference lay with the question of NATO integra-tion and thus transaction costs of how to provide European security in the future That substantially differentiated France from Germany and the UK

Finally these transaction costs did not fundamentally change during the last phase of the period covered by this study While the terrorist attacks of 911 appeared at first to improve Franco- American relations the military interventions in Afghanistan and particularly Iraq created severe tensions Since EU facilities for military planning were continuously on the agenda the bilateral relations rather worsened (US Department of Defense 2003)31 Many officials in the new administration believed that France would actively seek to undermine NATO in order to reduce American influence in Europe It was often seen to lsquopunch above its weightrsquo These allegations were however strongly denied by French officials (Gallis 2006 13ndash6) At the same time American influence in Europe was again channelled through London and Berlin when the headquarters issue threatened to escalate32 In that sense nothing had really changed since the previous phases

In sum Franco- American interactions about European security arrange-ments did not affect French risks of opportunism as extensively as did the United Statesrsquo general security interests Even though they did not decrease uncertainty neither did they increase it Despite some ambivalence the French government always understood what was at stake The withdrawal threat looming in the background however did not represent a comparable problem for France since it was not integrated into NATOrsquos military struc-tures except for its participation in the basically European NATO Response Force (NRF) Thus withdrawal would not be a genuine worst case

To sum up the process- tracing analysis demonstrated that the most important causal effect was the interaction between the perceived demand for a security institution linked to substantial risks of opportunism in the European security setting In contrast to its partners who were participating in NATOrsquos command structure the French costs of transacting were consid-erably higher from the very beginning That was reinforced by the French claim to play a leading role in the risky security environment Hence far- reaching responsibilities for the EU in military planning would be an effec-tive and thus desirable institution that would counter these high levels of



transaction costs for the provision of European security The analysis of these signalling processes is summarised in Table 72

The French choice of the institutional context

The previous sections have shown that French voice opportunities in the United States were limited Nevertheless a more complete exit from NATO than French non- integration into the military structures had never been considered Instead the Alliance was regarded as a kind of lsquodinosaurrsquo33 that could remain useful for the unlikely task of large- scale territorial defence This sectionrsquos point of departure is again the four specific options for institution- building in European security

I) NATO as a whole II) NATO with strong lsquoEuropean pillarrsquo (that could act independently)III) The EU as an independent security institution highly compatible with

NATO andIV) The EU as security institution fully detached from NATO

In the mid- 1990s the starting point was NATOrsquos dominant position within the contemporary European security setting Unlike Germany or the United Kingdom the French government had never been a wholehearted supporter of option I) This was primarily because of its reduced voice opportunities within the Alliance Option II) however had been seriously considered in the mid- 1990s mainly because of French experi-ences in the Balkans While the UKrsquos interpretation of the Bosnian crises

Table 72 France and its lsquosignallingrsquo with the United States

France the United States and European Security




Uncertainty about the American commitment (eg Bosnia) increasing isolationist concern and severe risks of opportunism



Risks of opportunism at a high but stable level

Conditional support for the ESDP(relatively negligible for France)


Risks of opportunism at a stable level isolationist concern combined with new unilateralism

Still conditional support(despite increasing tensions relatively negligible for France)



mainly placed the emphasis on the fact that the United States ultimately intervened the French reading drew a distinct conclusion Washington had been reluctant for a considerable time to commit forces Thus the United Statesrsquo hesitations with respect to Europersquos security problems combined with the limited French voice opportunities in Washington contributed as far as France was concerned to much greater risks of opportunism in its attempts to provide European security In addition its military needed to permanently adjust to NATOrsquos procedures on the ground which appeared increasingly problematic In short French trans-action costs within the initial setting were relatively high This made a European pillar within NATO at least attractive to the government

Furthermore we saw that the American threat of disengagement which had a strongly constraining impact on both Germany and the UK was largely ineffective in the French case Therefore Paris was considerably less concerned about the exponentially rising risks of opportunism should the US withdraw from Europe Put differently France would have preferred an unambiguous American approach either a full commitment to European security with a reliable engagement of (ground) forces or withdrawal with the consequence of losing its veto position in all questions of European security The process- tracing of the signalling however pointed into the opposite direction namely a kind of built- in American ambiguity As a result there was a combination of a perceived demand for institutions in European security severe doubts about the credibility of the American commitment and at the same time costly adjustments to the Alliance on the ground This made both options I) and II) inherently expensive in terms of transac-tion costs

Based on the lesser impact of the American lsquothreat of complete with-drawalrsquo the French government at least considered option IV) While the United Kingdom and Germany excluded this possibility above all for politi-cal reasons (that is accommodation with the US) France distanced itself primarily for functional reasons (that is because Europe was not capable of providing security) Despite permanent suspicions towards the Americans Paris expected similar risks of opportunism if Europe took on all responsi-bility for the provision of European security Thus option IV) was also prob-lematic for France in transaction costs terms Hence both options II) and IV) entailed significantly high risks of opportunism and thus increasingly suggested a focus on option III)

The consequence was a preference for a European Security and Defence Policy that would remain compatible with NATO while at the same time guaranteeing the lsquoautonomous decision- making capacity of the EUrsquo34 This approach offered the opportunity of reducing transaction costs for the provision of European security on a sustainable basis On the one hand the dependence on the American willingness to participate and thus the expected opportunism would gradually decrease Instead of waiting for



American troops Europe could act autonomously On the other hand the ESDP served as an instrument for reducing the French transaction costs of coordinating among the Europeans It would help reduce the require-ments of adjusting permanently to NATO procedures which had largely emerged without French input The mutual provision of information was to be applied to a wide range of military planning from low- intensity peace-keeping over combat operations to collective defence These results are illus-trated by Table 73

The causal pathways of this study are clearly reflected by the process- tracing of French preferences The interaction between a demand for institution- building and the signals sent by the United States was the deci-sive driver of Francersquos approach towards the large substantive scope of the ESDP Not only were the transaction costs of all other options higher but in particular the actual arrangements of the 1990s were more costly to Paris than to Berlin or London In short the relative magnitude of French transaction costs for providing European security was significant It was the main feature that differentiated the country from its partners namely its non- integration into multilateral military structures With the noticeable exception of the Eurocorps the French military traditionally operated at a national level of command which clearly increased both problems and costs for multilateral crisis management operations such as in the Gulf or

Table 73 French transaction costs for the provision of European security and its resulting choice of the institutional context

France and transaction costs for the provision of European security


Francersquos resulting choice of institutional context



Some increase Preference for option II) Severe risks of opportunism (isolationism)


Further increase Preference for option III) Continuously severe risks of opportunism isolationist and unilateralist concerns


Constant increase Clear preference and strongest proponent of option III)

Severe risks of opportunism isolationist and unilateralist concerns



in the Balkans (eg Gloannec 1997 86) As early as the mid- 1990s French transaction costs were thus significantly higher than those of their British and German partners This was due primarily to the fact that Francersquos rap-prochement with NATO had failed so an active stance in European security was considerably more costly for Paris After all its military forces had to adjust to the Alliance not vice versa35 While the French government was thus faced with high risks of opportunism in European security its transac-tions to provide the good were nevertheless more costly than for most of its partners Finally the high congruence between operational and defence planning that we can observe in the French case points to another crucial difference from Britain Partly based on its non- integration into NATOrsquos command structure the French government focused on shaping the EU- only option as comprehensively as possible The ESDP should evolve as a genuine project of the Union The overall approach was therefore also more consistent

So far this study has exclusively focused on the question of why institu-tions for European security should be built This is followed by the ques-tion of how to shape these institutions In other words the study turns to questions of institutional design and starts again with the process- tracing analysis of the German case


114

8Germany ndash An Incrementally Decreasing Willingness to Bind the Country

This chapterrsquos guiding questions are to what extent did the German gov-ernment prefer a high degree of bindingness in the emerging ESDP How demanding should the rules that would govern this issue- area be Should there be a division of labour between the EU and its member states

German preferences on institutional depth

The most significant finding in what follows is Germanyrsquos gradual and slight decrease in the institutional depth it desired for the EU This suggests some convergence with the rest of the EU as in the mid- 1990s Germany was the strongest supporter of highly binding agreements However Germany was the only country that demonstrated a desire to gradually bind itself less over the period of the analysis The government was increasingly reluctant to accept exceptions to unanimity in decision- making which used to be the typical German strategy for making EU policies more efficient Instead the consensus principle was reinforced (for example in the European Defence Agency) and the government invested enhanced efforts to create the pos-sibility of lsquoflexible arrangementsrsquo The exclusion of this option from military affairs was regarded as the main obstacle to an efficient ESDP In addition the government supported the build- up of an organisational structure for the ESDP within the Council whereby the position of the supranational institutions was consequently weakened Thus the desired balance was gradually shifting towards the intergovernmental elements of the Unionrsquos framework

Amsterdam and a strong EU defence pillar

In the mid- 1990s Germany preferred a relatively high degree of lsquobinding-nessrsquo with respect to European security policy This preference applied more strongly to functional differentiation than to demanding rules Firstly the


Germany and Preferences on Institutional Depth 115

government preferred to adjust the decision- making procedures because these had been regarded as the main weakness of the CFSP so far (Kinkel 1995 1996a Kohl and Chirac 1996) The rule was promoted to distinguish between decisions of principle (unanimity) and implementation (qualified majority voting ndash QMV) (Kinkel and de Charette 1996) While Germany was among the strongest supporters of extending QMV into CFSP matters it made unambiguously clear that this did not apply to military issues (Kinkel 1996c) Here the consensus model was to be broadly maintained although there was a desire to facilitate flexible arrangements such as lsquoconstructive abstentionsrsquo (CDUCSU Group 1994)1 At the time of the IGC preparations Germany supported the unification of the EUrsquos treaty structure (eg Lamers 1995) This implied a possibly incremental lsquocommunitarisationrsquo of the CFSP whereby military issues would retain their special status and remain embed-ded in an intergovernmental structure At the same time Germany was not overly concerned about the Commissionrsquos potential involvement in these issues (Kinkel 1996d Aggestam 2000 73) The German government formu-lated some clear demands with respect to lsquoflexible arrangementsrsquo in defence German politicians had significantly contributed to initiating this debate (that is Lamers and Schaumluble) The most important aspect for Germany was to emphasise that the laggards must not be able to impair the EUrsquos ability to progress towards increased integration (CDUCSU Group 1994 Lamers 1995 Kinkel 1995) Defence was in fact regarded as an appropriate issue- area for flexible arrangements whereas Germany wanted to shape those arrangements to make them as inclusive as possible (Kinkel 1994 1996c) Accordingly no member that was willing and able to participate was to be excluded (Kinkel and de Charette 1996)

Secondly while Germany was slightly hesitant with respect to the desired decision- making procedures it supported incorporating the European institutions and dividing labour with them It was primarily the European Council that was to be responsible for dealing with defence questions on an intergovernmental basis In instances of lsquostructured cooperationrsquo or lsquovari-able geometryrsquo only the participants in the vanguard were to be entitled to make decisions (Kinkel 1995 1996d German Government 1996) Because Germany had always been one of the defenders of a strong Commission in terms of both its administrative and political functions the govern-ment also wanted to strengthen the role of the Commission in security issues Therefore defence issues should remain located within the European Council while the Commission would be granted (non- exclusive) agenda- setting and implementation rights (CDUCSU Group 1994 Hoyer and Barnier 1995 Kinkel 1996c) Nevertheless after some serious opposition at the start the German government ultimately supported a long- term effort to weaken the Commission namely the establishment of a new lsquoMrMs CFSPrsquo within the Council She was meant to increase the Unionrsquos visibility and continuity in security matters Together with the reformed Presidency



and the External Relations Commissioner the new post would represent the EU on the international stage It was to be supported by a new per-manent analysis and planning unit (Hoyer 1996 Kinkel and de Charette 1996 Kohl and Chirac 1996)2 Germany also formulated quite far- reaching demands with respect to the European Parliamentrsquos (EP) powers in secu-rity matters during the IGC- preparation phase (Kinkel 1996d) However it backed away from these demands and instead promoted only consultation procedures This implied at least a certain strengthening of the EPrsquos role (Kinkel 1996b)

Overall the German governmentrsquos objective was a more coherent and effective CFSP This was to be achieved through flexible decision- making procedures and a strengthened division of labour As a result Germany showed itself to be a relatively lsquosupranationalistrsquo member in the Amsterdam- IGC especially compared to the other states in this study

St Malo and the strengthening of a more intergovernmental ESDP

As in the analysis of preferences on substantive scope the British shift at St Malo fundamentally altered the landscape in terms of bindingness In par-ticular the increased substantive scope had the potential to lead to stronger interference in sensitive areas of the member statesrsquo sovereignty The ques-tion of bindingness therefore gained new momentum In short the issue of more lsquointergovernmentalismrsquo in the EU versus a potential lsquocommunitari-sationrsquo of the second pillar was at stake (Jopp 1999 21 Aggestam 2000 73) Firstly the German government wanted to maintain the distinction between decisions of principle and implementation It believed the ESDP should be based on unanimous agreement This referred particularly to the use of force3 The preferred decision- making procedure was thus a unani-mously decided lsquocommon strategyrsquo that could be followed by implementa-tion on the basis of QMV (Fischer 1999a 1999b) Moreover the German government gradually distanced itself from the idea of profoundly lsquocom-munitarisingrsquo security issues Instead the aim was lsquocoherencersquo In terms of orderings of possible outcomes the debate then used to focus on whether to create a fourth pillar (the ESDP) rather than integrating the second into the first (Jopp 1999 2 17)4 Thus the government accepted the status quo (Fischer 1999a) but opposed any attempts to further fragment the EUrsquos structure The Germans continuously supported the introduction of flexible instruments into the ESDP (Fischer 2000a 2001b) There was essentially no shift in this dimension In contrast Germany quite unexpectedly opposed peer- reviewed convergence criteria for the lsquoforce generation processrsquo This was initially proposed by the UK and Italy and was then reconfirmed by France5 However the German government was against binding measures and promoted instead a lsquocatalogue systemrsquo with non- binding (because self- reviewed) commitment conferences (Scharping 1999c Knowles and Thomson- Pottebohm 2004 597 Wagner 2005 465)



Secondly Germany still supported ndash though rather less enthusiastically ndash the division of labour with the European institutions (Schroumlder 2001b) At a declaratory level the government continued to promote a strong role for the Commission in the ESDP while it ultimately reinforced the one- sided strengthening of the Councilrsquos structures in essentially all military affairs (Jopp 1999 22) The same could be observed for the rights of the Parliament (eg Schroumlder 2001b)6 As a consequence the development of German pref-erences gradually pointed more strongly towards the intergovernmental ele-ments for building up the ESDP

The Convention and a gradually less binding ESDP

At the Convention- IGC the German government ultimately favoured inter-governmental procedures in military matters Now this was also applied to functional differentiation where the Council was to be continuously strengthened Firstly Germany preferred unanimity in an expanded area of decisions with military implications (Fischer 2002 Fischer and de Villepin 2002) For example the government strictly opposed QMV as a decision- making procedure for the European Defence Agency ldquoIn a striking break with previous positions Fischer tabled an amendment that argued for unan-imous decision- making in specifying the agencyrsquos statute According to the German government qualified majority voting could lead to the assignation of competencies that included the coordination of armed forcesrdquo (Wagner 2006 132) As long as the consensus model was sustained however Germany was much less concerned about lsquocommunitarising through the backdoorrsquo than was for instance Britain Implementation decisions could thus be taken by QMV and Germany was a strong supporter of expanding QMV into CFSP issues other than the military For example the lsquoGeneral Affairs Councilrsquo was to become generally governed by QMV (Fischer 2001b 2003a)

Among the most critical issues of that time was the question of lsquoflexible arrangementsrsquo The status quo of the Nice Treaty prohibited the application of flexible rules to military issues Germany was dissatisfied with this situa-tion The government therefore promoted lsquoenhancedrsquo or lsquopermanent struc-tured cooperationrsquo since it seemed to represent the best available option for achieving more demanding and thus more efficient rules for the ESDP ndash despite the general consensus on unanimity (eg SPD Bundestag Group 2000 Fischer 2000a 2001b) This introduction of structured cooperation was one of the German governmentrsquos central priorities (German Government 2002 Fischer 2004c 2004b)7 In particular Germany preferred to include the UK because a lsquocore defence grouprsquo would only make sense if the leading military power participated (eg Meiers 2005 131ndash4)8

The more specific lsquoorderings of outcomes in flexibilityrsquo were the follow-ing The Germans viewed the rule of how to initiate lsquostructured cooperationrsquo in the ESDP as very important and clearly preferred that no EU member be



given the opportunity to block those who wished to proceed (Fischer 2001b 2003d Schroumlder 2004) Thus it should not be necessarily a unanimous agree-ment of the European Council but decided by QMV (Schroumlder and Chirac 2003) Structured cooperation would be particularly useful for rules govern-ing (1) multinational forces with integrated headquarters (2) armaments cooperation and (3) mutual assistance clauses (German Government 2002 Fischer 2004a Fischer and de Villepin 2002) This would not undermine NATO because the WEU had existed alongside the NATO obligations for several decades (Fischer 2003d European Defence Meeting 2003) Finally Germany had initially preferred a financing system similar to NATOrsquos pool-ing the minimum spending financed by the Community budget and cover-ing the other costs lsquowhere they fellrsquo (in other words national financing) Ultimately it could also agree to distinguish between two categories of com-mon costs (1) headquarters (EU) and (2) barracks and troop deployment (at the national level) (Fischer 2003a German Government 2004)9

Secondly the German government consistently supported a certain division of labour between the member states and the EU institutions Nevertheless it was still the European Council that was predominantly responsible for the ESDP This also referred to increased armaments cooperation Germany pre-ferred to strengthen this institution by establishing a permanent President (German Government 2002 Schroumlder 2003a Schroumlder and Chirac 2003)10 In contrast to Germanyrsquos general willingness to extend the Commissionrsquos powers the External Relations Commissionerrsquos position was not to be sig-nificantly expanded in the ESDP (German Government 2002 2004) The successor of Mr CFSP namely the new EU foreign minister was meant to have a generally strong position (Schroumlder 2003a) However Germany was less enthusiastic about a complete merger of the High Representative for CFSP and the External Relations Commissioner instead preferring lsquodouble- hattingrsquo that is to have the two functions exercised by one person work-ing in two institutional roles (Fischer and de Villepin 2002) Nevertheless the government was not concerned about a potential lsquocommunitarisationrsquo of the CFSP and ESDP (Fischer 2001b 2003b)11 In addition the Germans opposed potential European Court of Justice (ECJ) jurisdiction in security issues as well as formal EP oversight Instead it believed consultation would suffice (Schroumlder 2001a Schroumlder and Chirac 2003 Schroumlder 2003a)

Apart from lsquoflexibilityrsquo the Convention debate was very much dominated by the planned organisational resources of the EU institutions The Unionrsquos ambitions to be capable of conducting EU- only operations soon raised the issue of how to plan command and control them There were essentially two options either a standing European operational headquarters (such as a strengthened EUMS) or national HQs The political problem was that while the former might duplicate NATOrsquos SHAPE the latter could lead to duplica-tion among the EU members (see also German Government 2004)12 The extraordinary relevance of this topic was primarily based on the fact that



the ambiguities produced so far within the ESDP could not be kept at bay on the one hand to reaffirm Atlanticist loyalty while on the other to estab-lish European facilities for autonomous action13

To begin with the government supported the creation of EU planning facilities but backed away quite quickly when faced with harsh UKndashUS oppo-sition14 Germany then supported strengthening national HQs for EU- only operations and the establishment of both a civilian- military cell at EUMS and an EU cell at SHAPE The shift also implied that Berlin Plus had re- evolved as some sort of official default position15 Based on the documentary analysis and particularly the interviews this study assesses German preferences as displaying overall support for equipping the EU with the standing capacity for operational planning It should be decisively smaller than SHAPE for pri-marily functional ndash rather than political ndash reasons since the purpose envis-aged was the provision of planning for small- scale operations It should not be about lsquomoving armiesrsquo such as within SHAPE In some respects this was a good illustration of Germanyrsquos overall position strengthening the EU should not automatically weaken NATO Instead wherever the government felt it was functionally sensible it supported strengthening EU efforts (Fischer and de Villepin 2002)16 Furthermore Germany was a strong supporter of the estab-lishment of a European Defence Agency which would make the procurement policies more efficient However the government supported a narrow man-date for the EDA (that is it should be a purely intergovernmental agency) particularly with respect to decision- making which should be based on the unanimous agreement of the steering board (German Government 2002)17

Finally in the context of the planned European Security and Defence Union (ESDU) Germany preferred to create different multinational train-ing centres (for strategic transport for example) and it also supported the gradual establishment of a European Diplomatic Service It was to consist of representatives of the member states and Commission officials (European Defence Meeting 2003 Schroumlder and Chirac 2003)

Germanyrsquos overall preferences were ndash though still relatively far- reaching ndash less supportive of bindingness in comparison to the mid- 1990s The gov-ernment wanted to maintain the consensus principle but at the same time create opportunities for lsquostructured cooperationrsquo in military matters This should be initiated by QMV No single member or group should be able to stop those who wished to proceed However each member would be entitled to join Germanyrsquos intergovernmental outlook was particularly reflected in the preference for a strengthened Council and no significant new responsibilities for the Commission Neither the EP nor the ECJ was to be granted significant participation in military matters Regarding new units under the Council Germany had initially preferred standing opera-tional headquarters On the whole its preferences regarding institutional depth were largely characterised by a lsquoreform orientationrsquo particularly by a comprehensive application of lsquostructured cooperationrsquo in security issues As



shown in Table 81 the quite far- reaching demands of the mid- 1990s had been replaced by an lsquoevolutionaryrsquo approach to ESDP

The exploration above entails two challenges for a comprehensive explana-tion Firstly the relatively far- reaching German willingness to bind itself in the mid- 1990s is puzzling from the perspective of most approaches to secu-rity cooperation in International Relations Secondly I need to explain why Germany wanted less rather than more binding arrangements over time While this meant convergence at the European level it went against the general trend

Explaining German preferences on depth uncertainty asset specificity and the institutional path of the ESDP

The following sections demonstrate how transaction costs within the ESDP largely drove the extent of the German governmentrsquos willingness to bind itself18 The focus is therefore on the frameworkrsquos main analytical building blocks namely uncertainty about the partners the degree of specificity of the assets that the states jointly create and finally the institutional path I show how the tradeoff between potential risks of opportunism and govern-ance costs largely determined German preferences

Table 81 Detailed overview of German preferences on institutional depth

Germany and Preferences on Institutional Depth

How demanding should the rules be governing security

and defenceDesired division of labour with EU

institutions

Decision-making procedures

lsquoFlexible arrangementsrsquo

Strengthening of intergovernmental institutions

Strengthening of supranational institutions


Consensus (with some exceptions)

Yes should be gradually considered

Yes indirectly (for example planning unit in the Council)

Concessions for the Commission due to the establishment of Mr CFSP


Consensus in questions of principle

Yes should be considered

Increasingly yes Merely in civilian aspects of the ESDP


Reinforcement of consensus principle in an expanded number of issues

Yes a German priority

Yes directly (eg EU Foreign Minister Presidency EDA)

Basically exclusion of the CommissionECJ EP from military aspects of the ESDP



France the UK and uncertainty

In this context uncertainty refers to the German view on what to expect from its cooperation partners in the near future were their commitments credible Uncertainty and thus the need to insist on highly binding agree-ments gradually decreased in the German case While the point of depar-ture was some uncertainty about John Majorrsquos UK in the mid- 1990s19 the process- tracing showed a notable increase of trust in Tony Blairrsquos Britain after St Malo Despite numerous tensions the German government maintained a close relationship with France its other main partner so that uncertainty about its western neighbour was consistently low Therefore this analytical building block pointed in the correct direction for tackling the explanatory challenge of Germanyrsquos decreasing willingness but on its own can only modestly explain why Germany wanted relatively binding arrangements in the mid- 1990s The subsequent development of German preferences was therefore partly attributable to greater certainty about the UK and other partners and thus a decreased need for credible commitments In the fol-lowing section I trace in greater detail the German governmentrsquos reliance on its collaborators during the previous decade20

Firstly Germany was faced with a low level of uncertainty about its French partner As indicated above we need to examine Francersquos general security interests and its position towards the ESDP The German government was certain about Francersquos interests as a world player and its wholehearted sup-port for a genuinely European defence While numerous channels of inter-action between the two countries had existed the Franco- German Security and Defence Council in particular had enhanced trust It was founded in the context of the Elysee treaty framework in 1988 (eg Krotz 2002 18 Schroumlder 2003a) Besides being integrated into NATOrsquos command structure there was an additional close partner in military affairs namely France through the lsquoEurocorpsrsquo The latter was highly binding insofar as its head-quarters could only be deployed as a single unit which would be decided by a common committee (Pfeiffer 2006 141ndash5) In terms of transaction costs it was a highly specific asset These close cooperative links did not imply a harmony of interests In fact there were severe tensions about for exam-ple the Eurocorpsrsquo military functions (eg Genscher 1995 Gloannec 1997 90 Pfeiffer 2006 145ndash7) about the relationship with NATO (Grant 1996 252ndash3 Howorth 1997 Lanxade 2001) and about possible interventions in the Balkans (Clark 2001 98ndash106 Pfeiffer 2006) Nevertheless the degree of uncertainty about each otherrsquos position was extraordinarily low

In the mid- 1990s Germanyrsquos view on France was dictated by the unexpect-edly radical military reforms announced by Jacques Chirac informing only the German Chancellor and not the Defence Minister in advance (Chirac 1996a Kohl 1996b Pfeiffer 2006 177ndash84)21 The abandonment of the conscrip-tion but also the exclusive focus on power projection made it increasingly



difficult for the German government to find overlapping interests (Sauder 1996 586) For instance the German government was concerned about whether France would hold its share of the front line in a major tank bat-tle in Europe (Howorth 1997 38) The preparations for the Amsterdam- IGC however brought both countries closer together which resulted in common proposals (eg Barnier 1996 Kinkel and de Charette 1996) During the set- up phase of the ESDP in 1998ndash9 the German government displayed only minor uncertainty about France It even agreed to Francersquos wish to establish the lsquoEurocorpsrsquo as the core of the future rapid reaction capability of the EU Any potential uncertainties were resolved during the Franco- German Council of Potsdam in 1998 which came after Londonrsquos indications of support for an ESDP and immediately preceded St Malo (Pfeiffer 2006 188ndash91)22 Again there were also tensions such as the French launching of an action plan uni-laterally instead of formulating it as a bilateral initiative (Chirac 1999b) This did not however increase uncertainty about future French behaviour since it largely corresponded to German expectations Finally the period preceding the Convention- IGC was possibly among the closest ever in Franco- German relations (eg Chirac 2002b) The transatlantic tensions over Iraq encouraged the two countries to cooperate closely at the Convention This ultimately resulted in the foreign ministersrsquo common contribution (Fischer and de Villepin 2002) but also led to mutual adjustment during the preparation of the EUrsquos battlegroups (eg Kempin 2004) In conclusion uncertainty about Paris can neither be said to be the lsquotriggerrsquo of Germanyrsquos approach in the mid- 1990s nor behind the more moderate German preferences at the Convention since the expected risks of opportunism (eg abandonment and exploitation) were constantly low

Secondly the German government anticipated some uncertainty about the UK in the mid- 1990s ndash if there had in fact been a security and defence policy of the EU After all the UK exercised an effective veto of a structured link between the EU and European defence issues (George 1996 Howorth 2000 2)23 Therefore it was apparent to the German government that a hypothetical arrangement within the EU should be binding in order to enhance the credibility of the British commitment In contrast BritishndashGerman cooperation in NATO was usually unproblematic For example col-laboration was smooth when the UK initiated NATOrsquos European pillar and thus the Berlin Plus agreement on the Combined Joint Task Forces (Kinkel 1996a Rees 2001 62) On the whole there was only a low level of uncer-tainty about London and this had gradually decreased since the mid- 1990s after Labour entered office

In the UK the phase preceding the Amsterdam- IGC was characterised by a weak Conservative government frequently struggling over Europe and fairly strained bilateral relations (George 1996 56ndash7)24 While the incom-ing New Labour government was obviously more supportive of the EU (Blair 1995 Smith 2005 708ndash9) this did not yet include defence issues



which it believed should remain within NATOrsquos competences (Labour Party 1996 McInnes 1998) Moreover the highly critical attitude of the British public particularly the media largely prevented politicians from siding too clearly with EU projects (Smith 2005 704 713)25 In contrast to most other EU members the UKrsquos widespread lsquoEuroscepticismrsquo also applied to issues of European defence (Kernic et al 2002 67 69 Eichenberg 2003 632) The Conservative mediarsquos buzzword was the lsquoEuro- Armyrsquo26 After the centre- left takeovers in both countries the relationship became closer and made the German government more certain about the UKrsquos position on the recently established ESDP The necessity to bind the eternal laggard gradually decreased The most influential factor however that made the German government increasingly certain about London was a shared inter-est in close coordination with NATO (see also Schaumlfer 2004) This became particularly apparent during the Cologne European Council in 1999 (Roper 2000 15) Despite the bilateral tensions over Iraq during the Convention phase this shared interest again became apparent when a compromise was required for the military headquarters issue at the end of 200327 In conclusion uncertainty about the UK was higher than uncertainty about France While this was particularly the case in the mid- 1990s it steadily decreased This suggests that this factor may have contributed to the incre-mental reduction of German risks of opportunism and thus transaction costs within the ESDP though on its own it appears insufficient as a com-prehensive explanation

Before we turn to the dimension of asset specificity we should briefly discuss the interrelationship between uncertainty and the institutional path as an additional explanatory factor for the German preferences (eg Pierson 2004 44ndash8) After all this study is based on the premise that the ESDP as an institution emerged for the purpose of reducing the uncertain-ties involved in European security policies Although this does not suggest that the ESDP is efficient (North 1990b 24) the process- tracing analysis demonstrates that it reduced but did not eradicate uncertainties among German politicians that emerged due to incomplete information about the future behaviour of its main cooperation partners (eg Schroumlder 2002)28 In other words the German government was decreasingly concerned about being abandoned entrapped or exploited in the context of the emerg-ing ESDP The risks of opportunism were low29 For instance Berlin often attempted to embed its crisis management in multilateral frameworks such as the EU Cooperation with London was thereby substantially simplified and ultimately made more efficient (eg Fischer 2000b Straw 2002a) The same conclusion can be drawn from the lsquolessons learned processesrsquo of the EUrsquos first operations They were ultimately a kind of trust- building measure among the ESDP members Despite some problems uncertainty about the UK and France undoubtedly decreased Due to this strengthened credibility of commitment we can observe sunk transaction costs so the necessity for



binding agreements gradually lost importance from a German perspective Table 82 summarises the section above

The problem of uncertainty examined above is in fact closely linked to the question of asset specificity The combination of the two provides an explanation of preferences on institutional depth because it sheds light on the risks of opportunism and governance costs that Germany faced

Political- Military structures the institutional path and asset specificity

For the process- tracing analysis of asset specificity the framework of this study suggests two dimensions first the individual costs of investments and second the redeployability of those investments30 We may for instance assume that despite potential efficiency gains it might be costly for a gov-ernment to create a European Army The population may largely oppose it or the cooperation could impose substantial and externally determined financial burdens on the country Moreover a government can either use the investments of the cooperation for other purposes or not This studyrsquos premise is that in combination with uncertainty these dimensions deter-mine the risks of opportunism and governance costs that a country is con-fronted with This affects in turn the governmentrsquos desired outcomes of negotiations on the institutional set- up of the ESDP31 Two main kinds of assets are created within the ESDP (1) political structures for responding jointly to a crisis and (2) military forces for potential interventions Since their specificity differs significantly they are analysed separately

Firstly the process- tracing analysis suggests that the German govern-mentrsquos approach of striving for relatively specific political structures was based primarily on the interaction of transaction costs and beliefs among the elites about the role of the Commission in the European integration process At this stage we merely deal with (transaction costs)32 On the one hand the financial and political costs that would be incurred by the German government in establishing political structures in the EU to deal

Table 82 German uncertainty within the ESDP

Germany and uncertainty within the ESDP

Uncertainty about France

Institutional path and uncertainty

Uncertainty about the United Kingdom


Absent No impact Present


Absent No impact Gradually decreasing


Absent Gradually decreasing

Reduced uncertainty



with security and defence questions were low in the mid- 1990s (eg German Government 1996 Fischer 2000b) The idea was to gradually integrate some of the WEUrsquos structures into the EU and to strengthen the Commissionrsquos External Relations This would not have led to significant costs (see also Hoyer 1996 Scharping 1999b) The financial costs slightly increased over time with the establishment of genuinely EU structures such as the Political and Security Committee but at no period of the analysis were they excessive (eg SPD Bundestag Group 2000 German Government 2004) Similarly the political costs that is domestic opposition to increased cooperation within a multilateral framework were low for the German government Indeed there was even a widespread willingness after the Constitutional Courtrsquos ruling of 1994 to strictly embed the political supervision of crisis manage-ment within a multilateral framework like the EU (eg German Ministry of Defence 1994 2003) In other words the relatively low costs ndash in particular political costs ndash of transacting with its EU partners allowed the German government to be flexible with respect to the specificity of the political structures

On the other hand to what extent could the planned political assets be redeployed for other purposes In a nutshell the envisioned political struc-tures of the ESDP were basically not redeployable at the national level or to other international organisations (eg German Bundestag 2002 German Government 2004) For example the strengthened Council Secretariat could not be simply moved to another organisation In short the politi-cal structures were to a large extent lsquotransaction- specificrsquo This first asset entailed consistently low costs for the German government while at the same time it would not be redeployable Therefore asset specificity alone can-not persuasively explain why Germany wanted relatively binding rules in the mid- 1990s The primary problem was that the low costs allowed for some flexibility which makes predictions indeterminate The last section of this chapter shows how this lacuna may ultimately be filled In contrast the further evolution of German preferences and thus gradual convergence with other EU members can be traced back to transaction costs within the ESDP because the common investments in specific assets reinforced the trend towards further investment in the same structures In addition most of the defence officials involved knew that their transatlantic partner with whom they had to operate in the field did not wish to give information to the EUMS The Commission however would never receive any meaning-ful information from that source Instead the Council Secretariat served as the point of reference for them as a bureaucratic organisation that was intended to help coordinate the defence policies of numerous states33

In sum the German government was not confronted with genuinely high risks of opportunism with respect to building political structures in the Council This was primarily based on the low political and financial costs of those assets At the same time the specific nature of the political assets



suggested that a binding though not mandatory agreement could make sense In other words these results are indeterminate to a certain extent In the course of the analysis however ndash when actual investments were made ndash not only these costs but also the potential risks of opportunism increased slightly This closely corresponds to Germanyrsquos preferences because it sug-gested some safeguards against opportunistic actions even though they were not particularly strong

Secondly the initial high degree of the military forcesrsquo desired specificity can be traced back primarily to the virtual non- existence of German power projection capabilities in the mid- 1990s On the one hand the high costs of the military assets required a gradual transformation of the German forces that had so far only been capable of defending the Alliancersquos terri-tory In times of budgetary pressures and political adherence to the draft (eg Longhurst 2003) the Bundeswehr was confronted with low defence expenditures More specifically it was two per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 1994 with a clearly falling trend (IISS 1995 264ndash5) Even more problematic was however the significant gap relative to comparable states in research and development which accelerated the difficult situa-tion (IISS 1995 38ndash9) The German government building on politically lsquointended interdependenciesrsquo with France (German Government 1996) strove for a cost- efficient solution to overcome at least partly its own short-comings (eg German Ministry of Defence 1994 Ruumlhe 1996a) Therefore it was also willing to bind itself quite considerably For instance it sup-ported to a certain extent ldquoa centralised European Armaments Agency that would be ultimately responsible for the coordination and control of all European defence procurement and would exercise a preferential European purchasing policyrdquo (IISS 1995 38ndash9) Furthermore political costs were also higher than with respect to the political assets because the mid- 1990s had still been characterised by a relatively strong domestic consensus that the Bundeswehr should not really go out- of- area (eg Berger 1998 Harnisch 2001)34 The only opportunity to reduce these political costs for invest-ments into German power projection at home was by integrating into mul-tinational structures

On the other hand the nature of the military structures which were envi-sioned for the ESDP was indisputably general The European Rapid Reaction Force (ERRF) remained organised at the level of lsquoindependently deployable brigadesrsquo (IISS 2001 283) In other words the military structures were ear-marked for the ESDP by national governments but could be redeployed for other purposes or operate under another flag (for example that of NATO or the UN) Based on a combination of its own military shortcomings35 and the hesitancy of the other EU members the German government supported less specific military structures during the set- up phase of the ESDP That was one of the main reasons why Germany promoted the more moderate



design envisaged for the ERRF Although its general nature made it more costly to the German government in financial and political terms at the same time the design guaranteed its prominent participation Moreover Germany learned rapidly in the set- up phase of the ESDP in 1999 that rede-ployable military means would be the key to attaining American agreement to the project (Aggestam 2000)36 After all the ERRFrsquos general outlook facili-tated a burden- sharing interpretation of the ESDP which the US preferred to European autonomy (Schroumlder 1998 1999a) The general nature of the established assets made further steps towards increased bindingness less urgent creating no new transaction costs within the ESDP (Meiers 2005 125ndash8 132 Schmalz 2005 53ndash4)

In sum combining both dimensions of the second asset implied high costs at a constant level for the German government while its general nature made the assets easily redeployable Due to these high costs the govern-ment supported a relatively high degree of bindingness in the mid- 1990s Specific assets constituted a relatively efficient solution to German mili-tary shortcomings In other words nontrivial investments in transaction- specific assets were increasingly required The government was therefore less concerned about the potential governance costs of more binding agree-ments It was in fact willing to give up some residual rights of control since the German premise was necessarily to apply military force in a multilateral way Instead the potential risks of opportunism triggered German concerns (about abandonment) (eg German Ministry of Defence 1994) That became particularly clear in the approach that the then Minister of Defence Volker Ruumlhe promoted in the mid- 1990s (eg Ruumlhe 1996a 1996b 1997) In 1999 however the actual focus on general assets made the government prefer less binding agreements because the requirement for credible commitments or the risks of opportunism had decreased After all its own investments could be easily redeployed This is a good illustration of the tradeoff governments faced within this context relatively efficient solutions but hardly any flex-ibility or vice versa (Williamson 1985 54ndash6 see also Wallander 2000) The German government began with the former but gradually moved to the latter

Thirdly the institutional path is considered separately for both kinds of assets The political structures within the Council were basically not rede-ployable and hence were the most specific assets of the ESDP They repre-sented high profile investments by the member states to the extent that they could not be used for other purposes What would we therefore expect from a transaction costs perspective

Where investments in the specific assets of an institution are high actors will find the cost of any institutional change that endangers these assets to be quite high indeed actors in this situation may be reluctant to run



risks of any change at all Where such investments are low the costs of change are low (Gourevitch 1999 144)

While the German government supported functional differentiation and more specifically a strong role for the Commission in the mid- 1990s the process- tracing analysis showed how this option incrementally lost importance with the actual set- up of the ESDP (eg Kinkel 1995 Ruumlhe 1997 Scharping 1999a) Instead the Council Secretariat and the High Representative had evolved as the default position to be strengthened Germanyrsquos adjustment of its preferences with respect to the Commissionrsquos non- involvement can be inferred from the institutional path which led to it continuing on this track and consequently profiting from the sunk costs The government wanted less bindingness with respect to a division of labour with the Commission since it had invested in specific assets of the intergov-ernmentally organised Council In addition it was the highest political level that had initially decided on the institutional design of the ESDP However the German defence officials who were involved in the daily practice of the ESDP had neither contact with nor knowledge about the Commission Only in civilian- military issues did they sometimes need to interact with it Thus when they formulated the national positions on institutional reforms and wanted to improve the division of labour through delegated coordination they did not even think of the Commission Instead the default option was the Council Secretariat37 In other words the institutional path of the ESDP had a deferred impact on the German formulation of preferences The Commissionrsquos relevance had vanished and it thus lost the German govern-ment as an otherwise constant supporter

This demonstrates the importance of the initial decision to largely exclude the Commission from defence affairs In retrospect it was a lsquocriti-cal juncturersquo Although genuine delegation with exclusive agenda- setting rights would have not been desired in German defence circles its poten-tial function as a bureaucratic hub preparing and coordinating the ESDPrsquos activities was virtually replaced by the Council Secretariat The decisions taken in Amsterdam Cologne and Helsinki favoured some further specific options within the ESDPrsquos institutional development The Council had gradually acquired nontrivial transaction- specific assets that would lower future costs which made further investment in its organisational structure plausible This corresponds precisely to what Paul Pierson meant with the crucial implication that the fact ldquothat these investments will alter actorsrsquo assessments of the benefits of institutional changerdquo has often been missed (Pierson 2004 149) In other words we found positive feedback not only with institutional development but also with the formulation of individual preferences

In contrast to these trends for the reinforcement of specific political structures Peter Gourevitch pointed to the opportunities for institutional



change when the assets created are general Indeed the German govern-ment supported the reform of military structures with the Headline Goal 2010 The latter significantly changed the EUrsquos outlook on military opera-tions because it announced a shift of focus from deploying 20000ndash60000 forces for a year (the Helsinki Headline Goal) to the new primary objective of 1500 for about two months (the battlegroup concept)38 After brief hesi-tation the strong German support for this transformation was primarily based on the general nature of the ESDPrsquos military assets which could easily be redeployed (for example to contingents for NATOrsquos Response Force)39 The costs of change were low simply because the previous investment had been in general rather than specific assets At the level of state preferences this largely corresponds to what Celeste Wallander has discovered regarding international institutions the general nature of assets may lead to decreased efficiency but offers at the same time the opportunity to react more flex-ibly to a changing environment since assets have remained redeployable (Wallander 2000) Table 83 summarises the results of the process- tracing of Germany and asset specificity

The last step of the analysis focuses on the interactions between uncer-tainty and asset specificity and thus on the magnitude of transaction costs within the ESDP that the German government faced

Transaction costs within the ESDP and German preferences for depth

The premise of transaction costs economics is that ldquothere are rational economic reasons for organizing some transactions one way and other transactions anotherrdquo (Williamson 1985 52) The comparative analysis of political (specific) and military (general) structures over time illustrated how uncertainty asset specificity and thus transaction costs affected German

Table 83 Germany and asset specificity in the ESDP

Germany and asset specificity in the ESDP

Specific political structures General military structures

Financial and political costs

Rede-ployability


Rede-ployability


Low No High (political and financial)

No(essentially non-existent)


Low No High (financial)Medium (political)

Increasingly yes


Slightly increased

No High (financial)Medium (political)

Yes



preferences for institutional depth What we observe in the German case and similarly expect for the other case studies is that the

parties to a transaction commonly have a choice between special purpose and general purpose investments Assuming that contracts go to comple-tion as intended the former will often permit cost savings to be realized But such investments are also risky in that specialized assets cannot be redeployed without sacrifice of productive value if contracts should be interrupted or prematurely terminated General purpose investments do not pose the same difficulties lsquoProblemsrsquo that arise during contract execution can be solved in a general purpose asset regime by each party going his way (Williamson 1985 54)

The evaluation of these opportunities and risks corresponds closely to large parts of Germanyrsquos preferences on how to design the EUrsquos security and defence pillar By combining uncertainty about the partners with the specificity of distinct assets and the institutional path we gain access to the governmentrsquos tradeoffs and thus its desired lsquoordering of possible outcomesrsquo Investments in specific assets offered great opportunities to reduce politi-cal and financial costs but included at the same time important dangers that could potentially increase future governance costs The process- tracing emphasised that the German government was in the relatively comfortable position of being able to invest in specific but non- costly assets (political structures) on the one hand and in costly but general assets (military struc-tures) on the other

Firstly German transaction costs within the ESDP go some way to explain-ing the governmentrsquos preferences with respect to political structures From the frameworkrsquos perspective the main problem is that several factors conjoin in the context of the German approach in the mid- 1990s non- costly invest-ments in specific assets that cannot be redeployed combined with moderate levels of uncertainty about the main partners In such a situation a govern-mentrsquos choice is relatively indeterminate from a transaction costs perspective it may want to bind the partners because of the specific investments (risks of opportunism) or it may prefer flexibility due to the low costs of the invest-ments (governance costs) Germanyrsquos initial uncertainty about the UKrsquos com-mitment to a hypothetical EU defence pillar strongly suggested establishing some safeguards The subsequent decrease of uncertainity however linked to the stable bilateral relations with France reduced this necessity over the course of the analysis Therefore both choices still appear plausible and we need to ask why the German government largely focused on the former

A brief review of the research on German foreign and security policy suf-fices at this stage to give a preliminary answer to the question There is an overwhelming consensus that during the Cold War Germany was tradition-ally the strongest supporter of international institutions such as NATO or



the EU (eg Anderson and Goodman 1993 60 Berger 1998) These multi-lateralist tenets of Cold War times were deeply embedded and remained unquestioned by political elites after the fall of the Wall (Banchoff 1999 171ndash4 Duffield 1998 61ndash9 Fischer 2000b) A lsquoEurope- Articlersquo replaced for example the Basic Lawrsquos lsquoUnification- Articlersquo after 1990 (eg Kohl 1994 Voigt 1996)40 Even though this was also a matter of symbolism it clearly indicated how the German case differed from for instance the British because it revealed some of the standards that are widely seen as appropriate for the German approach to European institutions As a result we may draw the conclusion that the elitesrsquo belief systems became effective when trans-action costs were indeterminate The government preferred to grant the Commission a prominent role within the EUrsquos security policy for reasons of strongly held beliefs in genuinely European rather than national solutions This demonstrates why the studyrsquos argument is a mid- range theoretical expla-nation rather than a lsquocovering lawrsquo of preferences for institution- building within European security Under certain conditions transaction costs may also encounter problems of indeterminacy For example low costs specific assets and moderate uncertainty do not dictate a particular choice This limi-tation of the scope of the argument does not however make the bulk of its explanatory leverage invalid It suggests instead that more empirical research needs to be done in order to gain better insights into the exact con-ditions of the frameworkrsquos applicability to study preferences and security cooperation

Secondly German preferences with respect to the institutional depth of the military assets can be fully explained from a transaction costs perspec-tive The problematic shape of the German military in the mid- 1990s implied that the government should focus on specific assets since this appeared to be an efficient solution to its military weaknesses ndash because of both political and financial costs For such a scenario and due to the uncertainty about Britain some safeguards would be required Once the ESDP was established however general military assets and uncertainty about the main partners decreased institutional safeguards lost urgency and therefore the German government like others insisted on some residual rights of control in the defence planning process In other words the assetsrsquo general nature and decreased uncertainties accommodated the previous risks of opportunism and more binding agreements would have entailed governance costs with-out providing additional benefits

Thirdly and this is of particular importance from a historical- institutionalist perspective the framework improves its explanatory lev-erage over time This is primarily due to the explicit incorporation of the institutional path and thus feedback effects and sunk costs What we can observe in the German case is clearly what Oliver Williamson had in mind when he stated that ldquo[t]ransactions that are supported by invest-ments in durable transaction- specific assets experience lsquolock- inrsquo effectsrdquo



(Williamson 1985 53) This was reflected in Germanyrsquos position on the Commissionrsquos participation in defence issues The Councilrsquos role was lsquolocked inrsquo and that was reinforced in virtually all subsequent steps Due to the fact that these were specific investments the chosen path was resilient (Gourevitch 1999 144) In contrast the general set- up of military assets facilitated changes such as the new design of the battlegroup concept Consequently the very costly assets were to be of a general nature that gave them much greater flexibility and did not require strongly binding agreements

In sum the framework of this study explains the development of German preferences In particular the general design of military assets and thus their redeployability decreased the need for binding agreements within the emerging ESDP although it increased the financial costs for Germany In combination with the moderate level of uncertainty about the main part-ners Germanyrsquos risks of opportunism were at a tolerable level with respect to the military structures More binding agreements would have granted an opportunity for efficiency gains but would have led to rising governance costs This was to be avoided However the empirical record with respect to political structures is indeterminate Although we have seen German concerns about abandonment by Britain in the early stages this does not fully explain the governmentrsquos approach towards political structures The combination of low political and financial costs moderate uncertainty and specific political structures in particular granted some flexibility to the German government with regard to whether to prefer a binding or a non- binding agreement in this domain Neither the risks of opportunism nor the governance costs unambiguously suggested the institutional choice Under this condition additional factors need to be integrated and more empiri-cal research is required Finally the separate treatment of the institutional

Table 84 German transaction costs within the ESDP and institutional depth

German transaction costs within the ESDP

Uncertainty about the EU partners

Relative magnitude of transaction costs within the ESDP Asset Specificity


Mixed(France darr vsUK uarr)

Moderate starting point

Moderate to high


Gradual decrease Slow decrease Mixed(political uarr vs military darr)


Further decrease Further gradual decrease

Mixed(with reinforcing trend)41



path provided some further insights for the analysis of both assets While the government adjusted its approach to the actual design of the relatively specific political assets the general nature of the ESDPrsquos military assets facil-itated some major reforms Table 84 gives an overview of the interrelation-ship between transaction costs and preferences for institutional depth in the German case

The causal pathway builds on the general premise that the more costly a state assesses the transactions within the ESDP to be the more it prefers to build binding institutions in this domain More specifically the previ-ous section demonstrated how the combination of uncertainty about the partners and the corresponding asset specificity triggered the German formulation of preferences with respect to the desired bindingness of the ESDP The decisive tradeoff was between concerns about opportunistic actions by France or the UK and the loss of control rights over the conduct of security policy in Europe (governance costs) In particular the German approach to military assets and the development of its preferences over time could be explained using the transaction costs framework The former was based on military shortcomings and thus the governmentrsquos willingness to establish a cost- efficient arrangement which however required some safeguards The general nature of the military assets actu-ally established accounts then for more moderate German preferences regarding institutional depth The development over time was closely linked to the sunk costs of the established arrangements and thus to the decreased necessity to bind the partners since most assets remained redeployable for other purposes The initial exclusion of the Commission appears to be the critical juncture for the German government because it subsequently equated an increased division of labour with a strengthen-ing of the Council Secretariat and the High Representative These sunk costs of further institutional development encouraged the government to continue to support the strengthening of the intergovernmental Council structures rather than the more supranationalist Commission In con-trast the costly assets (military structures) were first viewed as requiring particularly binding rules but the German government increasingly prof-ited from the general set- up and continued to support this These rules were more flexible and thus easier to change as time went on Germany therefore supported the shift in focus from the Helsinki Headline Goal to the lsquobattlegrouprsquo concept

However one caveat remains The initial point of departure ndash how to build the EUrsquos political structures ndash was indeterminate so additional factors had to be considered Although we saw some indications of how to resolve this first puzzle we need to acknowledge that uncertainty and asset specificity do not explain everything about institution- building in European security Instead it becomes clear that under certain conditions other factors inter-vene that ultimately determine preferences when the causal pathway of



transaction costs is indeterminate In short we could trace back the devel-opment of German preferences if not all the way to their starting point Nevertheless the overall record points to a comprehensive explanation of the studyrsquos research questions This will be discussed in combination with the other results of the lsquostructured focused comparisonrsquo in the studyrsquos final chapter


135

9Great Britain ndash From No EU Security Policy to a Purely Intergovernmental ESDP

British preferences on institutional depth

The most remarkable finding of the following investigation is the relatively sudden increase in the desired institutional depth of the EU at the end of the 1990s Great Britain made however that the ESDP should always remain an intergovernmentally organised policy In short enhanced coordination yes genuine integration no This approach was also to remain the default posi-tion for the Convention whereas we can observe ndash parallel to the analysis of desired scope ndash that the British government was willing to bind itself in defence rather than in operational planning Hence the British case points towards some convergence in these questions among the Big Three as we ultimately see in the study of France

Straightforward opposition in Amsterdam

The Conservative government opposed all kinds of binding agreements with respect to a potential EU security policy until the mid- 1990s It wanted neither demanding rules in this issue- area nor any interference from the European institutions Instead defence was to be either a national or a NATO affair In contrast to Germany for example it wanted to maintain a veto in essentially all areas of the CFSP This position was not significantly changed by the incoming Blair administration (eg Labour Party 1995) Firstly the British government would never give up national authority over defence questions and therefore abandoning unanimity was not to be con-sidered (Major 1994) Furthermore Great Britain wanted to rule out any form of potential communitarisation ndash also lsquothrough the back doorrsquo The treatyrsquos pillar structure was therefore to be strictly maintained The specific intergovernmental nature of the second pillar was in fact presented as a sine qua non for any further negotiation (Government of the UK 1995a Rifkind 1996a) The UK government opposed both lsquoenhanced cooperationrsquo



in security and defence issues (Whitman 1999 10) and also a lsquotwo- speed Europersquo of the lsquofounding familyrsquo1 Therefore the British linked the estab-lishment of lsquovariable geometryrsquo to one crucial condition a consensus of all members would be required for its initiation Otherwise this cooperation would have to remain outside the treaty framework without recourse to the Unionrsquos institutions and budget Again this approach was intended to preserve the national veto (Government of the UK 1995a 1996 Rifkind 1996b)

Secondly the British preferred neither involvement from nor the division of labour with genuinely European institutions It had to be exclusively the European Council (or a new WEU Summit) that dealt ndash on an intergovern-mental basis ndash with security questions (Major 1994 House of Lords 1995 Rifkind 1996a Government of the UK 1996) The UK had always been criti-cal of the European institutions especially when they claimed a political function Therefore the government wanted neither the involvement of the Commission and the EP nor the ECJ in defence issues (eg Labour Party 1995 Major 1996) However London supported the establishment of the new High Representative for the CFSP as long as (1) she would be exclu-sively responsible to the Council and (2) the Commissionrsquos influence was kept to a minimum MsMr CFSP was to execute the ministersrsquo will and could not be permitted to develop into an independent political force (EP- Briefing 1997a 1997b) In conclusion the UK wanted neither demanding rules nor functional differentiation in security issues with military implica-tions In short Great Britain represented an exclusively intergovernmental-ist member in the Amsterdam- IGC This position remained largely stable in this period continuing under the new Labour government of Tony Blair

St Malo and improved coordination

The analysis of British preferences with regard to substantive scope has already shown that London wanted the EU to gain responsibilities for mili-tary planning over the course of 1998 The question then was what form this should take Firstly the Blair administration made unambiguously clear that it would agree to the setting up of the ESDP solely under the condition of the consensus principle (eg Cook 2000)2 This referred to all questions with military implications and not only to the operational use of force The notion of a potential lsquocommunitarisationrsquo was completely ruled out Wherever it was reasonable to increase coherence with the rest of the Unionrsquos external relations there could be some coordination but definitely no integration3 On the contrary the UKrsquos defence secretary even proposed the establishment of a fourth pillar which would have resulted in an even stronger institutional fragmentation of the EU (Whitman 1999 7 Missiroli 2000 25) Interestingly enough it was the UK ndash together with Italy ndash that proposed relatively binding lsquoconvergence criteriarsquo for the participating states in defence planning4 This was meant to be a demanding review mechanism


Great Britain and Preferences on Institutional Depth 137

that would guarantee that the ESDP would acquire not merely institutions but military hardware The mechanism would not have been identical to the budgetary constraints of the European Monetary Union but nonethe-less was to be characterised by relatively direct interference in the nation statesrsquo responsibilities ldquoTherefore the EU will need to agree a mechanism to ensure we achieve the goal including for Ministerial- level review between now and 2003 so that the requisite improvements in capabilities are made and progress kept under reviewrdquo (Cook 2000) However Britainrsquos advance in military issues would have implied interference in countries such as Germany or smaller countries There would have been essentially no conse-quences for France and the UK

Secondly in contrast to this novel approach to rules governing the ESDP the British government consistently preferred little involvement of the European institutions and thus no division of labour The intergovernmen-tal Council also should be somewhat strengthened to become capable of accomplishing coordinative ndash but not political ndash functions (Whitman 1999) Neither the European Parliament nor the Commission should be given a say in defence matters (eg Cook 2000) As one of the most influential figures of the first Blair administration Lord Robertson emphasised at the informal meeting of EU defence ministers in Vienna

We are not suggesting removing defence from the control of national governments ( ) it would not be right for the European Commission or the European Parliament to have a direct role in defence matters as defence lsquomust remain intergovernmentalrsquo and decisions lsquomust continue to be made by consensusrsquo5

In conclusion the UKrsquos government had inaugurated the debate on insti-tutional questions with its willingness to incorporate military planning into the European Union The design was however to be overwhelmingly inter-governmental both with respect to rules and functional differentiation Wherever it appeared functionally necessary to give some competences to the Council that was supported but political control remained strictly with the national governments

The Convention and some gradual adjustments

At the Convention- IGC the United Kingdom continued to favour inter-governmental arrangements It not only wanted to maintain its veto in all decisions with military implications but it consistently preferred to exclude supranational institutions Firstly all issues with military implications had to be decided unanimously No exception to this rule would be accepted (in other words the British lsquored linersquo) The government was however aware that this consensus principle would hamper the Unionrsquos activities in secu-rity issues Thus it wanted at least to strengthen the use of lsquoconstructive



abstentionsrsquo and under clearly defined conditions disclose this issue- area for flexible arrangements mainly for the implementation stages After severe doubts at the start the UK supported the proposal to replace the pil-lar structure with a single Constitution However the distinctiveness of the ESDP had to be maintained and any lsquocommunitarisation through the back doorrsquo was to be avoided The ESDP represented an issue- area distinct from the rest of the EUrsquos policies (Blair 2001 2002 Hain 2003a Straw 2003b 2004a see also Menon 2003 975)

The UK had a highly differentiated approach to lsquoflexible arrangementsrsquo during the Convention While the government welcomed the opportunities emerging from such an approach (Blair 2000) it was largely lsquostatus quorsquo- oriented with respect to the ESDP (eg Menon 2003 977) It argued that the range of available options would already provide effectiveness in an EU of 25 all EU members should decide but then the agreement could be imple-mented in a flexible way (eg Straw 2002a Government of the UK 2003a) Due to the fact that the IGC debated different new models however the British government needed to develop a position in this regard The rule of how to initiate lsquostructured cooperationrsquo in foreign and defence policy was absolutely crucial it had to be a unanimous agreement of all EU member states (Straw 2003b 2003c) The UK also wanted to prevent any sense of exclusivity of the new club For example the government opposed the idea of an added protocol to list in advance the lsquofounding familyrsquo6 Furthermore also under lsquostructured cooperationrsquo the UK supported a general solidarity clause but nothing that could resemble NATOrsquos Art V (Government of the UK 2004) The single issue- area where the government was a strong sup-porter of flexible arrangements was ndash in accordance with its lsquocapabilities- focusedrsquo approach ndash defence planning and armaments cooperation This also referred to the newly established Defence Agency (Straw 2004b)7 Finally the British government wanted to orient the ESDPrsquos financial regu-lations towards the NATO model It should therefore be the member states that would carry the costs in security issues (lsquopicking up the costs where they fellrsquo) Only a minimum would be financed by the Community budget (Government of the UK 2004)8

Secondly British preferences with regard to a division of labour were highly consistent with its desired rules for the governance of the ESDP since London wanted to strengthen merely the intergovernmental bodies of the EU Neither the Commission nor the EP was to gain competences in this sensitive issue- area The European Council should remain the insti-tution mainly responsible for the ESDP Hence the UK supported the idea of a permanent President who would be accountable only to the govern-ments (Blair 2002 Blair and Schroumlder 2002)9 The government preferred a strengthening of the High Representative for the CFSP For instance she was to be granted an independent right of initiative a larger budget and also overseas delegations The optimal outcome for the UK would be to



locate this post strictly under the Council but to give it full access to the resources of the Commission Thus a merger of this office and the External Relations Commissioner was vehemently opposed by Peter Hain the British representative (Menon 2003 972ndash5) The government could ultimately accept lsquodouble- hattingrsquo ndash that is to have the two functions exercised by one person working in two institutional roles because the new foreign minis-ter would not be a full Commission member with full collegial responsi-bility The government insisted on a special status of the new post in the Commission and it opposed calling this strengthened position an EU for-eign minister (Straw 2003b Hain and Palacio 2003 Government of the UK 2004) Furthermore Britain resisted both ECJ jurisdiction and formal EP oversight in ESDP Due to the inherent intergovernmental nature of security and defence exclusively national parliaments should have a say This was also based on the deeply- rooted idea of lsquoparliamentarian sovereigntyrsquo (Blair 2000 Straw 2003a Hain and Palacio 2003)

Finally there was one more salient issue in the Convention debates that provoked serious tensions among the members namely the issue of the institutional underpinning of military planning10 While the British acknowledged that this had been a major shortcoming of the ESDP they did not want to participate in a project to build standing operational headquar-ters which could compete with NATOrsquos SHAPE (Blair 2001 Straw 2003c)11 Therefore the government favoured first lsquoBerlin Plusrsquo operations with recourse to NATO assets Second the lsquolead nation conceptrsquo implied recourse to national headquarters in EU- only operations Lastly they proposed a lsquovir-tual task forcersquo and lsquoprimary augmenteesrsquo that could improve the coordina-tion of the distinct national HQs (Government of the UK 2003a 2004) The last option however was not pursued any further in the Convention debate Accordingly the UK did not want to substantively strengthen the newly established EU Military Staff with respect to operational plan-ning The actual compromise of a lsquocivilianndashmilitary cellrsquo and close links between NATOrsquos SHAPE and the EUrsquos EUMS were then acceptable to the government12

Finally the UK clearly supported the establishment of a European Defence Agency as long as it was unambiguously organised at the intergovernmen-tal level This closely corresponded to the main motivation for the UKrsquos ini-tiation of a European security project namely an actual increase in military capabilities (Straw 2003c) This was also the preferred function of the EDA more efficient defence rather than operational planning In this issue- area coordination was to be improved while avoiding steps towards lsquorealrsquo inte-gration (Government of the UK 2004 2005)13

Taken as a whole British preferences were lsquostatus quorsquo oriented dur-ing the Convention While the blunt reality of the ESDP suggested some modifications of the Nice agreements of 2000 the UK government main-tained its traditional position on organising the ESDP on a predominantly



intergovernmental basis The overall results of this exploration are summa-rised in the overview of Table 91

Explaining British preferences on depth modest uncertainty and the opportunities of non- specific assets

The next sections set out the key results of the process- tracing analysis namely that transaction costs within the ESDP were the primary determi-nant of British preferences for institutional depth Most importantly the transaction costs approach sheds light on the explanatory challenge to account not merely for the fact that the UK wanted some sort of EU security and defence policy but in particular what kind of institutional arrangements the government ultimately preferred

France Germany and uncertainty

This section analyses what the UK government expected from its EU coop-eration partners could it rely on their commitments or not The answer to this question in turn determined the degree of uncertainty the United

Table 91 Detailed overview of British preferences on institutional depth

Great Britain and Preferences on Institutional Depth



institutions






Consensus (without exceptions)

No not in security and defence

Reluctantly accepted (that is planning unit in the Council)

No not in security issues


Consensus (with minor exceptions)

Yes should be considered (esp in implementa-tion)

Increasingly yes No not in questions with military implications

Convention2003ndash4)


Yes but under some strict conditions

Yes directly (eg Council EU Foreign Minister Presidency EDA)

Basically exclusion of the CommissionECJEP from military aspects of ESDP



Kingdom had at any given point in time To begin with London exhib-ited essentially zero uncertainty This was based not so much on strong trust but simply on the fact that it did not expect any commitments at all After all the government opposed integrating military matters into the EU When this changed with the shift at St Malo Great Britain also had to assess the extent of uncertainty about its ESDP partners The British prefer-ence for more binding agreements can be primarily inferred from its need to safeguard its investments in the ESDP Starting from zero uncertainty and thus the risks of opportunism increased slightly While Germany could deliver fewer military capabilities that is fewer than it initially claimed and fewer than its economic power would suggest France could use the ESDP to gradually compete with NATO Therefore we can observe a combination of concerns of lsquoexploitationrsquo (Germany) and lsquoentrapmentrsquo (France) At the same time the UK was in the comfortable position between a Germany that could do too little and a France that wanted to do more (eg Deighton 2002 725 Baker 2005 31) Also important was the fact that the permanent British option of alternative coalitions (with the US) limited the growth of uncer-tainty about the main EU partners during the whole period of the analysis Against this background the UK had never been confronted with genuinely high risks of opportunism and thus transaction costs within the ESDP

Firstly the British government was not concerned about its German part-ner Although the economic and monetary power of the reunified country caused some concerns among the British public governments ndash after that of Margaret Thatcher ndash had never been uncertain about German security ambitions While the American offer to the Germans of lsquoleadership in part-nershiprsquo immediately after the end of the Cold War caused some anxiety in British circles Londonrsquos prominent participation in the Gulf and later in the Balkans soon suggested that this would be unwarranted in the longer term (George 1996 57 Rees 2001 57) Thus cooperation with Bonn in security affairs remained unproblematic The Royal Air Force withdrew completely from Germany at the end of the 1990s but the government continued to deploy one of its two Army divisions there This enabled confident col-laboration with the German military (Government of the UK 1998 37ndash38 50 146)

The only concern about Germany was whether it could meet its military obligations with respect both to the deployment of troops in operations and the procurement of suitable military capabilities The British view was that Germany should not hide behind history but rather live up to its responsi-bilities Accordingly Britain played in the ESDP the part that the US played in NATO namely demanding more military capabilities from Germany (Cohen 1999 Hain 2003b) That also lsquotriggeredrsquo the UKrsquos proposal for lsquoconvergence criteria in defence planningrsquo since the German commitment would have gained substantially in terms of credibility (eg Cook 2000)14 After some lsquoCapabilities Commitment Conferencesrsquo had demonstrated European and



in particular German weaknesses in expeditionary warfare the UK initi-ated a more modern concept that of the so- called battlegroups For this the British government even wanted to include explicit numbers and regions in the agreements in order to oblige members such as Germany in particular to deliver the promised assets15 At the same time numerous overlapping interests encouraged solid cooperation and decreased uncertainty to accept-able levels (eg Blair and Schroumlder 2002 see also Roper 2000 15) British preferences for institutional depth corresponded closely to the uncertainty of its transactions since there were some but no grave concerns about being exploited by the German partner

Secondly the United Kingdom also had no uncertainty about its French neighbour While the Balkans demonstrated to Europe its powerlessness at the same time it showed that a potential remedy would have to build on Franco- British cooperation Therefore it was particularly the British Ministry of Defence that invested major efforts in facilitating French lsquore- entryrsquo into NATOrsquos military structures (George 1996 57ndash8 Howorth 2000) After these attempts had failed for reasons independent of Franco- British relations their collaboration on defence issues ndash for example nuclear and air force cooperation ndashimproved continuously (IISS 1995 35) Despite many disagreements about the general future of the European Union the United Kingdom felt certain about French intentions for European security at that time (Major 1996 Rifkind 1996a Blair 1998a)

The declaration of St Malo embodied then a fundamentally novel basis for Franco- British security cooperation London consequently had to think more carefully about the credibility of French commitments within the ESDP because British investments were now at stake The agreements were based on a subtle compromise between European autonomy and NATOrsquos primacy Britainrsquos risks of opportunism began to rise because the government could not be fully certain about the French commitment to accept NATOrsquos primacy in practice (eg Howorth 2000 49 57 59) However this did not become a major obstacle since the British government was very much aware of the common interests in strengthened European capabilities16 Although French advances towards more autonomy had to be checked this did not increase the UKrsquos uncertainty to such an extent that more binding agreements would have been a suitable safeguard (Baker 2005 31) In other words the fear of entrapment in a lsquoEuropean autonomy projectrsquo was moderate among British officials Instead intense coordination represented a sufficient assurance for the government This did not change during the political frictions over Iraq between 2002 and 2004 (Miskimmon 2004 291ndash3) The British government was constantly aware of the fact that France judged that the ESDP could be successful only if the UK participated17 In other words British lsquofears of abandonmentrsquo were modest This became particularly apparent in the two countriesrsquo battlegroup initiative which clearly demonstrated Franco- British insistence on lsquomilitary effectivenessrsquo rather than political ambitions (Sawers



2004 Webb 2004) Linked to its view of Germany the UKrsquos preferences for institutional depth can clearly be traced back to uncertainty about its main partners on the one hand zero uncertainty and thus no bindingness in the mid- 1990s and on the other hand a moderate increase in its risks of oppor-tunism with the establishment of the ESDP after St Malo

Finally British uncertainty about its European partners was mitigated by another condition that had a constant impact on its preferences for the ESDPrsquos bindingness Especially in contrast to France the United Kingdom always had an alternative option for its security policy namely close coop-eration with the United States (IISS 1995 40 Blair 2001 Hoon 2003 see also Howorth 2000 95) The institutional path therefore played a relatively less important role since the lsquospecial relationshiprsquo overshadowed it to a significant extent Clearly the UK also profited from sunk costs and this precluded potential sources of new risks of opportunism Nevertheless the institutional path has to be subordinated in the British case The credible alternative of US cooperation appeared even more plausible after the terror-ist attacks of September 11 2001 After all the UK was the only European country that was militarily capable of collaborating with the United States on the battlefield ldquoIn the short term the UK is the only European nation to act on the requirement ndash identified through operations in Afghanistan ndash to develop a lsquonetwork- centricrsquo capability and to reduce lsquosensor- to- shooterrsquo timesrdquo (IISS 2003 28) This powerful alternative decreased British concerns of being possibly lsquoabandoned entrapped or exploitedrsquo within the ESDP Table 92 summarises the section above

In sum the UK was faced with moderate uncertainty about its main part-ners Three trends increased British risks of opportunism to some degree after 1998ndash9 and thus contributed to its rising transaction costs within the ESDP (1) there were some doubts in British security circles about the cred-ibility of Germanyrsquos commitment to its ESDP obligations (2) the govern-ment was aware of the fact that French ambitions for increased European

Table 92 British uncertainty within the ESDP

Great Britain and uncertainty within the ESDP


United States as an alternative option

Uncertainty about Germany


Absent Present Absent


Moderate increase Present Moderate increase


Constantly moderate

Present Constantly moderate



autonomy needed to be checked and (3) the lsquospecial relationshiprsquo with the United States represented a formidable fallback option if the ESDP were to fail As in the preceding German case study the next section analyses asset specificity The combination of both dimensions ultimately explains British preferences for institutional depth between the mid- 1990s and the Convention


As indicated above the two sorts of assets in the ESDP were (1) political structures and (2) military forces This section again examines each kind of asset along two dimensions on the one hand the costs of investments and on the other hand the issue of redeployability Firstly the hesitant British approach to political structures can be largely inferred from the transaction costs that the government faced within the ESDP More specifically it can be traced back to the combination of potential costs and the question of redeployability The major trigger was to avoid ex ante governance costs that is giving up control rights by subscribing to the ESDP (eg Government of the UK 2004) Although the EUrsquos political structures were essentially non- redeployable and thus specific the requirement for safeguarding them was not particularly strong At no time would the financial costs for specific political structures have been particularly high for the United Kingdom These costs increased incrementally when the ESDP was set up beginning in 1999 but remained nevertheless modest From this perspective alone preferences for more binding agreements would at least have been conceiv-able as we observed in the German case

However the UK government was confronted with substantial polit-ical costs a significant level of domestic opposition to the creation of a European- based multilateral framework (eg Eichenberg 2003 638 Dover 2005 518) To illustrate this with a single anecdote from the final stages of the Convention- IGC the highly influential tabloid The Sun lsquoprinted a photo of Tony Blair in an undertakerrsquos hat on the front page of its issue of 10 September 2003 beneath the headlinersquo ldquoLast rites Blundertaker Blair is set to bury our nationrdquo (cited from Menon 2003 963)18 The two main issues constantly at stake were the duplication of NATO and British defence auton-omy This further encouraged the government to preserve its veto position within these quite specific political structures Otherwise the anticipated political costs would have increased dramatically This condition remained stable during the whole period of analysis and thus accounts for the limited British support for strengthening the Council ndash and under no circumstances the Commission (eg House of Commons 19989a 19989b Government of the UK 2003a) In conclusion the anticipation of the high governance costs of more binding political assets was critical The British government wanted to make coordination easier by for instance establishing the Political and



Security Committee The idea was to provide information but avoid a loss of control (eg Cook 2000 Government of the UK 2003b Straw 2003b)19

Secondly the British governmentrsquos strong opposition to an independ-ent EU defence policy in the mid- 1990s suggests ndash as in the question of uncertainty ndash omitting the question of asset specificity at that time Unlike Germany however the United Kingdom was well equipped with power projection capabilities that had so far been deployed within NATO or in close collaboration with the US at a bilateral level Hence the additional investments that resulted from the establishment of the ESDP remained at a modest level as long as the military assets were redeployable to NATO or to national forces (eg House of Commons 19989a Government of the UK 1998 Hoon 2003) As a consequence the existence of a strong expedition-ary force offered highly efficient solutions and thus a strong division of labour less urgent than for example in the German case (eg IISS 2001) In addition the option of establishing military structures at a non- specific level created the two- fold advantage of (1) more easily overcoming domestic opposition ndash since the forces remained redeployable ndash and (2) simultaneously setting up military forces that could ultimately be deployed by NATO In the words of a policy director in the UKrsquos Ministry of Defence ldquoEverything we can do to make the EU more usable actually provides a capacity that is available also to NATOrdquo (Webb 2004) The British government was thus not concerned about potential opportunism as long as it could redeploy its investments At the same time more binding arrangements would have not added any benefits for the British but merely entailed governance costs which were to be avoided

On the one hand defence expenditure in the UK was clearly higher than on the Continent (eg 1994 = 34 of GDP IISS 1995 39 264ndash5 IISS 2002 35) The British military did not need to be substantially transformed since Labourrsquos Strategic Defence Review of 1998 corresponded closely to the ESDP initiative (McInnes 1998 Howorth 2000 4) While the latter also consumed resources these were not really additional resources with respect to the military At the same time the UK now had a mechanism at its disposal for encouraging its European partners to invest more in their projection forces which were to resemble the British ones In particular the reformed lsquoHeadline Goal 2010rsquo ndash linked to the planned rules of lsquostructured coopera-tionrsquo ndash pointed in this direction

This initiative has attracted a high level of political support throughout Europe not least as it is closely linked to the protocol for structured coop-eration in the new European Constitutional Treaty Structured coopera-tion is a treaty mechanism to allow some Member States to make more binding commitments to each other in defence matters The UK ensured that the Treaty set out participation in battlegroups as the principal entry criterion for membership of structured cooperation This has two



welcome effects first it prevents structured cooperation becoming a closed or exclusive club () second it has provided a strong political incentive for all Member States to make real investment in deployable high readiness forces so that they can contribute to a battlegroup and hence be included in structured cooperation (Hoon 2005)

While financial costs were accordingly moderate Geoff Hoonrsquos clarifica-tions also show the sensitivity of the ESDP from a political perspective Even in 2005 a British government had still to justify domestically its commit-ment to European defence whereas this problematique had been signifi-cantly more salient at the end of the 1990s (House of Commons 19989a 19989b)

On the other hand the process- tracing analysis highlighted in partic-ular that the issue of redeployability was central to an understanding of British preferences The results were in some sense paradoxical While asset specificity normally points towards more bindingness as the key mecha-nism of transaction costs it was precisely the prevention of the latter that determined British preferences for institutional depth as long as the ESDPrsquos military assets remained redeployable to other purposes and to NATO in particular the UK welcomed the idea of strengthening Europe militari-ly20 Therefore the interrelationship between the ESDP and NATO was to remain one in which ldquoin the areas of security and defence the European Union is at the very best second fiddle to NATOrdquo (Sawers 2004) In the post- Cold War period the UK was probably the strongest supporter of the building of a capable European pillar within NATO After its failure there was still a need to provide European security if possible without recourse to the Americans The substantive core of the European Rapid Reaction Forces would indirectly contribute to NATOrsquos ability to project force since all countries had only lsquoa single set of forcesrsquo at their disposal Although the EU had now entered into the defence business two of the British red lines guaranteed that the ESDP would in fact come close to the initial ideal of a European Alliance pillar Berlin Plus secured NATOrsquos political and opera-tional primacy in dealing with a crisis and the general nature of the ESDPrsquos military assets strengthened non- American power projection capabilities This explanation of British preferences was well reflected by the Defence Secretary himself Geoff Hoon

[T]he Battlegroup initiative will be mutually reinforcing with the larger NATO Response Force (NRF) each providing a positive impetus for mili-tary capability improvement Wherever possible and applicable stand-ards practical methods and procedures for Battlegroups are analogous to those defined within the NRF Correctly managed there is consid-erable potential for synergy between the two initiatives ( ) [T]he EU Battlegroups have the potential to act as a useful stepping- stone for



countries who want to contribute to the NRF by developing their high readiness forces to the required standard and integrating small countriesrsquo contributions into multinational units The key will be to ensure trans-parency in the development of these initiatives so that we avoid duplica-tion and enable those Member States contributing to both to harmonise their commitments (Hoon 2005)

Taken together the combination of high political with relatively low financial costs and the opportunities provided by non- specific and thus redeployable military structures pushed British preferences in the direction that was explored in the previous section In particular the general nature of the military assets sustainably reduced the risks of opportunism and sug-gested that governance costs should not be increased through a more bind-ing arrangement

Finally the role of the institutional path is considered separately On the one hand the UK took the exact opposite position to Germany in that the government had always opposed the Commissionrsquos participation in security issues This was reinforced by its experience with the Commission in other issue- areas The institutional path of the integration process as a whole therefore had an impact on British preferences namely to continue to exclude the Commission from the ESDP (eg Government of the UK 2004) The UKrsquos then Minister for Europe and representative at the Convention explained his countryrsquos insistence on excluding the new foreign minister from the lsquocollegiality principlersquo of the EU Commission

So you could find the Commission through the back door in a kind of gradual process exerting more and more influence so that the centre of gravity moves away from governments keeping a tight hold on the com-mon foreign and security policy to the Commission So thatrsquos where we need to get the details right (Hain 2003b 953)

In a counterintuitive way we witness here some sort of anti- Europeanisation The governments have learned how to exclude future supranational influ-ence Accordingly the European Unionrsquos institutional path reinforced British opposition to the Commission and thus implied the embedding of the ESDPrsquos political structures strictly within the Council

On the other hand one can observe some sort of Europeanisation in terms of the EUrsquos military structures This recalls the German case more strongly (eg Irondelle 2003 Bulmer and Burch 2005 886) The adjustment of British preferences during the Convention to smaller- scale but rapidly deployable troops was facilitated by the general nature of the initial Helsinki Headline Goal arrangements The institutional path of the ESDP in shap-ing general military structures facilitated their reform at a later stage when the government perceived a change in external demands A feedback effect



became operative The UK consequently promoted the battlegroup concept that largely drew upon the EUrsquos experiences in DR Congo in 2003 Smaller rapidly deployable troops were required This ultimately led to an adjust-ment of the British ordering of possible institutional outcomes (eg Hoon 2005 Lindstrom 2007 9ndash12)21 Accordingly the institutional path of gen-eral military assets did not cause the UKrsquos ordering of its preferences in a strict sense but instead enabled them to be modified in a relatively unprob-lematic way

In sum these examinations reveal the logic of transaction costs and in particular Oliver Williamsonrsquos discussion of special vs general purpose investments (Williamson 1985 54) British preferences were inspired by this tradeoff whereas the flexibility of general assets usually outweighed the efficiency gains of specialised investments This applied primarily to the ESDPrsquos military assets while the British government was keen to at least maintain its veto position within the more specific political structures Before we move on to a summary of British preferences regarding institu-tional depth Table 93 gives a broad overview of the previous analysis

Finally the different dimensions of the above analysis are combined in terms of the studyrsquos transaction costs framework

Transaction costs within the ESDP and British preferences with regard to depth

The interaction between the different dimensions accounts for the mag-nitude of transaction costs within the ESDP that the British government was confronted with On the whole it was the combination of increased ndash though only moderate ndash uncertainty with costs of the ESDPrsquos assets politi-cal and financial rising only modestly that determined British transaction

Table 93 Great Britain and asset specificity in the ESDP

Great Britain and asset specificity in the ESDP



Rede-ployability


Rede-ployability


High (political)Low (financial)

No High (political)Low (financial)

No(essentially nonndashexistent)


High (political)Medium (financial)


Yes



No Medium (political)Low (financial)

Yes(even increasingly so)



costs between the mid- 1990s and the Convention This general trend was reinforced ndash rather than triggered ndash by the institutional path Furthermore the slightly increased willingness of the UK to bind itself after St Malo was based on the need to safeguard its investments whereas again high politi-cal costs prohibited more demanding rules In short British preferences with regard to institutional depth clearly reflected a tradeoff between the risks of opportunism and rising governance costs while the ultimate trigger for the United Kingdomrsquos shift in the end of the 1990s was the opportunities provided by redeployable military assets This was illustrated for instance by the British Secretary of State for Defence in his account of the Headline Goal 2010 in 2005

The EU Battlegroup concept was conceived primarily as a means of encouraging continued improvements in deployable European capa-bilities thus widening the scope for burden sharing with our European partners This will in turn broaden the pool of European high readiness capabilities available not only to the EU but also to NATO and specifi-cally the NATO Response Force (Hoon 2005)

The reasoning was the following let us create assets that are as general as possible because the option of redeploying them for other purposes makes lsquobindingnessrsquo unnecessary British preferences for high- quality but less specific military assets can thus be traced back to two factors first the anticipated high governance costs of any more binding agreement and sec-ond the significant advantages of more redeployable general assets that could become closely linked to NATO These advantages far outweighed any potential efficiency gains achieved through more binding arrangements

In the mid- 1990s the United Kingdom opposed the incorporation of security and defence into the European Union Hence neither the risk of opportunism nor governance costs was on the UKrsquos agenda Asset specif-icity played no role When the ESDP was set up the government made clear its willingness to preserve residual rights of control in essentially all respects Firstly the political costs of both political and military structures were appreciably higher than in other European states since the idea of a genuinely European defence was not accepted within the domestic debate (eg Kernic et al 2002 25ndash65 70ndash106 Eichenberg 2003 638)22 This con-cern was particularly dramatic for military and less so for political struc-tures of the ESDP Secondly the supreme condition of the British military ndash in particular with respect to the new tasks of expeditionary warfare ndash made highly specific assets unnecessary for the UK This distinguished it from Germany in particular which had strong incentives at least to seek the most efficient possible solutions to military shortfalls The UKrsquos concerns about potential governance costs permanently outweighed the problem of opportunism since the general nature of the military assets accommodated for the latter



It was precisely the interaction between uncertainty about the partners on the one hand and asset specificity on the other that explains the sub-tle tradeoff of the British governmentrsquos approach While it shared with the French the ambition for a militarily strengthened Europe it compelled the Germans towards a European commitment which was expected to be more credible than a commitment to the Alliance At the same time it shared with the Germans a willingness to keep the United States within European security which was a safeguard against the French ambition for autonomy The key to this subtle approach was the opportunity to limit the estab-lishment of specific military assets As long as these assets remained rede-ployable (to NATO) the United Kingdom could minimise its transaction costs within the ESDP This was described by for instance a Commission of the French National Assembly that elaborated on transatlantic relations in 2005 ldquoAccording to the British perspective the ESDP has one purpose to strengthen NATO so as to satisfy the American desire for a functioning and effective military instrumentrdquo (French National Assembly 2005 24 of 60) Though crudely formulated it was exactly this tradeoff that inspired the British shift at St Malo and evolved afterwards as a sort of equilibrium that might be adjusted but not significantly changed Table 94 gives an overview of the interrelationship between British transaction costs and its preferences for institutional depth

Finally the causal pathway proposed by the transaction costs framework builds on the premise that a government may prefer more binding agree-ments if the assets of the cooperation are costly and non- redeployable and the government is uncertain about the partnersrsquo commitment These condi-tions did not come together in the British case Not only was uncertainty about France and Germany relatively low but London also always had a fallback option namely its special relationship with the United States

Table 94 British transaction costs within the ESDP and institutional depth

British transaction costs within the ESDP




Basically no uncertainty

Very low starting point

Basically zero


Gradual increase(Germany could do too little and France too much)

Gradual increase Low(political vs military)


Relatively stable and only modest increase

Relatively stable Low(political vs military)



Although entering a European defence agreement was a politically costly step for the British government the general nature of most assets did not clearly imply that it should bind itself Indeed the opposite was the case the relatively low risks of opportunism shifted the focus of the government to possibly rising governance costs It wanted to maintain residual rights of control and thus preferred relatively low degrees of bindingness within the emerging ESDP

To sum up the studyrsquos framework fully accounts for British preferences on institutional depth It is applicable to Londonrsquos approach towards both the political and the military structures of the EU Transaction costs within the ESDP increased slightly at the very moment when the UK had decided to invest in a security and defence pillar of the EU After all costly informa-tion about the partnersrsquo future actions had now become indispensable The governmentrsquos initial unwillingness to bind itself was overcome but conse-quently required some modest safeguards While Germany was persuaded to invest more into its power projection France had to be checked with respect to its autonomy plans for the ESDP At the same time the opportunity to create general military assets that remained redeployable to other purposes decisively decreased the UKrsquos risks of opportunism In other words both the initial low level of transaction costs within the ESDP and the deliber-ate prevention of further governance costs ultimately triggered the United Kingdomrsquos preferences for institutional depth


152

10France ndash A Consistently Intergovernmental Approach towards ESDP

French preferences on institutional depth

The most important finding of this chapter is that a gradual but slight increase of the EUrsquos desired institutional depth has taken place since the mid- 1990s The French government left no doubt that the ESDP remained an intergovernmentally organised domain Thus its two parameters were (1) to maintain unanimity of any decisions that had military implications and (2) to limit the influence of the European Commission As in the British approach information was to be provided to enhance coordination but genuine integration was still to be restricted The major difference however was Francersquos constant support for lsquoflexiblersquo institutional arrangements In a certain sense this placed France between Germany and the UK Francersquos point of departure was relatively overt opposition to most of the more bind-ing proposals during the preparation phase of Amsterdam in the mid- 1990s When the ESDP was in fact set- up after 1998 the French maintained its intergovernmental outlook but wanted at the same time to improve the EUrsquos institutional capacity This led to a few modifications towards more binding arrangements A basically intergovernmental approach with some gradual modifications represented Francersquos ordering of possible outcomes during the Convention on the Future of Europe

An intergovernmental EU defence pillar in Amsterdam

At that time the French government consistently promoted an intergov-ernmental approach (Gloannec 1997 97) Firstly the consensus princi-ple was to be applied to all issues with military implications While the French government supported arrangements such as lsquoconstructive absten-tionsrsquo and lsquoflexibility clausesrsquo in military issues at the same time it empha-sised the permanent relevance of the lsquoLuxembourg compromisersquo (French Government 1996a Chirac 1996b EP- Briefing 1997b) France did not want to unify the EUrsquos treaty structure The pillars were to be maintained The government even preferred a clear division of labour between the distinct


France and Preferences on Institutional Depth 153

pillars and a distinction between the CFSP and the EUrsquos External Relations competences The objective was not so much coherence but rather a clear separation of responsibilities The underlying objective was to exclude the supranational institutions and to create a fully intergovernmental regime (French Government 1996b de Charette 1997)1

France was among the strongest supporters of introducing flexibility ndash especially in security issues with military implications The proposals focused on the notion of a ldquohard core founding familyrdquo (Chirac and Kohl 1995 Juppeacute 1996) whereas in the course of the deliberations this was for-mulated more inclusively For the French government it was of particu-lar importance that those arrangements could be initiated without severe obstacles ndash that is without giving veto rights to non- participating states (particularly Britain) (Balladur 1994 de Charette and Kinkel 1996)

Secondly in terms of functional differentiation the French government preferred neither the strong involvement of nor a division of labour with genuinely European institutions Only the European Council and thus the governments should be strengthened For that purpose France wanted not only to prolong the Presidencies but also to guarantee the large statesrsquo per-manent representation there (in other words a lsquoEuropean Security Councilrsquo) The French government had traditionally been hesitant to delegate compe-tences to the European institutions Consequently it wanted to strengthen the role of neither the Commission nor the European Parliament in security and defence lsquoBrusselsrsquo was to confine itself to administrative rather than political tasks Instead the national parliaments and the Council should be strengthened (French Government 1996b Chirac and Kohl 1996) In this context France was the initiator of the new High Representative post which answered exclusively to the Council and the member states This new function was to be supported by an augmented Council Secretariat thereby strengthening the EUrsquos external representation while at the same time limiting the role of the Commission (French Government 1996a see also EP- Briefing 1997a 1997b)2 In conclusion French preferences on insti-tutional depth were overwhelmingly characterised by their intergovern-mental nature While the preceding chapter on substantive scope noted the willingness of the French government to enhance the Unionrsquos capacity to act in security issues it wanted to maintain strictly national control This sort of dilemma inspired support for flexible arrangements ndash without aban-doning the French veto

St Malo and the lsquoFrench Action Planrsquo

Like Germany the French government adjusted its approach only slightly when Tony Blair first raised the idea of creating an EU security and defence policy in Poumlrtschach in 1998 The plan was still to gradually integrate the WEU In the further course of events however the French President sub-mitted novel proposals for the establishment of the ESDP (Chirac 1999b)3



Firstly France supported the strictly intergovernmental outlook of the EUrsquos security and defence policy from the outset4 Therefore all issues with military implications were to be decided on the basis of unanimous agree-ment and the pillar structure should be maintained The latter ultimately expressed the distinctiveness of this policy domain and was by no means to be altered The government completely rejected the idea of improving the coherence of the CFSP by a gradual lsquocommunitarisationrsquo (Chirac 1999b Jospin 1999 Goulard 2000) France therefore welcomed proposals to inte-grate lsquoflexibilityrsquo into the ESDP because it offered opportunities to circum-vent problematic situations with both the neutrals and the Atlanticists This referred primarily to operational planning (Chirac 1999a 2000) but also to overcoming some of the EUrsquos weaknesses in defence planning (Richard 2000b) For instance the President adopted the BritishndashItalian proposals of lsquoconvergence criteriarsquo (Chirac 1999b 50) In this context the participat-ing ndash though militarily weak ndash states would bind themselves in a relatively far- reaching way As in the British reasoning however it was clear that this would not lead to serious interference in French defence planning proc-esses After all the country was in the midst of defence reforms that pointed precisely into the direction that the ESDP was moving namely an improve-ment of power projection capabilities at the expense of large- scale territo-rial defence (and nuclear deterrence) (Chirac 1999c see also Howorth 1997 37ndash40 Rynning 1999 Irondelle 2003)

Secondly the actual establishment of the ESDP in this period also put the prospective involvement of the European institutions on the agenda The EU treaty emphasised the role of the European Council in lsquoframing the future defence policy of the Unionrsquo This corresponded precisely to French prefer-ences Security and defence policy was to be conducted by governments within the Council whose organisational capacities were consequently to be strengthened The objective was clearly improved coordination rather than integration Neither the European Parliament nor the Commission in particular should be granted a prominent role in military planning (Chirac 1999b Richard 2000b) Taken as a whole Francersquos approach to the institu-tional depth of the ESDP was overwhelmingly stable The consensus princi-ple in decision- making remained ndash like that of the UK and most others ndash a sine qua non While the French government acknowledged that this would weaken the effectiveness of the ESDP in the long term it supported lsquoflex-ible arrangementsrsquo but still wanted to exclude the European institutions Thereby the French political class frequently indicated that this was the lsquolesson learnedrsquo from the market integration of the previous decade

Some minor adjustments at the Convention

For the deliberations of the Convention the French government consistently preferred intergovernmental procedures in military issues Except for full- scale support for flexible arrangements all institutional innovations were



to strengthen the intergovernmental bodies of the Council (for example the new foreign minister a standing HQ) Firstly France mainly opposed QMV in security issues while it was nonetheless amenable to extend-ing it to some other foreign policy areas In the case of a potential pioneer group France even considered making some implementation decisions with military implications on the basis of QMV but not an actual decision to send troops (Moscovici 2001b Chirac 2002a de Villepin and Fischer 2002) Despite initial concerns then the French government fully supported the Conventionrsquos proposal to unify the EUrsquos structure for the purpose of greater coherence After all it was evident that (1) unanimity provisions in the ESDP would be maintained (2) that the Luxembourg compromise would continue to exist and (3) that Community institutions would play only a marginal role (European Defence Meeting 2003 de Villepin 2003)

In addition the government was among the strongest supporters of flex-ible arrangements within the ESDP It thus promoted a highly differentiated approach that provided an alternative to the notion of a general lsquoTwo- Speed Europersquo The message was instead that those who wish to proceed should not be held back by those who do not (whilst keeping the door open for the latter to join up later on and respect the existing Community rules) The model that France envisaged was militarily capable and politically willing lsquopioneer groupsrsquo ndash similar to the evolution of the Euro or Schengen (Jospin 2001 Moscovici 2001a Chirac 2001a 2001b) According to that model the French approach was highly reform- oriented because the Nice Treaty did not provide for lsquoenhanced cooperationrsquo in security issues with military implications (Schroumlder and Chirac 2003 European Defence Meeting 2003) Francersquos point of departure was that only the participants themselves should establish pioneer groups Therefore it preferred to abandon the option of initiating lsquostructured cooperationrsquo by a consensus of the entire European Council QMV for example rather than consensus should suffice for the establishment of EU operational headquarters The lsquopioneersrsquo could then decide important issues on the basis of QMV whereas France would always retain the sovereign right to send troops (Chirac 2002a de Villepin 2003) Furthermore France had always preferred some form of collective defence within the Union Due to the existence of neutral members it was clear that a mutual assistance clause could only be introduced under some form of structured cooperation France preferred such a clause for the pioneer group to be as comprehensive and explicit as possible (de Villepin and Fischer 2002 Chirac 2003b) The French government was also a strong supporter of flexible arrangements in defence planning and armaments cooperation This corresponded closely to its preference for a substantial capability build- up by the EU member states to pursue a more credible security policy on the world stage (European Defence Meeting 2003 Franco- German Defence and Security Council 2003)5 Finally France preferred to finance the ESDPrsquos operations by charging common costs to the Unionrsquos budget According to



Art 28 (TEU) this would imply pooling all expenditures proportionate to the Gross National Product (de Villepin 2003)6

Secondly France consistently opposed a division of labour between the member states and the EU institutions Therefore neither the Commission nor the EP was to gain extensive new powers in the ESDP Instead the European Council should retain responsibility for all defence matters In this context the French repeated their demand to create a permanent President of the EU ndash not only of the European Council She was to be elected by the governments which would demonstrate continuity and visibility to the rest of the world Ultimately the government also supported the establish-ment of a President of the European Council (Franco- German Defence and Security Council 2003 de Villepin and Lenoir 2003) France preferred to strengthen the High Representative for the CFSP transforming the post into an EU foreign minister However it opposed a complete merger of this office and the External Relations Commissioner Instead France also supported the double- hatting arrangement in order to limit potential influence from the supranational institutions (Chirac 2002a Schroumlder and Chirac 2003) Furthermore security issues were not to fall under ECJ jurisdiction nor was the EP to have formal oversight Due to the intergovernmental nature of the ESDP exclusively national parliaments should have a say The latterrsquos role was to be strengthened in the EU for instance by a sort of lsquoCongressrsquo (de Villepin 2002 de Villepin and Lenoir 2003)

Finally France was unambiguously the strongest supporter for the crea-tion of a standing operational headquarters at the EU level It had already attempted to promote this idea in Nice in 20007 The main reason for this was to decrease dependence on NATO assets and thus American influ-ence in crisis situations However France did not propose establishing a sophisticated structure such as NATOrsquos SHAPE It rather supported a staff of up to forty people who could meet the minimum need for planning and command Since the government did not expect a Europe- wide con-sensus on these plans it preferred to initiate this under structured coop-eration However no member was to be given a veto position for such an initiative (Chirac 2001b de Villepin and Fischer 2002 European Defence Meeting 2003 Chirac and Blair 2003)8 In addition France clearly preferred the establishment of a European Defence Agency at the intergovernmental level if feasible among all EU members if not under structured cooperation It even wanted the EDA to take charge of defining the EUrsquos armament and equipment programmes In the course of the Convention debate the previ-ously proposed lsquoconvergence criteriarsquo were gradually replaced by the more moderate demand for lsquocoherence indicatorsrsquo (de Villepin 2002 de Villepin and Fischer 2002 Schroumlder and Chirac 2003)9

In conclusion the French government advanced an intergovernmental approach to the ESDP The rules to be agreed on were primarily to pro-vide information to all member states However in order to improve the



EUrsquos institutional capacity France strongly supported the introduction of flexible arrangements in numerous issue- areas In these cases it would also accept relatively far- reaching rules At the same time the government did not strive for a substantially enhanced division of labour with the EU insti-tutions the intergovernmental branches alone should be strengthened Again the objective was to improve coordination between rather than integra-tion of the member states The results of the account above are summarised in the overview of Table 101

Explaining French preferences on depth maintaining residual rights of control

The following exploration needs to focus on the limited bindingness that France wanted for the ESDP and the gradual emergence of a preference for stronger institutional depth in the course of the process itself The next section demonstrates that in general the moderate extent of transaction costs faced by France accounted for its reluctance to allow more binding agreements in the ESDP In particular the combination of low uncertainty

Table 101 Detailed overview of French preferences on institutional depth

France and Preferences on Institutional Depth



institutions



Strengthening of inter governmental institutions



Consensus(without exceptions)

Yes(eg lsquofounding familyrsquo)

Yes support(eg planning unit in the Council)

Nonot in security issues


Consensus(with minor exceptions)

Yesshould be the key to more effective ESDP

Yes increasing support

Noat least not in questions with military implications



Yesshould be applied to numerous aspects of ESDP

Yes continuous support(eg EU President EU Foreign Minister EDA)

Nocontinuous exclusion of the CommissionECJEP from military aspects of ESDP



about its main partners and mostly general assets made highly credible commitments unnecessary The minor increase of transaction costs within the ESDP then implied that it should safeguard its own investments to a certain extent Like the United Kingdom it was limiting rising governance costs rather than the risks of opportunism that was reflected by the French approach

Germany Great Britain and uncertainty

The French government was slightly concerned about potential exploitation by Germany and occasionally uncertain about being abandoned by the UK Neither form of uncertainty however had ever grown to such an extent that the resulting risks of opportunism would have entailed France to pro-mote highly binding agreements for the ESDP Firstly the French reform of the military made defence cooperation with Germany more difficult (eg de Charette 1996 Sauder 1996 586ndash594 Pfeiffer 2006 163ndash184) This entailed German complaints that France would like to transform the lsquoEurocorpsrsquo into an lsquoAfricacorpsrsquo (Gloannec 1997 89ndash91)10 The highly integrated nature of the Eurocorps made it difficult when the two partners disagreed on its basic military purpose ndash territorial defence andor crisis management abroad (eg Genscher 1995) After all its headquarters could only be deployed as a single unit which would be decided by a common committee (Pfeiffer 2006 141ndash5) These tensions also had a negative impact on establishing the otherwise obligatory common approach to the Amsterdam negotiations The French government was in particular stunned by Germanyrsquos opposition to power projection as the contemporary challenge for the militaries (eg Howorth 1997 37 Heisbourg 2000b 36) Given the well- developed channels of inter-action between the two countries however mutual trust was strengthened in the course of the 1990s11 In particular the Franco- German Security and Defence Council enabled new commonalities The joint security con-cept represented a compromise between crisis management and territorial defence (French Government 1996c see also Krotz 2002 14ndash18) Through this development France was reconciled and thus relatively confident about Germanyrsquos commitment to European security (Barnier 1996)

This mutual trust constituted a strong foundation for the upcoming chal-lenges in the context of the establishment of the ESDP The French gov-ernment was informed in advance about the German position because high- level consultations in Potsdam immediately preceded the Franco- British declaration of St Malo (Rutten 2001 4ndash7) This considerably reduced uncertainty and implied ndash from the French perspective ndash that there was merely one obstacle left what if the German government was politically unwilling or unable due to budgetary constraints to engage seriously in the build- up of power projection capabilities The consequence was that French government officials were continually confronted with these risks of oppor-tunism (eg Howorth 1997 39 Lanxade 2001)12 The explicit expressions



lsquobandwagoningrsquo or lsquofree- ridingrsquo were used in order to warn the Germans to keep to their commitments (eg Heisbourg 2000b Andreani 2000 see also Richard 2000b) This combination of concerns about Germanyrsquos willingness to engage itself militarily linked to an otherwise high degree of certainty remained largely stable during the subsequent phase On the one hand the Convention period was characterised by strengthened bilateral relations in security and defence The two countries created common proposals with respect to all important questions thereby reinventing the traditional engine (eg Raffarin 2004)13 This reduced the risks of opportunism within the bilateral relationship On the other hand France had remained hesitant in three regards (1) the German reluctance to use force as a sometimes nec-essary means of foreign policy (eg Heisbourg 2004) (2) its ambivalent atti-tude towards NATO (eg French National Assembly 2005 20ndash24 of 60) and (3) the concern that had already been important in the previous phases ldquoit [Germany] will definitely have to increase its budget investment in the mili-tary field The imbalance between its role in Europe and its defence funding is too striking todayrdquo (French National Assembly 2005 50 of 60)

In conclusion the generally low level of uncertainty about Germany did not entail high risks of opportunism Among other factors this implied little need to create more binding agreements in the ESDP The concerns that created fears of potentially being lsquoexploitedrsquo explained for instance Francersquos willingness to propose lsquoconvergence criteriarsquo or lsquocoherence indica-torsrsquo (see also Weiss 2010) In the words of the Minister of Defence Michegravele Alliot- Marie ldquoOne cannot say that the essential element in the construc-tion of Europe is a common foreign and defense policy and then not fund itrdquo14 The safeguards preferred by the French government were to make the mutual commitments more credible Others were simply not required at this stage This situation served as an important background for promoting flexible arrangements since it would allow for more substantive coopera-tion among the members France did not need to be uncertain about15

Secondly the bilateral relationship with the United Kingdom differed from the relationship with Germany France had never been uncertain about the British willingness to build power projection forces The two countries had common experience as colonial powers16 In addition the post- Cold War era witnessed increasingly close Franco- British cooperation at the military level that had begun under the UKrsquos Conservative governments Against the important background of their common experience in the Balkans the two countries announced at their meeting in November 1994 the forma-tion of the lsquoCombined Air Forces Grouprsquo whose objective was to improve the air forcesrsquo capacity to conduct humanitarian interventions The group included a small planning cell but did not have permanently allocated forces such as the lsquoEurocorpsrsquo (IISS 1995 35) This close cooperation culmi-nated with the French attempts at rapprochement with NATO in the mid- 1990s For that reason the French government would have also expected



some British moderation with respect to the security and defence negoti-ations in Amsterdam ldquoPlus la France normalise en effet sa situation avec les structures militaires de lrsquoAlliance plus la Grande- Bretagne raidit sa position drsquohostiliteacute envers une deacutefense commune dans le cadre de lrsquoUnion europeacuteennerdquo (Gnesotto 1996 114 see also Grant 1996 Rees 2001 62)17 The British government however did not meet these expectations ndash not even under Tony Blair Due to the fundamental British opposition it was clear to the French government that a potential arrangement within the EU needed to include binding elements in order to enhance the credibility of the British commitment (de Charette 1996 Rifkind 1996a) In this respect the French assessment strongly resembles the German one While the latterrsquos uncer-tainty about the UK was then accommodated by a similar position on NATO French concerns were mitigated by the developments in increased coopera-tion at the operative military level In short Paris was faced with a low level of opportunistic risks

Against that background the shift of the Blair initiative came as a great surprise the French government was lsquoperplexedrsquo18 After St Malo the French governmentrsquos assessment of the credibility of the British commitment gained considerably in importance since real investments were now at stake France had never been one hundred per cent certain about the motivation behind the UKrsquos shift to what extent should the ESDP be instrumentalised as a pure lsquoforce generatorrsquo for NATO19 This concern however did not lead to a dramatic increase in French risks of opportunism which more binding safeguards would have required The French fear of abandonment by the UK was moderate due to the general nature of the military assets

This assessment largely remained stable during the studyrsquos last phase Despite recurring frictions over the American missile shield (IISS 2002 32) and in particular Iraq the governments of both countries cooperated closely within the ESDP (for example the ARTEMIS mission and the battle-group concept) (eg Sawers 2004)20 The process- tracing shows that French uncertainty about the UK remained by and large modest during these peri-ods of frictions as well The Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin made crystal clear that it wanted the UK to participate in the ESDP ldquoThere can be no Europe without European defence and no European defence without Britainrdquo21 In other words there were still fears about potential abandon-ment (French National Assembly 2005 53 of 60) Table 102 gives an over-view of the section above

In sum uncertainty about the UK was higher than uncertainty about Germany These moderate risks of opportunism persisted when the ESDP was launched and accelerated somewhat during the Convention phase Nevertheless it had never dominated to the extent that France would have urgently preferred to bind Great Britain more strongly thereby giving up its own rights of residual control While the creation of flexible arrange-ments constituted one suitable instrument the effect of uncertainties was



simultaneously mitigated by the general nature of the ESDPrsquos military assets

Political- military structures the institutional path and asset specificity

This section demonstrates that the modest extent of asset specificity involved also contributed to keeping French transaction costs within the ESDP relatively low Firstly Francersquos opposition to more binding politi-cal structures in the EUrsquos security and defence policy was ndash in combina-tion with low uncertainty ndash reinforced by the relatively low costs of the EUrsquos political structures Hence the French government made no serious attempts to introduce stronger safeguards Only in the set- up phase was the government closely engaged in order to exclude NATOrsquos impact as far as possible and thereby strengthen EU policymaking It forcefully insisted on creating new structures which might in some ways resemble the Alliance but were to function according to a genuinely European logic The latter was to be substantially shaped by France (Chirac 1999b Richard 2000a see also Howorth 2000 56) Moreover its financial costs had basically never been high even though they increased modestly with the establishment of the ESDP after 1998 (eg French Ministry of Defence 2002) Similarly the political costs of strengthening the political structures of the EU in security and defence were low Except for the extremes of the political spectrum there was a strong domestic consensus so that the politicians in charge did not have to expect political opposition when they promoted the ESDP (eg French Ministry of Defence 1996 see also Irondelle 2003) As long as the French veto position was guaranteed the government supported strength-ening these structures in order to generate information and thus improve coordination The underlying aim was to be neither abandoned by mem-bers such as Britain nor exploited by for instance Germany (Weiss 2010) The problem of entrapment played a much less important role for France than for instance the UK In conclusion France regarded the potential

Table 102 French uncertainty within the ESDP

France and uncertainty within the ESDP





Absent No impact Moderate


Small increase No observable impact

Moderate increase


Constantly moderate

No observable impact

Constantly moderate



governance costs of more hierarchical forms as more problematic than the continuous risks of opportunism which the actual arrangement entailed Since the political structures did not incur particularly high costs their spe-cific nature was acceptable to the government22

Secondly when we examine the military structures we see a different pic-ture evolving In order to better understand the French approach to military affairs and thus explain its preferences for institutional depth we need to take into account two crucial developments The post- Cold War era saw not only a shift in France related to what to do with military force but also in particular how to do it Until 1990 there was unwavering ldquoconsensus on the Gaullist precepts of national independence and non- integration into mul-tilateral defence structuresrdquo (Howorth 1997 27ndash8 see also Gregory 2000 33ndash65) However this was about to change drastically On the one hand the lsquoLivre Blancrsquo represented at the strategic level a break with the past by replac-ing the lsquosanctuarisationlsquo of French territory through nuclear deterrence with the repeated use of conventional force (French Government 1994 94) Therefore the French forces needed to be transformed into military units that were specialised in expeditionary warfare (Chirac 1996a 1996b French Ministry of Defence 1996) However the reforms were fully compatible with both the Helsinki Headline Goal and then the Headline Goal 201023 In this respect the case of France strongly resembled the developments in the UK but must be differentiated from those in Germany On the other hand it was also the question of how to use force that was answered in novel ways national independence and non- integration of French forces were gradually adjusted President Mitterrand had agreed for the first time to put French forces directly under American command in the Gulf War in 1991 (eg Gloannec 1997 86 Treacher 2003 64ndash69) In the course of the 1990s France had increasingly become a supporter of multilateral peacekeeping operations mainly by the United Nations (French Government 1994 31)24 whereas the Bosnian experience demonstrated that high- intensity operations still had to be performed by NATO (Treacher 2003 56) This implied that the French should gradually improve their interoperability with the Alliancersquos forces with respect to command and control communications and the composi-tion and projection of forces (eg Gregory 2000 110 Greacutegoire 2002 7ndash16 see also Rynning 1999)

Based on the novel premise that French military forces would usually operate out- of- area with allied troops significant transaction costs were expected in the future As indicated by the in- depth analysis of substantive scope that was also the driving force behind French rapprochement with NATO in the mid- 1990s (eg Grant 1996 61ndash3) When this failed however it was clear that France would be compelled nonetheless to orient its defence planning towards NATO procedures without having a say The only alter-native left was the (W)EU ndash for example through flexible arrangements Establishing a European variant from the ground up would entail fewer



adjustment costs since France would be actively involved in its setting up (Howorth 2000 56) This constellation served as the basis of its approach to the institutional depth of the ESDP

At the level of the financial and political costs of military assets the French government could build on a relatively strong consensus in France that security and defence cooperation was accepted as long as it did not interfere too strongly with national sovereignty That could be applied to both the general public and the political class (eg Eichenberg 2003 645ndash6 655ndash6 Kernic et al 2002 63ndash4 see also Vennesson 2003)25 At the same time France was confronted with some financial costs since it needed to create new forces and adjust the existing ones in order to improve interop-erability Those necessary investments however would fit neatly into the defence reforms under way since 1996 Nevertheless it was a difficult proc-ess since the French government simultaneously cut defence expenditures due to budgetary constraints (from 33 of GDP in 1995 to 26 in 2001) In particular it gradually invested less in procurement and research and devel-opment than the United Kingdom This was the clearest indication of the problems faced by the French military At the same time the situation was clearly more advantageous than in Germany (IISS 1995 39 2002 35) As the transformation of the French military became effective over time the additional financial costs gradually decreased (IISS 2002 36) In short the French government was confronted with neither extremely high political nor with unbearable financial costs with respect to the military structures of the ESDP Since the EUrsquos defence pillar did not entail additional costs Francersquos risks of opportunism were relatively low

Nevertheless we should mention one of the few cases when the French government did promote more binding arrangements It was telling that France preferred to create strategic lift capabilities on a relatively binding basis (eg Common Air Command A- 400M) because that was precisely the area where its forces were severely lacking (IISS 2002 36ndash7 286ndash294) Thus as in Germany in the mid- 1990s efficient solutions had to be found (Gregory 2000 180ndash3)

Rapidly projecting more with hundreds of pieces of heavy equipment is beyond Francersquos actual capabilities France lacks lift capability and France is not accompanying its expansion of projection forces with parallel expansion of airlift or sealift refuelling and logistics support capabili-ties ( ) France lacks funding for lift capacity to deploy military forces in external theatres using national means exclusively (Greacutegoire 2002 15ndash17)

In other words when financial costs rose drastically the French gov-ernment also preferred more efficient solutions to the shortfalls and thus wanted some safeguards against the risks of opportunism This corresponds



precisely to transaction costs reasoning Therefore the option of creating flexible arrangements was extremely important for the French govern-ment since it provided some safeguards without significantly increasing governance costs (eg French Government 1996c French Government and German Government 2001) However this condition of additional high costs was often not met so the French government did not perceive a gen-eral necessity to make the mutual commitments more credible and thus more binding

This brings us directly to the question of redeployability The non- specific nature of virtually all military assets removed all French impetus to create more binding agreements for them The French government would have been the only proponent of a kind of lsquoEuro- Armyrsquo in the long term26 Since this study however has focused on the orderings of possible outcomes such an arrangement was out of reach and has thus played no role here When the French government supported the non- specific assets that were in fact cre-ated under the ESDP it was clear that higher degrees of bindingness would be unnecessary Since the opportunities to redeploy the forces were given the potential governance costs clearly outweighed the potentially reduced risks of opportunism Based on the impossibility of a lsquoEuro- Armyrsquo French preferences for high- quality but non- specific military assets can be prima-rily traced back to two factors first to the fact that redeployable military assets decreased the risks of opportunism to such an extent that binding became increasingly irrelevant and second to the increasingly good shape of the French military that meant that it did not focus on the most efficient arrangement from a purely financial and political costs perspective (eg Chirac 1999b 1999c Richard 2000b see also Alliot- Marie 2005)

While for the UK the option to create military forces at a general and thus redeployable level was the trigger for creating any ESDP France preferred non- binding agreements since the assets would be redeployable anyway Greater institutional depth would not have added any value This dimension is crucial for a comprehensive understanding of preference formation in the ESDP since it offers a perspective for understanding the underlying reasoning behind both the different and the similar orderings of possible outcomes

In short where Great Britain sees the ESDP as a means to strengthen the Alliance France calculates differently it sees in the Alliance a means to rein-force the ESDP in particular thanks to the growth of interoperability between Europeans and to the common military culture created in its midst This policy of constructive ambiguity consolidates the French position as much as the ESDP This is precisely its objective (French National Assembly 2005 53ndash60 emphasis added)

Accordingly the analytical dimension of asset specificity could account for the lsquoconstructive ambiguityrsquo that has constantly been present in the



ESDP since its very inception In short the emerging transaction costs within the ESDP determined French preferences for its institutional depth Moreover when we take into account the French support of and involve-ment in NATOrsquos Response Force which was created at the Prague Summit in 2002 (eg Rynning 2005)27 we observe precisely the same approach as that usually taken by the UK with respect to the ESDP France actively partici-pated since the forces would be redeployable but was critical towards more binding proposals from other NATO members (IISS 2003 27ndash8 French National Assembly 2005 26 of 60)

Finally the institutional path had a very similar impact on French pref-erences as we showed in the British case study A closer examination of the reasoning behind the strict exclusion of the European Commission highlighted the by now deeply- seated suspicion of delegating powers and making military planning more binding within the EU In particular this was based on the French view of how market integration had evolved and became apparent from the governmentrsquos efforts to exclude the Commission not only from military but also from political affairs in the ESDP (eg Chirac 1999b 2002a) At the same time French preferences with respect to the reform of the military aspects of the ESDP clearly reflected the impact of the path chosen so far Since the military assets were of a general nature they could be changed more easily than political assets The lsquolessons learnedrsquo from the French- dominated operation ARTEMIS encouraged the govern-ment to increasingly invest in the ESDP (eg Alliot- Marie 2004)28 On that basis it initiated more small- scale but rapid deployment troops That shift was after all facilitated by the general character of the Helsinki Headline Goal and culminated in the battlegroup concept In short the ESDP affected the French government to the extent that it indicated modified orderings of possible outcomes of how the EU should conduct its policies at a military level in the future29

In sum France was the member state that faced the lowest level of both financial and political costs which further decreased over time On the one hand the defence reforms of the mid- 1990s became increasingly effec-tive and were largely compatible with the ESDPrsquos objectives and on the other hand the former principle of not integrating its own military forces was constantly weakened within the domestic debate This situation clearly decreased incentives for the French government to seek highly efficient and thus binding agreements Accordingly it was not so much concerned about its partnersrsquo opportunism as about the possibility of giving up residual rights of control However the investments that France had actually made were to be safeguarded to a certain extent The overview below (Table 103) illustrates the most important findings

The last stage of this examination combines these different dimensions of transaction costs within the ESDP and shows how they shaped French preferences



Transaction costs within the ESDP and French preferences on depth

In the mid- 1990s Francersquos transaction costs were relatively low This was primarily based on the modest uncertainty about its main partners and the low degree of asset specificity In the course of the analysis this combina-tion increased incrementally but also unevenly with respect to the politi-cal vs military assets of the ESDP This growth in turn accounts for the slightly greater French willingness to bind itself with respect to the EUrsquos military planning On the whole however the government was confronted with a moderate scale of transaction costs and thus preferred a consistently intergovernmental ESDP Firstly despite the fact that the potential political structures were basically not redeployable their moderate costs did not lead the French government to establish more binding safeguards In combina-tion with the low extent of uncertainty about its main partners the risks of opportunism were not particularly high The question of credible com-mitments became vital however when the ESDP was actually established in 1998ndash9 The French reassessment pointed towards a gradual increase in uncertainty since the government was sometimes sceptical about the British lsquospecial relationshiprsquo with the United States Accordingly there were at least some concerns about being abandoned30 Moreover German credibility also suffered since budgetary constraints entailed delays and cancellations in numerous common procurement projects Also Germanyrsquos maintenance of the draft caused numerous practical problems in bilateral relations In other words France was slightly concerned about potential exploitation by Germany and sudden abandonment by a Britain that would in the end side with the Americans rather than Europe These developments encouraged

Table 103 France and asset specificity in the ESDP

France and asset specificity in the ESDP



Rede-ployability


Rede-ployability


Medium (political)Low (financial)

No Medium (political)Medium (financial)




No Low (political)Medium (financial)

Yes



No Low (political)Low (financial)

Yes



the French government to create some safeguards for its investments in the ESDP and has thus inspired it to prefer more binding agreements since the end of the 1990s In particular flexible arrangements could reduce some of these opportunistic risks so they were strongly promoted by the French government The objective was to gradually improve the mutual provision of information but without delegating genuine competences

Secondly Francersquos transaction costs in contributing to the potential mili-tary structures were moderate Three factors were of particular importance First the defence reforms were underway with objectives that were highly compatible with all ESDP projects The increasingly good shape of the French military forces made highly efficient and thus binding arrangements for the establishment of military structures unnecessary Only a few additional costs emerged Exceptions to this overall trend precisely indicate transac-tion costs considerations at work the French government preferred more binding arrangements ndash for instance under flexibility if it was dependent on finding the most efficient solutions possible (for example due to budg-etary constraints) Second the general nature of the military assets made them redeployable to other purposes This considerably decreased French risks of opportunism within the ESDP Third the moderate levels of uncer-tainty about the main partners kept these risks at acceptable levels while more binding arrangements would not create additional benefits for France Only governance costs would rise and this was to be avoided

Finally the French approach was characterised by the greatest degree of continuity and the sections above have demonstrated why France preferred not to bind itself too strongly within the EUrsquos military planning On the one hand the German government was faced with significant financial costs that were due to the bad shape of its military It therefore promoted propos-als for the EUrsquos military structures that due to their greater efficiency were more ambitious On the other hand the UK had the lowest financial costs but was highly vulnerable politically since its position marked a significant departure from a deep- seated tradition Hence the British government was even more resistant to the EUrsquos institutional depth in military planning In contrast Francersquos desired outcomes were neither triggered by the concept of general military assets nor by the necessity of establishing primarily effi-cient solutions to military shortfalls Based on this relatively low scale of transaction costs within the ESDP it was relatively immune to opportunism and wanted thus to retain permanent control over military affairs French concerns about exploitation or abandonment were modest In short Paris wanted the provision of information to enhance coordination but no actual integration By this standard French preferences regarding institutional depth were much closer to those of the United Kingdom than Germany which can be persuasively traced back to transaction costs within the ESDP Table 104 encapsulates the interrelationship between transaction costs and Francersquos preference formation



This chapter has illustrated the frameworkrsquos causal pathway at work While the modest extent of uncertainty about its cooperation partners did not entail particularly strong concerns about opportunistic behaviour this trend was reinforced by the ESDPrsquos largely general nature concerning most military assets We have thereby arrived at the interesting result that French transaction costs for the provision of European security were substantial while those that emerged from transacting within the ESDP were modest In particular we did not witness the materialisation of a mutually reinforcing interaction effect between uncertainty about Germany and the UK on the one hand and high asset specificity on the other Furthermore the combi-nation of uncertainty and asset specificity which both increased modestly over time gave us a strong explanation for why the French government actually wanted what it wanted during the period of analysis Both Francersquos greater willingness to bind itself in military planning since 1999 and its support for flexible arrangements can be traced back to the requirement of safeguarding some of its investments in the ESDP In contrast highly bind-ing rules were only promoted when the government had a real need to cre-ate the most efficient possible solutions to military shortfalls In this regard the commitments of the partners were to be made more credible because the risks of opportunism would have increased correspondingly In most of the other issues however the French government was more concerned about rising governance costs and thus about giving up residual rights of control

To conclude the transaction costs framework comprehensively accounts for French preferences regarding the institutional depth of both politi-cal and military structures of the emerging ESDP Transaction costs were

Table 104 French transaction costs within the ESDP and institutional depth

French transaction costs within the ESDP




Mixed(Germany darr vsUK uarr)

Moderate to low starting point

Basically zero


Gradual increase(Germany could do too little at the military level and the UK too little at the political one)







moderate from the beginning and merely increased to some extent when the ESDP was actually established Similar to Great Britain the French gov-ernment was sometimes concerned about Germanyrsquos inability to fully meet its commitments Thus it also supported ambitious rules for the ESDPrsquos defence planning In contrast this problematique was largely irrelevant for its transactions with the United Kingdom Instead the government some-times feared abandonment and thus British disengagement from the EUrsquos security and defence policy This was not however to be realistically miti-gated by highly binding agreements Thus it was also the general nature of most military assets that served as the major safeguard for Paris rather than a potentially more hierarchical arrangement with London The differ-ence was mainly that general military assets represented a kind of assurance rather than the initial trigger as in the UK

As a result we have arrived at the end of the studyrsquos structured focused comparison of Germany Great Britain and France Before we summarise the main arguments and conclude with the implications of the previous theoretical and empirical investigations the next chapter discusses first alternative explanations of the empirical record and then the theoretical scope of this studyrsquos argument



Part III

Transaction Costs and Security Institutions ESDP Unravelled



173

11Alternative Explanations and Theoretical Scope of the Transaction Costs Framework

This chapter pursues four objectives which are addressed in the two fol-lowing sections First it closes the circle left open in Chapter 2 where I critically reviewed the internal consistency of standard IR programmes by completing the lsquoLakatosian checkrsquo in terms of external consistency (Lakatos 1970 116ndash22 133ndash4) Second alternative explanations are indispensable for strengthening the plausibility of a novel approach such as the transaction costs framework promoted here In short they are an integral step in ldquocase studies and theory developmentrdquo (George and Bennett 2005 117ndash9) Third while the studyrsquos transaction costs framework explained most preference formation of the ESDP it could not account for every single aspect Crucially the empirical analysis revealed a few indeterminacies which need to be dealt with Finally the case selection was primarily based on the requirement to achieve variation in the dependent variable (George and Bennett 2005 23) The result was however that we examined only large and allied states For a better assessment of the theoretical scope of the argument I will conduct a brief lsquoplausibility probersquo of a small and neutral country Ireland (Eckstein 1975 118ndash23) When we finally achieve these four objectives the transac-tion costs framework will have gained substantial explanatory leverage and plausibility as a mid- range theoretical approach to the study of preference formation regarding security institutions

Testing the plausibility of a transaction costs framework

Chapter 2 consulted standard IR research programmes for their potential contribution to the studyrsquos puzzles The following sections confront these three explanations with empirical evidence from the structured focused comparison and if necessary from additionally generated data The objec-tive is to assess the explanatory power of the transaction costs framework from competing perspectives



Realism and the challenges of variances timing and binding Germany

A (structural) Realist explanation of preference formation is first and fore-most based on anarchy and the distribution of material capabilities which determine the polarity of the international system In turn the relative posi-tion of an individual state in this system is expected to induce its security preferences (eg Koenig- Archibugi 2004 144ndash5) Confronted with empiri-cal evidence from the ESDP however Realism suffers from three main shortcomings First almost identically positioned states such as France and Britain have different sometimes even opposite preferences Second changes of preferences were not preceded by shifts in the regional or inter-national distribution of power (Wolforth 1999 see also Weiss 2009 328) This is particularly striking in the case of Britain Third the empirical evi-dence that the institutionalisation of ESDP may be related to the purpose of lsquobindingrsquo Germany is more than fragile Putting it bluntly the empirical analysis of this study indicates that the ESDP might be neither a lsquoresponse to unipolarityrsquo nor a lsquomoderate balancing effortrsquo (Posen 2004 10ndash2 2006 150ndash1 Jones 2007 24ndash32)1 Even though Realists had never argued that the distribution of capabilities might explain everything in world politics these findings are nonetheless challenging because unipolarity should at least tell us some important things about security cooperation such as the ESDP among the great powers (Waltz 1979 Wolforth 1999 Mearsheimer 2001 Posen 2006)

To begin with Realists argue that the observable convergence among the EU members can be inferred from unipolarity (eg Jones 2007 81ndash96) From a more differentiated perspective however this study has revealed signifi-cant differences between for instance French and British preferences for the substantive scope of the ESDP While the former consistently preferred a military solidarity clause for the EU the latter strongly opposed such an expansion of the Unionrsquos scope Furthermore there were significant differ-ences between the two countries with respect to the projection of power While the French government wanted to build the ESDP for the full spec-trum of the Petersberg Tasks the UK had envisaged low- intensity combat operations for EU troops Thus three states ndash two of them in particular ndash in highly similar or almost identical relative positions had unambiguously distinct even opposite preferences Thus eventual agreement was facili-tated by the fact that preferences were not mutually exclusive in all respects rather than by the common purpose of for instance achieving a lsquosoft bal-ancersquo with the US (eg Art et al 20056 184) This indicates that neither unipolarity nor the relative position of France Germany and the UK can explain the important differences between the member states Although these structural conditions may have contributed to the European percep-tion of investment in power projection (eg Jones 2007 24ndash32) they cannot


Explanatory Scope of the Framework 175

account for the fact that the European pillar was built within the EU rather than within the Alliance as the mid- 1990s had clearly suggested In other words unipolarity does not precisely determine certain choices but leaves substantial room for manoeuvre Thus it seems more appropriate to under-stand unipolarity as kind of background condition rather than as the ultimate cause or starting point of the causal chain

In addition Seth Jones has argued that the EU member states wanted to increase their power to project force and decrease their dependence on the hegemon (Jones 2007 181ndash219 see also Posen 2004 2006) In this context this does not represent a major difference from the argument put forward in this study In particular Jonesrsquo emphasis on the motivation behind the ESDP is similar in that this study also highlighted Europersquos doubts about the credibility of the American commitment This was also treated as one of the main triggers Hence not all parts of the Realist explanation are com-peting with this study and thereby mutually exclusive Instead the conse-quences of decreasing credibility of commitments are essentially identical within the Realist and the transaction costs logic However analysis made in this study could support the view to a lesser degree that the preferences of the Big Three were related to the objective of increasing global power This is primarily based on the fact that the transaction costs perspective directs our attention to different factors such as the opportunities provided by the general nature of the EUrsquos military assets Except for some French rhetoric however the empirical evidence for the objective of increasing global power among the Europeans appears rather weak

The second smaller problem for a Realist explanation is to do with timing (eg Moravcsik 1998 28 34) When we consider the three member statesrsquo preferences with respect to institution- building in security issues since the end of the Cold War we are confronted with strong continuities such as in France and partly in Germany but simultaneously with significant changes such as in Britain From a Realist perspective we would expect some sort of noteworthy shift in the balance of power either world- wide or in the regional European system (Jones 2007 19ndash24) However in fact we can observe no significant changes between the mid- 1990s and the Convention phase (Weiss 2009) Admittedly the end of the Cold War resulted in a shift from bipolarity to unipolarity but this in no way explains the timing of the change to the ESDP in 1998ndash9 While we saw no trend that culminated in St Malo the preceding trend clearly seemed to favour a European pillar within NATO In fact the shift appeared as a change in preference of the new Labour government under Tony Blair However what does this shift have to do with unipolarity or the UKrsquos relative position in Europe Why in 1998ndash9 and not in 1996ndash7 In fact Realism remains largely silent about these devel-opments Thus a power explanation cannot comprehensively explain the changes in preferences but only the continuities of for example France However the apparent counter- example of the British case suggests that the



confirming Realist explanation of Francersquos preferences may emerge for the wrong reasons (see also George and Bennett 2005 161ndash2 207)

Finally the empirical analysis could undoubtedly refute Seth Jonesrsquo hypothesis based on Realist thought that

security cooperation has occurred and it is caused by a desire both to enmesh Germany in an international security institution and to prevent future security competition among European powers ndash what I call an lsquoinstitutionalizingrsquo strategy (Jones 2003 115)

In contrast this study identifies an opposite concern with respect to Germany which was formulated by Great Britain France and the United States respectively namely exploitation The fear was in fact that the reunified country would not live up to its responsibilities of providing power projection capabilities In other words the partners were concerned about a militarily weakened rather than dominant Germany2 Indeed the concerns about a hegemonic Germany played a role in the beginning of the 1990s when the ESDP or something similar failed to be established In contrast when the ESDP actually emerged the situation was the oppo-site Germany was to contribute more strongly to the provision of European security At the same time Seth Jones was right in emphasising European concerns about a potential American withdrawal (Jones 2003 143ndash6) These concerns were however largely independent of fears about Germany and were instead based on rising transaction costs for the provision of European security as was experienced painfully in the Balkans

In sum and closely corresponding to the second chapterrsquos conclusion about Realismrsquos internal consistency the results with respect to external consistency are not signficantly more supportive Again we observe severe weaknesses In particular the notion of balancing appears to be highly problematic for explaining the emergence of the ESDP Thus this study con-cludes that the lsquobuilt- in ambiguityrsquo of the EUrsquos security and defence policy ndash that is the inherent tension between European autonomy and the primacy of NATO ndash cannot simply be lsquoseen through a Realist lensrsquo In contrast the transaction costs framework used in this study seems more innovative and more capable than Realist thought of explaining the complex institutional arrangements made in European security This applies in particular to pref-erence formation

Liberal Intergovernmentalism and the challenges of preference formation without a clearly identifiable market of interest groups

The absence of a clearly identifiable market of competing interest groups makes it inherently difficult to examine LIrsquos hard core and to discuss its external consistency (see also Moravcsik 1998 50 428) Despite this fact three modifications to explain the emergence of the ESDP are discussed in



the following section first the attempt to replace the market of domestic interest groups with party politics second the recourse to dramatic- political actors and the core executive and third differentiating between the eco-nomic and political aspects of the ESDP and its implications for evaluating LIrsquos explanatory leverage

To begin with it is not only interest groups which compete for influence with the national government but also political parties (see also Rathbun 2004) Even if interest- group competition is low in the ESDP party com-petition may still be strong and have a major impact on the shape of a governmentrsquos security preferences While this focus on party politics con-stitutes an extension of Andrew Moravcsikrsquos original research programme (Moravcsik 1993a 1997 1998) it nonetheless supports his core idea namely that national policy preferences can be inferred from the dynamics of domestic political contestation At first glance this modification appears persuasive On a simple and co- relational basis we observed two changes of governments in the UK (1997) and in Germany (1998) which largely cor-responded to changes in preferences highly pronounced in the former and more gradual in the latter Simultaneously France experienced no change of government and its preferences were characterised by a strong degree of continuity

Despite this initial plausibility additional empirical evidence raises seri-ous doubts about the explanatory leverage of this factor First of all the UKrsquos government did not change its approach towards the ESDP in Amsterdam in 1997 While this is precisely what we would expect from a party poli-tics explanation Poumlrtschach and St Malo came later More importantly the integration of party programmes and election manifestos as indis-pensable sources (Jachtenfuchs 2002) do not support this kind of expla-nation No indications can be found for why the newly elected British or German governments introduced major changes after entering power (Labour Party 1995 1996 CDUCSU Group 1994 SPD Bundestag Group 2000) While British Labour was obviously much closer to Europe than the Tories of the mid- 1990s this did not explicitly apply to security and defence affairs (House of Commons 1998 McInnes 1998) In Germany sources from party politics even point in opposite directions Some of the key party proponents (such as Karl Lamers) and the majority of manifestos of the CDU were consistently closer to EU defence cooperation than was the governmentrsquos approach Nevertheless these party preferences were not translated into governmental preferences This only happened in the course of the Nice and Convention deliberations under the initially more criti-cal centre- left government Finally there is a theoretical objection Liberal Intergovernmentalismrsquos interest groups focus on relatively transparent allo-cation rules Farmers prefer certain subsidies exporters free trade and so on These groups can anticipate what certain decisions imply for them in the future This is what makes Andrew Moravcsikrsquos argument so powerful



yet parsimonious But what about allocation rules for institution- building in security (Zuumlrn 1997 300) Who knows what their consequences will be How is political pressure to be organised in order to represent particular-istic interests Who are the winners Who will lose Obviously one could replace this problem by returning to a simple assumption Politicians want to win elections However I argue that no party in Europe will win or lose elections because of institution- building in the ESDP The issue is simply not sufficiently salient (see also Meacuterand 2008 150) In short replacing the market mechanism by party politics seems a worthwhile but ultimately unsatisfactory endeavour

Secondly the British shift of St Malo was judged to be an example for which Liberal Intergovernmentalism may contribute to our understanding of the emergence of the ESDP (Dover 2005) In the period preceding St Malo the UKrsquos Ministry of Defence (MoD) was basically detached from the EU and it certainly made no efforts towards the establishment of the ESDP (Bulmer and Burch 2005 882) There was some debate between the MoD and the Foreign Ministry about a European defence initiative but it was ultimately unresolved Thus no significant inputs came from the military establish-ment (Dover 2005 511) If this is the case a Liberal Intergovernmentalist focuses on Tony Blairrsquos Cabinet Office and searches for the lsquodramatic- political actorrsquo who pushed forward the shift (eg Howorth 2004 221ndash223 Dover 2005 512ndash513) There is some empirical evidence though not uncon-tested that Tony Blair asked his closest advisors to suggest how Britain could take a leadership role in Europe ndash as long as it did not involve joining the Monetary Union The result was security and defence (Dover 2005 513ndash515 see also Meacuterand 2008 114ndash118)3 Accordingly the dramatic- political actor Tony Blair took the initiative and launched the ESDP Due to Blairrsquos suspi-cions towards the UKrsquos own Europe- critical bureaucracy he even integrated some of his Cabinet officials into the policy unit of No 10 Downing Street One would expect this to consolidate his personal power and authority over EU policymaking (Bulmer and Burch 2005 877) Does this provide us with a satisfying LI- explanation To put the question in a different way to what extent does this correspond to the research programmersquos causal hypotheses

[T]he decision to adopt a pro- European defence policy was principally taken by the PM in the absence of domestic interest- group pressure Moreover domestic interest groups merely provided support for this pol-icy after the decision had been taken (Dover 2005 521)

This attempt to save LIrsquos hard core tends to degenerate into an ad hoc explanation While this may increase the research programmersquos consistency with the external real world it makes it basically non- falsifiable After all the remarks suggest that in contrast to what we would expect from a Liberal



Intergovernmentalist perspective the major domestic stake- holders namely the military establishments were often neglected during the member statesrsquo preference formation processes Instead the modified LI- approaches apply ad hoc assumptions such as the key importance of dramatic- political actors or the core executive

Finally despite the fact that this evidence overwhelmingly questions a Liberal Intergovernmentalist explanation of the studyrsquos research subject it offers an opportunity of distinguishing the more political from the more economic aspects of the ESDP This differentiated approach has always been the main strength of this research programme When defence planning or the institutionalisation of a common armaments policy is to be the focus it definitely makes sense to incorporate the large armaments corporations and their influence on governments (Moravcsik 1993b Jones 2006) For exam-ple the often hesitant position of the UK on these issues can clearly be traced back to the companiesrsquo fears of getting into direct conflict with the United States and consequently losing ground in the much more relevant American market (especially BAe Systems) (Government of the UK 2005)4 Similarly the relatively protectionist position of the French is related to its desire to further support the lsquonational defence championsrsquo such as Dassault Aviation (IISS 1995 38ndash9 Bulmer and Burch 2005 see also DeVore and Weiss 2010)5

In sum this section has presented three modifications of the original research programme which should strengthen its external consistency when faced with the empirical record of this study The results are ambiv-alent While party politics seems to represent a heuristically promising ndash though not fully comprehensive ndash view a focus on the core executive seems rather misleading and is strongly reminiscent of an auxiliary hypothesis in a Lakatosian sense Being fully compatible with the research programmersquos origins it became also apparent that there is a greater potential for explain-ing economic ndash rather than political ndash issues Taken as a whole however it was also demonstrated that none of these modified explanations represent a more persuasive approach than the studyrsquos transaction costs framework

Constructivism and the challenge of non- incremental preference changes

For Constructivismrsquos check of external consistency one of the greatest chal-lenges is to account for preference changes Chapter 2 has already shown that most (moderate) Constructivists (eg Katzenstein 1996) argue that cul-ture ndash in the form of belief systems held by elites ndash has a significant impact on what governments promote in security issues at an Intergovernmental Conference6 While the abrupt change in the British case study would defi-nitely represent the hardest test for such an explanation Germany repre-sents the most likely case according to most of the literature (Duffield 1998 Banchoff 1999 Maull 2000 Longhurst 2003 see also Weiss 2009) There is



a widespread consensus that its lsquoculture of restraintrsquo allegedly determines its foreign and security policy Therefore it should also have major explanatory leverage to account for preferences for institution- building in security If the explanation of Germanyrsquos case were faced with severe difficulties there would be sufficient reasons to question more generally the external consist-ency of this approach (Eckstein 1975 118ndash23)

The structured focused comparison has demonstrated that the German governmentrsquos preferences were characterised by relatively far- reaching ambitions Germany wanted both the EUrsquos substantive scope and the institutional depth of the ESDP to be far-reaching compared to both of the other large states At first glance this need not be puzzling from a cultural-ist perspective Germany was often willing to bind itself despite its great power status Its culture of restraint and its deep- seated tradition as a media-tor between Paris and Washington fits neatly into that picture (Duffield 1998 Haftendorn 1999) Rather than simply pointing to the compatibil-ity between beliefs and preferences however it is necessary to show that changes in the German belief systems preceded changes in preferences Otherwise the assumed causal pathway between both analytical building blocks appears to be questionable

For this purpose I will consider data from both domestic discourse and opinion polls (Pye 1991 498ndash502 see also Weiss 2009) At the level of discourse we see that the beliefs about the question of when and why to use force did not change substantially between 1996 and 2003 Preventive (civilian) actions were consistently regarded as both more effective and more appropriate (German Ministry of Defence 1994 45 2003 7ndash10) When comparing this aspect of the German political- military culture in Amsterdam with the time before the Convention we observe a high degree of continuity Obviously there were adjustments such as after 911 when lsquoharbouring terroristsrsquo was included as a legitimate reason to use force (Scharping 2002) but the general position remained highly stable even after the Kosovo intervention in 1999 (Hyde- Price 2001 29ndash32) The ques-tion of Atlanticist vs Europeanist orientations can be answered in a similar vein (eg German Ministry of Defence 2003) NATO and the EU are both regarded as indispensable From the perspective of opinion polls as a means of measuring belief systems the Germans lsquowant to have it both waysrsquo this means widespread support for NATO and at the same time for the EU in security issues (Eichenberg 2003 628 see also Collmer 2004) Given this brief overview of German beliefs it is inherently difficult to predict prefer-ences for institution- building in the ESDP Crucially however the empiri-cal record does not reveal that preference changes were preceded by belief changes (eg Kernic et al 2002 Eichenberg 2003) Instead there are strong indications that Germanyrsquos shifts in beliefs largely follow policy changes (Weiss 2009 323ndash6) This closely corresponds to the results from a longer time series of Eurobarometer surveys (Lutz 2002) We may conclude that



Germany initiated some remarkable changes between the mid- 1990s and the Convention but at the level of policy not of belief systems or culture Non- incremental shifts in preferences did not follow the changes of the elitesrsquo (or mass) belief systems

While an explanation based on culture does demonstrate that Germany favours pursuing security policy via institutions it does not tell us whether NATO or the EU would be the preferred option In other words it provides a similar degree of persuasiveness as the exclusive demand perspective pre-sented in Chapter 4 yes these factors might play a role but do not provide a comprehensive explanation Nevertheless this study also demonstrated that transaction costs did not dictate particular preferences but left some space for qualified assessments of the respective governments Thus it would clearly be too extreme as position to exclude cultural variables completely from the empirical analysis After all a countryrsquos strategic culture may serve as an important context for its governmentrsquos assessment of transaction costs and thus its formulation of preferences for institution- building In short belief systems seem more suitable as a lsquotrackrsquo of preferences rather than as a genuine lsquotriggerrsquo It is therefore a question of parsimony and theoretical coherence rather than a statement of truth as to whether to incorporate cul-tural variables into an explanation of preferences for institution- building in European security

In sum these three alternative explanations clearly show that a transac-tion costs approach is not the only story that we can tell about the ESDP Nevertheless it has also become clear that neither of the standard IR approaches ndash Realism Liberal Intergovernmentalism and Constructivism ndash really provides a comprehensive explanation for similarities and differences or continuities and changes respectively Even though the studyrsquos transaction costs frame-work cannot explain everything about the ESDP it represents an innovative point of departure for future research In particular it may be a contribution to liberal IR- theory since it offers an approach to accounting for preferences in issue- areas other than economic Not only from an International Relations perspective but also for European studies this progressive nature may become even more important when we consider the growing relevance of the ESDP for the European political project as a whole (Scharpf 2001 50ndash1)

Defining the scope of the transaction costs argument

After having systematically addressed the explanatory leverage of the transaction costs framework compared to standard IR approaches two additional challenges arise for any potential generalisation from the studyrsquos argument first the latent bias of the case selection and second some indeterminacies of the German case in particular Before I confront the latter I first discuss to what extent the choice of big states as cases affected the answers I obtained (Geddes 1990)



A small and neutral country Ireland as a lsquoplausibility probersquo

This study chose to analyse different cases from the perspective of the expected outcomes of the dependent variable (George and Bennett 2005 153ndash60) The basis for the selection was Andrew Moravcsikrsquos three groups of the CFSP in Maastricht (Moravcsik 1998 451) However two potentially relevant factors were excluded by this The study focused exclusively not only on allied but also on the most powerful states in the ESDP For that rea-son in the following section I conduct a lsquoplausibility probersquo (Eckstein 1975 108ndash13) of a small and neutral country Ireland in which variance within both dimensions is established This will allow me to determine more thor-oughly how widely the arguments put forward in this study apply To what extent did transaction costs apply to Irelandrsquos preferences for institution- building in European security

Firstly we need to determine the Irish governmentrsquos preferences over time with respect to substantive scope what responsibilities for military plan-ning should the EU acquire For Ireland the United Nations was the domi-nant institution for all questions of international peace and security In the mid- 1990s the reference point of Irelandrsquos approach to European security was military neutrality (eg Doherty 2002) Thus the government fiercely opposed the introduction of mutual defence guarantees (in other words merger with the WEU)7 but at the same time supported the incorpora-tion of the Petersberg Tasks for crisis management (eg Spring 1995 Irish Government 1996) For the Irish government the latter functional task was the domain which had to be strengthened by increased cooperation even in part institutionalisation A genuine lsquomilitarisationrsquo of the EU however should be clearly ruled out Instead the Union should increasingly adopt a ldquocomprehensive approach to securityrdquo (Irish Government 1996 Townsend 1996) Hence the focus was undoubtedly on Petersbergrsquos lower end Despite the Irish position of supporting operational crisis management tasks for the EU it was not particularly inclined to extend this support to defence plan-ning Here the government largely stood for an lsquoad hoc approachrsquo rather than institutionalisation (eg Mitchell 1995 Townsend 1996) In short the EU should acquire at most a limited amount of responsibility for low- intensity crisis management

Interestingly enough it was precisely the relatively non- ambitious agree-ments of the Nice Treaty that the Irish people rejected via a referendum While the country thus joined NATOrsquos lsquoPartnership for Peacersquo (PfP) in 1999 it simultaneously rejected to some degree the Unionrsquos ESDP The possibility of breaking with their own tradition of military neutrality was among the most contested issues within the domestic debate on ratifying Nice (Gilland 2002 Hayward 2002) Subsequently the constitution was amended to add an explicit clause requiring that accession to a military alignment must be decided by the people via a referendum8



At the time of the Convention Irelandrsquos main frame of reference for ques-tions of peace and security remained the UN rather than the EU or NATO (Irish Department of Defence 2000 19 of 99) The purpose it preferred for the ESDP was mainly to improve UN peacekeeping While Ireland was involved in practical terms and participated in the ESDP it was still con-cerned about a potential lsquomilitarisation of the EUrsquo Based on this approach Ireland opposed mutual defence assistance However those members who wish to adopt that strategy should not be hindered Moreover Ireland sup-ported a solidarity clause with respect to terrorist attacks and natural dis-asters whereby all decisions with military implications were required to be unanimous Consequently it supported the updating of the Petersberg Tasks and the European Security Strategy because both approached the problem of security in a lsquoholisticrsquo way (European Council 2003) In sum the Irish lsquoorderings of possible outcomesrsquo remained largely stable no collective defence but merely crisis management with an emphasis on Petersbergrsquos lower end Thus we have to ask how far we can trace this approach back to the studyrsquos framework

In simple terms transaction costs for the provision of European security were relatively low from an Irish perspective This was partly based on an assessment of the security environment that was essentially analogous to the perception of the lsquoBig Threersquo

The external security environment does not contain any specific threats to the overall security of the State ( ) The new security environment in greater Europe however is marked by a lower degree of risk of large scale military conflict but also by new challenges and uncertainties (Irish Department of Defence 2000 12 13 of 99)

In short the demand for a security institution was perceived to be a given In addition and this was something new for Dublin they were confronted with demands from Europersquos major powers to participate in crisis manage-ment (eg Hoon 2005)9 Hence the Irish government primarily focused on the transaction costs of (low- intensity) peacekeeping tasks in Europe since world- wide combat missions were beyond the capacity of a small state (Irish Department of Defence 2000 25 of 99) When we then consider Irelandrsquos comparative institutional assessment it becomes clear that the Irish per-spective is rather narrowly concentrated on regional arrangements so we need to consider the governmentrsquos reasoning about joining NATOrsquos PfP

Considerable benefits will accrue to the Defence Forces from participa-tion in PfP allowing them to enhance their capability for multinational peacekeeping operations in the future through the medium of interoper-ability development training and exercises PfP will be of value to Ireland in cooperation and planning for Petersberg Tasks Irelandrsquos participation



in NATO- led UN mandated forces in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in Kosovo are examples of the type of situations in which Ireland can ben-efit from participation in PfP because much of the preparation and train-ing for these new style missions is undertaken by countries under the auspices of PfP (Irish Department of Defence 2000 68 of 99)

Given that statement Dublinrsquos turn towards more active forms of partici-pation in European security activities is strongly reminiscent of the French case examined in earlier chapters The costs of adjustment had meanwhile reached substantial levels so that joining the security institution became a conceivable option After all this would help to reduce the transaction costs for the provision of European security that also affected small and neu-tral Ireland (eg Irish Department of Foreign Affairs 1999 Doherty 2000)10 Therefore the government also preferred the provision of information and thus enhanced cooperation at the EU level with respect to responsibilities in which it faced substantial transaction costs11 This meant primarily peace-keeping tasks whose institutionalisation could contribute to a reduction of Irish transaction costs and was thus supported (Irish Department of Foreign Affairs 1999 Keohane 2001)

Finally how may we link Irish opposition to a collective defence function to transaction costs In other words why did the government not want the EU to evolve as an all- encompassing security institution Any answer to this question that omitted the Irish tradition of military neutrality would be incomplete (eg Doherty 2002) At the same time however the actual implementation of this principle was put under increasing pressure by the developments of the post- Cold War era (eg Fine Gael 2000 Keohane 2001)12 What we did indeed observe was the tension between an integral part of Irish identity and the new demands of a changing security environ-ment The former remained the more powerful so collective defence con-tinued to be opposed by the government Nevertheless Irish moves to first accept and then actively promote low- intensity crisis management at the EU level can be derived from the perceived demand This became particularly visible in its position towards the Constitutional Treaty

The Governmentrsquos approach to security and defence matters was to ensure an outcome which would enable the Union to develop its capabili-ties for conflict prevention and crisis management whilst ensuring that any new arrangements were fully consistent with Irelandrsquos traditional policy of military neutrality (Irish Government 2005 89)

In sum this initial examination suggests that a transaction costs frame-work can indeed sharpen our understanding of actors other than the Big Three To apply the framework to Irish preferences on substantive scope its analytical concepts would need to be adjusted in that the role of the United



States and grand strategic considerations would be largely replaced by an explicit focus on more regional arrangements in Europe In addition the studyrsquos framework would probably be supplemented by an identity- concept such as military neutrality which could serve as a kind of intervening vari-able as in the German case on institutional depth In general however the plausibility probe indicates that Irish preferences for the provision of secu-rity were also determined by functionalist considerations and transaction costs This lsquoexplanansrsquo was mediated by a deeply- rooted belief in military neutrality and therefore did not straightforwardly translate into prefer-ences for substantive scope Nevertheless it represented a strong predictor Thus we have seen why the Irish government supported selected functional aspects of the EUrsquos defence pillar and I now turn to the question of how it wanted to design the institutional arrangement

Secondly Ireland clearly opposed specific and demanding rules for the EUrsquos security policy in the mid- 1990s Nevertheless it was relatively open- minded with respect to some division of labour with the European institutions (eg Irish Government 1996 Townsend 1996) Even though its neutrality pro-hibited its abandoning of the unanimity model in decision- making (that is a lsquored linersquo) Ireland always supported the strengthening rather than the weakening of supranationalist institutions such as the Commission (eg Irish Government 1996 2003) At the Amsterdam IGC- negotiations the government was largely oriented toward the status quo supporting only some minor reforms to increase the EUrsquos coherence on the international stage13 Because the Nice referendum had subsequently also failed because of the ESDP provisions (eg Gilland 2002 Hayward 2002) Irish hesitancy with respect to greater bindingness was decisively reinforced

Because of these difficult experiences and the constitutional change that would be required the government entered the Convention- IGC with so- called red lines which were expected to preserve the countryrsquos military neutrality The central concern was how to accommodate this Irish tradi-tion within the ESDP in which it wanted to participate to a certain extent (eg Cowen 2003a 2003b 2003c) Therefore the government supported the maintenance of both the Treatyrsquos lsquosafeguard clausersquo and the lsquoemergency brakersquo Flexible arrangements in security policy should become facilitated while some political control of the EU as a whole had to be ensured this applied also to military operations involving only a few member states This opportunity for lsquostructured cooperationrsquo should also refer to collective defence although in that domain Ireland itself would not participate (Irish Government 2005 89) In short the government clearly preferred inter-governmental procedures While this referred particularly to the consensus model of decision- making the government also rejected ndash contrary to the Irish tradition ndash an increasing division of labour between the member states and EU institutions such as the Commission In conclusion Irelandrsquos pref-erences with regard to institutional depth were largely characterised by a



hesitant orientation towards the status quo The lsquoNice rulesrsquo should not be made more ambitious so the government wished to preserve a veto position in ESDP matters Again the question arises to what extent we may trace back this generally reluctant Irish approach towards bindingness to transac-tion costs within the ESDP

When we refer to the frameworkrsquos main dimensions we see how a transac-tion costs perspective may contribute to our understanding of Irish prefer-ences on institutional depth While uncertainty about the partners appears to be generally moderate a focus on asset specificity seems heuristically interesting Irelandrsquos insistence on unanimity and the preservation of its neutrality can be derived straightforwardly from the substantial political costs of more specific military assets After the Nice referenda these costs were prohibitive (eg Keohane 2001 Hayward 2002) Recalling Douglass Northrsquos statement that ldquo[n]onspecialization is a form of insurance when the costs and uncertainties of transacting are highrdquo (North 1990b 34) we may directly apply this to the Irish case The governmentrsquos uncertainty about the partners was relatively low (Cowen 2003a 2003b) In contrast however the political and financial costs were significant for Ireland Under such conditions a government may either support specific assets and build corre-spondingly strong safeguards or pull back from increased cooperation and support more general assets The latter strategy was in fact chosen since it preserved the neutrality provisions of the Irish constitution In terms of transaction costs Ireland wanted to limit the risks of lsquoentrapmentrsquo in a European security project that could create severe problems for its militarily neutral status In a nutshell the interaction of modest uncertainty and the high political costs of defence integration implied either a support for spe-cific structures with strong safeguards or greater moderation in its demands so that binding agreements would not be necessary The Irish government chose the latter course The modest level of transaction costs did not dictate a particular choice but nonetheless strongly suggested the approach that was ultimately selected

In sum we may tentatively conclude that ndash without establishing clear causal pathways ndash this plausibility probe suggests some heuristic value in expanding the scope of the argument to smaller states within the EU The emphasis was thereby on suggesting rather than proving since more empirical work is required Similar to some stages of the studyrsquos process- tracing the Irish case indicates that it might be necessary to supplement the transaction costs framework with some cultural variables if in fact we were to expand the scope of the argument to additional cases Finally this section turns to some of the indeterminacies of the structured focused comparison

Indeterminacies of a transaction costs framework

Significantly the German case study on institutional depth revealed that under certain conditions the causal pathway of transaction costs may be



indeterminate How is a government expected to formulate its prefer-ences if non- costly investments into specific assets are at stake In such a situation a governmentrsquos choice is relatively indeterminate from the perspective of the studyrsquos framework it may want to bind the partners because of the specific investments ( risk of opportunism) or it may pre-fer flexibility due to the low costs of the investments (governance costs) As a result it is reasonable to prefer either a binding or a non- binding agreement The German government ultimately preferred the participa-tion of the European institutions and thus a more binding agreement for primarily ideational reasons it was the domestically appropriate posi-tion to support a division of labour It corresponded more closely to the countryrsquos multilateralist tenet and its lsquoculture of reticencersquo As in the plausibility probe of Ireland we see that the studyrsquos framework would gain explanatory leverage if it added more variables culture or belief systems appear particularly suitable to complement the framework Nevertheless such an expansion would not be cost- free More specifi-cally the argument would not only become less parsimonious but would also require us to derive the variables from partly contradictory research programmes This is mainly problematic for reasons of theoretical coher-ence Therefore this study chose the approach of focusing on the lsquotrig-gersrsquo of security preferences namely transaction costs and accordingly ran the risk of not being able to explaining everything with respect to institution- building in ESDP

Put differently the studyrsquos objective was to establish a coherent mid- range theoretical explanation rather than a covering law The transaction costs framework was capable of explaining some of the most important things in the ESDP It offered a comprehensive approach to the main playersrsquo prefer-ences and explained why they wanted what they wanted Certain conditions such as a strong identity or some other national uniqueness may intervene and thus determine more precisely the lsquotracksrsquo chosen by a government The lsquotriggerrsquo however was transaction costs whether for the provision of European security or within the ESDP itself

In conclusion this chapter has strengthened the view that the transaction costs framework provides the most comprehensive approach to explaining preference formation in the ESDP Despite different degrees of plausibility none of the standard IR research programmes were fully ndash or even ndash more persuasive when confronted with empirical evidence from the structured focused comparison At the same time however explanatory factors build-ing on Constructivist thought provide useful supplements to the studyrsquos framework However they cannot replace transaction costs as initial trig-gers of preference formation Closely related to this result the plausibility probe of a small and neutral country reconfirmed the basic tenet of the first part of this chapter Despite the fact that some modifications would be necessary the transaction costs framework fulfils its objectives and provides



plausible mid- range explanations of institutional preferences As indicated above by meeting the four objectives defined in the beginning of this chap-ter the studyrsquos framework has gained substantial explanatory leverage The concluding chapter will summarise the most important results of this study and finally discuss what this might imply for the transformations of the state


189

12Conclusion ndash Theory-Development in the European Security and Defence Policy

Before this chapter recapitulates the argument of this study step- by- step I first discuss the importance of resolving the puzzles raised in the Introduction and the value added to International Relations as a discipline The primary relevance was given by the simple existence of the ESDP com-bined with the disciplinersquos failure to explain this in a theoretically coher-ent rather than ad hoc manner A European defence pillar was established at the end of the 1990s albeit not within NATO as most indicators had initially suggested Therefore the member statesrsquo preferences represented a highly suitable point of departure for analysing the emergence of this security institution In particular the empirical analysis of preferences on substantive scope provided an answer to the puzzle of why the ESDP emerged Because this had corresponded closely to Francersquos initial position I focus on Germany and Britain and on the factors that triggered their preferences towards the establishment of an EU defence pillar rather than a European one within NATO

Given the failure of Francersquos rapprochement with the Alliance both gov-ernments needed to reconsider the institutional basis of the European secu-rity architecture The study demonstrated that it was primarily the rising uncertainty about whether the United States was fully committed to each serious crisis that increased the risks of opportunism and thus transaction costs for Berlin and London These crises at the borders of Europe particu-larly in the Balkans played an increasingly prominent role in the debate on the future of European security While NATO in many regards remained the two countriesrsquo organisation of choice its ability to provide European secu-rity continuously and effectively lost credibility Crucially isolationist voices from Capitol Hill were heard with great concern in both Berlin and London A capable EU- only option represented a promising point of departure towards the gradual provision of security for Europe Information on future military planning was to be shared between the European countries enabling the



transaction costs of these cooperative exchanges to be kept down At the same time compatibility with NATO was still required as high- intensity combat missions would not be feasible without the US for a considerable time Therefore incompatibility had the potential to produce new uncertain-ties The comparative institutional assessment of NATO and the EU and their capacities to reduce in the medium- to longer- term the transaction costs for the provision of European security encouraged both countries to promote though to different degrees the creation of the ESDP

However it would be simplistic to understand the emergence of a secu-rity arrangement as merely meeting a demand or a market failure within European security Instead the studyrsquos transaction costs perspective on preferences sheds light on the important differences between the member states France which consistently faced high costs of adjustment in military affairs wanted to build the ESDP much earlier than for instance Britain who had a formidable fallback option in the US Germany fell somewhere in between and mainly needed efficient solutions to military shortfalls In other words the transaction costs framework has a two- fold advantage over a purely market failure explanation it does not only explain the individual preferences of EU members but also the timing of the emergence of the ESDP by identifying the thresholds of the governmentsrsquo comparative insti-tutional assessments In addition the explicit integration of the notion of asset specificity permitted us to make sense of the lsquobuilt- in ambiguityrsquo of the EUrsquos defence pillar while going beyond a supposed objective demand The key was rather the ESDPrsquos largely general and thus redeployable assets which have enabled a reconciliation between the two opposing principles of European autonomy and the primacy of NATO

Having briefly shown the relevance and the value added by the study I will now provide a chapter- by- chapter summary Following that I draw the principal conclusions from the study which respectively refer to theory analytical concepts and substantive matters Finally the last section will explicitly address the implications of this analysis for the transformations of the state

Transaction costs security institutions and unravelling the ESDP

While the emergence of the ESDP as one of the most recent transforma-tions in world politics served as the studyrsquos point of departure the primary research objective was to systematically answer the allegedly trivial ques-tion of why the EU member states wanted what they wanted when entering nego-tiations over institution- building in European security The simple answer is that they sought the reduction of current and the limitation of future trans-action costs These costs emerge from cooperative exchanges between the main actors within Europersquos security setting and represent the main trigger


Theory-Development in the ESDP 191

behind the EU member statesrsquo preference formation This explanatory path-way not only turned out to be the most progressive approach in comparison to the main alternative explanations but also contributes the only account of both lsquocontinuitiesndashchangesrsquo and lsquosimilaritiesndashdifferencesrsquo Finally it pro-vides a differentiated perspective on a highly complex institutional arrange-ment Nevertheless it must be emphasised that this study developed a mid- range theoretical explanation rather than a covering law of preferences for institution- building in European security

As indicated above the empirical objective of this study was to explain the preferences of Germany Britain and France with respect to the com-mon build- up of political- military structures within the ESDP since the mid- 1990s Following the introductory chapter I first consulted the three main research programmes within International Relations (Chapter 2) Building on Imre Lakatosrsquo lsquosophisticated falsificationismrsquo (Lakatos 1970 116) I reviewed Realist Liberal Intergovernmentalist and Constructivist ideas in terms of their internal consistency The results were mixed at best Preferences are derived by specific mechanisms that respectively refer to power plenty or interactions (Zuumlrn 1997 299 Weiss 2005) While Realismrsquos anarchy as the sole determinant of security preferences gave rise to numerous problems Liberal Intergovernmentalism was confronted with the absence of a clearly identifiable market of domestic interest groups Thus it frequently trans-ferred the explanatory burden to variables outside its hard core Finally Constructivismrsquos socialisation also failed to provide a full explanation of what triggers preference formation Given these preliminary results I was confronted with the question of where to go from here whether to build a synthesis out of these existing approaches or look at other schools of politi-cal science

The latter option was chosen and I therefore addressed the lsquonew institu-tionalismsrsquo and in particular their historical form as an analytical toolkit for an improved understanding of and explanation for the emergence of security institutions (Hall and Taylor 1996 Lake 1999 Pierson 2004) The basic framework started out from general propositions about actors with preferences interactions between them in the sense of security cooperation and institution- building (Frieden 1999 Morrow 1999) moving step- by- step towards more specific processes and mechanisms in the emergence of the ESDP In addition the envisaged mid- range theoretical explanation built on theories of political economy and some previous applications of the latter to security problems The idea of introducing transaction costs as an explana-tory building block was ultimately due to a simple observation if scholars of political economy are correct when they observe that institutions mat-ter under the condition of costly transactions I expect to find that it is precisely those transaction costs that trigger the EU member statesrsquo prefer-ences on whether and how to build these institutions in the first place In a functionalist sense the EU members may prefer to build institutions for the



resolution of perceived problems and to structure their future interactions While this study assumed that the member statesrsquo preferences are primarily determined by costndashbenefit calculations this does not imply that all solu-tions of collective action problems are functional Indeed some systematic modifications were integrated into the transaction costs framework Most crucially both the supposed costs and benefits of institution- building heav-ily draw on cognitivist and interpretative notions (Carlsnaes 2002 341ndash4 Rathbun 2007 541ndash9)

Chapter 3 theoretically derived a transaction costs framework applicable to cooperation and institution- building in European security At this stage of the analysis I introduced one major feature of the lsquoexplanandumrsquo that had to be reflected within the explanatory building blocks and consequently structured the complete empirical analysis On the one hand preferences on substantive scope refer to problems that the governments wanted to sub-sume under an institutional arrangement The underlying question of this dimension was why the EU members wanted to build the ESDP or why not On the other hand this study followed the assumption that it was insuf-ficient merely to answer this question Instead the analytical concepts that explain the governmentsrsquo willingness or otherwise to cooperate might at the same time be applicable to the question of how these institutions were to be designed As a result a typology of preferences for institution- building in European security was developed1

The transaction costs framework for the study of preferences for institution- building in European security builds on four basic assumptions First the actors namely governments are subject to lsquobounded rationalityrsquo Second human behaviour is opportunistic and may thus give rise to prob-lems with regard to credible commitments Third transactions between the actors are organised along a continuum between anarchy and hierarchy However most of the time international politics is dominated by hybrid forms Finally these institutional settings may allocate values in an ineffi-cient way and thus be subject to change by the actors involved (eg Keohane 1984 Williamson 1985 North 1990a)

The next step focused on the costs and benefits that the EU member states want to acquire through cooperation and institution- building namely greater security from threats and risks at an acceptable cost (Lake 1999 Weber 2000) It is assumed that the pooling of resources shapes the essential incentives for the EU governments to even consider cooperation in this domain Their underlying objective is to reduce the production costs of security When we compare the unilateral with the multilateral provision of this good we iden-tify three main mechanisms behind institution- building in European secu-rity Economies of scale functional differentiation and positive externalities may all reduce the costs of providing security through institutions These efficiency gains achieved through cooperation however require transac-tions and thus also incur costs the lsquorisk of opportunistic behaviourrsquo refers



to the problem of credible commitments whereas increased hierarchy may reduce these risks but states must instead give up residual rights of con-trol (lsquogovernance costsrsquo) (Lake 1999 52ndash71) In short this study understands security cooperation primarily through the lens of a tradeoff between costs and benefits

A transaction costs analysis focuses on the ldquocomparative costs of planning adapting and monitoring task completion under alternative governance struc-turesrdquo (Williamson 1985 2) The size of transaction costs depends primarily on the attributes of the transactions at stake asset specificity on the one hand and uncertainty on the other The former refers to the nature of the object of cooperation If it is specific it cannot be easily redeployed to other purposes but at the same time promises significant gains (eg economies of scale) If the asset is rather general however it may be redeployed to other settings and thus increases flexibility for the exchange partners In this case the potential gains from cooperation are normally lower In contrast uncertainty emerges from incomplete information about the expected pref-erences and behaviour of other actors in the course of future interactions It is thus about the assessed credibility of the partnersrsquo commitments The interaction between these dimensions gives rise to the risks of opportunism and governance costs whose tradeoff determines the member statesrsquo rela-tive magnitude of transaction costs This in turn triggers their preferences for institution- building in European security because each government ulti-mately strives to adjusting the ESDP to its ex post and ex ante transactions in terms of uncertainty and asset specificity

At a more specific level the framework distinguished between two kinds of transaction costs for the analysis of preferences on substantive scope and institutional depth Both were inferred from the research programmersquos hard core while they were at the same time sufficiently specific to meet the challenges of an empirical study Hence I started from some general proposi-tions about preferences security cooperation and institution- building and moved to more specific processes and mechanisms of institutional choice and development in political- military issues Crucially I distinguished between comparative costs that emerge from the general provision of European security (including the US) and transaction costs that materialise within the ESDP (EU- only) While the former drive preferences on scope the latter determine the desired outcomes of institutional depth

Firstly an analysis of transaction costs for the provision of European security must examine different institutional contexts from a comparative perspective The primary determinants of transaction costs are uncertainty and opportunism and thus the issue of credible commitments To discover why the EU member states suddenly wanted to establish the ESDP ldquocom-parative institutional assessments of the adaptive attributes of alternative governance structures must necessarily be maderdquo (Williamson 1985 57) Building on the frameworkrsquos costndashbenefit perspective a member state would



not assess transaction costs for the provision of European security in abso-lute terms but would instead compare it to another institutionrsquos ability to reduce the costs This other institution was primarily NATO The focus of the analysis was thus on uncertainty about the credible commitments of how to provide the good of European security and therefore the risks of opportunism On that basis a government may engage or disengage from a security institution2 This step of the analysis explained the member statesrsquo preferences on the substantive scope of the ESDP

Secondly the next step focused more specifically on the question of how the EU governments wanted to design the new institution Transaction costs within the ESDP refer to the assessment of credible commitments of the other EU members alone and to the actual assets that were to be established within the ESDP In this respect the individual costs for a member and the question of redeployability were crucial The interaction between uncer-tainty and asset specificity was then reflected within the risks of oppor-tunism and (anticipated) governance costs among the governments The tradeoff between these dimensions ultimately constituted the magnitude of transaction costs that an EU member state faced and thus determined its desired extent of bindingness for the new agreements At this stage however it is crucial to emphasise that high risks of opportunism can be avoided by two opposing strategies determining governmental preferences on institutional depth one can either establish binding mechanisms which prevent (anticipated) cheating or build general non- specific assets which decreases the potential losses in the event of cheating In other words the anticipated limitation of future transaction costs may lead to preferences for general rather than specific assets

Finally the studyrsquos causal pathway primarily built on a rationalndashfunction-alist logic It thus explained preferences for institution- building in terms of the expected effects of the arrangement The underlying motivation for the governments was to reduce uncertainty in the provision of European security and to safeguard investments that it had already made in the ESDP Based on these theoretical considerations the study expected that the more costly a state judges the transactions to be with respect to the provision of European security the more it will prefer to build institutions in this domain This general path could be further specified for preferences on both substantive scope and institutional depth The study went on to apply this framework to an empirical examina-tion of German British and French preferences for institution- building in European security since the mid- 1990s The key concepts were defined and operationalised in order to confront them with the empirical evidence The studyrsquos origins in historical- institutionalist thought suggested focusing not only on the governmentsrsquo institutional choice but also on development over time In other words the in- depth analysis was confronted with the challenge of tracing back the preferences of the Big Three over a period of about ten years This comprised the bulk of the subsequent seven chapters



Before the book could proceed with the individual country studies how-ever I needed to examine the perceived demand for a security institution on a comparative basis For that purpose the Big Threersquos perceptions of the security environment since the end of the Cold War were analysed The result pointed towards convergence although there were some differences in terms of timing From the Big Threersquos point of view the primary demand referred to increased risks and instabilities in the security environment As a consequence there was the common perception of a need for cooperation and engagement to intervene on a multilateral basis while the demand for institutions to deal with large- scale invasions had significantly decreased This preliminary examination provides a plausible approach to the explan-atory task of explaining changes in preferences In a functionalist sense increased problems entail preferences for building institutions that tackle these challenges form follows function This was not however the end of the story A functionalist explanation of this nature might explain neither the differences between the three states nor why the EU rather than NATO was the desired institution for a European defence pillar In other words although demand alone might be a necessary condition it is not sufficient to explain preferences for institution- building in European security The next six chapters met this challenge by combining the perceived demand for a security institution with specific transaction costs of the individual states

Before we discuss the explanatory power of the studyrsquos approach step- by- step I refer back to Table 31 in order to give a brief overview of what actually the explanatory challenge was for the transaction costs framework Figure 121 visualises the development of the three countriesrsquo preferences for institution- building in European security The primary task for the structured focused comparison was therefore to trace back the develop-mental path that a state chose between the mid- 1990s and the Convention from I) towards II)

This overview suggests why the ESDP was not established in the mid- 1990s The British veto simply prevented such an arrangement (UK I) although Germany and more especially France was already promoting a common defence policy at the Amsterdam- IGC Furthermore the United Kingdomrsquos preferences changed significantly whereas those of Francersquos were largely unchanged The former moved from the position of tentatively accepting that the EU might take responsibility for some crisis manage-ment tasks towards support for a capable ESDP based on intergovernmen-tal procedures In other words the UK preferred the EU to evolve from a secondary to a primary security institution with increasing relevance to the government In contrast France had supported granting the EU some responsibilities for military planning in the mid- 1990s and was willing to bind itself more strongly when the ESDP was actually set- up Nevertheless the French approach remained basically intergovernmental with respect to



institutional depth Germany was somewhat in between these two posi-tions and the only country that became increasingly reluctant to bind itself The more important change however was the gradually increasing support for an expansion of the EUrsquos responsibilities in military planning In other words the EU evolved as an important security institution for the provi-sion of European security on an equal footing with NATO The task of the structured focused comparison was thus to explain these developments The enormous challenge was that of simultaneously not only explaining similarities and differences but also changes and continuities What was the trigger behind these developments

Firstly the member statesrsquo preferences on substantive scope could be explained by the relative magnitude of transaction costs for the provision of European security To begin with the case study of Germany showed that the most effective driver of its approach towards military planning was the mutually reinforcing interaction between the perception of new security risks and increased uncertainties about how to provide security in Europe In short its risks of opportunism within NATO were rising Thus the govern-ment gradually disengaged from NATO as the primary security institution ndash without giving it up altogether ndash and turned towards the ESDP The German perception of new risks in the environment represented the demand for institutions that might tackle these challenges and therefore the functional task of building them The key to the increasing investment in the ESDP rather than NATO was that the United Statesrsquo commitment to European security had gradually lost credibility The governmentrsquos perception of both

Figure 121 Overview of German British and French preferences on the insti-tutionalisation of European security from the I) Amsterdam-IGC towards the II) Convention-IGC

Non-bindingagreements

Highly bindingagreements

Minimal military planning at the EU-level

Maximal military planning at the EU-level

Germany I

Germany IIFrance II

France I

UK II

UK I



isolationist and unilateralist trends in US foreign policy prompted increas-ing uncertainty about its future willingness to provide the public good of European security At the same time the signals sent by the superpower sug-gested that ambitious responsibilities for the EU in military planning could ultimately encourage Washington to withdraw completely from Europe This was definitely not a favourable scenario for German decision- makers since the risks of opportunism would increase exponentially This trade-off constituted the transaction costs for the German government in this context Based on these transaction costs assessments Germany preferred increasing the responsibilities of the EU while at the same time promoting compatibility with NATO Therefore the establishment of the ESDP should function in the medium to long term as a sort of alternative for the USrsquos previous provision of European stability It should not however replace the American contribution In short Germany wanted to reduce the risks of opportunism in such a way as not to prompt too many new risks In terms of transaction costs it wanted to provide European security at an acceptable cost

Great Britainrsquos preferences were similar to those of Germany insofar as it wanted to strengthen the EUrsquos responsibilities for military planning while at the same time preserving the ESDPrsquos compatibility with NATO as a top priority Back in the mid- 1990s the UKrsquos transaction costs for the provi-sion of European security had not yet reached a genuinely high level The UK interpretation of the Bosnian crises differed from that of France to the extent that London insisted more strongly on the fact that the United States had ultimately intervened while France emphasised first and foremost the long period of waiting before America was willing to deploy forces and its simultaneous demand for the lifting of the arms embargo In terms of this study the American commitment to European security crises was more credible in Londonrsquos eyes so its risks of opportunism were significantly lower than for Paris This British assessment was about to change when isolationist voices became gradually more influential in Washington This development of British preferences represented a particular challenge for the transaction costs framework

The shift of St Malo was not only the most drastic change but also the most consequential since it opened the road to Cologne and Helsinki in 1999 Furthermore we could observe minor but nonetheless important dif-ferences between the UKrsquos willingness to grant the EU more responsibili-ties in defence planning at the expense of operational planning Like the German government Great Britain perceived a general growth of security risks It therefore recognised the need for improved coordination and thus for a political- military instrument to tackle these risks in Europe on a mul-tilateral basis This kind of demand however did not tell us where such an arrangement should be set- up The next step of process- tracing therefore focused on the signalling process between the United States and Britain On



the one hand it could be demonstrated that the latter was increasingly con-cerned about US isolationism because the formerrsquos full- scale commitment was partly questioned in London On the other hand the American lsquored linesrsquo were taken seriously and constrained British support for any increase in scope of the EUrsquos responsibilities in military planning Accordingly the ESDP represented among other things a British attempt to strengthen its voice through a militarily capable Europe because this was the most prom-ising way to be heard in Washington While Germany and France regarded this as a welcome side- effect so to speak it represented an important driver for the Blair administration This also became apparent through the stronger support for expanding the EUrsquos responsibilities in defence rather than operational planning The latter was not only vehemently opposed by the American administration but even enhanced defence planning was strongly supported

The primary trigger for the British approach was however the increase of transaction costs in the course of the 1990s This was ultimately rooted in the interrelationship between a growth in perceived security risks linked to the British governmentrsquos concerns about isolationism how should security be provided in the European security architecture if the United States were reluctant to take on this role There should therefore be a viable EU- only option which also had to be compatible with NATO This was aimed at reducing the existing risks of opportunism without producing new ones Consequently the tradeoff between making functionally reasonable invest-ments in the ESDP without exiting from the special partnership with the US represents the key to a comprehensive explanation of the development of British preferences on substantive scope

Among the Big Three France was the member state which consistently supported the most far- reaching responsibilities for the EU in military planning It basically wanted to create an all- encompassing security insti-tution which could deal with the whole spectrum of military tasks from collective defence to humanitarian relief assistance In terms of the studyrsquos transaction costs framework the interaction between increased risks on the one hand and consistently high risks of opportunism combined with significant costs of adjustment within NATO on the other was the key to French preferences on substantive scope The governmentrsquos concerns about isolationist ndash and partly unilateralist ndash trends within the US were built primarily on experiences on the ground such as in the Balkans The fact that Europe had to wait for the superpower as well as Washingtonrsquos simultaneous insistence on maintaining a say made the American com-mitment questionable In France however in contrast to Germany and Britain these risks of opportunism were not constrained by the threat of American disengagement which represented less of a problem to Paris The governmentrsquos voice in Washington to encourage further American commitment had been persistently weak in any case However France did



not go as far as to abandon the Alliance3 In addition and this differentiated Francersquos transaction costs from those of Germany and the UK the French regularly had to adjust to NATOrsquos military planning processes which made transactions with the partners in European security inherently costly as France had not really participated in establishing these rules in the first place In short the costs of transacting within the European security set-ting were consistently highest for France

The corollary was to promote the ESDP in a way that remained compat-ible with NATOrsquos territorial defence of the Continent At the same time the autonomous decision- making capacity of the EU should be guaran-teed This approach offered an opportunity to reduce Francersquos transaction costs for the provision of European security On the one hand dependence on the American commitment and thus the risks of opportunism within NATO would gradually decrease Instead of waiting for American troops Europe could act autonomously On the other hand the ESDP served as an instrument for reducing the transaction costs for France of adjusting to the Europeans in military operations The mutual provision of information would gradually decrease this necessity and should therefore be applied to a wide range of military planning from low- intensity peacekeeping through combat operations to collective defence

In sum the process- tracing analysis of the Big Three over time suggested one main trigger behind preference formation on substantive scope The comparative assessment of how to provide European security in an increas-ingly risky environment was the key Transaction costs in NATO were increasing although to different degrees At the same the signals sent by the United States strongly suggested creating an arrangement compatible with NATO otherwise it could and might further disengage This sce-nario linked to traditional bilateral relations accounted for the different magnitudes of transaction costs faced by the Big Three When we apply the reasoning of this study the process- tracing analysis basically corroborated the idea that the more a state regards the EU as a relatively effective institu-tion for the provision of European security the larger the substantive scope that it prefers for it in military planning (given the statersquos membership in both NATO and the EU) The emergence of the ESDP might ultimately be seen as a joint answer to a market failure of European security in the end of the 1990s This is however incomplete and applicable only at the level of systemic outcomes In contrast the studyrsquos transaction costs perspective on state preferences was capable of explaining not only development over time but also the differences in the governmentsrsquo approaches In short it offers a more differentiated view of the emergence of a complex institu-tional arrangement

Secondly preferences on institutional depth could also be largely traced back to transaction costs within the ESDP As we saw in the German case study the government promoted relatively binding agreements in the mid-



1990s It supported the active participation of EU institutions within a potential security and defence pillar but it was rather hesitant with respect to the rules of decision- making This initial willingness however gradu-ally decreased with the actual establishment of the ESDP at the end of the decade Instead the focus was increasingly on lsquoflexible arrangementsrsquo and the intergovernmental Council structures both of which were intended to strengthen the institutional capacity of the ESDP The study subsequently demonstrated that it was primarily the interaction of uncertainty about the partners and the respective asset specificity that had a strong impact on the formation of German preference for how to design the ESDP In the mid- 1990s the government was moderately uncertain about Great Britain but this uncertainty gradually decreased over time The low political and financial costs of creating political structures at the EU level provided the government with some flexibility with regard to whether to bind itself or not However the initial German support for active participation in EU institutions cannot be derived solely from a transaction costs logic Instead other factors needed to be integrated This weakness of the studyrsquos frame-work was discussed in more detail above In contrast increasing support for the intergovernmental Council could be persuasively traced back to lsquoposi-tive feedbacks and sunk costsrsquo of the institutional path of the ESDP and thus to the willingness to invest further in these specific assets The same mechanism but in the opposite direction could be traced back with respect to the general nature of the ESDPrsquos military assets Their institutional path did not suggest further expansion of the initial investments thus facilitat-ing a smooth transition of the lsquoHelsinki Headline Goalrsquo into the lsquoHeadline Goal 2010rsquo

Back in the mid- 1990s however Germanyrsquos military shortcomings linked to budgetary constraints and critical domestic voices had triggered the ini-tial high degree of specificity desired for the EUrsquos military forces In terms of transaction costs specific assets could represent a relatively efficient remedy for these shortcomings since Germany would benefit from economies of scale division of labour and so on This indicated the governmentsrsquo trade-off relatively efficient solutions but hardly any flexibility or vice versa Germany started preferring the former solution but then had to gradually turn towards the latter This was first of all due to the practice of the ESDP which allowed merely for general military assets In addition it became rapidly clear that rules which were too demanding could exclude Germany from participation because of its severe military shortcomings As a result the general nature of the ESDPrsquos military assets made more binding agree-ments less urgent and thus encouraged the German government to redirect its focus onto the limitation of governance costs The risks of opportunism had simply lost prominence under the condition of general military assets

In contrast British preferences on institutional depth started from zero in the mid- 1990s The government essentially wanted no EU interference in



its military affairs When the ESDP was eventually established it was made clear from the very beginning that defence would not become a Community affair but should remain intergovernmental Whenever it appeared func-tionally necessary the Council would be the Council Secretariat Political control however would remain the responsibility of the national govern-ments This approach remained largely stable until the Convention reflect-ing the combination of modestly increased risks of opportunism with the gradually rising political and financial costs of the political- military assets that accounted for British transaction costs within the ESDP At the end of the 1990s the UK government became concerned that Germany could provide fewer power projection forces than it had expected In addition it feared that France might instrumentalise the ESDP in competition with NATO The process- tracing could thus indicate a combination of British concerns exploitation by Germany and entrapment by France At the same time the UK was the member state within the ESDP that had a permanent alternative option namely bilateral relations with Washington On the whole the risks of opportunism and thus transaction costs within the ESDP remained low Nonetheless the UK governmentrsquos increased willingness to bind itself after the end of the 1990s could be primarily traced back to the need to safeguard some of its actual investments

The studyrsquos causal pathway was based on the premise that a government might prefer more binding agreements if the assets of cooperation were costly and non- redeployable and linked to uncertainty about the partnersrsquo commitment These conditions were not present in the British case Not only was uncertainty about France and Germany relatively low but London always had a fallback option Although the Blair governmentrsquos subscription to the ESDP was politically costly the general nature of most assets did not suggest binding itself and the partners High political costs suggested rather less demanding rules Hence the relatively low risks of opportunism shifted the attention of the government onto a possible rise in governance costs It therefore preferred preserving residual rights of control Hence the trade-off for the British government over whether to invest in specific or general assets consistently suggested that the flexibility of general assets usually outweighed the cost- saving of specialised investments In addition rede-ployable military assets provided a most welcome opportunity to accom-modate the antagonistic principles of NATOrsquos primacy vs European defence autonomy

The French government initially promoted a similar approach with respect to questions of institutional depth but in the course of the analysis it moved gradually closer to Germany This however did not imply that France had given up its consistently intergovernmental approach to the ESDP In particular it opposed interference by EU institutions and therefore wanted to enhance institutional capacity through lsquoflexible arrangementsrsquo with governments taking a dominant position In short the objective was



improved coordination rather than integration Chapter 10 was able to trace back these preferences to the modest size of French transaction costs within the ESDP In the mid- 1990s this could be inferred from its rela-tive certainty about Germany and the low extent of asset specificity Both dimensions gradually increased and thus accounted for Francersquos slightly greater willingness to bind itself since the end of the 1990s In contrast to Great Britain and Germany however Francersquos desired outcomes were neither triggered by the concept of general military assets nor by the neces-sity of establishing primarily efficient solutions to military shortfalls Not only were its military forces in good shape but also the general nature of these assets served mainly as a kind of assurance rather than an ini-tial trigger After all the French government was confronted neither with extremely high political nor with unbearable financial costs with respect to the ESDP When it was in fact launched the government was mod-erately uncertain about the dangers of being exploited by Germany4 and abandoned by the UK which would ultimately rally around the Americans rather than Europe Like London the French therefore wanted to create some safeguards for their investments in the ESDP Aside from the general nature of most military assets lsquoflexible arrangementsrsquo could reduce some of these risks of opportunism in the future and were thus strongly promoted by the French government In terms of transaction costs both safeguards should make the mutual commitments more credible Others were sim-ply not required Hence France was relatively immune from opportunism and primarily wanted to maintain permanent control in military affairs It consequently judged the anticipated governance costs of more hierarchi-cal forms to be more costly relative to the modest but permanent risks of opportunism

In sum it was not only demonstrated that transaction costs triggered the member statesrsquo preferences for institution- building but also how The studyrsquos structured focused comparison of the Big Three was able to trace back their preferences on institutional depth primarily to transaction costs within the ESDP Hence several attributes of past and future transactions were decisive The extent of uncertainty about the partnersrsquo commitments the political and financial costs of the political- military assets and the ques-tion of redeployability of those assets determined the individual tradeoffs made between risks of opportunism and governance costs and thereby the magnitude of the transaction costs that governments were facing The in- depth analysis of the three countries largely confirmed that the higher the combination of uncertainty and involved asset specificity within the ESDP for a state the more depth and thus bindingness it will prefer with respect to the institutional arrangement In other words the member states assessed their risks of opportunism and the (frequently anticipated) governance costs that emerged from more hierarchical forms of cooperation and formulated their preferences accordingly At the same time we also saw that strong



uncertainty and high costs might encourage a state to prefer general rather than specific assets This can be understood as a preventive limitation of future transaction costs and is thus fully compatible with the studyrsquos logic In Robert Keohanersquos words causes were explained in terms of their effects

After having theoretically developed and empirically examined pref-erence formation in the ESDP from the perspective of a combination of historical- institutionalist and political economy approaches it was none-theless evident that this could not be the last word on the ESDP Because a theoretical explanation cannot really be tested against the real world but must be tested against alternative theoretical explanations the systematic integration of the latter became an integral step of this study Again fol-lowing Imre Lakatos Chapter 11 pursued the check of external consist-ency and therefore consulted the three standard IR research programmes again Despite some plausibility none of these approaches was fully ndash or even more ndash persuasive than the studyrsquos transaction costs framework Only explanatory factors from Constructivist thought might represent heuris-tically interesting supplements while not replacing transaction costs as the initial triggers of preference formation This became clear when they were confronted with the majority of empirical evidence from the structured focused comparison In addition the plausibility probe of Ireland as a small and neutral country reconfirmed the overall evaluation Although some minor modifications would be necessary the transaction costs framework provides a plausible mid- range explanation of institutional preferences

In conclusion this section has not only summarised the main theoreti-cal and empirical results but has also given an account of the explanatory strategies undertaken by the study The primary objective appears to have been reached namely to explain an empirically complex arrangement by a theoretically parsimonious argument Against this background the chap-terrsquos next section draws the principal conclusions from this study before I ultimately elaborate on todayrsquos deliberate ndash though functionally driven ndash internationalisation of the monopoly of the use of force and its implications for modern statehood

The principal conclusions filling the gap with a new conceptual lens

Firstly international political economy conventionally applied transac-tion costs to explain the design of institutions This may be traced back to the history of the research programme (eg Williamson 1985 2ndash14) The New Institutional Economics started out by asking why some economic exchanges were pursued within the firm (hierarchy) and others within the market (anarchy) Their answer obviously referred to transaction costs in one way or another (eg Milgrom and Roberts 1990 North 1990b) They explained the degree of hierarchy of different organisational arrangements



Many IR scholars who researched the problem of cooperation eventually turned to these ideas and thus explained (non- )cooperation or (non- )insti-tutionalisation (eg Keohane 1984 Weber 2000 Koremnos et al 2001) This implied at the same time that questions of substance were largely excluded from these analyses but if they were in fact tackled it was normally by building on other approaches such as an ldquoendogenous policy theory of eco-nomic interestrdquo (eg Moravcsik 1998 35ndash50) In contrast this study began to build on but subsequently departed from this tradition to the extent that it applied the theoretical concept of transaction costs to both substan-tive scope and institutional depth Based strongly on the work of Oliver Williamson this study has suggested the central importance of compara-tive institutional arrangements and the relative magnitude of transaction costs This decisively expanded the range of possible research questions to be answered by a transaction costs framework The study argued that the governments not only preferred a certain degree of hierarchy with respect to international institutions but also comparatively assessed how differ-ent organisations may reduce the costs of the provision of the public good Consequently I was able to not only ask why the governments preferred a specific design for the ESDP but also how far- reaching its substantive scope with respect to military planning should be In short familiar issues were analysed from an unfamiliar perspective

Secondly Renate Mayntz once reminded the audience at a presentation of her seminal discussion of lsquogovernance and steeringrsquo (eg Mayntz 2004) that ldquoas social scientists analytical concepts are our eyesrdquo5 From this per-spective transaction costs may indeed represent heuristically interesting lsquoeyesrsquo for the study of preferences security cooperation and institution- building In particular they contribute to overcoming simplistic concepts that require a decision as to whether ESDP is ultimately a lsquobalancing act against US powerrsquo or lsquobandwagoning with the hegemonrsquo Instead the analy-sis demonstrated that it is in fact both ndash and to different degrees for dif-ferent countries The key to a comprehensive understanding of the ESDP lies in the fact that its institutional set- up reconciled two mutually oppos-ing principles within a single political project it was about both European autonomy and NATOrsquos primacy Realismrsquos binary logic at the level of ana-lytical concepts however blinds us to these complex ambiguities that poli-tics is ultimately all about This is primarily because of its conceptual legacy from alliance politics which represents the exclusive way of understanding security cooperation from a Realist point of view In contrast a transaction costs framework emphasises two aspects First of all it enables us to see the impact of isolationist trends within the US that made its commitment less credible and thus increased the risks of opportunism and transaction costs for the Europeans This was however not the end of the story since we observed countervailing signals from Washington The threat of with-drawal represented a highly uncertain scenario for some governments and



thus constrained a purely functional formulation of preferences (especially in the UK) Instead compatibility with NATO was the key to reconciling the ambiguities In short the ESDP was both against and for the United States Thus the studyrsquos analytical lenses enable us to understand at a conceptual level the US influence on Europe that goes beyond the futile balancing vs bandwagoning debate Second the concept of asset specificity draws our attention to the crucial opportunities of redeployable military assets Power projection forces were built within the ESDP but could in general be rede-ployed to NATO or other purposes Ultimately this represents the key to an understanding of the UKrsquos change of position at St Malo In other words the analytical concept of asset specificity functions as a kind of hinge between European autonomy and NATOrsquos primacy Taken as a whole transaction costs shed light on some aspects that other approaches exclude at the con-ceptual level thus making them lsquoblindrsquo to important features for their theo-retical explanations

Finally and inherently linked to this debate a transaction costs perspec-tive facilitates a qualified statement on the actual scope of the ESDP as a political project This had been widely contested by scholars There are those that claim that the ldquoEuropeanisation of security has been the great political revolution of the late twentieth and early twenty- first centuriesrdquo (Webber et al 2004 19 see also Smith 2004 Jones 2006) Others emphasise instead the continuing dependence on the United States and argue merely that ldquotac-tics may have changedrdquo (Howorth 2000c see also Lieber and Alexander 2005) Indeed both camps are right in their assessment although their claims appear incompatible at first glance The studyrsquos emphasis on asset specificity can reconcile these two views The ESDP has in fact made tre-mendous progress within a relatively short time Today there are a Rapid Reaction Force and Battlegroups that can be deployed under the EU flag Based on the member statesrsquo single set of forces however the same troops may also be deployed under NATO command This became for instance evident during the support mission to the African Union in Darfur in 2005 While some European airplanes were under the EU flag others operated under NATO command Consequently the concept of general rather than specific assets that has played such a prominent role in this study provides a persuasive approach to understanding and explaining these ambivalent trends thereby reconciling the contradictory interpretations

In addition the study has contributed not only to a better understanding of the ESDP but also more generally of security and defence after the end of the Cold War National security still represents an lsquoambiguous symbolrsquo (Wolfers 1962) but it has evolved in one specific direction with important consequences the impossibility of a war between the major powers (Jervis 2005 26ndash9) While Robert Jervis principally examined the impact of this condition on American foreign policy another conclusion may be drawn contemporary security policy is not exclusively ndash or even primarily ndash about



survival This was also the reasoning behind this studyrsquos conceptualisation security policy is based on the protection from threats and risks but at the same time and on an equal footing on the desire to achieve this lsquoat accept-able costsrsquo The corollary is that we do not necessarily have to differentiate economic from security cooperation in all respects There are still impor-tant differences but when we examine why states want to build power projection forces at a multilateral level we can employ theoretical and analytical concepts from other domains In many ways the ESDP can be understood as a lsquocoordination game with distributive consequencesrsquo rather than a lsquoprisonerrsquos dilemmarsquo that so strongly characterised strategic thinking during the Cold War Britain and France were concerned much more about a Germany that might contribute too little to the common enterprise than about a rising hegemon that may threaten them in the future This suggests at the same time that a heuristically interesting answer to the new security agenda is not first and foremost based on the question of whether to expand or narrow down the notion of security The provision of security still rep-resents a central problem for present- day governments It should however be increasingly understood as a kind of good that is ultimately comparable to economic stability or a clean environment If that is the case it seems worthwhile to think more often of borrowing theoretical tools from other disciplines such as transaction costs After all this study strongly suggested that they might indeed have triggered preferences for institution- building in European security With these conclusions in mind the final section refers back to debates on the transformations of the state and addresses to what extent this study has improved our understanding of this fundamen-tal puzzle in political science

Transforming Europersquos governance of defence without replacing the state

By examining both the issue- area of military planning and the Big Three as main actors this study has investigated a hard case of internationalising sensitive state activities from the perspective of mainstream political sci-ence Additionally in the absence of one single manifest lsquoraison drsquoecirctrersquo such as a threatening Soviet Union the emergence of the ESDP was even more puzzling for students of modern statehood As Freacutedeacuteric Meacuterand has argued ldquoESDP redefines the nature of European integration and the way we think about the state in the twenty- first centuryrdquo (Meacuterand 2008 3) The apparent lack of a simple explanation led to disagreement among scholars of why and how the EUrsquos defence pillar has been established from 1998 onwards Why have todayrsquos governments been deliberately willing to internationalise their means of coercion in the form of military planning although they individually possess substantial military capacity and are not struggling for survival Against this background and based on the results of the study this



final section specifies the changes in the monopoly of force and addresses implications for the transformations of the state

In contrast to widespread assumptions the study has shown that there is no single linear trend in the process of dismantling the European nation state Instead the development is mostly uneven Therefore the analysis could not validate the widespread notion of globalization which puts pressure on all states to pool and delegate their competences The German case study on institutional depth for example demonstrated that the government mostly welcomed the participation of the European institutions but strictly opposed pooling in terms of convergence crite-ria for the building of military capabilities In contrast although facing very similar stimuli France and the UKrsquos preferences were the opposite In other words analysing unit- level preferences rather than exclusively system- level outcomes enables a more differentiated lens to understand and explain the mechanisms behind todayrsquos trend towards international-ising the use of force

In a nutshell the study shows how military planning is increasingly embed-ded in international institutions such as the EUrsquos defence pillar while all actors vehemently oppose genuine delegation In other words the monopoly of the use of force is not to be transferred to the European level (see also Meacuterand 2008 148) The internationalisation of the defence function through the ESDP therefore changes the role of the government but does not replace the state The Big Threersquos governments prefer to provide each other with information on military planning and therefore create some institutional safeguards against the risks of opportunism such as exploitation or entrap-ment The fear of exploitation was particularly salient in the British and French cases both of which have formidable power projection forces at their disposal They were consistently concerned about having granted other EU members a say in defence issues without obtaining improved military capa-bilities Both the general nature of most military assets and institutional rules such as for example the battlegroup concept served as safeguards for their investments in the ESDP In contrast Germany needed to guarantee its ability to participate and was therefore rather hesitant in the establish-ment phase of the EUrsquos military forces Potential governance costs ndash the loss of national control over military planning (and procurement decisions) ndash weighed too heavily

As a result of these countervailing trends the governance of Europersquos defence is increasingly pursued within a coordinated ndash though not inte-grated ndash context We may speak of lsquogovernance with governmentsrsquo in the sense that the unilateral provision of security is being gradually replaced by a multilateral mode of governance Direct control over the use of force and the organisation of the military however remains located at the national level Indeed there is no better example to illustrate this differentiated result than the struggle for the EU Headquarters



Apart from having Berlin Plus options (that is NATOrsquos SHAPE) at their disposal Europersquos governments deliberated on the headquarters issue basi-cally in terms of two options the framework lead nation concept with plan-ning facilities from national resources delegated on a case- by- case basis or a standing EU organisation In terms of transaction costs the specificity of the asset to be created was at stake nationally earmarked and thus general assets or a European body that cannot be easily redeployed for other pur-poses6 Germany and even more France preferred to strengthen the EUrsquos Military Staff by ultimately transforming it into an operational headquar-ters to prepare plan and implement small- scale military missions This was strongly opposed by the UK government although it broadly recognised the functional necessity of such an institution

The ultimate compromise the so- called Civil- Military Cell and the sub-sequent Hampton Court formula has come close to being an HQ for civil-ian operations and providing some links to military aspects of operations It is however not a genuinely military HQ While it is a relatively specific asset its scope explicitly omits the most sensitive domain namely concrete operational planning The actual consequence nonetheless is that the EU governments face a severe obstacle when they decide to initiate the creation of military options in a political crisis Ultimately they need to coordinate among themselves and with the EUrsquos Military Staff While they still have the national capacity and resources to plan unilaterally for these military operations there is ndash apart from greater legitimacy ndash a strong incentive to pursue this planning via the institutions of the ESDP because national devices always involve the risk of ultimately carrying the burden of com-mand and control in any operations that take place This is frequently not desired by most governments

In other words this study shows that as a response to functional demands governments do not simply delegate military planning as an integral part of their monopoly of force to the EU level Instead this is a politically contested process whereby preferences are formed and institu-tional outcomes negotiated Because this study regarded the monopoly of force as a means of resolving the functional problem of protecting a statersquos territory from external military threats state preferences were first of all examined from such a perspective Although a simple functional argument might not be sufficient for a complete explanation of the internationalisa-tion of the use of force this study demonstrated that a transaction costs framework which builds on functionalist cognitivist and historical sources of preferences is heuristically suitable for understanding the extent of the governmentsrsquo willingness to internationalise their defence function It was empirically demonstrated that the primary determinant of preferences was indeed to reduce current and anticipated transaction costs for the provi-sion of European security As a result information is shared among the EU members and governments change their security governance by increasing



coordination at the European level At the same time however they main-tain national resources and capabilities which will continue to make the nation state irreplaceable in European security (see also Meacuterand 2008 148) This fully confirms what Philipp Genschel and Bernhard Zangl have argued for in a broader context (Genschel and Zangl 2008 430ndash1 see also Genschel and Leibfried 2008) The modern state is transformed from an exclusive holder of the monopoly of force towards a sovereignty manager initiating and coordinating the governance of European security

Finally building on the works of Pierre Bourdieu Freacutedeacuteric Meacuterand has established a theoretically powerful and empirically rich argument on the emergence of the ESDP and the transformation of the state In contrast to this studyrsquos primary determinant of transaction costs Meacuterand argues from a much broader historical perspective that the emergence of the ESDP as a

transgovernmental field () is a by- product of two parallel developments that have been unfolding since the end of World War II and are peculiar to Europe the internationalization of European defence structures and the Europeanization of foreign policymaking () Certain individuals or groups of actors were instrumental in shaping ESDP but without those structural conditions already in place there would be no talk of ESDP today (Meacuterand 2008 4ndash5)

Based on this structural framework Meacuterand draws the conclusion that ldquoEuropean defence is a symptom but not a cause of a broader transforma-tion of the state in Europe one in which the state is moving away from its core functionsrdquo (Meacuterand 2008 137) In contrast this studyrsquos stronger focus on actors and thus on preference formation (in the same states examined by Meacuterand) leads to a more hesitant conclusion while todayrsquos governments partly want to internationalise military planning the state is not moving away from its core functions Instead it has increasingly developed a new role for itself in the governance of defence in Europe In other words the ESDP is also a cause of ndash or perhaps better a reason for ndash a broader transfor-mation of the state Today governments manage the provision of security in close collaboration with their EU partners (and the US) However this does not appear to ldquoamount to a partial surrender on the part of state actors of their monopoly over legitimate violencerdquo (Meacuterand 2008 148) This study has traced back the great importance governments assign to potential gov-ernance costs in the defence field While they are willing to provide some information on military planning they strongly insist on preserving the control of the military and in particular over the use of force While the governance of the defence function is gradually changing by being increas-ingly internationalised the military has not simply become a lsquoservicersquo like any other as Freacutedeacuteric Meacuterand has argued (2008 152) On the contrary it remains a key attribute of the state although from the perspective of the



golden- age nation state the defence function is now executed in distinct ndash that is more internationalised ndash ways In conclusion building on the logic developed by this study we can expect that Europersquos future of governing defence via security institutions depends primarily on one crucial constella-tion of drivers the individual reduction of existing and anticipated transac-tion costs on the part of the European states


211

Notes

1 Introduction

1 The French President pushed strongly for the building of a European defence pil-lar within NATO lsquoChirac talked philosophically and with assurance on a broad range of foreign policy topics including his plans for closer military cooperation with the United States in NATO ( )rsquo Chirac continued lsquoNATO must make inter-nal changes that will permit European countries to have more autonomy and take more responsibility in European defense ldquoThe reforms we have proposed must lead to a European identity in defense within NATOrdquo rsquorsquo Chirac at Cruising Speedrsquo by Jim Hoagland The Washington Post 21 April 1996

2 This chapterrsquos last section explains the reasoning behind the selection of the lsquoBig Threersquo However it should be noted that in the final part of the book I will conduct a brief lsquoplausibility probersquo of Ireland as a lsquosmallrsquo (and neutral) country in order to enable a more qualified statement about the argumentrsquos scope in this regard (for example Eckstein 1975 108ndash113)

3 In this sense the studyrsquos objective is similar to that of lsquoThe Choice for Europersquo In Helen Wallacersquos words Moravcsikrsquos book lsquocontributes to international relations theory by removing the study of west European integration from its idiosyn-cratic corner and locating it in the mainstream of theorizing about the relation-ship between the state and the international systemrsquo (Wallace 1999 156) That is exactly what this study also aims to do It differs however insofar as it modestly restricts itself to one single issue- area namely security and defence

4 While all components of Weberrsquos seminal conceptualisation are important for analysing recent transformations of the state this study focuses on the monop-oly of external force (in other words military) rather than on the interrelated issues of legitimacy and internal pacification (in other words police)

5 I decided to use David Lakersquos term lsquogovernance costsrsquo rather than lsquoinfluence costsrsquo as used by Paul Milgrom and John Roberts (Milgrom and Roberts 1990 72ndash86) The main reasons are its similarity to Oliver Williamsonrsquos term lsquogov-ernance structuresrsquo and its greater applicability to ongoing debates in political science (for example Gourevitch 1999) The underlying concepts however are essentially identical

6 For instance Francersquos fears of exploitation by Germany accounted for the French willingness to support lsquoconvergence criteriarsquo or lsquocoherence indicatorsrsquo in defence planning

7 The lsquoplausibility probersquo of Ireland as a small and neutral country also suggests that a transaction costs framework will sharpen our understanding of these cases too Some of the concepts need to be adjusted to the extent that the role of the United States and grand strategic considerations would be largely replaced by an explicit focus on the European security architecture Furthermore the frame-work would probably be supplemented by an identity concept such as military neutrality which could serve as a kind of intervening variable Nevertheless the plausibility probe demonstrates the general applicability of the studyrsquos approach to small and non- allied states

9780230_280120_14_notindd 2119780230_280120_14_notindd 211 162011 62456 PM162011 62456 PM

212 Notes

8 In this way the approach can shed light on the numerous ambiguities of ESDP ndash for instance that it was neither lsquobalancingrsquo nor lsquobandwagoningrsquo with the United States (for example Posen 2004 10ndash12 Art et al 20056 184) Instead it was simultaneously about lsquoEuropean autonomyrsquo and the Alliancersquos primacy This lsquosquaring of the circlersquo was primarily facilitated by the general nature of the EUrsquos military forces

9 Some authors even refer to these countries as an informal directorate in the ESDP (Freedman 2004) However I admit that when it comes to the explanation of preferences the exclusion of lsquosmallrsquo or lsquomediumrsquo states cannot be fully justi-fied It may in fact be wrong to do this because at least in principle this might be one of the reasons for varying preferences For that reason the book conducts a lsquoplausibility probersquo (but not a lsquocase studyrsquo) of Ireland as a small and neutral coun-try because this represents the greatest possible contrast to the lsquoBig Threersquo On that basis the scope of the bookrsquos argument will be specified in the concluding chapter

10 It is structured because I will ask in each case the same theoretically relevant questions that guide my analysis It is focused because I selectively limit the analysis to those aspects that are particularly relevant for the studyrsquos research objectives (George and McKeown 1985 41)

11 However there is one major obstacle with respect to official sources as an expert at the leading institute on European security wrote lsquoIt should be noted here that as European defence becomes a reality the more documents issued by military authorities or defence ministries are classified and therefore the unclassified texts reproduced here are not as numerous as might have been desirablersquo (Haine 2003 12)

12 lsquoIt has been our experience at any rate that generally the data that can be obtained relatively easily from public records and qualified newspaper reports correspond remarkably well with inside information that could only have been gained through access to operative documents confidential interviews or par-ticipant observationrsquo (Scharpf 1997 63)

13 Most of the interviews were face- to- face but a few used e- mail andor telephone All were conducted under Chatham House Rules

2 Theorising Preference Formation for Institution-Building in European Security

1 Imre Lakatosrsquo ideas are applied as a heuristic tool This should not be understood as a partisan statement on a certain epistemological perspective (for example in opposition to Thomas Kuhnrsquos ldquoparadigmsrdquo or Steve Fullerrsquos ldquosocial epistemol-ogyrdquo) After all most parts of the study are fully compatible with Kuhnrsquos concep-tion of ldquonormal science as puzzle- solvingrdquo (Kuhn 1996 35ndash42)

2 ldquoFor the sophisticated falsificationist a theory is lsquoacceptablersquo or lsquoscientificrsquo only if it has corroborated excess empirical content over its predecessor (or rival) that is only if it leads to the discovery of novel facts This condition can be analysed into two clauses that the new theory has excess empirical content (lsquoacceptability 1rsquo) and that some of this excess content is verified (lsquoacceptability 2rsquo) The first clause can be checked instantly by a priori logical analysis the second can be checked only empirically and this may take an indefinite timerdquo (Lakatos 1970 116)


Notes 213

3 A brief look at the editorial boards of the two most important scholarly journals that deal primarily with security questions (International Security and Security Studies) seems sufficient to confirm this statement

4 Power is understood as a sort of currency of structurally determined constraints and opportunities For critical treatments see Baldwin (1979) and Hill (2003)

5 For an illustrative overview of lsquoneoclassical realismrsquo see Rose (1998) Nevertheless the lsquocause of last resortrsquo or the lsquocausal chainrsquos starting pointrsquo will always be the relative position of that state in the international system This represents the lsquohard corersquo of the Realist research programme

6 The worst corollary however was to engage in ldquoconceptual stretchingrdquo (eg Collier and Mahoney 1993) and to supplement the initial theory with terms such as lsquosoftrsquo This adds neither conceptual clarity nor empirical leverage and can be thus described as degenerative

7 According to Harald Muumlller for example a ldquoutilitarian theory of action cannot explain the logical gap between a plausible motivation for inter- state coordina-tion and the actual cooperative efforts under the constraining conditions of anarchy and existential risksrdquo (Muumlller 1994 15) This argument represented one of the starting points for the so- called lsquoZIB- Debattersquo in Germany in the mid- 1990s

8 One of the main weaknesses is the implicit lsquoevolutionary logicrsquo of Europeanisation approaches They often assume some convergence andor harmonisation of EU interests (Meyer 2006 39ndash42) For example Michael E Smith traces the develop-ment of CFSP back as a history from ldquobargaining to problem- solvingrdquo and from a ldquologic of consequences towards a logic of appropriatenessrdquo (eg Smith 2004) At a closer look this is inherently normative and problematic since it is merely implicitly so

9 The book limits the empirical analysis (and comparison) to some sort of moder-ate Constructivism (eg Katzenstein 1996) This is firstly for resource reasons since it was not feasible to conduct in- depth ldquomeaning- making processesrdquo in three countries (eg Jackson 2006) The second reason is that these moderate approaches (still) largely dominate the scholarly debates (eg Duffield 1998 Smith 2004 Meyer 2006) They therefore represent the main competitor to this bookrsquos approach and serve as the main frame of reference

10 The most far- reaching proposition from the perspective of a socialising and culturalist argument would be undoubtedly that the vast amount of iterated interactions between the EU member states should lead ndash via socialisation ndash to overall preferences that slowly converge The national self- interest will be slowly replaced by a genuinely European self- interest because the self- definition of ldquowerdquo increasingly refers to Europe (eg Adler and Barnett 1998 Meyer 2006 11) This line of argumentative will however not be addressed at great depth because the period of analysis is simply too short

11 However we need to keep in mind that Kenneth Waltz had already argued that a ldquotheory of international politics ( ) can tell us what pressures are exerted and what possibilities are posed by systems of different structure but it cannot tell us just how and how effectively the units of a system will respond to those pres-sures and possibilitiesrdquo (Waltz 1979 71)

12 Although arguing from another perspective and for other purposes Robert Jervis pushed in fact very similar ideas forward See in particular Jervis 1997 146ndash55


214 Notes


1 This procedure is also intended to fill the gap left by Andrew Moravcsikrsquos Liberal Intergovernmentalism (Moravcsik 1998) when the EU turned to security and defence The ESDP had been characterised neither by intense lobbying by domes-tic interest groups nor by a simple cost- benefit relationship as in the Common Agricultural Policy (Zuumlrn 1997 299) This otherwise successful approach there-fore ran out of comprehensive explanations when faced with an issue- area not strictly corresponding to the logic of a pluralist market of interest groups

2 Without this assumption the contractual process would be merely a problem of lsquopromisersquo (Williamson 1985 31)

3 From the level-of-analysis perspective a market failure represents a system- level outcome that may have an impact on the units The breakdown of a multipolar balance of power is an example of market failure Stability is gone In contrast high transaction costs would for example correspond to a situation in which the balance of power may be upheld but at very high costs for one or more members of the system In such a situation the individual states may prefer cooperative agreements in order to decrease their costs (in other words external balancing) In other words transaction costs can be regarded as a unit- level problem

4 ldquoAs it is one of several primary goods however individuals and polities never desire security to the exclusion of all other goods This implies that a greater or lesser tradeoff always exists between security and other valued goods ndash a lsquogunsbutterrsquo tradeoff in common parlance This tradeoff is central to the implication ( ) that polities will seek to minimize the costs of producing their desired level of securityrdquo (Lake 1999 24)

5 It is precisely this understanding of security that facilitates the application of a transaction costs framework If contemporary security policy was exclusively about their own survival this would prohibit the use of these concepts that build strongly on equilibrium and efficiency concepts I appreciated the comments by Dieter Wolf who directed my attention towards this problematique

6 This study mainly applies the terminology of Oliver Williamson who concep-tualised asset specificity and uncertainty as attributes or dimensions of transac-tions (Williamson 1985 52ndash61) This author had initially included frequency but this was excluded from the studyrsquos framework since it did not promise addi-tional heuristic value (Weber 2000 141 note 61) Firstly the members have suffi-ciently frequent contact in the European security setting Secondly membership of the EU more or less guarantees that this will remain stable Therefore it would only make sense within a cybernetic framework agrave la Karl Deutsch which is dif-ferent from the approach chosen here

7 The major challenge of a transaction costs approach is a persuasive procedure of how to operationalise these costs It is a truism that it always makes sense to rationalise ex post actorsrsquo preferences by reference to costs However this must be determined ex ante as this problematique was exactly responsible for the former lsquotautological reputationrsquo of transaction costs economics (Williamson 1985 4)

8 ldquoVoice is here defined as any attempt at all to change rather than to escape from an objectionable state of affairsrdquo (Hirschman 1970 30)

9 The dimension of asset specificity plays a lesser role in this context since govern-ments are first and foremost assumed to assess the othersrsquo engagement within an institution The analysis of substantive scope requires so to speak a broader point of view so the question is whether to cooperate at all For the more specific


Notes 215

issue of how the EU members want to cooperate it is necessary to narrow down the focus on both uncertainty and asset specificity

10 In Rathbunrsquos very useful categorisation this book can be located between lsquoration-alismrsquo and lsquocognitivismrsquo While the overall logic behind the studyrsquos argument is most closely related to the former focusing on perception and interpretation and emphasising ldquolacking information about othersrsquo intentionrdquo (Rathbun 2007 534) the analytical framework also incorporates the problems of subjective interpretations and ambiguity

11 ldquo[A]sset specificity is the big locomotive to which transaction cost economics owes much of its predictive content Absent this condition the world of contract is vastly simplified enter asset specificity and nonstandard contracting prac-tices quickly appearrdquo (Williamson 1985 56)

12 These two strategies are based on Paul Piersonrsquos discussion of rationalndashfunction-alism He proposed that ldquo(1) functionalist premises about institutional origins and change should be replaced by carefully specified functionalist hypotheses and (2) functionalist hypotheses should be supplemented and contrasted with hypotheses stressing the possible nonfunctionalist roots of institutionsrdquo (Pierson 2004 130)

13 The former is more strongly reflected with respect to substantive scope whereas the latter could essentially be applied to the issue of institutional depth The understanding of lsquopossible outcomes of an interactionrsquo required adjusting the concept to what was really going on in the real world of political practices in European security Otherwise an empirical analysis would hardly have been feasible As a researcher however I intended not to be dominated by the political rhetoric but instead to develop lsquodistinctions that make a differencersquo The result is thus a compromise

14 The best (and lsquohardestrsquo) source would obviously be records of internal discus-sions of a governmentrsquos decision- makers preceding certain EU meetings (eg Zuumlrn 1997 300ndash 1) Unfortunately they are unavailable However this appears not particularly problematic for this kind of analysis (eg Jachtenfuchs 2002 220ndash4) Why should for instance the United Kingdom publicly oppose lsquocollec-tive defencersquo within the EU but secretly support it

4 The Demand for a Security Institution German British and French Perceptions of the Environment in the 1990s

1 As explained above in the following sections I analyse documentary sources to find out what the government in question judged to be the main challenges to its security The easier procedure at this stage of analysis would have been to rely exclusively on objective data such as conflict barometers According to historical- institutionalist thought however the intersubjective process of inter-pretation and assessment is the primary determinant of the uncertainty Hence the respective perceptions are empirically analysed and compared

2 We should keep in mind one unusual feature of France Hardly any public state-ments are made about far- reaching defence issues This feature is due to the fact that a small circle of elites who usually discuss behind closed doors almost exclusively conducts security and defence policy in France Hence what is often regarded as a national consensus in question of security and defence is often more indicative of an absence of a public debate (Becker and Kempin 2005 6)


216 Notes

3 See also lsquoFrance Says It Is Willing to Discuss Its Nuclear Role in NATOrsquo by Craig R Whitney The New York Times 18 January 1996 and lsquoChirac Ends Francersquos Nuclear Test Program Paris to Take ldquoActiverdquo Role in Disarmamentrsquo by William Drozdiak The Washington Post 30 January 1996

4 Another lsquolesson learntrsquo was the abandonment of conscription It was not only militarily but also politically infeasible to send conscripts regularly into crisis management operations abroad For instance the French government had been politically unable to send conscripts into the Gulf in 1991 where numerous casu-alties were expected Therefore it created one light division of professionals out of fifty regiments This was a considerable problem at the time because it was costly (Heisbourg 2000b 37)

5 In the beginning there was disagreement within French political opinion about potential reconciliation with NATO While the left opposed such a step or made almost unacceptable demands the right was at least open- minded to accom-modating the US in order to achieve further objectives (see in particular Menon 2000 127ndash134 279)

6 See in particular lsquoIn Shift France Vows To Modernize Militaryrsquo by Keith B Richburg The Washington Post 16 October 2004

7 Between 1994 and 1996 the NATO allies agreed on the so- called Berlin Plus arrangements its lsquoCombined Joint Task Forcesrsquo Concept was not only to establish a European pillar but also confirmed ndash though indirectly ndash NATOrsquos right of first refusal in any crisis Europe may only act alone if NATO chooses not to do so (Hunter 2002)

5 Germany ndash From Defending the Alliancersquos Territory to Crisis Management for the Union

1 This trend was later reconfirmed by the German lsquoWhite Paperrsquo of 2006 (German Ministry of Defence 2006 17ndash24)

2 See also lsquoEU pact rules should exclude defence spend ndash Struckrsquo Reuters News 1 December 2003

3 lsquoEU- WEU Text of the Document of France Germany Italy Spain Belgium and Luxembourg on the Gradual Integration of the WEU into the European Unionrsquo No 2906 Atlantic News 3 April 1997

4 lsquoEUDefenceFranceGermanyrsquo Agence Europe 28 January 1997 lsquoUK ldquoTo Vetordquo EU Defence Bid ndash France and Germany Push for Closer Tiesrsquo by Caroline Southey and Lionel Barber Financial Times 24 March 1997

Some (influential) German politicians even proposed that the EU play a role in future territorial defence (eg CDUCSU Bundestag Group 1994 Lamers 1995) However this never developed into an official government preference

5 We need to keep in mind that Germany was a wholehearted supporter of NATOrsquos lsquoBerlin Plusrsquo arrangements which implicitly made high- intensity opera-tions dependent on the US because of NATOrsquos right of first refusal (eg Hunter 2002 23ndash4)

6 The lsquoEurocorpsrsquo for example was to represent the nucleus of further European integration in this hardware provision for military tasks In the mid- 1990s how-ever the primary function was still territorial defence (German Government 1996)

7 This problematique was reconfirmed in numerous interviews by both German and French officials


Notes 217

8 Interview with a senior French official of the Ministry of Defence See also lsquoTiptoeing Toward the Eurorsquo by Jim Hoagland The Washington Post 30 January 1997

9 lsquoInformal Reflection at WEU on Europersquos Security and Defencersquo (German Presidency Paper Bonn 24 February 1999) lsquoStrengthening the Common Policy on Security and Defencersquo (Informal Meeting of EU Foreign Ministers Eltville 13ndash14 March 1999 German Proposal) cited from Rutten 2001 14ndash16 and 17ndash19

10 See also Franco- German Security and Defence Council (1999) Declaration (Toulouse 29 May 1999) cited from Rutten 2001 40

11 Interviews with two senior officials of the German Ministry of Defence (ESDP Unit) (Berlin AprilMay 2007)

12 lsquoGerman leader says EU defence initiative ldquonot competingrdquo with NATOrsquo BBC Monitoring European 4 November 2003

13 See also lsquoGerman minister calls on US to give up reservations against EU defence policyrsquo BBC Monitoring European 9 December 2003

14 lsquoEin Hauptquartier das nicht so heiszligen darfrsquo by Martin Winter Suumlddeutsche Zeitung 31 May 2007

15 lsquoBerlin to join UK and France in ldquobattle groupsrdquo rsquo by Judy Dempsey Financial Times 11 February 2004

16 This decision is reprinted in EU- ISS 2005 10ndash1617 lsquoEUDefencersquo Agence Europe 11 February 2004 lsquoEUDefence ndash Germany joins

Franco- British rapid reaction force initiativersquo Agence Europe 12 February 200418 Interviews with two senior officials of the MoDrsquos ESDP unit (AprilMay 2007)19 The full transformation in thinking occurred between the publication of two

strategic documents the Defence Policy Guidelines (2003) and the new White Paper (2006) However the actual transformation process is still underway

20 The following analysis is also a contribution to one of the main challenges in the domestic politics research agenda formulated by Peter Gourevitch ldquoThe great challenge confronting the domestic politics research agenda is to model the interaction of countries with each other and with the system We have devel-oped strong research traditions that hold either system or country constant We do not have very good theories to handle what happens when both are in play when each influences the other when the domestic politics of one country interacts with the domestic politics of another an interaction which itself helps define a system that reverberates back on the partsrdquo (Gourevitch 2002 321)

21 This part of the analysis is illustrated in detail in the German case The chapters on Britain and France merely refer to the broad results and therefore focus on the perceptions of the signals sent by the United States

22 This trend was reflected in the reorganisation of the US Foreign Ministry after 1990 For instance one could observe an American withdrawal from those areas where the US had no vital interests (such as Africa) lsquoNational Security Directive 75 American Policy Toward Sub- Saharan Africa in the 1990srsquo (23 December 23 1992) cited from httpwwwfasorgirpoffdocsdirecthtm (last access 3 January 2006)

23 The first instance of this new policy was the civil war in Rwanda in 1994 in which a military intervention had never been seriously considered lsquoUS Troop Withdrawal Ends Frustrating Mission To Save Rwandan Livesrsquo by Thomas W Lippman The Washington Post 3 October 1994

24 lsquoUS Europe The Gap is Wideningrsquo by Rick Atkinson The Washington Post 8 February 1995 lsquoLeading NATO on Bosnia Rebuffed Once US Takes a Forceful


218 Notes

Tack Toward Allies on Approach to Balkan Warrsquo by Michael R Gordon The New York Times 3 August 1993 lsquoAs Europe Seeks Wider NATO Role Its Armies Shrinkrsquo by Rick Atkinson and Bradley Graham The Washington Post 29 July 1996

25 See also lsquoCrisis in the Balkans The Continent Europersquos Aim Arms Parityrsquo by Roger Cohen The New York Times 15 June 1999

For an opposite view see lsquoEurope and America Arenrsquot Divorcingrsquo by Ivo H Daalder The Wall Street Journal Europe 10 December 1999

26 lsquoNervous Looks Among Alliesrsquo by Jim Hoagland The Washington Post 19 December 1999 lsquoWeathering the Stormrsquo The Economist (US edition) 9 September 2000 lsquoOur Champion of Continuityrsquo by Jackson Diehl The Washington Post 19 March 2001

27 This interpretation is also based on interview material with two senior officials at the German Ministry of Defence who were involved in these issues after the mid- 1990s The interviews were conducted in AprilMay 2007

28 Here for example the German Minister of Defence Rudolf Scharping cited from lsquoUS and NATO Allies Divided Over Defense Needsrsquo by Craig R Whitney The New York Times 3 December 1999

29 From the perspective of the National Security Strategies issued since July 1994 by President Clinton his multilateralism appears to have been a choice rather than a firm belief He always made clear that the ldquodecision on whether and when to use force is therefore dictated first and foremost by our national interests In those specific areas where our vital or survival interests are at stake our use of force will be decisive and if necessary unilateralrdquo (White House 1996)

30 ldquoLikewise Germany is a crucial partner of the United States and since its reuni-fication has been a key player in bringing the emerging democracies of the East closer to the Westrdquo (US Department of Defense 1995)

31 lsquoNATO Calms US Fears of European Defence HQrsquo by Stephen Castle The Independent 21 October 2003

32 lsquoThe Transatlantic Rift Is Getting Seriousrsquo by David Ignatius The Washington Post 15 February 2002

33 lsquo4 European Leaders Form Pact To Boost Defense Cooperationrsquo by Robert J McCartney The Washington Post 30 April 2003

34 This interpretation was moreover confirmed by interviews with two senior offi-cials of the German Ministry of Defence who were involved in these issues at that time The interviews were conducted in Berlin in AprilMay 2007

35 lsquoIn the transatlantic alliance we donrsquot have too much America we have too little Europersquo the [Minister of Defence Rudolf Scharping] saidrsquo Cited from lsquoEurope Says Its Strike Force Wonrsquot Impair Role of NATOrsquo by Craig R Whitney The New York Times 2 December 1999

36 lsquoUS Bonn Clash Over Pact with Francersquo by Frederick Kempe The Wall Street Journal 27 May 1992

37 The US administration had made unambiguously clear in the so- called Bartholomew letter that lsquoEuropean- onlyrsquo experiments could put American engagement (and thus NATO) at risk

38 These assessments were confirmed by an American policy expert with whom I conducted an interview (Berlin April 2006)

39 lsquoEU Force Could Spell NATOrsquos End Cohen Saysrsquo by Douglas Hamilton and Charles Aldinger The Washington Post 6 December 2000 lsquoEU force ldquoputs NATO at risk of becoming relicrdquo rsquo by Michael Evans The Times 6 December 2000 lsquoUS urges EU to keep link with NATO Military Capabilityrsquo by Alexander Nicoll Financial Times 6 December 2000


Notes 219

40 For the reaction on the Helsinki European Council see for example lsquoEuropeans Envisioning Strike Force Without USrsquo by Craig R Whitney The New York Times 26 November 1999 lsquoUS and NATO Allies Divided Over Defense Needsrsquo by Craig R Whitney The New York Times 3 December 1999 lsquoEurodefensersquo (edito-rial) The Washington Post 10 December 1999 lsquoNervous Looks Among Alliesrsquo by Jim Hoagland The Washington Post 19 December 1999 lsquoUS Tepid on European Defense Plan American Stance Vexes EU Leadersrsquo by William Drozdiak The Washington Post 7 March 2000 lsquoDefence row looms at EU summitrsquo by Robin Oakley CNN 5 December 2000

41 lsquoUS tries to persuade Turkey not to veto EU defence plansrsquo Agence France- Presse 12 December 2000 lsquoAlbright Cem meet at NATO to discuss EU defencersquo Agence France- Press 14 December 2000 lsquoTurkey presses on NATO forcersquo by Alexander Nicoll Financial Times 14 December 2000 lsquoIn Accord Turkey Tentatively Agrees European Union Force May Use NATO Basesrsquo by Michael R Gordon The New York Times 5 June 2001

42 lsquoUS Tepid on European Defense Plan American Stance Vexes EU Leadersrsquo by William Drozdiak The Washington Post 7 March 2000

43 Interview with senior MoD officials who also allowed me to see some of the confidential documents from that period (Berlin AprilMay 2007)

44 The former had been the driving force behind a lsquodefence planning guidance draftrsquo under the Bush Sr administration which led to significant transatlantic tensions because it designated Western Europe ndash more or less explicitly ndash as a future global competitor It stated lsquoit is of fundamental importance to preserve NATO as the primary instrument of Western defense and security as well as the channel for US influence and participation in European security affairs While the United States supports the goal of European integration we must seek to prevent the emergence of European- only security arrangements which would undermine NATO particularly the alliancersquos integrated command structurersquo US Department of Defense (1992) lsquoDraft of the Defense Planning Guidance for the Fiscal Years 1994ndash1999rsquo cited from lsquoExcerpts From Pentagonrsquos Plan ldquoPrevent the Re- Emergence of a New Rivalrdquo rsquo The New York Times 8 March 1992

The lsquoNuclear Posture Reviewrsquo (2002) recalled significantly the approach taken by parts of the Pentagon in 1992 Apparently the competitive character of the transatlantic relationship had regained significance in US strategic thinking (US Department of Defense 2002a)

45 lsquoBut whatever the causes the rift between the United States and its European ldquoalliesrdquo is getting serious You could hear the NATO alliance tearing at the seams on Tuesday as Germanyrsquos foreign minister Joschka Fischer denounced the Bush administrationrsquos anti- terrorism policy and warned that Europeans will refuse to be treated like ldquosatelliterdquo statesrsquo Cited from lsquoThe Transatlantic Rift Is Getting Seriousrsquo by David Ignatius The Washington Post 15 February 2002

See also lsquoHerr Rumsfeldrsquos Warningrsquo by Fred Hiatt The Washington Post 9 February 2003 lsquoThe Great Divide The US and Europe Stretch to Close Itrsquo by Elaine Sciolino The New York Times 8 December 2003

For a comprehensive overview of (un)contested issues in the transatlantic rela-tionship from a US perspective see Wayne 2003 Jones 2004

46 lsquoUS calls Nato meeting on EU defencersquo by Judy Dempsey Financial Times 17 October 2003 lsquoCrossed Wires on European defensersquo Financial Times 18ndash19 October 2003 lsquoEUDefence ndash United States fiercely opposed to European ldquohead-quartersrdquo outside NATOrsquo Agence Europe 2 October 2003 lsquoNATO Calms US Fears of European Defence HQrsquo by Stephen Castle The Independent 21 October 2003


220 Notes

47 ldquoBut when the ink was barely dry [on the EUndashNATO Strategic Partnership] you had this summit on April 29 of France Germany Belgium and Luxembourg [Tervuren] and they said letrsquos create an independent EU military headquarters letrsquos think about an Article 5- like clause for the EU constitution letrsquos think about our own SHAPE All those issues are being debated now in the Inter- governmental Conference as they look at finalizing the EU constitution And what Secretary Rumsfeld has been putting forth at this meeting ndash in individual meetings but also in the larger gathering ndash is we need to go back to the roots of Berlin Plus and preserve a cooperative but not competitive relationship The US is opposed to attempts to split Europe off ndash rather the EU off ndash from NATO Thatrsquos a major chal-lengerdquo (US Department of Defense 2003)

48 lsquoEurope Warms to Idea of Unified Military Agencyrsquo by Heather Timmons The New York Times 22 July 2004

Another instance of initial US opposition was the question of an independent European satellite system that might be extremely relevant in future military operations lsquoUS and EU poised to agree on satellite navigation networksrsquo by Judy Dempsey Financial Times 3 February 2004 lsquoUS backs EU development of mili-tary satellite systemrsquo by Judy Dempsey Financial Times 27 February 2004

49 For the initial German position see the previous exploration of German prefer-ences For the gradual shift see the development

lsquoDefying US Germany stands firm on EU defence HQrsquo Reuters News 11 September 2003

lsquoEUDefence ndash United States fiercely opposed to European ldquoheadquartersrdquo out-side NATOrsquo Agence Europe 2 October 2003

lsquoEUDefencersquo Agence Europe 8 October 2003 lsquoUS calls Nato meeting on EU defencersquo by Judy Dempsey Financial Times 17

October 2003 lsquoCrossed Wires on European defensersquo Financial Times 1819 October 2003 lsquoGermanyrsquos Struck sees EU defence planning at NATOrsquo by Markus Krah Reuters

News 24 October 2003 lsquoGerman leader says EU defence initiative ldquonot competingrdquo with NATOrsquo BBC

Monitoring European 4 November 2003 lsquoEUDefencersquo Agence Europe 25 November 2003 lsquoEUIGCNATO ndash Donald

Rumsfeld denies criticising EU Naples plansrsquo Agence Europe 2 December 2003 lsquoGerman minister says no EU NATO internal opposition on defencersquo BBC

Monitoring European 4 December 2003 lsquoFischer sees US support for EU defence plansrsquo Reuters News 5 December 2003 lsquoThe Great Divide The US and Europe Stretch to Close Itrsquo by Elaine Sciolino

The New York Times 8 December 200350 See also lsquoLetrsquos talk ndash but wherersquo The Economist 24 February 200551 Under certain circumstances it could even strengthen the lsquovoice opportunitiesrsquo

in Washington though this was not the decisive aspect The idea was that a capable Europe might have a greater say at the White House and on Capitol Hill I will come back to this aspect in the British case study below

6 Great Britain ndash From Opposing the Union towards a Subordinated ESDP

1 While the UK played a major role in all of these summits the St Malo and Sintra documents are particularly relevant for understanding the genuinely British approach to ESDP


Notes 221

Joint Declaration by the French and British Government (St Malo 34 December 1998) Meeting of European Union Defence Ministers (including lsquoFood for Thought Paperrsquo going back to the UKrsquos Ministry of Defence) (Sintra 28 February 2000) cited from Rutten 2001 8ndash 9 94ndash107

2 lsquoEU Defencersquo Financial Times 25 March 1997 lsquoRifkind attack widens EU gulfrsquo The Herald 26 March 1997 lsquoUK ldquoTo Vetordquo EU Defence Bid ndash France and Germany Push for Closer Tiesrsquo by Caroline Southey and Lionel Barber Financial Times 24 March 1997

3 lsquoMajor Wins Test of Policy On Europe Ruling Party Divided Over Britainrsquos Rolersquo by Fred Barbash The Washington Post 2 March 1995 lsquoMajor Warns on EU Defence Rolersquo by Bruce Clark Financial Times 24 February 1996

4 lsquoEU Leaders With Eye Toward Expansion Revamp Rules of Operationrsquo by Anne Swardson The Washington Post 18 June 1997

5 lsquoEU Defencersquo Financial Times 25 March 1997 lsquoEU Defencersquo Financial Times 10 December 1997

6 Joint Declaration by the French and British Government (St Malo 3ndash4 December 1998) cited from Rutten 2001 8ndash9

7 lsquoEUPortschach Summitrsquo Agence Europe 27 October 1998 lsquoCooperation Talks Aim at Giving EU a Military Role Within NATO Blair and Chirac Sketch Defense Pactrsquo by Joseph Fitchett International Herald Tribune 4 December 1998

8 Cited from lsquoUK ndash Blair backs EU defence armrsquo BBC News 21 October 1998 cited from httpnewsbbccouk1hiuk197887stm (last access 20 August 2007) See also lsquoBlair to back creation of EU defence armrsquo by Andrew Parker Financial Times 21 October 1998

9 See in particular Meeting of European Union Defence Ministers (including lsquoFood for Thought Paperrsquo going back to the UKrsquos Ministry of Defence) (Sintra 28 February 2000) cited from Rutten 2001 94ndash107

10 Tony Blair explicitly refused to follow the German minister of defence in terms of the merger proposal lsquoEUDefenceUnited Kingdomrsquo Agence Europe 10 March 1999

11 BritishndashItalian Summit (1999) Joint Declaration Launching European Defence Capabilities Initiative (London 19ndash20 July 1999) cited from Rutten 2001 46ndash7

12 See also lsquoEUDefence ndash At London summit UK and France offer European- led forces use of headquartersrsquo Agence Europe 27 November 1999 lsquoEUDefencendashEurocorpsrsquo Agence Europe 4 December 1999

13 Cited from lsquoWEU ndash Before the Assembly Mr Robertson stresses that debate on institutional options remains openrsquo Agence Europe 3 December 1998

14 The question then of why the new administration had not significantly changed the Conservativesrsquo approach by the time of Amsterdam is often answered by reference to time It simply came too early (eg Howorth 2000c 381 footnote 18) An identical account was (independently) given by a British policy expert I interviewed in Berlin in 2006

15 lsquoNew EU arms agency should avoid ldquobuy Europeanrdquo approach ndash Hoonrsquo Agence France Press 17 November 2003 lsquoFrance Britain Germany said near EU defence dealrsquo by Mark John and Marie- Louise Moller Reuters News 28 November 2003 lsquoUK and France disagree on role of arms agencyrsquo by Judy Dempsey Financial Times 18 May 2004

16 See in particular UKFranceGermany (2004) lsquoFood for Thought Paperrsquo (Brussels 10 February 2004) cited from EU- ISS 2005 10ndash16

17 lsquoLondon and Paris push ahead on common EU defence goalsrsquo by Judy Dempsey Financial Times 14 March 2003


222 Notes

18 lsquoUK and France plan joint forcersquo by James Blitz and Judy Dempsey Financial Times 10 February 2004

19 lsquoUK and France disagree on role of arms agencyrsquo by Judy Dempsey Financial Times 18 May 2004

20 Cited from Blair 1998c21 See for the Conservativesrsquo criticisms lsquoThatcher Launches Attack on Euro Armyrsquo

The Times 8 December 1999 lsquoThe Nationrsquos New Nuclear Perilrsquo by Ian Duncan Smith Daily Telegraph 11 April 2000

22 The following sections build on some of the results of the German case whereas differences arise from BritishndashAmerican interactions The studyrsquos theoretical framework argues not on the basis of a simple market failure that might have confronted all European states in the same way Instead the premise is that the EU member states are faced with transaction costs when they provide European security if these increase the governments start to consider creating alternative governance structures to make gains or to save on costs

23 lsquoUS Senator Dole in London for icy talks on Bosniarsquo Agence France- Presse 30 November 1994 lsquoUS Europe The Gap is Wideningrsquo by Rick Atkinson The Washington Post 8 February 1995 lsquoEmergency Meeting on Ex- Yugoslavia on Saturday in Parisrsquo Agence Europe 3 June 1995

24 lsquoMajor Wins Test of Policy On Europersquo by Fred Barbash The Washington Post 2 March 1995 lsquoMajor Warns on EU Defence Rolersquo by Bruce Clark Financial Times 24 February 1996

25 Cited from lsquoTarnished The Spreading War in Kosovo Reveals Europersquos Unreadiness to Act on Its Ownrsquo by Peter Riddell The Washington Post 4 April 1999

26 Cited from lsquoNATO Appoints British Defense Chief to Its Top Civilian Postrsquo by Craig R Whitney The New York Times 5 August 1999 See also lsquoOne Foot in Washington Britainrsquos in Europe Sort ofrsquo by Alan Cowell The New York Times 28 February 1999

27 See in particular lsquoNATO Nations Balk at Paying Large Share of Expansion Defense Ministers Oppose USrsquo by William Drozdiak The Washington Post 3 October 1997

28 lsquoPentagon Chief Sends for Toryrsquo by Ben Fenton The Daily Telegraph 17 February 2001 See also statements of the influential US official John Bolton about the UKrsquos policies in 1999 lsquoRisking NATOrsquos futurersquo by John Bolton The Washington Times 15 December 1999

This was perceived as a severe problem by the UK See for example lsquoBush aides launch assault on Euro armyrsquo by Matthew Campbell and Stephen Grey The Sunday Times 17 December 2000 lsquoWersquove Lost That Allied Feeling Bushrsquos First Moves Arenrsquot Winning Europersquos Heartrsquo by Hugo Young The Washington Post 1 April 2001

29 lsquoUS Strikes ndash The Aftermath ndash World Outrage ndash and support ndash Soundbitesrsquo Financial Times 22 August 1998

30 See also lsquoBlair in the Middlersquo by Jim Hoagland The Washington Post 16 April 2000

31 lsquoBlair Offers to Be ldquoBridgerdquo Between US Europersquo by T R Reid The Washington Post 18 July 2001

32 lsquoBlair says UK will aid US military reprisalsrsquo by Patrick Wintour The Guardian 14 September 2001 lsquoBlair in diplomatic efforts to ensure European support for US- led actionrsquo by Brian Groom Financial Times 17 September 2001 lsquoBlair explores


Notes 223

the grey areas of compromisersquo by Brian Groom Financial Times 8 October 2001 lsquoBlair diplomacy effort angers EU leadersrsquo by Robert Shrimsley and Judy Dempsey Financial Times 5 November 2001

33 See for instance lsquoGovernment is ready to resist move to extend action to Iraqrsquo by Brian Groom Financial Times 10 October 2001 and lsquoAttack on Afghanistan divisionsrsquo by Ewen MacAskill Richard Norton- Taylor Julian Borger and Ian Black The Guardian 9 November 2001

34 lsquoReports Insist on Independence of WEUrsquo Agence Europe 10 June 1995 lsquoWEU Assembly to Focus on New World Order for Peace and Securityrsquo Agence Europe 20 June 1995 lsquoMajor Warns on EU Defence Rolersquo by Bruce Clark Financial Times 24 February 1996 lsquoEU Leaders With Eye Toward Expansion Revamp Rules of Operationrsquo by Anne Swardson The Washington Post 18 June 1997

35 lsquoBritain Joins Francersquos Call for European Forcersquo by Craig R Whitney The New York Times 5 December 1998

36 lsquoBlair Backs Clintonrsquos Call for Iraqi Opposition Groups to Topple Husseinrsquo by Warren Hoge The New York Times 18 November 1998

Another factor that might have contributed to the moderate US response to St Malo was the fact that President Clinton was dramatically weakened in the fall of 1998 (lsquoLewinsky Affairrsquo) lsquoDeep Concern in the World Over Weakened Clintonrsquo by R W Apple The New York Times 25 September 1998

37 This interpretation is however not uncontested ldquoBritish officials argue that they did apprise the United States in advance of what was going to be agreed upon at St Malo but certainly it was not well known and particularly not among those Americans ndash especially in Congress ndash who proved to be most concerned about what was agreed uponrdquo (Hunter 2002 32 footnote 6)

38 At about the same time the two governments made clear that a lsquoFortress Europersquo should be prevented with respect to defence procurements The bilateral lsquoDeclaration of Principlesrsquo for defence equipment and industrial cooperation did send a strong signal to other EU members in this regard See US- UK Declaration of Principles (for defence equipment and industrial cooperation) (Munich February 2000) cited from Schmitt 2003 60ndash7

39 See in particular lsquoUS Raises Objections to New Force in Europersquo by Craig R Whitney The New York Times 11 October 1999 lsquoUS Tepid on European Defense Plan American Stance Vexes EU Leadersrsquo by William Drozdiak The Washington Post 7 March 2000 lsquoEU Force Could Spell NATOrsquos End Cohen Saysrsquo by Douglas Hamilton and Charles Aldinger The Washington Post 6 December 2000 lsquoEUDefence ndash European Council approves report on ESDP but renounces ndash after British requestrsquo Agence Europe 9 December 2000

40 lsquoEuropean Military Force To Cooperate With NATOrsquo by Keith B Richburg The Washington Post 9 December 2000

41 lsquoPentagon Chief Sends for Toryrsquo by Ben Fenton The Daily Telegraph 17 February 2001

42 lsquoUS dismay over Blairrsquos stance on EU defencersquo by James Blitz and Peter Spiegel Financial Times 16 October 2003 lsquoNATO Calms US Fears of European Defence HQrsquo by Stephen Castle The Independent 21 October 2003

7 France ndash From Gradual WEU Integration to Full-Scale ESDP

1 lsquoM Chirac SrsquoExprimera Deux Fois sur la Politique Europeacuteene ndash Les Principaux Points de la Position Francaisersquo Le Monde 21 February 1996 lsquoEUDefenceFrance


224 Notes

Germanyrsquo Agence Europe 28 January 1997 lsquoUK ldquoTo Vetordquo EU Defence Bid ndash France and Germany Push for Closer Tiesrsquo by Caroline Southey and Lionel Barber Financial Times 24 March 1997

2 lsquoFrance Says It Is Willing to Discuss Its Nuclear Role in NATOrsquo by Craig R Whitney The New York Times 18 January 1996 lsquoFrance and Germany to Discuss Joint Nuclear Deterrentrsquo by Craig R Whitney The New York Times 25 January 1997

3 See also lsquoEUDefence ndash Proposals by Pierre Lellouchersquo Agence Europe 9 May 1996

4 Due to the far- reaching proposals made by the French government at the IGC the ultimate ndash fairly moderate ndash results of security and defence issues in Amsterdam were not regarded as a success See in particular lsquoLes Quinze ont eacutechoueacute a reacuteformer les institutions de lrsquoUnionrsquo by Henri de Bresson and Alain Franco Le Monde 19 June 1997

5 Joint Declaration by the French and British Government (St Malo 3ndash4 December 1998) cited from Rutten 2001 8

6 Final Declaration of the Franco- German Summit (Potsdam 1 December 1998) cited from Rutten 2001 4ndash7

The view that France wanted the EU to evolve into an all- encompassing secu-rity organisation was also emphasised by a senior French defence official with whom I conducted interviews in May 2007 in Berlin The reasoning was that crisis management might require a solidaristic response in emergencies Hence collective defence should not be excluded from the EUrsquos functional scope so NATOrsquos primacy in territorial defence would not be questioned

7 lsquoEU Force Takes Shape With Pledge of Troops A Crucial Step in Fielding 60000 by 2003rsquo by Joseph Fitchett International Herald Tribune 20 November 2000 lsquoEUDefence ndash European Council approves report on ESDP but renounces ndash after British requestrsquo Agence Europe 9 December 2000

8 See also lsquoEUDefence ndash Michel Barnier thinks NATO ldquomust not be cannot be only responserdquo from EU in defencersquo Agence Europe 25 April 2003 lsquoEUDefence ndash ldquoMini summit of the fourrdquo on defence presents seven concrete initiativesrsquo Agence Europe 30 April 2003

9 lsquoChirac says EU defence plans will respect NATOrsquo Agence France Presse 17 October 2003 lsquoEUDefenceFrancersquo Agence Europe 10 January 2004

10 lsquoEUDefence Industry calls for caution when opening up defence marketsrsquo Agence Europe 27 October 2004 lsquoEUDefence Michegravele Alliot- Marie calls for strength-ened EU military capabilities larger national defence budgets and creation of European defence marketrsquo Agence Europe 26 November 2004

11 lsquoFrancersquos Villepin on EU defence talks with Britain Germanyrsquo BBC Monitoring European 29 November 2003 lsquoFrench defence minister on Libya Iraq relations with USA EU defencersquo BBC Monitoring European 23 December 2003

12 lsquoEUDefence ndash Informal Meeting of Defence Ministers in Brussels on 6 Aprilrsquo Agence Europe 30 March 2001

13 lsquoBritain and France try to project unity on defencersquo The Irish Times 25 November 2003 lsquoEUDefence ndash France and United Kingdom in support of EU rapid reaction force deployable in two weeksrsquo Agence Europe 26 November 2003

14 This is an illustrative example of the studyrsquos mixed approach towards transac-tion costs On the one hand they affect the government like an lsquoobjective forcersquo France must deal with Washingtonrsquos commitment if it wants to provide European security On the other hand the French government may perceive similar lsquoforcesrsquo


Notes 225

in a different way from for example Germany Therefore it is ultimately about the lsquosubjective interpretations of objective forcesrsquo

15 The following sections will also adopt some of the results from the case study on Germany and merely discuss French perceptions which partly differed from and partly resembled the German ones

16 lsquoDes Frappes Aeacuteriennes Deacutefensivesrsquo by Jacques Isnard Le Monde 10 May 1993 lsquoFrench Successfully Bluff Their Allies on Bosniarsquo by Alan Riding The New York Times 13 December 1994

17 lsquoChiracrsquos attack on Congress has a bigger targetrsquo by Joseph Fichett International Herald Tribune 9 November 1999

18 That was also emphasised by a senior official of the French ministry of defence with whom I conducted an interview (Berlin May 2007)

19 lsquoFrance may pose long- term challenge to US defense policy Perle saysrsquo Aerospace Daily amp Defense Report by Nick Jonson 13 February 2003 lsquoNice Summit Euro- force still cause of divisionrsquo by Anton LaGuardia The Daily Telegraph 9 December 2000


21 Cited from lsquoChiracrsquos attack on Congress has a bigger targetrsquo by Joseph Fichett International Herald Tribune 9 November 1999

22 ldquoFrance as an heir to a prestigious history may potentially be threatened by this development [that is unipolarity]rdquo (authorrsquos translation)

23 lsquoEUDefence ndash Explanations by the ldquoFourrdquo on European defence are welcomed in Kastellorizorsquo Agence Europe 6 May 2003

24 lsquoFrench Defense Minister Visiting US Hopes to Improve Tiesrsquo by Keith Richburg The Washington Post 16 January 2004

25 These conclusions were largely reconfirmed by an interview that I conducted with a senior official of the French ministry of defence (Berlin May 2007)

26 lsquoFrance goes on the defence offensiversquo by David Buchan Financial Times 24 January 1994

27 lsquoUS Raises Objections to New Force in Europersquo by Craig R Whitney The New York Times 11 October 1999

28 lsquoUS urges EU to keep link with NATO Military Capabilityrsquo by Alexander Nicoll Financial Times 6 December 2000 lsquoFrance snubs America over Euro- armyrsquo by Anton LaGuardia The Daily Telegraph 7 December 2000 lsquoFrench trigger NATO furorersquo by Philip Webster Richard Beeston and Martin Fletcher The Times 8 December 2000

29 Cited from lsquoEuropean Military Forces To Cooperate With NATOrsquo by Keith B Richburg The Washington Post 9 December 2000

30 Cited from lsquoNato deadlock over EU reaction forcersquo by Anton LaGuardia The Daily Telegraph 15 December 2000


32 lsquoNATO Calms US Fears of European Defence HQrsquo by Stephen Castle The Independent 21 October 2003 lsquoEUIGCNATO ndash Donald Rumsfeld denies criticis-ing EU Naples plansrsquo Agence Europe 2 December 2003

33 This term stems from an interview with a French senior official from the Ministry of Defence (Berlin April 2007)

34 Francersquos fundamental insistence on this latter point was emphasised by numer-ous participants at a Conference on lsquoESDP and the German Presidency in 2007rsquo in Berlin


226 Notes

35 While Francersquos active participation in NATOrsquos Response Force after 2002 could have led to an incremental decrease of transaction costs and thus to more mod-erate preferences with respect to the EUrsquos substantive scope at that time the institutional path and lsquosunk costsrsquo affected the French formulation of prefer-ences The government voluntarily stayed on the track once chosen out of some sort of necessity Moreover the success of the NRF was increasingly questioned and therefore pure reliance on this institutional arrangement would also have been short- sighted

8 Germany ndash An Incrementally Decreasing Willingness to Bind the Country

1 The general option of invoking the lsquoLuxembourg compromisersquo was to be weak-ened by for instance asserting lsquovital national interestsrsquo in advance

2 The latter should comprise staff from Member States the Commission and the EU Secretariat Germany supported strengthening the Councilrsquos organisational structure in defence issues while avoiding fragmentation of the EUrsquos overall structure Therefore the Commission should participate in the strategy and planning unit yet to be established

3 According to German constitutional law the use of force is decided by the national parliament rather than the government However both the expansion of lsquoconstructive abstentionsrsquo and QMV in as many areas as possible were gener-ally welcomed by the new German government

4 The fourth pillar was initially proposed by the British Secretary of Defence Lord Robertson (Missiroli 2000 25) Accordingly the contemporary agenda focused on a potential change of the status quo but in a direction opposite to the one Germany had initially favoured

5 British- Italian Summit (1999) Joint Declaration Launching European Defence Capabilities Initiative (London 19ndash20 July 1999) and French Action Plan (1999) Letter from the French President Jacques Chirac to the Finish Presidency of the European Union (Paris 22 July 1999) cited from Rutten 2001 46ndash53

6 Two German rationales in particular back the relatively benevolent view the Commission should improve efficiency whereas the Parliament increases legitimacy In addition there were debates to establish a lsquoCouncil of Defence Ministersrsquo because up to that point only the General Affairs Council had dis-cussed questions with defence implications The German presidency in 1999 had proposed the formal establishment of such a Council in its draft report (Rutten 2001 17ndash19 see also German Bundestag 2002 20ndash21)

7 This arrangement should be open to join later and should be related to the rest of the EUrsquos policies Thus a protocol should be added to the treaty explicitly stating which states wish to do what

8 lsquoBelgian plan is ldquosign of a multi- speed Europerdquo European defence cooperationrsquo by Judy Dempsey Daniel Dombey and George Parker Financial Times 26 March 2003 lsquoEUDefence ndash George Papandreou says Costas Simitis may be observer at four country Summitrsquo Agence Europe 12 April 2003

9 lsquoEUDefence ndash Council assesses three solutions for defence financingrsquo Agence Europe 12 November 2001

10 At the start of the deliberations the German government (and the Foreign Ministry in particular) had been critical towards this strengthening of the Council which was regarded as effectively weakening the Commissionrsquos execu-


Notes 227

tive powers However Germany did not want double- hatting for the roles of the Commission President and the Council President

11 A potential strengthening of the supranational bodies (especially the Commission) was to be avoided but not at all costs If it increased the EUrsquos effectiveness in for example implementation procedures the German government would have an open- minded approach It was not concerned about the stigmatised lsquocommuni-tarisation through the back doorrsquo

12 For the most important steps of the process after Germany together with France Belgium and Luxembourg had presented its proposals in Brussels in April 2003 (European Defence Meeting 2003) see lsquoDefying US Germany stands firm on EU defence HQrsquo Reuters News 11 September 2003 lsquoEUDefence ndash Spokesman for the German government confirms opposition of his country to creation ofrsquo Agence Europe 8 October 2003 lsquoGermanyrsquos Struck sees EU defence planning at NATOrsquo by Markus Krah Reuters News 24 October 2003 lsquoGerman leader says EU defence initiative ldquonot competingrdquo with NATOrsquo BBC Monitoring European 4 November 2003 lsquoGerman minister says no EU NATO internal opposition on defencersquo BBC Monitoring European 4 December 2003 lsquoFischer sees US support for EU defence plansrsquo Reuters News 5 December 2003

13 This is among the most difficult issues because one can observe a shift of the German position in the course of the Convention deliberations I therefore sup-plemented the documentary analysis with interviews with senior officials in the German Ministry of Defence (AprilMay 2007) In this context I was also allowed to examine confidential documents that were crucial in this context but which will not be directly quoted This whole procedure is based on and congru-ent with Michael Zuumlrnrsquos propositions on how to assess preferences (Zuumlrn 1997 298ndash302)

14 While this opposition was implicit the US (and later the UK) became highly active to prevent EU operational headquarters especially after October 2003

For the decisive negotiations in particular see lsquoCrossed Wires on European defencersquo Financial Times 18ndash19 October 2003 lsquoNATO and EU try to defuse defence disputersquo by Judy Dempsey Financial Times 20 October 2003 lsquoNATOrsquos European allies offer reassurance to USrsquo Financial Times 21 October 2003

15 There are always two ways to interpret such a development either the establish-ment of EU operational headquarters represented the real German preference and the new position is only a result of the interactions (pressure from the US and UK) or it represented a maximal demand in order to achieve the real prefer-ence of a slightly strengthened EUMS In retrospect the first interpretation is more plausible because the necessity and preference for an independent stand-ing operational HQ had already been formulated by the Social Democratic Party Group of the Bundestag in 2000 It seems rather that the tensions arising from the Iraq crisis in 2003 facilitated the German governmentrsquos decision to state its preferences publicly for the first time


17 Interview with senior official responsible for lsquocapability building in ESDPrsquo within the Ministry of Defence (Berlin April 2007)

18 The initial motivation of Germany however has to be more closely linked to factors outside the frameworkrsquos variables namely some traditional beliefs the potential ESDP was to be part of the EUrsquos integrative project This limitation of the studyrsquos argument will be discussed below


228 Notes

19 Due to the virtual certainty about the UKrsquos position namely one that was criti-cal of Europe it was clear that if security policy were to be integrated into the EU London would be required to be locked in or its commitment would never become credible Again we see the argumentrsquos functionalist legacy since it is ultimately anticipated costs and benefits that carry the main explanatory bur-den

20 Because it is neither feasible nor reasonable to examine German relations to all EU members I will focus on the ones that are particularly relevant for the crea-tion of the ESDP ndash namely the UK and France Some authors have even referred to the lsquoBig Threersquo as an informal directorate in the ESDP (Freedman 2004)

21 First the Germans were lsquoduly miffedrsquo about the French President not discussing his reform plans in advance lsquoThe Helmut- and- Jacques showrsquo The Economist 6 April 1996


23 lsquoMajor Wins Test of Policy on Europe Ruling Party Divided Over Britainrsquos Rolersquo by Fred Barbash The Washington Post 2 March 1995

24 lsquoMajor Resigns as Party Leaderrsquo Agence Europe 24 June 199525 ldquoBlairrsquos announcement at Poumlrtschach was deliberately underplayed to the UK

media by the Prime Ministerrsquos communications officers a strategy that ensured that the subtle change in the official emphasis in UK defence policy was not subject to a wider debate in the UK media and thus potential revisionsrdquo (Dover 2005 518)

26 lsquoEuro army is a threat to NATO says USrsquo by Anton La Guardia The Daily Telegraph 6 December 2000 lsquoFrance fires fresh salvo at Britain over Euro armyrsquo by Robert Locke The Sunday Times 10 December 2000

27 lsquoStraw sets limits to EU military planrsquo by Ian Black and Patrick Wintour The Guardian 21 October 2003 lsquoBritain renews its opposition to EU defence head-quartersrsquo Agence France Presse 5 November 2003 lsquoGerman minister calls on US to give up reservations against EU defence policyrsquo BBC Monitoring European 9 December 2003

28 Because this is difficult to trace back solely on the basis of documentary sources I have invested some efforts into a lsquostructured questionnairersquo focusing on this question The results from the interviews conducted in the Ministry of Defencersquos ESDP unit were unambiguous (Berlin AprilMay 2007) The German govern-ment by now had a stronger level of trust in the commitment of its partners In this context it is interesting to point out that the German military has a much more favourable position towards the UK than most of the Foreign Ministry staff This stems primarily from good cooperation in NATO These officials are basically unfamiliar with problems with the UK

29 This was emphasised by numerous officials of the German French and British ministries of defence that I was allowed to talk to at a conference on the ESDP in Berlin in January 2007

30 Asset specificity is not so much about existing as about planned assets Again the anticipated effects of the institutions account for the preferences of a govern-ment to create them

31 At this stage it is useful to remember Oliver Williamsonrsquos quote from the begin-ning ldquoEmpirical research on transaction cost matters almost never attempts to measure such costs directly Instead the question is whether organizational rela-tions (contracting practices governance structures) line up with the attributes


Notes 229

of transaction costs predicted by transaction cost reasoning or notrdquo (Williamson 1985 22)

32 The author is aware of the fact that the latter factors are largely outside the studyrsquos framework This is so to speak a weakness of the framework and will be discussed in more detail below

33 This paragraph is almost completely based on assessments stemming from inter-view sources Unfortunately it was not possible to find publicly available infor-mation on these issues Nevertheless this was an important aspect for essentially all my interviewees in this context

34 This aspect increased the political costs to the extent that there was a domes-tic consensus to send exclusively non- conscripts out- of- area The possibility for this sort of power projection was only created by a ruling of the Constitutional Court in 1994 Therefore Germany could behave largely as an observer during the Bosnia crisis since constitutional problems were understood to prevent it sending forces abroad

35 The seriously bad shape of the German forces eventually became apparent in 1999 when then Minister of Defence Scharping admitted that the Bundeswehr would not qualify for the ESDP if convergence criteria were set like those for Economic and Monetary Union (Scharping 1999c)

36 This was also emphasised in numerous talks with senior officials of the German MoD

37 I had the opportunity to study the German background and position papers on these issues The studyrsquos overall assessments are also based on them though I have tried to refer as often as possible to publicly available sources

38 lsquoEUDefence ndash Germany joins Franco- British rapid reaction force initiativersquo Agence Europe 12 February 2004

39 Again these results are mainly based on German background and position papers

40 See also Eurobarometers No 431 (1995) 53 (2000) and 562 (2001) with a large amount of primary data on this trend

41 lsquoReinforcing trendrsquo implies here that specific assets become increasingly specific and general assets remain general or become increasingly so

9 Great Britain ndash From No EU Security Policy to a Purely Intergovernmental ESDP

1 lsquoRifkind attack widens EU gulfrsquo The Herald 26 March 1997 Only Labour allowed for some expansion of lsquoflexible arrangementsrsquo which did

not however refer to security and defence questions 2 lsquoWEU ndash Before the Assembly Mr Robertson stresses that debate on institutional

options remains openrsquo Agence Europe 3 December 1998 lsquoCooperation Talks Aim at Giving EU a Military Role Within NATO Blair and Chirac Sketch Defense Pactrsquo by Joseph Fitchett International Herald Tribune 4 December 1998

3 This approach to institutional questions had already been indicated by the St Malo declaration but finally became clear in the lsquofood for thought paperrsquo in 2000 See Joint Declaration by the French and British Government (St Malo 34 December 1998) Meeting of European Union Defence Ministers (including lsquoFood for Thought Paperrsquo going back to the UKrsquos Ministry of Defence) (Sintra 28 February 2000) both cited from Rutten 2001 8ndash9 94ndash107 See also lsquoBlair to back creation of EU defence armrsquo by Andrew Parker Financial Times 21 October 1998


230 Notes

4 BritishndashItalian Summit (1999) Joint Declaration Launching European Defence Capabilities Initiative (London 19ndash20 July 1999) cited from Rutten 2001 46ndash7 For the repeated insistence on these defence planning proposals by Minister of Defence Lord Robertson see lsquoEUDefencersquo Agence Europe 11 September 1999


6 lsquoBelgian plan is ldquosign of a multi- speed Europerdquo rsquo by Judy Dempsey Daniel Dombey and George Parker Financial Times 26 March 2003 lsquoBlair heals rift by agreeing to EU defence missionsrsquo by Stephen Castle The Independent 23 September 2003 lsquoEUDefence ndash Structured cooperation in defence possible if open to all Member Statesrsquo Agence Europe 18 October 2003

7 lsquoStates look to Blair to take stand on EU defencersquo by Judy Dempsey Financial Times 18 September 2003 lsquoBlair heals rift by agreeing to EU defence missionsrsquo by Stephen Castle The Independent 23 September 2003 lsquoFrance Britain Germany said near EU defence dealrsquo by Mark John and Marie- Louise Moller Reuters News 28 November 2003 lsquoUS retreat allows EU to clinch deal on defence forcersquo by Stephen Castle The Independent 12 December 2003


9 Initially the UK proposed so- called Team Presidencies that were to guarantee continuity (25 years) and the representation of at least one of the big member states (UK Germany France Italy and perhaps Spain) This would lend them a higher degree of credibility on the international stage In the course of the delib-erations however the government became increasingly familiar with the new position of a Council President Nevertheless it did not want a double- hatting role of the Commission President and the Council President (Hain 2002 Hain and Palacio 2003 see also Menon 2003 973)

10 The UK wanted to avoid the creation of a military EU headquarters ndash either by the whole EU or by some form of lsquostructured cooperationrsquo Thus the UK could not allow for the possibility that a lsquocore of countriesrsquo going forward and estab-lishing an operational HQ under lsquostructured cooperationrsquo Some form of veto had to be maintained in this respect because this would not only represent lsquounnec-essary duplicationrsquo of NATO but would also be an instrument for potentially excluding the UK from decision- making in sensitive areas Therefore it was one of the UKrsquos most important lsquored linesrsquo before and during the IGC since France Germany Luxembourg and Belgium had just proposed this in their lsquoEuropean Defence Meetingrsquo in April 2003

11 This British dilemma ndash acknowledging functional necessities on the one hand while avoiding competition with the US on the other ndash has been a constant feature of the UKrsquos policies for the ESDP Some years later there was a compro-mise namely the so- called Hampton Court Formula but this merely mitigated some of the problems A solution has not been found yet at the time of writing (2010) This assessment is based on documents that I was allowed to read but not to quote in the German Ministry of Defence (Berlin May 2007) See also lsquoEin Hauptquartier das nicht so heiszligen sollrsquo by Martin Winter Suumlddeutsche Zeitung 31 May 2007

12 Jack Straw reiterated at most appearances before the House of Commons Committee on the IGC that flexible arrangements are only about (increased) capabilities not operations

See for the British position in the headquarters bargaining lsquoEUDefence ndash At London summit UK and France offer European- led forces use of headquartersrsquo


Notes 231

Agence Europe 27 November 1999 lsquoBlair heals rift by agreeing to EU defence mis-sionsrsquo by Stephen Castle The Independent 23 September 2003 lsquoUS diplomat sparks EU defence row ndash sourcesrsquo Agence France Presse 16 October 2003 lsquoUS clashes with Europeans on EU defence ambitionsrsquo by John Chalmers Reuters News 16 October 2003 lsquoStraw sets limits to EU military planrsquo by Ian Black and Patrick Wintour The Guardian 21 October 2003 lsquoNato calms US fears of European defence HQrsquo by Stephen Castle The Independent 21 October 2003 lsquoBritain renews its opposi-tion to EU defence headquartersrsquo Agence France Presse 5 November 2003 lsquoFrance Britain Germany said near EU defence dealrsquo by Mark JohnMarie- Louise Moller Reuters News 28 November 2003 and lsquoUS retreat allows EU to clinch deal on defence forcersquo by Stephen Castle The Independent 12 December 2003


14 lsquoCooperation Talks Aim at Giving EU a Military Role Within NATO Blair and Chirac Sketch Defense Pactrsquo by Joseph Fitchett International Herald Tribune 4 December 1998 lsquoFrance Britain Germany said near EU defence dealrsquo by Mark John and Marie- Louise Moller Reuters News 28 November 2003

15 The demand for explicit numbers in the lsquobattlegroup agreementrsquo was explicitly directed against lsquocapabilities laggardsrsquo such as Germany This was repeatedly mentioned by UK officials (Interview with a German MoD official Berlin April 2007)

16 lsquoNew EU arms agency should avoid ldquobuy Europeanrdquo approach ndash Hoonrsquo Agence France Press 17 November 2003 lsquoBlair deal on EU defence may offend Bushrsquo by Ben Hall George Parker and Judy Dempsey Financial Times 28 November 2003

17 lsquoBritain has to give up sovereignty say Frenchrsquo by Graeme Wilson Daily Mail 20 October 2003 lsquoFrancersquos Villepin on EU defence talks with Britain Germanyrsquo BBC Monitoring European 29 November 2003

18 At the same time there were also Conservatives who supported the establish-ment of the ESDP lsquoTory grandees attack Hague over EU forcersquo by Severin Carrell and Andrew Grice The Independent 25 November 2000

19 This concern was also emphasised by a British policy expert with whom I con-ducted an interview in Berlin in late 2006

20 This was also the main reason for maintaining the distinction of operational vs defence planning during this study because it provides us with significant explanatory leverage for the British case as a whole After all British support for increased defence planning but a certain reluctance with respect to operations clearly demonstrates the lsquotriggersrsquo behind its preferences This is one of the main contributions that a transaction costs perspective may provide

21 ldquoRecent examples in Africa (such as the UKrsquos operational experience in Sierra Leone the French in Cocircte drsquoIvoire and the EUrsquos operation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo) have not only illustrated the need for such a capability but demonstrated how a relatively small number of forces can have a significant effect in a short period of time provided they can be deployed rapidly with the appropriate support ( ) The Battlegroup initiative sets a new level of ambition for the EU alongside the existing 1999 Helsinki Headline Goal It will form a part of the new 2010 Headline Goal which adds to the original aims a clearer focus on the quality of the capability such as the ability to deploy forces rapidly sustain them at distance and operate multi nationallyrdquo (Hoon 2005)



232 Notes

10 France ndash A Consistently Intergovernmental Approach towards ESDP

1 lsquoEUDefence ndash Mr Juppe places emphasis on strengthening the role of the European Councilrsquo Agence Europe 11 September 1996

2 lsquoEUDefence ndash Proposals by Pierre Lellouchersquo Agence Europe 9 May 1996 3 lsquoRichard announces intensive programme for EU defence ministers during com-

ing semesterrsquo Agence Europe 1 July 2000 4 Joint Declaration by the French and British Government (St Malo 3ndash4 December

1998) cited from Rutten 2001 8 5 lsquoEUDefence Richard Wilmot- Roussel believes constitutional treaty will allow

Defence Europe to make progress under EUrsquos watchful eyersquo Agence Europe 13 July 2004


7 lsquoRichard announces intensive programme for EU defence ministers during com-ing semesterrsquo Agence Europe 1 July 2000 lsquoEU Force Takes Shape With Pledge of Troops A Crucial Step in Fielding 60000 by 2003rsquo by Joseph Fitchett International Herald Tribune 20 November 2000 lsquoEUDefence ndash European Council approves report on ESDP but renounces ndash after British requestrsquo Agence Europe 9 December 2000

8 Furthermore I conducted a semi- structured interview with a senior official of the French Ministry of Defence who largely confirmed the publicly available statements and documents in this regard (Interview in Berlin May 2007)

See also lsquoItaly floats compromise as EU defence HQ plan fadesrsquo Reuters News 3 October 2003 lsquoChirac says EU defence plans will respect NATOrsquo Agence France Presse 17 October 2003 lsquoFrance insists EU defence plans not against NATOrsquo Agence France Presse 17 November 2003

9 lsquoEUESDP ndash Barrau Report Recommends ldquoCoherence Indicatorsrdquo rsquo Agence Europe 18 April 2000

10 lsquoLes ministres franccedilais et allemands ont du mal agrave dissiper les malentendusrsquo by Lucas Delattre and Daniel Vernet Le Monde 6 March 1996

11 lsquoThe Helmut- and- Jacques showrsquo The Economist 6 April 1996 lsquoMM Chirac et Kohl tentent de remettre sur les rails la coopeacuteration en matiegravere de deacutefensersquo by Lucas Delattre Le Monde 11 May 1996

12 lsquoEUESDP ndash Barrau Report Recommends ldquoCoherence Indicatorsrdquo rsquo Agence Europe 18 April 2000 lsquoRichard announces intensive programme for EU defence min-isters during coming semesterrsquo Agence Europe 1 July 2000 See also the last par-agraph of the Franco- German Declaration of Mainz in 2000 that emphasises French support for German transformative efforts (Franco- German Defence and Security Council 2000)

13 ldquoLrsquoexigence drsquoune constitution pour lrsquoEurope est historique ce nrsquoest pas une question de semaines Nous croyons lrsquoaccord possible nous y travaillons et nous comptons sur la preacutesidence irlandaise apregraves les avanceacutees de la preacutesidence italienne Dans lrsquohypothegravese contraire les pays qui ont lrsquoambition de cette con-stitution travailleront ensemble pour dans lrsquoaction convaincre les autres Les groupes pionniers construiront lrsquoavenir dans le respect de lrsquoacquis communau-taire La relation germano- franccedilaise authentiquement dense pourra server de pocircle drsquoaccueil pour ceux qui souhaiteront renforcer leur coopeacuteration par exem-ple le Royaume Uni pour les questions de deacutefense la Pologne pour stimuler le


Notes 233

triangle de Weimar ou lrsquoEurogroupe pour mieux lier stabiliteacute et croissance au sein du Pacte de lrsquoEurordquo (Raffarin 2004)

See also lsquoParis et Berlin reacutefleacutechissent agrave une ldquounion franco- allemanderdquo rsquo by Henri de Bresson and Arnaud Leparmentier Le Monde 12 November 2003 lsquoGermany and France exploring an alliancersquo by Thomas Fuller International Herald Tribune 13 November 2003

14 Cited from lsquoIn Shift France Vows To Modernize Militaryrsquo by Keith B Richburg The Washington Post 16 October 2002

15 Except for the quoted documentary and secondary sources the previous section substantially built on interviews that I conducted with two French senior offi-cials of the French ministry of defence (Berlin AprilMay 2007)

16 They also had common experience as nuclear powers In this respect the United Kingdom was the only European country that did not strongly criticise the incoming French government for its nuclear tests lsquoChirac Ends Francersquos Nuclear Test Program Paris to Take ldquoActiverdquo Role in Disarmamentrsquo by William Drozdiak The Washington Post 30 January 1996

17 See also lsquoDes Frappes Aeacuteriennes Deacutefensivesrsquo by Jacques Isnard Le Monde 10 May 1993 lsquoFrench Successfully Bluff Their Allies on Bosniarsquo by Alan Riding The New York Times 13 December 1994

18 lsquoParis accueille avec perplexiteacute lrsquoinitiative de Tony Blair sur la deacutefense europeacuteennersquo Le Monde 22 October 1998

19 lsquoEUDefence ndash At London summit UK and France offer European- led forces use of headquartersrsquo Agence Europe 27 November 1999

20 lsquoUK and France plan joint forcersquo by James Blitz and Judy Dempsey Financial Times 10 February 2004 lsquoAnglo- French defence drive to EU foreign policyrsquo by Daniel Dombey Financial Times 23 June 2005 lsquoLondon and Paris push ahead on common EU defence goalsrsquo by Judy Dempsey Financial Times 14 March 2003

21 Cited from lsquoBritain has to give up sovereignty say Frenchrsquo by Graeme Wilson Daily Mail 20 October 2003

22 This was also reconfirmed in an interview with a senior official of the French Ministry of Defence in April 2007 in Berlin

23 This was particularly emphasised by a senior official of the French Ministry of Defence with whom I conducted an interview in May 2007 in Berlin

24 This even went so far that France preferred to intervene under the EU flag in its traditional sphere of influence even though the bulk of the operation was car-ried out by French troops That was the case in the EUrsquos Operation ARTEMIS in the DR Congo in June 2003 (Ulriksen et al 2004 514)

25 See also Eurobarometers No 431 (1995) 53 (2000) and 562 (2001) with a mul-titude of primary data on this tendency There you can integrate a so- called opinion leader index that can be applied as a proxy for lsquoelite opinionrsquo or in this case lsquothe political classrsquo

26 The prospective development of a lsquoEuropean Armyrsquo (under French leadership) has clearly been preferred by the French government It has come close to some-thing like the French vision of the lsquofinaliteacutersquo of the ESDP However the French presidentrsquos lsquofreedom of decisionrsquo at both the political and the military levels was to be maintained In particular flexibility at the operative level was to be secured These assessments stem from a conversation with three senior officials of the French ministry of defence with whom I conducted interviews in April 2007 in Berlin


234 Notes

27 Francersquos support for the NRF is similarly pragmatic like that of the UK with respect to the ESDP At the same time the emphasis was clearly on the general nature of these military assets so that they could potentially be employed in the context of the EU too This assessment is based on an interview source (with senior official of French Ministry of Defence Berlin May 2007)

28 lsquoFuumlr Frankreich sind die Europaumler mittlerweile das Ruumlckgrat der NATO- Einsaumltzersquo Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 15 September 2004 lsquoEurokorps Waves EU Flag in Afghanistanrsquo by Craig Smith International Herald Tribune 23 September 2004

29 This was indirectly reconfirmed by a senior official of the French Ministry of Defence with whom I conducted an interview in May 2007 (Berlin)

30 This was particularly emphasised by the French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin when he visited the United Kingdom in the autumn of 2003 lsquoBritain has to give up sovereignty say Frenchrsquo by Graeme Wilson Daily Mail 20 October 2003

11 Alternative Explanations and Theoretical Scope of the Transaction Costs Framework

1 This study intentionally distances itself from Realismrsquos binary logic of coopera-tion of lsquofor or against someonersquo that primarily dates back to its intellectual roots in alliance politics (eg Mearsheimer 2001) Instead I argue that contemporary security cooperation corresponds rather to lsquocoordination problems with distribu-tive consequencesrsquo and therefore statesrsquo security preferences were not primarily driven by concerns about physical survival but rather by tradeoffs in terms of costs

2 For the purpose of generating data for this section on alternative explana-tions the study seriously attempted to find empirical evidence for the lsquobind-ing hypothesisrsquo that went beyond some biographical notes of Margaret Thatcher and Francois Mitterrand in 1990 which were wholeheartedly critical towards German re- unification Nothing was found for the period since the outbreak of the crises in the Balkans Therefore I developed indicators and asked several French and British officials and policy experts for the underlying motivation behind the ESDP I simply found no indication for the studyrsquos period of analysis Germany should not be lsquoenmeshedrsquo because other countries were afraid of its newly powerful position Instead it should be integrated in order to live up to its responsibilities

3 This assessment was also shared by a British policy expert with whom I con-ducted an interview in the winter of 2006

4 This was also emphasised by numerous policy experts with whom I discussed these topics

See also lsquoNew EU arms agency should avoid ldquobuy Europeanrdquo approach ndash Hoonrsquo Agence France Press 17 November 2003 lsquoFrance Britain Germany said near EU defence dealrsquo by Mark John and Marie- Louise Moller Reuters News 28 November 2003 lsquoUK and France disagree on role of arms agencyrsquo by Judy Dempsey Financial Times 18 May 2004

5 lsquoEUDefence Industry calls for caution when opening up defence marketsrsquo Agence Europe 27 October 2004

This position was reconfirmed by a French MoD official interviewed in May 2007 in Berlin


Notes 235

6 For the ESDP Christoph Meyer has argued from a (moderate) Constructivist perspective that the lsquostrategic cultures in Europe have become more similarrsquo ndash despite remaining important differences (Meyer 2006 11) This convergence is lsquotriggeredrsquo by three main mechanisms (1) learning through changing threat perceptions (2) mediatised crisis learning (3) social influence through the ESDP (Meyer 2006 31ndash9)

Meyerrsquos analysis is undoubtedly helpful in understanding the ESDP and its underlying cultural basis As indicated above a transaction costs framework may profit from integrating beliefs embedded in a countryrsquos strategic culture for its own explanation For this study this seems to apply more to Germany (and Ireland as will be shown below) than to the UK and France

7 See however lsquoSpring raises question of involvement with WEUrsquo The Irish Times 10 April 1995

8 lsquoSmith ducks and weaves presenting defence trucersquo by Denis Coughlan The Irish Times 1 March 2000 lsquoDebate needed on role in EU defencersquo by Lt- Gen Gerry McMahon (Former Chief of Staff) The Irish Times 21 June 2000 lsquoCowen Defence Line Criticizedrsquo The Irish Times 4 July 2000 lsquoIreland to resist dilution of defence policy powersrsquo The Irish Times 13 July 2002

9 lsquoDebate needed on role in EU defencersquo by Lt- Gen Gerry McMahon (Former Chief of Staff) The Irish Times 21 June 2000

10 lsquoIreland has stepped off the neutrality fencersquo by Patrick Smyth The Irish Times 14 April 1999

11 lsquoWhite Paper sets out challenging vision for the Defence Forcesrsquo by Michael Smith Irish Minister of Defence The Irish Times 26 April 2000

12 lsquoSpring raises question of involvement with WEUrsquo The Irish Times 10 April 1995 lsquoShould we back a pledge to defend others if they come under attack YesNorsquo The Irish Times 3 April 2003 lsquoByrne and Cowen divided on collective defencersquo by Denis Staunton The Irish Times 9 December 2003

13 See also EP- Briefing 1997a 1997b

12 Conclusion ndash Theory-Development in the European Security and Defence Policy

1 While this analytical device drew our attention to the question of how much the governments preferred certain outcomes for the EU defence pillar the conclud-ing sections of the respective empirical chapters on substantive scope gave more emphasis to the ordering nature of preferences by confronting NATO options with EU options

2 In Albert Hirschmanrsquos terminology governments may employ either lsquovoice opportunitiesrsquo within an arrangement or (threaten to) lsquoexitrsquo the institution (Hirschman 1970)

3 The French armed forces had even argued once in their strategy that ldquoFrench doc-trines must be compatible with those of NATOrdquo (cited from Rynning 2002 140) After France had failed to create a new chain of command within the Alliance however it retreated from active participation in NATO Nevertheless this did not result in French ignorance about NATO For instance it has remained highly active in the newly established NATO Response Forces since 2002 Moreover Anand Menon has persuasively argued that France never wanted to fully replace NATO by genuinely European structures and that instead it favoured a division of labour (Menon 2000 125ndash7)


236 Notes

4 For instance concerns that prompted fears of possible exploitation by Germany accounted for the French willingness to support lsquoconvergence criteriarsquo or lsquocoher-ence indicatorsrsquo in defence planning

5 The presentation was at a lsquoyoung scholarsrsquo conferencersquo in Bremen in 2006 She was in fact speaking in German and said lsquoKonzepte sind unsere Augenrsquo

6 This modest proposal was to be an intergovernmental rather than a suprana-tional body and therefore the internationalisation at stake was not particularly significant (Mayer and Weinlich 2007)


237

References

Abbott Kenneth W and Duncan Snidal 2000 lsquoHard Law and Soft Law in International Governancersquo International Organization 54 (3) 421ndash56

Adler Emanuel and Michael Barnett 1998 lsquoA Framework of the Study of Security Communitiesrsquo In Security Communities ed E Adler and M Barnett Cambridge Cambridge University Press 29ndash65

Aggestam Lisbeth 2000 lsquoGermanyrsquo In The Foreign Policies of European Union Member States ed I Manners and R Whitman Manchester Manchester University Press 64ndash86

Albright Madeleine 1998 lsquoThe Right Balance Will Secure NATOrsquos Futurersquo Financial Times 7 December

Albright Madeleine and Robin Cook 2000 lsquoComment ndash Euro force will beef up NATOrsquo The Observer 26 November

Alliot- Marie Michele 2004 lsquoEurope is in better shape than ever to face crisesrsquo Financial Times 17 September

mdashmdashmdash 2005 lsquoSecurity could be Europersquos great rallying pointrsquo Financial Times 5 December

Anderson Jeffrey J and John B Goodman 1993 lsquoMars or Minerva A United Germany in a Post- Cold War Europersquo In After the Cold War International Institutions and State Strategies in Europe 1989ndash1991 ed R O Keohane J S Nye and S Hoffmann CambridgeMA Harvard University Press 23ndash62

Andreani Giles 2000 lsquoWhy Institutions Matterrsquo Survival 42 (2) 81ndash95Art Robert 1996 lsquoWhy Western Europe Needs the United States and NATOrsquo Political

Science Quarterly 111 (1) 1ndash39Art Robert J Stephen G Brooks William C Wolforth Keir A Lieber and Gerard

Alexander 20056 lsquoCorrespondence Striking the Balancersquo International Security 30 (3) 177ndash96

Baker David 2005 lsquoIslands of the Mind New Labourrsquos ldquoDefensive Engagementrdquo with the European Unionrsquo Political Quarterly 76 (1) 22ndash36

Baldwin David A 1979 lsquoPower Analysis and World Politics New Trends vs Old Tendenciesrsquo World Politics 31 (2) 161ndash94

mdashmdashmdash 1997 lsquoThe Concept of Securityrsquo Review of International Studies 23 (1) 5ndash26Balladur Edoard 1994 lsquoLa Politique de deacutefense essentielle et permanentersquo Deacutefense

Nationale 50 (11) 11ndash25Banchoff Thomas 1999 The German Problem Transformed Institutions Politics and

Foreign Policy 1945ndash1999 Ann Arbor University of MichiganBarnier Michel 1996 lsquoDiscours du Ministreacute Deacuteleacutegueacute aux Affaires Europeacuteens M

Michel Barnier Deacuteclaration du Gouvernementrsquo Deacutebat agrave lrsquoassembleacutee nationale sur la CIG 13 March httpwwwdocdiplomatiegouvfrBASISepicwwwdocDDWM=1ampK=973422593ampW=AUTEUR+PH+IS+27barnier27+AND+DATE+3D+271303199627+ORDER+BY+DATEDescend (last access 5 December 2008)

Baumann Rainer Volker Rittberger and Wolfgang Wagner 2000 lsquoPower and Power Politics Neorealist Foreign Policy Theory and Expectations about German Foreign Policy since Unificationrsquo In Tuumlbinger Arbeitspapiere zur Internationalen Politik 30a

Becher Klaus 2000 lsquoReforming German Defencersquo Survival 42 (3) 164ndash8

9780230_280120_15_bibindd 2379780230_280120_15_bibindd 237 1192011 63835 PM1192011 63835 PM

238 References

Becker Patricia M and Ronja Kempin 2005 lsquoFrankreichs Haltung zur Revolution in Military Affairsrsquo In SWP- Diskussionspapier ed Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik Berlin

Bell Robert 2006 lsquoNATOrsquos Continuing Transformationrsquo NATO Review 54 (3) 1ndash4Berger Samuel 1999 lsquoAmerican Power Hegemony Isolationism or Engagementrsquo

Speech by the US Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs The Council on Foreign Relations 21 October httpwwwmtholyokeeduacadintrelbergheghtm (last access 3 April 2009)

Berger Thomas U 1998 Cultures of Antimilitarism National Security in Germany and Japan Baltimore The Johns Hopkins University Press

Biden Joseph R 2000 lsquoUnholy Symbiosis Isolationism and Anti- Americanismrsquo The Washington Quarterly 23 (4) 7ndash14

Blair Tony 1995 lsquoBritain in Europe An Agenda for Reformrsquo Speech to the Friedrich- Ebert- Stiftung British Embassy Bonn Press Release 30 May

mdashmdashmdash 1996 lsquoSpeech of Labourrsquos Leader to the BDI Conferencersquo Bonn 18 June httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homemsspeechstate- ukblairhtm (last access 6 July 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 1997 lsquoSpeech by the Prime Ministerrsquo Paris 27 May httpwwwnumber- 10govukoutputPage1022asp (last access 7 March 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 1998a lsquoPrime Ministerrsquos Speech to the French National Assemblyrsquo Paris 24 March httpwwwnumber- 10govukoutputPage1160asp (last access 7 March 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 1998b lsquoNotes from the Press Conference after the Informal European Summitrsquo PoumlrtschachAustria In Rutten 2001 1ndash3

mdashmdashmdash 1998c lsquoItrsquos Time to Repay Americarsquo The New York Times 13 Novembermdashmdashmdash 2000 lsquoVision of Europersquo Speech by the Prime Minister Warsaw Polish Stock

Exchange 6 October httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp061000_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2001 lsquoBritainrsquos role in Europersquo Birmingham European Research Institute 21 November httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp 231101_enhtm (last access 21 November 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2002 lsquoA clear course for Europersquo Speech by the Prime Minister Cardiff 28 October httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp281102_enpdf (last access 21 November 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2003 lsquoThe European Councilrsquo Statement by the Prime Minister before the House of Commons after the European Council of Thessaloniki London 23 June httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp230603_enpdf (last access 22 November 2008)

Blair Tony and Gerhard Schroumlder 2002 lsquoJoint letter by the UK Prime Minister and the German Chancellor to the Spanish Prime Minister Aznarrsquo 25 February 2002 httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp250202_enhtm (last access 21 September 2008)

Blair Tony and Jacques Chirac 2003 lsquoJoint press conference of the British Prime Minister and the French President after the Anglo- French Summitrsquo London 24 November httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsotheroth241103_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

Bozo Frederic 2003 lsquoThe Effects of Kosovo and the Danger of De- Couplingrsquo In Defending Europe The EU NATO and the Quest for European Autonomy ed J Howorth and J T S Keeler New York Palgrave 61ndash80


References 239

Breuer Fabian 2006 lsquoBetween Ambitions and Financial Constraints The Reform of the German Armed Forcesrsquo German Politics 15 (2) 206ndash20

Brooks Stephen G 2005 Producing Security Multinational Corporations Globalization and the Changing Calculus of Conflict Princeton Princeton University Press

Bruumlck Tilman 2005 lsquoAn Economic Analysis of Security Policiesrsquo Defence and Peace Economics 16 (5) 375ndash89

Bulmer Simon J and Martin Burch 2005 lsquoThe Europeanization of UK Government from Quiet Revolution to Explicit Step- Changersquo Public Administration 83 (4) 861ndash90

Bush George W 2002 lsquoGraduation Speech at West Pointrsquo Speech by the US President West PointNY 1 June httpwwwwhitehousegovnewsreleases200206print 20020601- 3html (last access 1 October 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2003a lsquoRoundtable Interview of the US President by British Print Journalistsrsquo Washington 14 November httpwwwwhitehousegovnewsreleases 2003 11 20031114- 2html (last access 1 November 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2003b lsquoInterview of the US President with Sir David Frostrsquo In BBCTV Washington 12 November httpwwwwhitehousegovnewsreleases200311 20031117- 1html (last access 1 November 2008)

Bush George W and Tony Blair 2001a lsquoRemarks by the President and the Prime Minister in Joint Press Conferencersquo Camp David 23 February httpwwwwhite-housegovnewsreleases200102print20010226- 1html (last access 2 November 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2001b lsquoJoint Statement by the President and the Prime Ministerrsquo February 23 httpwwwwhitehousegovnewsreleases200102print20010226html (last access 1 November 2009)

Carlsnaes Walther 1992 lsquoThe Agency- Structure Problem in Foreign Policy Analysisrsquo International Studies Quarterly 36 (3) 245ndash70

mdashmdashmdash 2002 lsquoForeign Policyrsquo In Handbook of International Relations ed W Carlsnaes T Risse and B A Simmons London et al Sage 331ndash349

CDUCSU Group 1994 lsquoManifesto in the Bundestagrsquo Bonn 1 September httpwwweuroparleuropaeuigc1996pos- de_enhtm (last access 19 September 2008)

CDUCSUFDP 1994 Coalition Agreement Point VIII Europe and Foreign Policy ndash Security and Defence Bonn 11 November httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homeeu- docparlmentpeen2htm (last access 5 November 2007)

Checkel Jeffrey T and Michael Zuumlrn 2005 lsquoGetting Socialized to Build Bridges Constructivism and Rationalism Europe and the Nation- Statersquo International Organization 59 (4) 1045ndash79

Chirac Jacques 1996a lsquoIntervention televise de M Jacques Chirac President de la Republique interroge Anne Sinclair et Alain Duhamelrsquo Paris Palais de lrsquoElysee 22 February httpwwwelyseefrelyseerootbankprint1163htm (last access 22 November 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 1996b lsquoAllocution aux Armeacutees prononceacutee par M Jacques Chirac Preacutesident de la Reacutepublique agrave lrsquoEcole militairersquo Paris 23 February httpwwwelyseefrelyseerootbankprint192htm (last access 22 November 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 1999a lsquoLa France dans un monde multipolairersquo Politique Eacutetrangegravere 64 (4) 802ndash11

mdashmdashmdash 1999b lsquoFrench Action Planrsquo Letter from the French President to the Finnish Presidency of the European Union 22 July In Rutten 2001 48ndash53

mdashmdashmdash 1999c lsquoEntretien de Monsieur Jacques Chiracrsquo In Armeacutees drsquoaujourdrsquohui 1 December


240 References

Chirac Jacques 2000 lsquoSpeech at the Presidentsrsquo Committee in the WEU Parliamentary Assemblyrsquo Paris 30 May httpwwwassembly- weuorgendocumentssessions_ordinariesrpt20001699html (last access 20 May 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2001a lsquoSpeech to the German Bundestagrsquo Berlin 27 June httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechspjune2000_enhtm (last access 31 May 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2001b lsquoAddress by the President of the French Republic at a Reception for Ambassadors Palais drsquoElyseersquo Paris 27 August httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp270801_enhtm (last access 20 May 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2002a lsquoSpeech by the President of the French Republicrsquo Strasbourg 6 March httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp060302_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2002b lsquoInterview of President Jacques Chiracrsquo In New York Times 8 September httpwwwelyseefrelyseeanglaisspeeches_and_documents2002- 2001interview_of_president_jacques_chirac_by_the_new_york_times- elysee_palace- sunday_september_8_200214617html (last access 13 December 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2003a lsquoFrance is not a Pacifist Country the target of US scorn Francersquos Jacques Chirac tells Timesrsquo Interview by James Graff and Bruce Crumely In Time Magazine 161 (3) 24 February

mdashmdashmdash 2003b lsquoPress conference with the President of the Republic on the IGCrsquo 13 December httpeuropaeuconstitutionfuturumdocumentspresspr131203_frpdf (last access 22 September 2008)

Chirac Jacques and Helmut Kohl 1995 lsquoJoint letter by the German Chancellor and the French President to the President of the European Council Felipe Gonzalesrsquo 6 December httpwwweuroparleuropaeuigc1996pos- fr_enhtmlett (last access 19 May 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 1996 lsquoGemeinsame Botschaft von Bundeskanzler Dr Helmut Kohl und dem Praumlsidenten der franzoumlsischen Republik Jacques Chirac an den amtierenden Vorsitzenden des Europaeischen Rates und Ministerpraumlsidenten von Irland John Brutonrsquo 9 December In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 102

Chirac Jacques and Tony Blair 2003 lsquoJoint press conference of the British Prime Minister and the French President after the Anglo- French Summitrsquo 24 November httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsotheroth241103_enpdf (last access 24 September 2008)

Choi Young Jong and James A Caporaso 2002 lsquoComparative Regional Integrationrsquo In Handbook of International Relations ed W Carlsnaes T Risse and B A Simmons London Thousand Oaks and New Delhi Sage 480ndash499

Christensen Thomas J 1996 Useful Adversaries Grand Strategy Domestic Mobilization and Sino- American Conflict 1947- 1958 Princeton Princeton University Press

Christopher Warren 1993 lsquoTowards a NATO Summitrsquo NATO Review 43 (4) 3ndash6Clark Wesley K 2001 Waging Modern War Bosnia Kosovo and the Future of Combat

New York Public AffairsClarke Michael and Paul Cornish 2002 lsquoThe European Defence Project and the

Prague Summitrsquo International Affairs 78 (4) 777ndash88Clinton Bill 1998 lsquoAddress to the Nation by the Presidentrsquo Washington 20 August

httpclinton6naragov1998081998- 08- 20- president- address- to- the- nationhtml (last access 20 June 2009)

Cohen William S 1999 lsquoRemarks at the Bundeswehr Commandersrsquo Conferencersquo Speech of the US Secretary of Defense Congress Center Hamburg 1 December httpwwwdefenselinkmilspeeches1999s19991201- secdef1html (last access 3 July 2009)


References 241

Cohen William S 2000a lsquoEuropean Security and Defense Identityrsquo Speech of the US Secretary of Defense at the 36th Munich Conference on Security Policy Munich 5 February httpwwwdefenselinkmilspeeches2000s20000205- secdef2html (last access 3 July 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2000b lsquoRemarks at WEUrsquos Transatlantic Forumrsquo Speech of the US Secretary of Defense Washington DC 28 June httpwwwdefenselinkmilspeeches2000s20000628- secdefhtml (last access 3 July 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2000c lsquoRemarks at an Informal NATO Defense Ministerial Meetingrsquo Speech of the US Secretary of Defense Birmingham UK 10 October httpwwwdefenselinkmilspeeches2000s20001010- secdefhtml (last access 3 July 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2000d lsquoNews Briefing with US Secretary William S Cohenrsquo Brussels 5 December httpwwwdefenselinkmiltranscripts2000t12052000_t1205sd2html (last access 3 July 2009)

Collier David and James E Mahoney Jr 1993 lsquoConceptual ldquoStretchingrdquo Revisited Adapting Categories in Comparative Analysisrsquo American Political Science Review 87 (4) 845ndash55

Collmer Sabine 2004 lsquolsquoAll politics is localrsquo Deutsche Sicherheits- und Verteidigungspolitik im Spiegel der Oumlffentlichen Meinungrsquo In Deutsche Sicherheitspolitik Eine Bilanz der Regierung Schroeder ed S Harnisch C Katsioulis and M Overhaus Baden- Baden Nomos 201ndash225

Cook Robin 2000 lsquoResponse of the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs to the Select Committee (Select Committee on the European Union) Session 1999ndash2000rsquo In 15th Report lsquoThe Common European Policy on Security and Defencersquo London The Stationery Office httpwwwpublicationsparliamentukpald200001ldselectldeucom141410htm (last access 24 June 2009)

Cowen Brian 2003a lsquoAnnual Address by the Minister for Foreign Affairs at the Institute of European Affairsrsquo Dublin 15 January httpwwwirelandcomnews-paperspecial2003cowenindexhtm (last access 7 June 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2003b lsquoThe European Convention Real Problems Real Solutionsrsquo Speech by the Minister for Foreign Affairs at the European Policy Center Brussels 3 April httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp030403_enpdf (last access 21 September 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2003c lsquoOpening Remarks to Daacuteil Debate on IGCrsquo Dublin 15 October httpeuropaeuconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp151003_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

Davis James W 2005 Terms of Inquiry On the Theory and Practice of Political Science Baltimore The Johns Hopkins University Press

de Charette Herveacute 1996 lsquoIntervention du Ministre des Affaires Etrangeresrsquo Deacutebat au Seacutenat sur la CIG 14 March httpwwwdocdiplomatiegouvfrBASISepicwwwdocDDWM=2ampK=973406212ampW=AUTEUR+PH+IS+27de+charette27+AND+DATE+3D+271403199627+ORDER+BY+DATEDescend (last access 25 November 2007)

mdashmdashmdash 1997 lsquoA big hand in Europersquo In Financial Times 23 Januaryde Charette Herveacute and Klaus Kinkel 1996 lsquoGemeinsamer deutsch- franzoumlsischer

Diskussionsbeitrag fuumlr die Regierungskonferenzrsquo Paris 17 October In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 84

de Charette Herveacute and Lamberto Dini 1997 lsquoInnover pour progresserrsquo Le Monde 25 March

de Villepin Dominique 2002 lsquoSpeech on Europe by the Minister of Foreign Affairsrsquo Marseille 2 December httpeuropaeuconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp021202_enpdf (last access 26 September 2009)


242 References

de Villepin Dominique 2003 lsquoHearing of the Minister for Foreign Affairs in the National Assemblyrsquos European Union Delegationrsquo Paris 5 November httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsotheroth051103_frpdf (last access 23 September 2009)

de Villepin Dominique and Joschka Fischer 2002 lsquoCommon contribution to the Convention on the Future of Europe Franco- German Proposals for ESDPrsquo 22 November CONV 42202

de Villepin Dominique and Noelle Lenoir 2003 lsquoSpeech by the Ministers of Foreign European Affairsrsquo Paris Science Po 18 January httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsotheroth180103_frpdf (last access 21 September 2009)

Deighton Anne 2002 lsquoThe European Security and Defence Policyrsquo Journal of Common Market Studies 40 (4) 719ndash41

DeVore Marc and Moritz Weiss 2010 lsquoWho is in the Cockpit Corporations Governments and Collaborative Aircraft Decisionsrsquo Paper presented to the Annual Convention of the International Studies Association (ISA) New Orleans 17ndash20 February 2010

Doherty Roisin 2000 lsquoPartnership for Peace The sine qua non for Irish Participation in Regional Peacekeepingrsquo International Peacekeeping 7 (2) 63ndash82

mdashmdashmdash 2002 Ireland Neutrality and European Security Integration Aldershot AshgateDover Robert 2005 lsquoThe Prime Minister and the Core Executive A Liberal

Intergovernmentalist Reading of UK Defence Policy Formulation 1997ndash2000rsquo British Journal of Politics and International Relations 7 (4) 516

Duffield John S 1998 World Power Forsaken Political Culture International Institutions and German Security Policy after Unification Stanford Stanford University Press

Eckstein Harry 1975 lsquoCase Study and Theory in Political Sciencersquo In Handbook of Political Science ed F Greenstein and N Polsby ReadingMA Addison- Wesley 79ndash137

Eichenberg Richard C 2003 lsquoThe Polls- Trends Having it Both Ways European Defense Integration and the Commitment to NATOrsquo Public Opinion Quarterly 67 (4) 627ndash59

EP- Briefing 1997a lsquoCommon Foreign and Security Policyrsquo ed European Parliament Intergovernmental Conference Briefing No 5 (Fourth update 21st March 1997) httpwwweuroparleuropaeuigc1996fichesfiche5_enhtm (last access 19 May 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 1997b lsquoWEU Security and Defencersquo ed European Parliament Intergovernmental Conference Briefing No 11 (Third update 21st March 1997) httpwwweuroparleuropaeuigc1996fichesfiche11_enhtm (last access 19 May 2008)

EU- ISS ed 2005 lsquoEU security and defence core documents 2004 Vol Vrsquo In Chaillot Papers No 75 EU Institute for Security Studies Paris

EU Reflection Group 1995 lsquoReflection Group Reportrsquo MessinaBrussels httpwwweuroparleuropaeuenlargementcuagreementsreflex2_enhtm (last access 27 September 2009)

European Convention 2002a lsquoFinal Report of Working Group VII on External Actionrsquo CONV 45902

mdashmdashmdash 2002b lsquoFinal Report of Working Group VIII ndash Defencersquo CONV 46102European Council 2003 A Secure Europe in a Better World Brussels 12 December

httpwwwconsiliumeuropaeuuedocscmsUpload78367pdf (last access 21 June 2009)

European Defence Meeting 2003 lsquoConclusionsrsquo Meeting of the Heads of State and Government of Germany France Luxemburg and Belgium 29 April httpwwwdiplomatiebeenpresshomedetailsaspTEXTID=6453 (last access 12 May 2009)


References 243

Fine Gael 2000 lsquoBeyond neutrality Irelandrsquos Role in European Defence and Securityrsquo Dublin httpwwwfinegaeliePubUploadsBeyond20Neutralitypdf (last access 12 January 2008)

Finnemore Martha and Kathryn Sikkink 1998 lsquoInternational Norm Dynamics and Political Changersquo International Organization 52 (4) 887ndash917

Fischer Joschka 1999a lsquoRede von Bundesminister Fischer in Straszligburgrsquo European Parliament Strasbourg 12 January In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 2

mdashmdashmdash 1999b lsquoEinfuumlhrungsstatement des Bundesauszligenministers zur Europaumlischen Sicherheits- und Verteidigungspolitik (WEU- Tagung)rsquo Bremen 10 May In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 30

mdashmdashmdash 2000a lsquoFrom Confederacy to Federation ndash Thoughts on the finality of European integrationrsquo Speech by the Minister of Foreign Affairs at the Humboldt University Berlin 12 May httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp120500_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2000b lsquoMultilateralismus als Aufgabe deutscher Auszligenpolitikrsquo Rede des Bundesministers des Auswaumlrtigen bei der ersten Konferenz der Leiterinnen und Leiter deutscher Auslandsvertretungen Berlin 4 September In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 53

mdashmdashmdash 2001a lsquoRede des Bundesministers des Auswaumlrtigen zu den transatlantischen Beziehungenrsquo German Bundestag Berlin 15 March In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 21

mdashmdashmdash 2001b lsquoHearing of the German Minister for Foreign Affairs as part of the lsquoMardis de lrsquoEuropersquo (Tuesdays on Europe) at the Assembleacutee Nationalrsquo Paris 30 October httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsofftextdoc301001_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2002 lsquoDie NATO auf die neuen Gefahren ausrichtenrsquo Regierungserklaumlrung des Bundesministers des Auswaumlrtigen zum bevor stehenden NATO- Gipfel in Prag German Bundestag Berlin 14 November In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 92

mdashmdashmdash 2003a lsquoRede des Bundesministers des Auswaumlrtigen zum Einsatz deutscher Soldaten im Zusammenhang mit der EU- Mission im Kongorsquo German Bundestag Berlin 18 June In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 50

mdashmdashmdash 2003b lsquoDeclaration by the Federal Foreign Minister on the results of the Thessaloniki European Council German Bundestagrsquo 26 June httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp260603_enpdf (last access 20 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2003c lsquoEurope and the Future of the Transatlantic Relationsrsquo Speech by the Foreign Minister at Princeton University Princeton 19 November httpwwwprincetonedu~lisdeventstalksFischer_Speechpdf (last access 26 June 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2003d lsquoRegierungserklaumlrung des Bundesministers des Auswaumlrtigen zum bevor stehenden Europaumlischen Rat in Bruumlsselrsquo German Bundestag Berlin In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 112

mdashmdashmdash 2004a lsquoEuropa auf der Suche nach politischer Ordnungrsquo Rede des Bundesministers des Auswaumlrtigen zur Eroumlffnung des Internationalen Bertelsmann Forums Berlin 9 January In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 3

mdashmdashmdash 2004b lsquoNarrow visions of Europe simply do not work any morersquo Interview with the Federal Minister of Foreign Affairs In Berliner Zeitung 28 February httpwwwauswaertiges- amtdewwwenausgabe_archivarchiv_id=5440 (last access 22 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2004c lsquoThe Reconstruction of the Westrsquo Interview with the Federal Minister of Foreign Affairs In Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 6 March httpwww


244 References

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Fischer Joschka and Dominique de Villepin 2002 lsquoCommon contribution to the Convention on the Future of Europe Franco- German Proposals for ESDPrsquo 22 November CONV 42202

Forsberg Tuomas 2007 lsquoExplaining the Emergence of ESDP Setting the Research Agendarsquo In European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR) Standing Group for International Relations (SGIR) Conference 12ndash15 September Turin httparchivesgireuuploadsForsberg- torino- forsberg- esdppdf (last access 20 December 2007)

Forster Anthony 1999 Britain and the Maastricht Negotiations HoundmillsBasingstoke Macmillan

Franco- German Defence and Security Council 1999a lsquoDeclaration of Toulousersquo 29 May httpwwwdeutschland- und- frankreichde73- Deutsch- franzosischer- Gipfel- inhtml (last access 23 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2000 lsquoDeclaration of Mainzrsquo 9 June httpwwwdeutschland- und- frankreichde75- Deutsch- franzosischer- Gipfel- inhtml (last access 23 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2002 lsquoDeclaration of Schwerinrsquo 30 July httpwwwdeutschland- und- frankreichdepublicpagescontent_pdfphpsess_id=Inv5XsEOC36H362PBUNrCw3clCFANOampid_contentLanguage=2 (last access 23 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2003 lsquo Declaration of Berlinrsquo 18 September httpwwwdeutschland- und- frankreichdepublicpagescontent_pdfphpsess_id=FK16GWXZeAaAHklAAV8Z9U4WklM5vKampid_contentLanguage=2 (last access 23 September 2008)

Freedman Lawrence 1999 The Politics of British Defence 1979ndash98 HoundmillsBasingstoke Macmillan Press

mdashmdashmdash 2004 lsquoCan the EU Develop an Effective Military Doctrinersquo In A European Way of War ed S Everts L Freedman C Grant F Heisbourg D Keohane and M OrsquoHanlon London Centre for European Reform 13ndash26

French Government 1994 lsquoLivre Blanc sur la Deacutefensersquo In La Documentation Franccedilaise Paris httplesrapportsladocumentationfrancaisefrBRP9440487000000pdf (last access 14 December 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 1996a lsquoMemorandum on Francersquos guidelines for 1996 ICGrsquo Le Figaro 20 February cited from httpwwweuroparleuropaeuigc1996pos- fr_enhtm (last access 20 January 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 1996b lsquoWhite Paper on the 1996 Intergovernmental Conference Volume II ndash Francersquo httpwwweuroparleuropaeuigc1996pos- fr_enhtm (last access 19 May 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 1996c lsquoGemeinsames deutsch- franzoumlsisches Sicherheits- und Verteidigungskonzeptrsquo Gebilligt bei der 16 Sitzung des Deutsch- Franzoumlsischen Verteidigungs- und Sicherheitsrates Nuremberg 9 December In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 12 1997

French Government and German Government 2001 lsquoJoint Declaration on the main priorities of Europersquo 23 November httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsofftextdoc231101_enhtm (last access 23 September 2008)

French Ministry of Defence 1996 lsquoProjet de loi de programmation militaire 1997ndash2002rsquo Paris httpwwwlegifrancegouvfraffichTextedocidTexte=JORFTEXT000000560200ampdateTexte= (last access 15 December 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2002 lsquoLe projet de loi de programmation militaire 2003ndash2008rsquo Paris httpwwwlegifrancegouvfraffichTextedocidTexte=JORFTEXT000000234154ampdateTexte= (last access 15 December 2007)


References 245

French National Assembly 2005 lsquoInformation Report remitted by the Foreign Affairs Committee on the relationship between Europe and the United States No 2567rsquo Paris httpwwwassemblee- nationalefr12dossierseurope_relations_etats- unis_englishasp (last access 12 May 2009)

Frieden Jeffry A 1999 lsquoActors and Preferences in International Relationsrsquo In Strategic Choice and International Relations ed D A Lake and R Powell Princeton Princeton University Press 39ndash76

Gallis Paul 2006 lsquoFrance Factors Shaping Foreign Policy and Issues in US- French Relationsrsquo Congressional Research Service Washington DC

Geddes Barbara 1990 lsquoHow the Cases You Choose Affect the Answers You Get Selection Bias in Comparative Politicsrsquo In Political Analysis Vol 2 ed J A Stimson Ann Arbor University of Michigan Press 131ndash150

Genschel Philipp and Bernhard Zangl 2008 lsquoMetamorphosen des Staates ndash vom Herrschaftsmonopolisten zum Herrschaftsmanagerrsquo Leviathan 36 (3) 430ndash454

Genschel Philipp and Stephan Leibfried 2008 lsquoSchupperts Staat Wie beobachtet man den Wandel einer Formideersquo Der Staat 47 (3) 359ndash380

Genscher Hans- Dietrich 1995 lsquoInterview mit dem Bundesauszligenministerrsquo In Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 10 November

George Alexander L and Andrew Bennett 2005 Case Studies and Theory Development in the Social Sciences CambridgeMA MIT Press

George Alexander L and Timothy J McKeown 1985 lsquoCase Studies and Theories of Organizational Decision Makingrsquo In Advances in Information Processing in Organizations Vol 2 Research on Public Organizations ed R F Coulam and R A Smith GreenwichCT JAI Press 21ndash58

George Stephen 1996 lsquoThe Approach of the British Government to the 1996 Intergovernmental Conference of the European Unionrsquo Journal of European Public Policy 3 (1) 45ndash62

German Bundestag 2002 lsquoFinal Report of the Committee on the Affairs of the European Union (1998ndash2002)rsquo Europaausschuss des Bundestages Berlin

German Government 1996 lsquoGemeinsames deutsch- franzoumlsisches Sicherheits- und Verteidigungskonzeptrsquo Gebilligt bei der 16 Sitzung des Deutsch- Franzoumlsischen Verteidigungs- und Sicherheitsrates Nuremberg 9 December In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 12 1997

mdashmdashmdash 2002 lsquoDeclaration of Schwerinrsquo Franco- German Council for Defence and Securityrsquo 30 July httpwwwdeutschland- und- frankreichdepublicpagescontent_pdfphpsess_id=Inv5XsEOC36H362PBUNrCw3clCFANOampid_contentLanguage=2 (last access 23 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2004 lsquoEuropaumlische Sicherheits- und Verteidigungspolitikrsquo Bundesministerium der VerteidigungAuswaumlrtiges Amt Berlin

German Ministry of Defence 1994 lsquoWeiszligbuch zur Sicherheit der Bundesrepublik Deutschland und zur Lage und Zukunft der Bundeswehrrsquo Bonn

mdashmdashmdash 2003 lsquoVerteidigungspolitische Richtlinienrsquo Berlinmdashmdashmdash 2006 lsquoWeiszligbuch zur Sicherheit der Bundesrepublik Deutschland und zur

Lage und Zukunft der Bundeswehrrsquo BerlinGerman Ministry of Foreign Affairs 1996 lsquoGermanyrsquos Objectives for the

Intergovernmental Conferencersquo In White Paper on the 1996 Intergovernmental Conference Summary of Positions of the member States of the European Union with a View to the 1996 Intergovernmental Conference Vol II ed European Parliament Intergovernmental Task Force Bonn 26 March httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homeeu- docparlmentpeen2htm (last access 25 May 2007)


246 References

Gilland Karin 2002 lsquoIrelandrsquos (First) Referendum on the Treaty of Nicersquo Journal of Common Market Studies 40 (3) 527ndash35

Gloannec Anne- Marie le 1997 lsquoEurope by Other Meansrsquo International Affairs 73 (1) 83- 98

Gnesotto Nicole 1996 lsquoLa deacutefense europeacuteenne au carrefour de la Bosnie et de la CIGrsquo Politique Etrangegravere 61 (1) 116ndash 24

Goulard Sylvie 2000 lsquoFranzoumlsische Europapolitik und oumlffentliche Debatte in Frankreichrsquo In Discussion Paper No C62 Bonn Zentrum fuumlr Europaumlische Integrationsforschung

Gourevitch Peter A 1999 lsquoThe Governance Problem in International Relationsrsquo In Strategic Choice and International Relations ed D A Lake and R Powell Princeton Princeton University Press 309ndash328

Government of the UK 1994 lsquoFront Line First The Defence Costs Studyrsquo Ministry of Defence London

mdashmdashmdash 1995a lsquoMemorandum on the United Kingdom Governmentrsquos approach to the treatment of European defence issues at the 1996 Intergovernmental Conferencersquo ed European Commission IGC 96 Task Force Brussels httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homems- docstate- ukdefencehtml (last access 6 July 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 1995b lsquoThe future of the European Union ndash Report on Labourrsquos position in preparation for the Intergovernmental Conferencersquo ed European Commission IGC 96 Task Force Brussels httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homems- docstate- uklabourhtml (last access 6 July 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 1996 lsquoAn Association of Nations UK White Paper on the Intergovernmental Conferencersquo London 12 March ed European Commission IGC 96 Task Force Brussels httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homems- docstate- ukposhtm (last access 6 July 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 1997 lsquoWEU Security and Defencersquo ed European Commission Intergovernmental Conference Briefing No 11 (Third update 21st March 1997) httpwwweuroparleuropaeuigc1996fichesfiche11_enhtm (last access 20 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 1998 lsquoStrategic Defence Review Presented to Parliament by the Secretary of State for Defence by Command of Her Majestyrsquo London httpwwwmodukNRrdonlyres65F3D7AC- 4340- 4119- 93A2- 20825848E50E0sdr1998_completepdf (last access 30 July 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2003a lsquoBritish Non- Paper lsquoFood for Thoughtrsquo Rome 29 August In Missiroli 2003 204ndash7

mdashmdashmdash 2003b lsquoFCO White Paper UK International Priorities Presented to Parliament by the Secretary of State for Foreign amp Commonwealth Affairs by Command of Her Majestyrsquo London httpwwwfcogovukFileskfileFCOStrategyFullFinal0pdf (last access 30 July 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2003c lsquoDefence White Paper Delivering Security in a Changing World Presented to Parliament by the Secretary of State for Defence by Command of Her Majestyrsquo London httpwwwmodukNRrdonlyres051AF365- 0A97- 4550- 99C0- 4D87D7C95DED0cm6041I_whitepaper2003pdf (last access 30 July 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2004 lsquoWhite Paper on the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europersquo London httpwwwfcogovukFileskfileWhite20Paper_Treaty20 establishing20a20Constitution20for20Europepdf (last access 21 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2005 lsquoDefence White Paper Defence Industrial Strategy Presented to Parliament by the Secretary of State for Defence by Command of Her Majestyrsquo London http


References 247

wwwmodukNRrdonlyresF530ED6C- F80C- 4F24- 8438- 0B587CC4BF4D0def_industrial_strategy_wp_cm6697pdf (last access 20 August 2009)

Grant Robert P 1996 lsquoFrancersquos New Relationship with NATOrsquo Survival 38 (1) 58ndash80

Greacutegoire Joseph P 2002 The Bases of French Peace Operations Doctrine Problematical Scope of Francersquos Military Engagements within the UN or NATO Framework Carlisle Strategic Studies Institute of the US Army War College

Gregory Shaun 2000 French Defence Policy into the Twenty- First Century HoundmillsBasingstoke Macmillan

Haftendorn Helga 1999 lsquoGerman Foreign Policy in a Strategic Triangle Bonn- Paris- Washingtonrsquo German Politics and Society 17 (1) 1ndash31

Haftendorn Helga Robert O Keohane and Celeste A Wallander eds 1999 Imperfect Unions Security Institutions over Time and Space Oxford Oxford University Press

Hain Peter 2002 lsquoThe Future of Europe Time for a new visionrsquo Speech by the UK Minister of European Affairs at the European Policy Center Brussels 29 January httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp290102_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2003a lsquoA Union of sovereign member statesrsquo Speech by the UK Minister of European Affairs at Westminster Hall London 20 March httpeuropaeuintcon-stitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp200303_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2003b lsquoThe International Affairs Interview Peter Hain talks to Martha Kearneyrsquo International Affairs 79 (5) 951ndash61

Hain Peter and Ana Palacio 2003 lsquoNote of Transmission of the UK Minister of European Affairs and the Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairsrsquo 28 February httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsotheroth280203_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

Hall Peter A and Rosemary CR Taylor 1996 lsquoPolitical Science and the Three New Institutionalismsrsquo Political Studies 44 936ndash57

Harnisch Sebastian 2001 lsquoChange and Continuity in Post- Unification German Foreign Policyrsquo In New Europe New Germany Old Foreign Policy German Foreign Policy Since Unification ed D Webber London Frank Cass 35ndash60

Hasenclever Andreas Peter Mayer and Volker Rittberger 1997 Theories of International Regimes Cambridge Cambridge University Press

Hayward Katy 2002 lsquoNot a Nice Surprise An Analysis of the Debate Surrounding the 2001 Referendum on the Treaty of Nice in the Republic of Irelandrsquo Irish Studies in International Affairs 13 167ndash86

Heisbourg Francois 2000a lsquoEuropean defence making it workrsquo In Chaillot Papers No 42 ed WEU Institute for Security Studies Paris

mdashmdashmdash 2000b lsquoTrittbrettfahrer Keine europaumlische Verteidigung ohne Deutschlandrsquo Internationale Politik 55 (4) 35ndash42

mdashmdashmdash 2004 lsquoThe French- German Duo and the Search for a New European Security Modelrsquo The International Spectator 39 (3) 61ndash72

Hellmann Gunther Rainer Baumann Monika Boumlsche Benjamin Herborth and Wolfgang Wagner 2005 lsquoDe- Europeanization by Default Germanyrsquos EU Policy in Defense and Asylumrsquo Foreign Policy Analysis 1 (1) 143ndash64

Hildebrandt Gregory G 1999 lsquoThe Military Production Functionrsquo Defence and Peace Economics 10 (3) 247ndash72


248 References

Hill Christopher 2003 The Changing Politics of Foreign Policy HoundmillsBasingstoke Palgrave Macmillan

Hirschman Albert O 1970 Exit Voice and Loyalty Responses to Decline in Firms Organizations and States CambridgeMA Harvard University Press

Hix Simon 2005 The Political System of the European Union 2nd edition HoundmillsBasingstoke Palgrave Macmillan

Hobbes Thomas 2008 Leviathan Oxford Oxford University PressHofmann Stephanie and Ronja Kempin 2007 lsquoFrance and the transatlan-

tic Relationship Love me love me not rsquo SWP- Working Paper FG2 ed Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik Berlin

Hooghe Liesbet 2005 lsquoSeveral Roads Lead to International Norms but Few Via International Socialization A Study of the European Commissionrsquo International Organization 59 (4) 861ndash98

Hoon Geoffrey 2003 lsquoBritainrsquos Armed Forces for Tomorrowrsquos Defencersquo RUSI Journal 184 (4) 33ndash9

mdashmdashmdash 2004 lsquoTransatlantic Relationsrsquo Speech by the British Minister of Defence at the 40th Munich Security Conference Munich 7 February httpwwwsecuri-tyconferencedekonferenzenredephpmenu_2004=ampsprache=deampid=128amp (last access 30 July 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 2005 lsquoEU Battlegroupsrsquo Letter from the British Minister of Defence to the Chairman of the Select Committee on European Union Fourth Report London 19 February httpwwwpublicationsparliamentukpald200506ldselectldeucom1616100htm (last access 20 August 2008)

House of Commons 1998 lsquoSixth Special Report on the Strategic Defence Reviewrsquo Select Committee on Defence London httpwwwparliamentthe- stationery- officecoukpacm199798cmselectcmdfence1198119804htma10 (last access 7 March 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 19989a lsquoThird Special Report (Annex A The Future of NATO)rsquo Select Committee on Defence London httpwwwparliamentthe- stationery- officecoukpacm199899cmselectcmdfence45 (last access 8 March 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 19989b lsquoEuropean Security and Defence ndash Eighth Reportrsquo Select Committee on Defencersquo London httpwwwparliamentthe- stationery- officecoukpacm199900cmselectcmdfence26 (last access 8 March 2009)

mdashmdashmdash 1999 lsquoKosovo NATO and Military Actionrsquo Research Paper No 9934 London HMSO

mdashmdashmdash 2000 lsquoSixth Reportrsquo Select Committee on Foreign Affairs London httpwwwpublicationsparliamentukpacm199900cmselectcmfaff38438405htm (last access 8 March 2009)

House of Lords 1995 lsquoSelect Committee Report on the Intergovernmental Conferencersquo London ed European Commission IGC 96 Task Force Brussels httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homemsspeechstate- ukuklordshtml (last access 6 July 2007)

mdashmdashmdash 2002 lsquoSelect Committee on the European Union Eleventh Reportrsquo London httpwwwparliamentthe- stationery- officecoukpald200102ldselectldeucom717103htm (last access 29 August 2009)

Howorth Jolyon 1997 lsquoFrancersquo In The European Union and National Defense Policy ed J Howorth and A Menon London Routledge 23ndash48

mdashmdashmdash 2000 lsquoEuropean integration and defence the ultimate challengersquo In Chaillot Papers No 43 ed WEU Institute for Security Studies Paris

mdashmdashmdash 2000c lsquoBritain NATO and CESDP Fixed Strategy Changing Tacticsrsquo European Foreign Affairs Review 5 (3) 377ndash96


References 249

mdashmdashmdash 2004 lsquoDiscourse Ideas and Epistemic Communities in European Security and Defence Policyrsquo West European Politics 27 (2) 211ndash34

mdashmdashmdash 2007 Security and Defence Policy in the European Union HoundmillsBasingstoke Palgrave Macmillan

mdashmdashmdash and Anand Menon 2009 lsquoStill Not Pushing Back Why the European Union Is Not Balancing the United Statesrsquo Journal of Conflict Resolution 53 (5) 727ndash744

Hoyer Werner 1996 lsquoInterview mit dem Staatsminister im Auswaumlrtigen Amtrsquo Der Spiegel 30 September httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homemsspeechstate- dehoyer1htm (last access 7 June 2008)

Hoyer Werner and Michel Barnier 1995 lsquoExistiert Europa Ein deutsch- franzoumlsisches Plaumldoyer fuumlr eine gemeinsame Auszligen- und Sicherheitspolitikrsquo Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 7 December

Hunter Robert E 1998 lsquoESDI and the Future of Transatlantic Relationsrsquo In CFSP Working Paper No 7 ed Jean Monnet Center Brussels

mdashmdashmdash 2002 The European Security and Defense Policy NATOrsquos Companion ndash or Competitor Santa MonicaCA RAND Corporation

Hurrelmann Achim Stephan Leibfried Kerstin Martens and Peter Mayer eds 2007 Transforming the Golden- Age Nation State HoundsmillsBasingstoke Palgrave

Hyde- Price Adrian 2001 lsquoGermany and the Kosovo War Still a Civilian Powerrsquo German Politics 10 (1) 19ndash34

mdashmdashmdash 2007 European Security in the Twenty- First Century The Challenge of Multipolarity LondonNew York Routledge

IISS 1995 The Military Balance 1995ndash1996 ed International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) Oxford Oxford University Press

mdashmdashmdash 2001 lsquoThe European Rapid Reaction Forcersquo In The Military Balance 2001ndash2002 ed International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) Oxford Oxford University Press 283ndash91

mdashmdashmdash 2002 The Military Balance 2002ndash2003 ed International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) Oxford Oxford University Press


Irish Department of Defence 2000 lsquoWhite Paper on Defencersquo Dublin http137191465defencewhitepaperhtm (last access 2 April 2009)

Irish Department of Foreign Affairs 1999 lsquoIreland and the Partnership for Peace An Explanatory Guidersquo Dublin httpwwwforeignaffairsirlgoviepolicypfppfpeg01asp (last access 26 October 2008)

Irish Government 1996 lsquoChallenges and Opportunities Abroad Irish White Paper on Foreign Policyrsquo Dublin 26 March ed European Commission IGC 96 Task Force Brussels httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homems- docstate- irirlahtml (last access 27 June 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2003 lsquoIreland and the European Union ndash Identifying Priorities and Pursuing Goals 2nd Editionrsquo Dublin httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturum documentsotheroth010403_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2005 lsquoWhite Paper ndash The European Constitutionrsquo Dublin httpwwweuro-peanconstitutioniepdfs1013- whitepaper- final- enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

Irondelle Bastien 2003 lsquoEuropeanization without the European Union French Military Reforms 1991ndash96rsquo Journal of European Public Policy 10 (2) 208ndash26

Jachtenfuchs Markus 2002 Die Konstruktion Europas Verfassungsideen und institu-tionelle Entwicklung Baden- Baden Nomos


250 References

Jachtenfuchs Markus 2005 lsquoThe Monopoly of Legitimate Force Denationalization or Business As Usualrsquo In Transformations of the State ed S Leibfried and Michael Zuumlrn Cambridge Cambridge University Press 37ndash52

Jackson Patrick Thaddeus 2006 Civilizing the Enemy German Reconstruction and the Invention of the West Ann Arbor University of Michigan Press

Jervis Robert 1997 System Effects Complexity in Political and Social Life Princeton Princeton University Press

mdashmdashmdash 2005 American Foreign Policy in a New Era New York RoutledgeJohnston Alastair Iain 1995 lsquoThinking about Strategic Culturersquo International Security

19 (4) 32ndash64mdashmdashmdash 2001 lsquoTreating International Institutions as Social Environmentsrsquo International

Studies Quarterly 45 (4) 487ndash515Jones Elisabeth 2004 lsquoThe Administrationrsquos Priorities in Europersquo Testimony of the

US Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs Washington DC 3 March httpwwwstategovpeurrlsrm30090htm (last access 2 March 2009)

Jones Seth G 2003 lsquoThe European Union and the Security Dilemmarsquo Security Studies 12 (3) 114ndash56

mdashmdashmdash 2006 lsquoThe Rise of a European Defensersquo Political Science Quarterly 121 (2) 241ndash67

mdashmdashmdash 2007 The Rise of European Security Cooperation New York Cambridge University Press

Jopp Mathias 1999 European Defence Policy The Institutional Aspects ed Institut fuumlr europaumlische Politik Berlin

Jospin Lionel 1999 lsquoLa politique de deacutefense de la Francersquo Deacutefense Nationale 53 (11) 5ndash17

mdashmdashmdash 2001 lsquoOn the future of an enlarged Europersquo Speech by the Prime Minister Paris 28 May httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp280501_enhtm (last access 31 May 2008)

Juppeacute Alain 1996 Deacutebat agrave lrsquoassembleacutee nationale sur la CIG Discours du Premier Ministre Paris 13 March httpwwwdocdiplomatiegouvfrBASISepicwwwdocDDWM=1ampK=973422598ampW=AUTEUR+PH+IS+27JuppE927+AND+DATE+3D+271303199627+ORDER+BY+DATEDescend (last access 5 December 2007)

Katzenstein Peter J ed 1996 The Culture of National Security Norms and Identity in World Politics New York Columbia University Press

Keck Margaret E and Kathryn Sikkink 1998 Activists beyond Borders Advocacy Networks in International Politics IthacaLondon Cornell University Press

Kempin Ronja 2004 lsquoFrankreich und die EU- Battlegroupsrsquo In SWP- Diskussionspapier ed Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik Berlin

Keohane Daniel 2001 lsquoRealigning Neutrality Irish Defence Policy and the EUrsquo In Occasional Paper No 24 ed WEU Institute for Security Studies Paris

Keohane Robert O 1984 After Hegemony Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy Princeton Princeton University Press

Kernic Franz Jean Callaghan and Philippe Manigart 2002 Public Opinion on European Security and Defense A Survey of European Trends and Public Attitudes Towards CFSP and ESDP Frankfurt aM et al Peter Lang

Kinkel Klaus 1994 lsquoDeutsche Auszligenpolitik in einer neuen Weltlagersquo Rede vor der Deutschen Gesellschaft fuumlr Auswaumlrtige Politik Bonn 29 August In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 76


References 251

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mdashmdashmdash 1996a lsquoRede des Bundesministers an der Universitaumlt Oxfordrsquo Oxford 17 January In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 7

mdashmdashmdash 1996b lsquoRede vor der Deutsch- Amerikanischen Handelskammerrsquo Stuttgart 27 February In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 17

mdashmdashmdash 1996c lsquoInterview mit dem Bundesminister des Auswaumlrtigenrsquo In Suumlddeutsche Zeitung 7 March

mdashmdashmdash 1996d lsquoGermanyrsquos objectives for the Intergovernmental Conference Document by the Minister of Foreign Affairsrsquo In European Parliament Intergovernmental Task Force (1996) White Paper on the 1996 Intergovernmental Conference Volume II Germany Bonn 26 March httpwwweuroparleuropaeuigc1996pos- de_enhtm (last access 19 May 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 1996e lsquoEinfuumlhrungsstatement des Bundesminister des Auswaumlrtigen (WEU- Fruumlhjahrstagung)rsquo Birmingham 7 May In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 48

mdashmdashmdash 1998 lsquoReden zur Auszligenpolitik der Berliner Republikrsquo Rede des Bundesauszligenminister vor der Deutschen Gesellschaft fuumlr Auswaumlrtige Politik eV (DGAP) Berlin 1 July In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 51

Kinkel Klaus and Herveacute de Charette 1996 lsquoGemeinsamer deutsch- franzoumlsischer Diskussionsbeitrag fuumlr die Regierungskonferenzrsquo Paris 17 October In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 84

Kissinger Henry 2001 Does American Need a Foreign Policy Toward a Diplomacy for the 21st Century New York Simon and Schuster

Knowles Vanda and Silke Thomson- Pottebohm 2004 lsquoThe UK Germany and ESDP Developments at the Convention and the IGCrsquo German Politics 13 (4) 581ndash604

Koenig- Archibugi Mathias 2004 lsquoExplaining Governance Preferences for Institutional Change in EU Foreign and Security Policyrsquo International Organization 58 (1) 137ndash74

Kohl Helmut 1994 lsquoEuroparsquos Standort in einer veraumlnderten Weltrsquo Rede auf der 31 Muumlnchener Sicherheitskonferenz Munich 4 February In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 12

mdashmdashmdash 1996a lsquoSicherheit fuumlr ein kommendes Europarsquo Rede auf der 33 Muumlnchener Sicherheitskonferenz Munich 3 February In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 15

mdashmdashmdash 1996b lsquoErklaumlrung des Bundeskanzlers zu der von Staatspraumlsident Chirac angekuumlndigten Reform der franzoumlsischen Streitkraumlftersquo GASP- Mitteilungen 23 February In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 17

mdashmdashmdash 1996c lsquoPressekonferenz mit dem Bundeskanzler zum Abschluss der Sondertagung des Europaumlischen Rates und zur Eroumlffnung der Regierungskonferenz zur Revision des Maastricht- Vertragesrsquo Turin 29 March In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 35

mdashmdashmdash 1998 lsquoRede des Bundeskanzlersrsquo Muumlnchener Sicherheitskonferenz Munich 7 February In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 15

Kohl Helmut and Jacques Chirac 1996 lsquoGemeinsame Botschaft von Bundeskanzler Dr Helmut Kohl und dem Praumlsidenten der franzoumlsischen Republik Jacques Chirac an den amtierenden Vorsitzenden des Europaeischen Rates und Ministerpraumlsidenten von Irland John Brutonrsquo Bonn and Paris 9 December In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 102


252 References

Koremnos Barbara Charles Lipson and Duncan Snidal 2001 lsquoThe Rational Design of International Institutionsrsquo International Organization 55 (4) 761ndash99

Kratochwil Friedrich and John G Ruggie 1986 lsquoInternational Organization A State of the Art on an Art of the Statersquo International Organization 40 (4) 753ndash75

Krotz Ulrich 2002 lsquoStructure as Process The Regularized Intergovernmentalism of German- Franco Bilateralismrsquo Program for the Study of Germany and Europe Working Paper No 023 ed Center for European Studies Harvard httpwwwcesfasharvardedupublicationsdocspdfsKrotz3pdf (last access 21 October 2009)

Kuhn Thomas S 1996 The Structure of Scientific Revolutions 3rd edition ChicagoLondon The University of Chicago Press

Kydd Andrew 1997 lsquoSheep in Sheeprsquos Clothing Why Security Seekers Do Not Fight Each Otherrsquo Security Studies 7 (1) 114ndash54

Labour Party 1995 The future of the European Union ndash Report on Labourrsquos position in preparation for the Intergovernmental Conference ed European Commission IGC 96 Task Force Brussels httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homems- docstate- uklabourhtml (last access 6 July 2007)

mdashmdashmdash 1996 Road to the manifesto a fresh start for Britain ndash Labourrsquos strategy for Britain in the modern world London

Lakatos Imre 1970 lsquoFalsification and the Methodology of Scientific Research Programmesrsquo In Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge ed I Lakatos and I Musgrave Cambridge Cambridge University Press 91ndash196

Lake David A 1999 Entangling Relations American Foreign Policy in Its Century Princeton Princeton University Press

mdashmdashmdash 2001 lsquoBeyond Anarchy The Importance of Security Institutionsrsquo International Security 26 (1) 129ndash160

Lamers Karl 1995 lsquoSpeech at the Royal Institute for International Affairsrsquo London 19 October httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homemsspeechstate- de191095html (last access 6 July 2006)

Lanxade Jacques 2001 Quand le monde a basculeacute Paris NiLLegro Jeffrey W 1996 lsquoCulture and Preferences in the International Cooperation

Two- Steprsquo American Political Science Review 90 (1) 118ndash38Leibfried Stephan and Michael Zuumlrn eds 2005 Transformations of the State

Cambridge Cambridge University PressLepgold Joseph 1998 lsquoNATOrsquos Post- Cold War Collective Action Problemrsquo

International Security 23 (1) 78ndash106Lieber Keir A and Gerard Alexander 2005 lsquoWaiting for Balancing Why the World

Is Not Pushing Backrsquo International Security 30 (1) 109ndash39Lindberg Leon N and Stuart A Scheingold 1970 Europersquos Would- Be Polity Patterns of

Change in the European Community Englewood Cliffs Prentice- HallLindstrom Gustav 2003 lsquoThe Galileo Satellite System and its security implicationsrsquo

In Occasional Papers No 44 ed EU Institute for Security Studies Parismdashmdashmdash 2007 lsquoEnter the EU Battlegroupsrsquo In Chaillot Paper No 97 ed EU Institute for

Security Studies ParisLonghurst Kerry 2003 lsquoWhy Arenrsquot the Germans Debating the Draft Path

Dependency and the Persistence of Conscriptionrsquo German Politics 12 (2) 147ndash65Lutz Felix Philipp 2002 lsquoHistorical Consciousness and the Changing of German

Political Culturersquo German Politics 11 (3) 19ndash34MacKinnon Michael G 2000 The Evolution of US Peacekeeping Policy Under Clinton A

Fairweather Friend LondonPortland Frank Cass


References 253

Maumlder Markus 2004 In Pursuit of Conceptual Excellence The Evolution of British Military- Strategic Doctrine in the Post- Cold War Era 1989ndash2002 Bern Peter Lang

Major John 1994 lsquoThe future of the European Unionrsquo Speech by the Prime Minister Leyden 7 September httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homemsspeechstate- ukmajor1html (last access 7 June 2007)

mdashmdashmdash 1996 lsquoOuvrer avec la France agrave bacirctir lrsquoEuropersquo Le Monde 8 NovemberMalici Akan 2005 lsquoDiscord and Collaboration between Allies Managing External

Threats and Internal Cohesion in Franco- British Relations in the 911 Erarsquo Journal of Conflict Resolution 49 (1) 90ndash119

Maull Hanns W 2000 lsquoGerman Foreign Policy Post- Kosovo Still a lsquoCivilian Powerrsquorsquo German Politics 9 (2) 1ndash24

Mayer Sebastian and Silke Weinlich 2007 lsquoInternationalization of Intervention UN and EU Security Politics and the Modern Statersquo In Transforming the Golden- Age Nation State ed A Hurrelmann S Leibfried K Martens and P Mayer HoundsmillsBasingstoke Palgrave 42ndash62

Mayntz Renate 2004 lsquoGovernance Theory als fortentwickelte Steuerungstheoriersquo In MPIfG Working Paper 041 ed Max- Planck- Institut fuumlr Gesellschaftsforschung Koumlln

McInnes Colin 1998 lsquoLabourrsquos Strategic Defence Reviewrsquo International Affairs 74 (4) 823ndash45

Mearsheimer John J 2001 The Tragedy of Great Power Politics New York WW Norton amp Company

Meiers Franz- Josef 2005 lsquoDie lsquoNATO Response Forcersquo und die lsquoEuropean Rapid Reaction Forcersquo Kooperationspartner oder Konkurrentenrsquo In Die Beziehungen zwischen NATO und EU Partnerschaft Konkurrenz Rivalitaet ed J Varwick Opladen Verlag Barbara Budrich 119ndash138

Menon Anand 2000 France NATO and the Limits of Independence 1981ndash97 The Politics of Ambivalence HoundmillsBasingstoke Macmillan

mdashmdashmdash 2003 lsquoBritain and the Convention on the Future of Europersquo International Affairs 79 (5) 963ndash78

Meacuterand Freacutedeacuteric 2008 European Defence Policy Beyond the Nation State Oxford Oxford University Press

mdashmdashmdash 2010 lsquoPierre Bourdieu and the Birth of European Defensersquo Security Studies 19 (2) 342ndash374

Meyer Christoph O 2006 The Quest for a European Strategic Culture Changing Norms on Security and Defence in the European Union HoundmillsBasingstoke Palgrave

Meyer John John Boli George M Thomas and Francisco O Ramirez 1997 lsquoWorld Society and the Nation Statersquo American Journal of Sociology 103 (1) 144ndash81

Milgrom Paul and John Roberts 1990 lsquoBargaining Costs Influence Costs and the Organization of Economic Activityrsquo In Perspectives on Positive Political Economy ed J E Alt and K A Shepsle Cambridge Cambridge University Press 57ndash89

Millon Charles 1996 lsquoFrance and the renewal of the Atlantic Alliancersquo NATO Review 44 (3)13ndash6

Miskimmon Alister 2004 lsquoContinuity in the Face of Upheaval ndash British Strategic Culture and the Impact of the Blair Governmentrsquo European Security 13 (3) 273ndash99

Missiroli Antonio 2000 lsquoCFSP defence and flexibilityrsquo In Chaillot Papers No 38 Paris WEU Institute for Security Studies

Mitchell Gay 1995 lsquoIntroductory Statement on the 1996 IGC by the Minister of State for European Affairs to the Joint Oireachtas Committee on European Affairsrsquo


254 References

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Moravcsik Andrew 1993a lsquoPreferences and Power in the European Community A Liberal Intergovernmentalist Approachrsquo Journal of Common Market Studies 31 (4) 473ndash524

mdashmdashmdash 1993b lsquoArmaments Among Allies European Weapons Collaboration 1975ndash1985rsquo In Double- Edged Diplomacy International Bargaining and Domestic Politics ed P B Evans H K Jacobson and R D Putnam Berkeley University of California Press 128ndash167

mdashmdashmdash 1997 lsquoTaking Preferences Seriously A Liberal Theory of International Politicsrsquo International Organization 51 (4) 513ndash53

mdashmdashmdash 1998 The Choice for Europe Social Purpose and State Power from Messina to Maastricht Ithaca Cornell University Press

Moravcsik Andrew and Kalypso Nicolaidis 1999 lsquoExplaining the Treaty of Amsterdam Interests Influence Institutionsrsquo Journal of Common Market Studies 37 (1) 59ndash85

Morrow James D 1999 lsquoThe Strategic Setting of Choices Signaling Commitment and Negotiation in International Politicsrsquo In Strategic Choice and International Relations ed D A Lake and R Powell Princeton Princeton University Press 77ndash114

Moscovici Pierre 2001a lsquoNo to a two- speed Europersquo Le Figaro 26 Junemdashmdashmdash 2001b lsquoTranscription of a chat with the Minister for European Affairsrsquo Paris 9

October httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsotheroth091001_enpdf (last access 23 October 2008)

Muumlller Harald 1994 lsquoInternationale Beziehungen als kommunikatives Handeln Zur Kritik der utilitaristischen Handlungstheorienrsquo Zeitschrift fuumlr internationale Beziehungen 1 (1) 15ndash44

mdashmdashmdash 2002 lsquoSecurity Cooperationrsquo In Handbook of International Relations ed W Carlsnaes T Risse and B A Simmons London Thousand Oaks and New Delhi Sage 369ndash91

North Douglass C 1990a lsquoA Transaction Cost Theory of Politicsrsquo Journal of Theoretical Politics 2 (4) 355ndash67

mdashmdashmdash 1990b Institutions Institutional Change and Economic Performance New York Cambridge University Press

mdashmdashmdash 1990c lsquoInstitutions and a Transaction- Cost Theory of Exchangersquo In Perspectives on Positive Political Economy ed J E Alt and K A Shepsle Cambridge Cambridge University Press 182ndash194

Pape Robert A 2005 lsquoSoft Balancing against the United Statesrsquo International Security 30 (1) 7ndash45

Paul TV 2005 lsquoSoft Balancing in the Age of US Primacyrsquo International Security 30 (1) 46ndash71

Peters Dirk 2010 Constrained Balancing The EUrsquos Security Policy HoundmillsBasingstoke Palgrave Macmillan

Pfeiffer Susanne 2006 Die deutsch- franzoumlsische Partnerschaft ndash stoumlranfaumlllig aber stra-pazierfaumlhig Eine Analyse im Bereich der Auszligen- Sicherheits- und Europapolitik (1990ndash2000) Frankfurt aM Peter Lang

Pickering Thomas R 1998 lsquoThe Transatlantic Partnership A History of Defending Freedom A Future for Extending Itrsquo Speech of the US Under Secretary for Political Affairs Old Dominion University Symposium NorfolkVirginia 30 October httpwwwmtholyokeeduacadintrelpickhtm (last access 3 March 2009)


References 255

Pierson Paul 2004 Politics in Time History Institutions and Social Analysis Princeton Princeton University Press

Pollack Mark A 2001 lsquoInternational Relations Theory and European Integrationrsquo Journal of Common Market Studies 39 (2) 221ndash44

Pond Elisabeth 2000 lsquoCome Together Europersquos Unexpected New Architecturersquo Foreign Affairs 79 (2) 8ndash12

Portillo Michael 1997 lsquoConservative party defence policyrsquo RUSI Journal 142 (3) 29ndash32Posen Barry R 2004 lsquoESDP and the Structure of World Powerrsquo The International

Spectator 39 (1) 5ndash17mdashmdashmdash 2006 lsquoEuropean Union Security and Defense Policy Response to Unipolarityrsquo

Security Studies 15 (2) 149ndash86Powell Walter W and Paul J DiMaggio 1991 The New Institutionalism in Organizational

Analysis Chicago The University of Chicago PressPye Lucian W 1991 lsquoPolitical Culture Revisitedrsquo Political Psychology 12 (3) 487ndash508Raffarin Jean- Pierre 2004 lsquoLa France pour lrsquoEuropersquo Statement of the Prime

Minister Paris 15 January httpeuropaeuconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp150104_frpdf (last access 12 November 2008)

Rathbun Brian C 2004 Partisan Interventions European Party Politics and Peace Enforcement in the Balkans Ithaca Cornell University Press

mdashmdashmdash 2007 lsquoUncertain about Uncertainty Understanding the Multiple Meanings of a Crucial Concept in International Relations Theoryrsquo International Studies Quarterly 51 (3) 533ndash57

Rees Wyn 2001 lsquoPreserving the Security of Europersquo In Britain and Defence 1945ndash2000 A Policy Re- evaluation ed S Croft A Dorman W Rees and M Uttley Harlow Pearson Education Limited 29ndash48

Rice Condoleezza 2000 lsquoPromoting the National Interestrsquo Foreign Affairs 79 (1) 45ndash62Richard Alain 2000a lsquoUn climat de confiance se develop entre lrsquoOTAN et lrsquoUnion

europeacuteenersquo Le Monde 22 Septembermdashmdashmdash 2000b lsquoOpening Speech of the French minister of defence at the Capabilities

Commitment Conferencersquo In Rutten 2001 164ndash7Rifkind Malcolm 1995a lsquoQuestions agrave M Malcolm Rifkind ministre britannique

des Affaires eacutetrangegraveres lsquosur le Royaume- Uni et lrsquoEuropersquorsquo In Le Soir 910 December httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homemsspeechstate- ukrifkindhtml (last access 5 July 2007)

mdashmdashmdash 1995b lsquoNeed for an Atlantic Community to better reflect US- European rela-tionsrsquo NATO Review 43 (2) 11ndash14

mdashmdashmdash 1996a lsquoEntretien avec Malcolm Rifkind Secretaire au Foreign Office suite a son intervention devant lrsquoinstitut francais des Relations internationals (IFRI)rsquo In Le Monde Paris 6 March httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homemsspeechstate- ukrifkind2htm (last access 5 July 2007)

mdashmdashmdash 1996b lsquoSpeech by the Minister of Foreign Affairs to the House of Commonsrsquo 24 October httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homemsspeechstate- ukrifk2410htm (last access 5 July 2007)

Riker William H 1990 lsquoPolitical Science and Rational Choicersquo In Perspectives on Positive Political Economy ed J E Alt and K A Shepsle Cambridge Cambridge University Press 163ndash181

Robertson George Lord 1998 lsquoSpeech of the Secretary of State for Defencersquo Koumlnigswinter March httpmodukspeechessof54- 98html (last access 24 September 2006)


256 References

Roper John 2000 lsquoKeynote Article Two Cheers for Mr Blair The Political Realities of European Defence Co- operationrsquo Journal of Common Market Studies 38 (Annual Review) 7ndash23

Rose Gideon 1998 lsquoNeoclassical Realism and Theories of Foreign Policyrsquo World Politics 51 (1) 144ndash72

Rudolf Peter 2004 lsquoGerman Foreign Policy and Transatlantic Relationsrsquo In SWP- Discussion Paper ed Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik Berlin

Ruggie John Gerard 1998 Constructing the World Polity Essays on international insti-tutionalization London Routledge

Ruumlhe Volker 1996a lsquoRede des Bundesverteidigungsministers an der lsquoFuumlhrungsakademie der Bundeswehrrsquorsquo Hamburg 26 January In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 12

mdashmdashmdash 1996b lsquoMut zur Verantwortung ndash Deutschland und der Frieden in Europarsquo Rede an der Hauptkirche St Katharinen Hamburg 5 February In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 15

mdashmdashmdash 1996c lsquoRede des Bundesverteidigungsministersrsquo Johns Hopkins School for Advanced International StudiesAmerican Institute for Contemporary German Studies Washington DC 30 April In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 34

mdashmdashmdash 1997 lsquoEuropaumlische Stabilitaumlt und der Beitrag der Bundeswehrrsquo Rede auf der 36 Kommandeurtagung der Bundeswehr Berlin 5 November In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 99

Rumsfeld Donald H 2001a lsquoSpeech by the US Secretary of Defense at the 37th Munich Security Conferencersquo Munich 3 February httpwwwsecurityconferencedekon-ferenzenredephpmenu_2001=ampmenu_konferenzen=ampsprache=enampid=31amp (last access 3 July 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2001b lsquoRemarks at the North Atlantic Council (NAC- D)rsquo Brussels 7 June httpwwwdefenselinkmilspeeches2001s20010607- secdefhtml (last access 3 July 2008)

Rutten Maartje ed 2001 European defence core documents (2001) From St- Malo to Nice Vol I In Chaillot Papers No 47 Paris WEU Institute for Security Studies

Rynning Sten 1999 lsquoFrench Defense Reforms and European Security Tensions and Intersectionsrsquo European Foreign Affairs Review 4 (1) 99ndash119

mdashmdashmdash 2002 Changing Military Doctrine Presidents and Military Power in Fifth Republic France 1958ndash2000 Westport Praeger

mdashmdashmdash 2003 lsquoWhy Not NATO Military Planning in the European Unionrsquo Journal of Strategic Studies 26 (1) 53ndash72

mdashmdashmdash 2005 lsquoA New Military Ethos NATOrsquos Response Forcersquo Journal of Transatlantic Studies 3 (1) 5ndash21

Sauder Axel 1996 lsquoLes changements de la politique de deacutefense franccedilaise et la coopeacuteration franco- allemandersquo Politique eacutetrangegravere 61 (3) 583ndash96

Sawers John 2004 lsquoThe EU Security Strategy Minutes of Evidence of the Director General Political (FCO) taken before the Select Committee of the European Union House of Lordsrsquo London 4 March httpwwwpublicationsparliamentukpaldlduncorreuc0403pdf (last access 20 August 2009)

Schaumlfer Michael 2004 lsquoNATO and ESDP Shaping the European Pillar of a Transformed Alliancersquo Speech by the Political Director of the German Federal Foreign Office Berlin 15 March httpwwwauswaertiges- amtdewwwenaus-gabe_archivarchiv_id=5500 (last access 15 July 2008)

Scharpf Fritz 1997 Games Real Actors Play Actor- centered Institutionalism in Policy Research Boulder Westview


References 257

mdashmdashmdash 2001 lsquoWhat Have We Learned Problem- Solving Capacity of the Multilevel European Polityrsquo In MPIfG Working Paper 014 ed Max- Planck- Institut fuumlr Gesellschaftsforschung Koumlln

Scharping Rudolf 1999a lsquoRede des Bundesverteidigungsministersrsquo Forum der Chefredakteure zur Sicherheitspolitik der Bundesakademie fuumlr Sicherheitspolitik Bad Neuenahr 26 January In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 6

mdashmdashmdash 1999b lsquoDas transatlantische Buumlndnis auf dem Weg in das 21 Jahrhundertrsquo Rede des Bundesverteidigungsministers bei der Deutschen Atlantischen Gesellschaft Bonn- Bad Godesberg 18 April In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 18

mdashmdashmdash 1999c lsquoRede des Bundesverteidigungsministers an der Fuumlhrungsakademie der Bundeswehrrsquo Hamburg 8 September In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 56

mdashmdashmdash 2000 lsquoErklaumlrung zur Zukunft der Bundeswehrrsquo Berlin 24 May In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 30

mdashmdashmdash 2002 lsquoGlobal Security ndash New Challenges New Strategiesrsquo Rede auf der 38 Muumlnchener Sicherheitskonferenz Munich 3 February httpwwwsecurityconferencedekonferenzenredephp menu_2002=ampmenu_konferenzen=ampsprache=enampid=88amp (last access 23 June 2009)

Schmalz Uwe 2005 lsquoDie Entwicklung der Europaumlischen Sicherheits- und Verteidigungspolitik 1990ndash2004rsquo In Die Beziehungen zwischen NATO und EU Partnerschaft Konkurrenz Rivalitaumlt ed J Varwick Opladen Verlag Barbara Budrich 45ndash59

Schmitt Burkard ed 2003 European armaments cooperation Core documents In Chaillot Papers No 59 Paris EU Institute for Security Studies

mdashmdashmdash 2004 lsquoEuropean capabilities how many divisionsrsquo In EU Security and Defence Policy The first five years (1999ndash2004) ed N Gnesotto Paris EU Institute for Security Studies 89ndash110

Schroumlder Gerhard 1998 lsquoErklaumlrung der Bundesregierungrsquo Vorschau auf den Europaumlischen Rat in Wien am 1112 Dezember und Ausblick auf die deutsche Praumlsidentschaft in der ersten Jahreshaumllfte 1999 German Bundestag Berlin 10 December In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 80

mdashmdashmdash 1999a lsquoRede des Bundeskanzlers bei der 37 Kommandeurstagung der Bundeswehrrsquo Hamburg 29 November In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 83

mdashmdashmdash 1999b lsquoRede des Bundeskanzlers vor der franzoumlsischen Nationalversammlungrsquo Assembleacutee Nationale Paris 30 November In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 83

mdashmdashmdash 2001a lsquoClosely involving citizens and parliamentsrsquo Statement by the Federal Chancellor Berlin 14 June httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentscontribcontjuin2001_enhtm (last access 21 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2001b lsquoRegierungserklaumlrung des Bundeskanzlers zum informellen Treffen des Europaumlischen Rates am 19 Oktober 2001 in Gentrsquo German Bundestag Berlin 18 October In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 73

mdashmdashmdash 2002 lsquoRede des Bundeskanzlers vor dem Frankreich- Zentrum der Albert- Ludwigs- Universitaumlt Freiburgrsquo Freiburg 12 April In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 27

Schroumlder Gerhard 2003a lsquoRede des Bundeskanzlers bei der gemeinsamen Sitzung des Deutschen Bundestages und der Assembleacutee Nationale zum 40 Jahrestag der Unterzeichnung des Elyseacutee- Vertragesrsquo Versailles 22 January In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 7

mdashmdashmdash 2003b lsquoRegierungserklaumlrung des Bundeskanzlers zur internationalen Lage und zu den Ergebnissen des Europaumlischen Rates in Bruumlssel am 2021 Maumlrz 2003rsquo German Bundestag Berlin 3 April In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 30


258 References

Schroumlder Gerhard 2004 lsquoRede des Bundeskanzlers beim lsquoWorld Leader Cyclersquo an der Erasmus- Universitaumltrsquo Rotterdam 15 April In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 34

mdashmdashmdash 2005 lsquoSpeech at the 41st Munich Conference on Security Policyrsquo Munich 12 Februaryhttpwwwsecurityconferencedekonferenzenredephp menu_2005=ampmenu_konferenzen=ampsprache=enampid=143amp (last access 7 June 2009)

Schroumlder Gerhard and Jacques Chirac 2003 lsquoDeutsch- franzoumlsischer Beitrag zur institutionellen Architektur der Europaumlischen Unionrsquo BerlinParis 15 January httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentscontribcont140103_depdf (last access 21 September 2008)

Schymanietz Klaus 1992 lsquoTiger Development Statusrsquo Vertiflite 38 (2) 37ndash44Serfaty Simon 2005 lsquoTerms of Estrangement French- American Relations in

Perspectiversquo Survival 47 (3) 73ndash92Simmons Beth A and Lisa L Martin 2002 lsquoInternational Organizations and

Institutionsrsquo In Handbook of International Relations ed W Carlsnaes T Risse and B A Simmons London Thousand Oaks and New Delhi Sage 192ndash211

Sloan Stanley R 2000 lsquoThe United States and European defencersquo In Chaillot Paper No 39 ed WEU Institute for Security Studies Paris

Smith Julie 2005 lsquoA Missed Opportunity New Labourrsquos European policy 1997ndash2005rsquo International Affairs 81 (4) 703ndash21

Smith Michael E 2004 Europersquos Foreign and Security Policy The Institutionalisation of Cooperation Cambridge Cambridge University Press

SPD Bundestag Group 2000 lsquoDie Zukunft der GASP ndash Sozialdemokratische Perspektiven fuumlr die Gemeinsame Auszligen- und Sicherheitspolitik der Europaumlischen Unionrsquo Discussion Paper of the SPD- Faction by Gernot Erler Berlin httpwwwgernot- erlerdeoldotot45html (last access 13 January 2008)

Spring Dick 1995 lsquoSpeech by the Minister of Foreign Affairs before the lsquoCentre for European Policy Studiesrsquorsquo Brussels 4 December httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homemsspeechstate- irspring2html (last access 19 May 2008)

Spruyt Hendrik 1994 The Sovereign State and Its Competitors Princeton Princeton University Press

Straw Jack 2001 lsquoSpeech by the Minister of Foreign Affairs at the Royal Institute of International AffairsChatham Housersquo London 27 July httpeuropaeuintcon-stitutionfuturumdocumentsotheroth270701_enhtm (last access 21 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2002a lsquoA new mission for Europersquo Speech by the Minister of Foreign Affairs Berlin 27 May httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsothersp270502_enhtm (last access 21 December 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2002b lsquoCollective Security in an enlarged Europersquo Speech by the Minister of Foreign Affairs at the Inter- Continental Hotel Budapest 9 July httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp090702_enhtm (last access 21 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2003a lsquoEurope in the Worldrsquo Speech by the Minister of Foreign Affairs at the Center for European Policy Studies Brussels 19 May httpeuropaeuintcon-stitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp190503_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2003b lsquoA constitutional treaty for the EU ndash the UKrsquos approachrsquo Statement by the Minister of Foreign Affairs to the House of Commons London 9 September httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp090903_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)


References 259

mdashmdashmdash 2003c lsquoBritainrsquos priorities in Europersquo Speech by Minister of Foreign Affairs before the EU Council debate at the House of Commons London 10 December httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp101203_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2004a lsquoNegotiations on the EU Constitutional Treaty at the House of Commons Debate on Referendumrsquo London 30 March httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfutu-rumdocumentsspeechsp300304_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2004b lsquoWhat is changing the new European Unionrsquo Speech by the Minister of Foreign Affairs at the Conference of Ambassadors to the Czech Republic Prague 31 August httpeuropaeuintconstitutionfuturumdocumentsspeechsp310804_enpdf (last access 21 September 2008)

Struck Hans- Peter 2003a lsquoRede des Bundesverteidigungsministers zur aktuel-len internationalen Lagersquo German Bundestag Berlin 13 February In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 14

mdashmdashmdash 2003b lsquoRede des Bundesverteidigungsministers zum Beitritt sieben europaumlischer Demokratien zur NATOrsquo German Bundestag Berlin 9 May In Bulletin der Bundesregierung No 35

mdashmdashmdash 2003c lsquoPerspektiven der Europaumlischen Sicherheits- und Verteidigungspolitikrsquo Rede auf dem 2 Europaumlischen Verteidigungskongress Berlin 9 December httpwwwnatointgermanyreden2003s031209ahtml (last access 11 March 2009)

Talbott Strobe 1999 lsquoAmericarsquos Stake in a Strong Europersquo Remarks at a Conference on the Future of NATO by the US Deputy Secretary The Royal Institute of International Affairs London 7 October httpwwwuseubeISSUESesdi1007html (last access 1 December 2006)

Tiersky Ronald 1997 lsquoFrench Gamemanship and NATOrsquos Future The Context of lsquoAFSOUTHrsquorsquo French Politics amp Society 15 (2) 49ndash56

Tilly Charles 1992 Coercion Capital and European States AD 990 ndash 1992 MaldenOxford Blackwell

Tonra Ben 2001 The Europeanisation of national foreign policy Dutch Danish and Irish foreign policy in the European Union Aldershot Ashgate

mdashmdashmdash 2003 lsquoConstructing the Common Foreign and Security Policy The Utility of a Cognitive Approachrsquo Journal of Common Market Studies 41 (4) 731ndash56

Townsend Richard 1996 lsquoContribution of the Political Director of the Department of Foreign Affairsrsquo Conference on the Priorities of the Irish Presidency Session on Security Policy Dublin 2425 May httpeuropaeuintenagendaigc- homemsspeechstate- irtownsendhtm (last access 6 July 2007)

Treacher Adrian 2003 French interventionism Europersquos last global player Aldershot Ashgate

US Department of Defense 1995 lsquoUnited States Security Strategy for Europe and NATOrsquo Washington DC httpwwwdefenselinkmilpubseurope (last access 3 March 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2000 lsquoStrengthening Transatlantic Security A US Strategy for the 21st Centuryrsquo Washington DC httpwwwdefenselinkmilpubseurostrategy2000pdf (last access 8 March 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2002a lsquoNuclear Posture Review Report (Submitted to Congress)rsquo Washington DC httpwwwglobalsecurityorgwmdlibrarypolicydodnprhtm (last access 30 March 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2002b lsquoResponsibility Sharing Report (Report on Allied Contributions to the Common Defense)rsquo Washington DC httpwwwdefenselinkmilpubsallied_contrib200202- Chptr102- Chptr_1txhtml (last access 16 January 2008)


260 References

US Department of Defense 2003 lsquoNews Transcript Background Briefing on Informal NATO Ministerial (presented by Senior Administration Official)rsquo httpwwwdefenselinkmiltranscripts2003tr20031008- 0748html (last access 3 July 2008)

Ulriksen Stale Catriona Gourlay and Catriona Mace 2004 lsquoOperation Artemis The Shape of Things to Comersquo International Peacekeeping 11 (3) 508ndash25

Utley RE 2001 lsquoFrance willing the means to the endrsquo In Uncertain Europe Building a new European security order ed M A Smith and G Timmins London Routledge 136ndash152

Vasquez John A 1997 lsquoThe Realist Paradigm and Degenerative versus Progressive Research Programs An Appraisal of Neotraditional Research on Waltzrsquos Balancing Propositionrsquo American Political Science Review 91 (4) 899ndash912

Veacutedrine Hubert 1997 Audition du Ministre des Affaires Etrangegraveres devant la Commission des Affaires Etrangegraveres de lrsquoAssembleacutee Nationale Paris 26 June httpwwwassemblee- nationalefreuropec- rendusc0134asp (last access 12 December 2007)

mdashmdashmdash 1999 lsquoLe monde au tournament du sieacuteclersquo Politique Eacutetrangegravere 64 (4) 813ndash22Vennesson Pascal 2003 lsquoCivil- Military Relations in France Is There a Gaprsquo Journal

of Strategic Studies 26 (2) 29ndash42Voigt Karsten 1996 lsquoGerman Interest in Multilateralismrsquo Auszligenpolitik 47 (2)

107ndash16Wagner Wolfgang 2005 lsquoFrom Vanguard to Laggard Germany in European Security

and Defence Policyrsquo German Politics 14 (4) 455ndash69mdashmdashmdash 2006 lsquoMissing in Action Germanyrsquos Bumpy Road from Institution- Building

to Substance in European Security and Defence Policyrsquo In Germanyrsquos EU Policy in Asylum and Defence De- Europeanization- by- default ed G Hellmann HoundmillsBasingstoke Palgrave 91ndash155

Wallace Helen James A Caporaso Friz W Scharpf and Andrew Moravcsik 1999 lsquoReview section symposium The Choice for Europe Social Purpose and State Power from Messina to Maastrichtrsquo Journal of European Public Policy 6 (1) 155ndash79

Wallander Celeste A 2000 lsquoInstitutional Assets and Adaptability NATO After the Cold Warrsquo International Organization 54 (4) 705ndash35

Wallander Celeste A Helga Haftendorn and Robert O Keohane 1999 lsquoIntroductionrsquo In Imperfect Unions Security Institutions over Time and Space ed H Haftendorn R O Keohane and C A Wallander Oxford Oxford University Press 1ndash18

Wallander Celeste A and Robert O Keohane 1999 lsquoRisk Threat and Security Institutionsrsquo In Imperfect Unions Security Institutions over Time and Space ed H Haftendorn R O Keohane and C A Wallander Oxford Oxford University Press 21ndash47

Waltz Kenneth N 1979 Theory of International Politics Reading Addison Wesleymdashmdashmdash 2003 lsquoThoughts about Assaying Theoriesrsquo In Progress in International Relations

Appraising the Field ed C Elman and MF Elman CambridgeMA MIT Press viindashxii

Wayne Anthony 2003 lsquoThe US- European Union Relationshiprsquo Remarks of the US Assistant Secretary for Economic and Business Affairs to the European Institute Washington DC 9 September httpwwwstategoveebrlsrm200324023htm (last access 3 March 2008)

Webb Simon 2004 lsquoThe EU Security Strategyrsquo Minutes of Evidence of the Policy Director (MoD) taken before the Select Committee of the European Union House of Lords London 4 March httpwwwpublicationsparliamentukpaldldun-correuc0403pdf (last access 20 August 2009)


References 261

Webber Mark Stuart Croft Howorth Jolyon Terry Terriff and Elke Krahmann 2004 lsquoThe Governance of European Securityrsquo Review of International Studies 30 (1) 3ndash26

Weber Katja 1997 lsquoHierarchy Amidst Anarchy A Transaction Costs Approach to International Security Cooperationrsquo International Studies Quarterly 41 (2) 321ndash40

mdashmdashmdash 2000 Hierarchy Amidst Anarchy Transaction Costs and Institutional Choice Albany State University of New York Press

Weber Max 1978 Economy and Society An Outline of Interpretive Sociology BerkeleyCA University of California Press

Weiss Moritz 2005 lsquoPreference Formation in the Absence of Structural Mechanisms The Case of European Security Policyrsquo CFSP- Forum 3 (4) 5ndash8

mdashmdashmdash 2009 lsquoPower and Signals Explaining the German Approach to European Securityrsquo Journal of International Relations and Development 12 (3) 317ndash348

mdashmdashmdash 2010 lsquoDesigning Security Institutions How Transaction Costs Trigger Institutional Preferencesrsquo Paper presented to the Annual Convention of the International Studies Association (ISA) New Orleans 17ndash20 February 2010

Wendt Alexander 1987 lsquoThe Agent- Structure Problem in International Relations Theoryrsquo International Organization 41 (3) 335ndash70

mdashmdashmdash 1999 Social Theory of International Politics Cambridge Cambridge University Press

White House 1991 lsquoNational Security Strategy of the United Statesrsquo Washington DC httpwwwfasorgmandocs918015- nsshtm (last access 1 June 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 1996 lsquoA National Security Strategy of Engagement and Enlargementrsquo Washington DC httpwwwfasorgsppmilitarydocopsnational1996strahtm (last access 1 June 2008)

mdashmdashmdash 2002 lsquoThe National Security Strategy of the United States of Americarsquo Washington DC httpwwwwhitehousegovnscnsspdf (last access 4 April 2008)

Whitman Richard G 1999 lsquoAmsterdamrsquos Unfinished Business The Blair govern-mentrsquos initiative and the future of the Western European Unionrsquo In Occasional Paper No 7 WEU Institute of Security Studies Paris

Williamson Oliver E 1985 The Economic Institutions of Capitalism New York Free Press

mdashmdashmdash 1996 The Mechanisms of Governance Oxford Oxford University PressWolfers Arnold 1962 Discord and Collaboration Essays on International Politics

Baltimore The Johns Hopkins University PressWolforth William C 1999 lsquoThe Stability of a Unipolar Worldrsquo International Security

24 (1) 5ndash41Woumlrner Manfred 1992 lsquoA Vigorous Alliance A Motor for Peaceful Change in Europersquo

NATO Review 40 (6) Web- EditionZakaria Fareed 1998 From Wealth to Power The Unusual Origins of Americarsquos World

Role Princeton Princeton University PressZangl Bernhard and Michael Zuumlrn 2003 Frieden und Krieg Sicherheit in der nationalen

und postnationalen Konstellation Frankfurt aM SuhrkampZoellick Robert B 2000 lsquoA Republican Foreign Policyrsquo Foreign Affairs 79 (1)

63ndash78Zuumlrn Michael 1997 lsquoAssessing State Preferences and Explaining Institutional Choice

The Case of Intra- German Tradersquo International Studies Quarterly 41 (2) 295ndash320ens Steffek Claudia Kissling and Patrizia Nanz (editors)


Jens Steffek Claudia Kissling and Patrizia Nanz (editors)CIVIL SOCIETY PARTICIPATION IN EUROPEAN AND GLOBAL GOVERNANCEA Cure for the Democratic Deficit

Klaus DingwerthTHE NEW TRANSNATIONALISMTransnational Governance and Democratic Legitimacy

Kerstin Martens Alessandra Rusconi and Kathrin Leuze (editors)NEW ARENAS OF EDUCATION GOVERNANCEThe Impact of International Organizations and Markets on Educational Policy Making

Achim Hurrelmann Steffen Schneider and Jens Steffek (editors)LEGITIMACY IN AN AGE OF GLOBAL POLITICS

Joan DeBardeleben and Achim Hurrelmann (editors)DEMOCRATIC DILEMMAS OF MULTILEVEL GOVERNANCELegitimacy Representation and Accountability in the European Union


Series Standing Order ISBN 978ndash1ndash4039ndash8544ndash6 (hardback)Series Standing Order ISBN 978ndash1ndash4039ndash8545ndash3 (paperback)

You can receive future titles in this series as they are published by placing a standing order Please contact your bookseller or in case of difficulty write to us at the address below with your name and address the title of the series and the ISBNs quoted above

Customer Services Department Macmillan Distribution Ltd Houndmills Basingstoke Hampshire RG21 6XS England

Series page continued


263

Index

A-400M transport aircraft 64 66 101 163

Afghanistan 71 89 92 106 109 143Africa 56 66 77 85 89 101 158 205

217 (note 22) 231 (note 21)Albright Madeleine 72 91 108Alliance see North Atlantic Treaty

Organization (NATO)anarchy anarchical arrangement 15

20 26ndash7 32 174 191ndash2 203ARTEMIS 66 148 160 165 231 (note

21) 233 (note 24)asset specificity definition and

conceptualisation 9 36 40 49ndash50 190 205 214 (note 6) 215 (note 11) 228 (note 30)

assetsgeneral or redeployable 40ndash1 127ndash30

141 148 165ndash6 194 202ndash3 205 208 229 (note 41)

political-military 47ndash8 229 (note 41)specific or non-redeployable 14 40ndash1

42 50 121 125 127ndash30 131 148 164ndash6 186ndash7 194 200 229 (note 41)

autonomy 9ndash10 11 16 20 21 37 49see also European autonomy

BAe Systems 179Balkans 54 69ndash70 87 91 93 103 104

107 110 113 121 141ndash2 159 176 189 198 234 (note 2)

See also Bosnia KosovoBennett Andrew 15ndash16 27 43 53 173

176 182bindingness 3 13 21 30 36 42 45ndash6

50 114 116 119 127ndash8 133 143 146 149 151 157 164 185ndash6 194 202

Blair Tony 13 63 79ndash84 87ndash92 94 96 121ndash2 135ndash9 142ndash4 153 160 175 178 198 201 221 (note 10) 228 (note 25)

Bolton John 73 222 (note 28)

Bosnia 5 54 55 69ndash70 88 89 93 103ndash4 108 110 162 184 197 229 (note 34)

See also Balkansbounded rationality 31 33 37 192Bourdieu Pierre 209Britain see United Kingdomburden-sharing 69ndash74 88 90 93 107

127 149 208Bush George W 69 71 73 89 92 103

105ndash6 219 (note 45)Bush Sr George 72 219 (note 44)

capabilities commitment conference 116 141 154 164

catalogue system 49 64 116causal mechanism 20 25 178causal path(way) 11 15ndash16 28 41ndash2

55 75 77 87 109 112 133 150 168 175 180 186 194 201 213 (note 5)

Charette de Herveacute 97ndash8 108 153Chirac Jacques 5 56ndash7 98ndash101 105ndash8

121ndash2 152ndash6 161 162 164ndash5 211 (note 1)

Clinton Bill 69ndash70 72 89ndash91 218 (note 29) 223 (note 36)

Coase Ronald 7Cohen William 72ndash3 91 141constructive abstention 45 115 137ndash8

152 226 (note 3)Constructivism 6 20 24ndash6 179ndash81

187 191 203 213 (note 9) 235 (note 6)

cultural approaches 24 180ndash1 186 213 (note 10) 235 (note 6)

preference formation 24ndash6 179ndash81 187 191 203

Convention on the Future of Europe 16 18 48 53ndash4 60 63 64ndash7 71 73 77 80 84ndash6 92 94 96 97 100ndash1 117ndash20 122ndash3 137ndash40 144 147 154ndash7 159ndash60 175 177 180ndash3 195ndash6 201 227 (note 13)

9780230_280120_16_indindd 2639780230_280120_16_indindd 263 162011 62517 PM162011 62517 PM

264 Index

convergence criteria 116 136 141 154 156 159 207 211 (note 6) 229 (note 35) 236 (note 4)

coordination game (with distributive consequences) 206

credible commitments 8 9 10 12 14 32 36 38ndash9 48 50 76 94 121 127 150 158ndash9 164 166 168 192ndash4 197 202 204 228 (note 19)

Dassault Aviation 179delegation 7 15 45 128 153 165 167

207ndash8demand (for institutions) 12 17ndash18

47ndash8 53ndash9 67 78 87 95 102 109 111ndash12 181ndash4 190 195 208

see also functionalism

Eckstein Harry 18 173 180 182efficiency gains 35 40ndash1 48 62 66

84 124 129 132 148ndash9 167 192 214 (note 5) 226 (note 6)

Enforcement 40enhanced cooperation see flexibility

flexible arrangementsEurocorps 64 98ndash9 112 121ndash2 158ndash9

216 (note 6)European autonomy 71ndash4 90 107ndash9

127 142ndash4 150ndash1 176 190 201 204ndash5 211 (note 1) 212 (note 8)

European Defence Agency 48 66 73 84ndash5 114 117 119ndash20 126 138ndash40 156ndash7

European Rapid Reaction Force (ERRF) 48 64ndash5 92 126ndash7 146

see also catalogue system capabilities commitment conference

European Security Strategy 56 65 183European Union

Communitarisationsupranationalisation 115 116 118 135ndash6 138 154 227 (note 11)

Council of the EU 48 63 81 98ndash9 114ndash20 123 127ndash8 132ndash3 136ndash40 144 147 153ndash7 200ndash1 226 (notes 2 6 10) 230 (note 9)

Council Secretariat 48 125 128 133 153 226 (note 2)

EU Battlegroups 10 34 48 50 64 66 85ndash6 100ndash1 122 129 132ndash3

142 145ndash6 148ndash9 160 165 205 207 231 (notes 15 21)

EU Commission 45 100 115ndash16 117 118ndash19 120 124ndash5 128 131ndash2 133 136 137 138 139 140 144 147 150 152 153 154 156 157 165 185 226ndash7 (notes 2 6 10 11) 230 (note 9)

EU Headquarters EU Military Staff Civil-Military Cell 45 48 64 65 73 74 85 91ndash2 100 109 118 119 121 123 125 139 155 156 207ndash8 220 (notes 47 49) 227 (notes 14 15) 230 (notes 10 12) see also Hampton Court

European Court of Justice 118 119 120 136 139 140 156 157

European Parliament 116 118 119 120 136 137 139 140 153 154 156 157

General Affairs Council 117 226 (note 6)

High Representative for the CFSP or Mr CFSP 118 120 128 133 136 138 153 156

Political and Security Committee 48 125 144ndash5

exit 38ndash40 49 68 75ndash6 78 87 94ndash5 104 110 198 235 (note 2)

Fischer Joschka 61 63 65 70ndash4 116ndash19 123 219 (note 45)

flexibility flexible arrangements 9 14 46 62 65 97 114ndash18 120 138 140 152ndash7 159ndash60 162 164 167ndash8 185 200 201ndash2 229 (note 1) 230 (note 12)

France 5 13ndash14 56ndash8 62 73 82 97ndash113 121ndash2 126 142ndash3 151 152ndash69 176ndash7 189 195 197 198ndash9 201ndash2 211 (note 6) 215 (note 2) 224 (notes 4 6 14) 225 (notes 33 34) 226 (note 35) 232 (note 8) 233 (notes 15 16 26) 234 (notes 27 30) 235 (note 3)

defence expenditure 163perceptions 56ndash8 103 183 195ndash6rapprochement with NATO 5 57 88

91 104 108 113 159ndash60 162 189see also governance costs French

government costs


Index 265

Franco-German Security and Defence Council 121 158

Frieden Jeffry 8 26 29 83functionalism 4 11 15ndash17 40 41 47

58 76 185 191ndash2 194ndash5 208 215 (note 12) 228 (note 19)

functionalist fallacy 43 53

Galileo System 64 66Genschel Philipp 15 31 209George Alexander 15ndash16 27 43 53

173 176 182Germany 4 13ndash14 21ndash3 60ndash78 82

99 114ndash34 140ndash3 150ndash1 158ndash61 166 174ndash7 179ndash81 189ndash91 196ndash7 200 206 211 (note 6) 213 (note 7) 216 (notes 4 5) 218 (notes 27 29 30) 220 (note 49) 225 (note 34) 226 (notes 2 3 4 6 10) 227 (notes 11ndash15 18) 228 (notes 19ndash21 28ndash29) 229 (notes 34ndash37)

Bundeswehr 54 61 63ndash4 126 229 (note 35)

culture of reticence (culture of restraint) 23 180 187

defence expenditure 126perceptions 53ndash5 58 70ndash1 183

195ndash6see also governance costs German

governance costsGourevitch Peter 31 47 127ndash9 132

217 (note 20)governance costs 3 9ndash10 12 13ndash14 31

36ndash7 39 41 42 187 193ndash4 200 202 209 211 (note 5)

British governance costs 144 145 147 149 151 201

French government costs 158 162 164 167 168 202

German governance costs 120 124 127 130ndash3 207

see also Transaction costsgovernance structures 9 32 36 39 40

47 193 211 (note 5) 222 (note 22) 228ndash9 (note 31)

hybrid governance structures 32 33 37 192

Gulf War 5 55 57 112ndash13 141 162 216 (note 4)

Hain Peter 90 139 141 147

Hampton Court 208 230 (note 11)

see also EU Headquarters EU Military Staff Civil-Military Cell

Headline Goal 2010 85 145 101 129 145 149 162 200

see also EU Battlegroupshegemon 12 21 68 71 74 76ndash7 87

91 93 94 96 102 103 106 108 175 176 197ndash8 204 206

Helsinki Headline Goal 64 65 85 101 129 133 147 162 165 200 231 (note 21)

hierarchy hierarchical arrangement 9ndash10 14 15 32 36ndash8 40 162 169 192ndash3 202ndash4

Hirschman Albert 33 38 40 75 214 (note 8) 235 (note 2)

Historical-institutionalism 3 17 27 29 53 131 191 194 203 208 215 (note 1)

Hobbes Thomas 7Hoon Geoff 85 89 145ndash7 149 231

(note 21)Hunter Robert 69 72 81 216 (notes 7

5) 223 (note 37)hypothesis 42 176 178 179 215 (note

12) 234 (note 2)

indeterminacy 25 47 125ndash6 130ndash1 132 133ndash4 181 186ndash7

institution institutional arrangement 4 11 13ndash14 22 29 31 38ndash9 42ndash3 47 50 71 74 76 91 95 140 152 176 185 191ndash2 199 202 204 226 (note 35)

feedback effect 128 131 147ndash8 200institutional path 68 120 123 124

127ndash8 130 131 143ndash4 147ndash9 161 165 200 226 (note 35)

institutional rules 207International Relations or IR (as a

discipline) 4 6 17ndash18 19ndash20 26 27 43 53 106 120 181 189 191 211 (note 3)

internationalisation of securitydefenceuse of force 3ndash4 6ndash7 11 15 30 58ndash9 69 203 206ndash10 236 (note 6)

Iraq 71 73 89 90 91 92 106 109 122 123 142 160 227 (note 15)


266 Index

Ireland Republic of 18 173 182ndash8 203 211 (notes 2 7) 212 (note 9) 235 (note 6)

isolationism 12 68ndash71 76ndash8 87ndash90 93ndash6 102ndash3 105ndash7 110 112 189 197ndash8 204

Italy 116 136 154 230 (note 9)

Jervis Robert 20 34 70ndash1 205 213 (note 12)

joint production economies 34ndash5

Keohane Robert 11 16 32ndash4 40ndash1 53 203ndash4

Kissinger Henry 5Kohl Helmut 60ndash1 64 121ndash2 131Kosovo 54ndash5 57 69ndash70 76 88 89 94

103ndash4 180 184see also Balkans

Kydd Andrew 20 48ndash9

Lakatos Imre 19 21 23 25 173 179 191 203 212 (notes 1 2)

Lake David 3 9ndash10 33ndash9 48 193 211 (note 5) 214 (note 4)

lead nation concept 64 139 208see also EU Headquarters EU Military

Staff Civil-Military CellLiberal Intergovernmentalism 19 22ndash4

176ndash9 191 214 (note 1)Preference formation 22ndash4 176ndash9 191

Major John 121 135market failure 32ndash3 190 199 214 (note

3) 222 (note 22)Mayntz Renate 43 204Meacuterand Freacutedeacuteric 206ndash7 209military planning 3 4 7 12 15 18 30

44ndash6 50 67ndash8 75 79 86ndash7 94ndash5 101ndash3 110ndash13 182 195ndash9 206ndash7

Millon Charles 98 104Moravcsik Andrew 4 6 8 16ndash17 22ndash3

45 46 176ndash7 182 204 211 (note 3) 214 (note 1)

neutrality (neutral) 9 63 97 154 155 173 182 184ndash7 203 211 (notes 2 7) 212 (note 9)

North Douglass 7ndash8 31ndash2 36ndash7 41 186

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) 5 7 11ndash14 38ndash9 42 49 180ndash1 183ndash4 189ndash90 195 196ndash9 205 211 (note 1) 216 (note 5) 218 (note 37) 219 (notes 44 45) 228 (note 28) 230 (note 10) 235 (note 3)

Article V 54 55 56 61 80 99 199 220 (note 47) 224 (note 6)

Berlin Plus Agreement 58 61 72ndash3 81 82 90 94 97 99 119 122 139 146 208 216 (notes 7 5) 220 (note 47)

European caucus 72 76Prague Summit (2002) 65 73ndash4 165primacy of 61ndash2 72 80ndash1 90 98

142 146 176 190 201 204ndash5 212 (note 8) 224 (note 6)

Response Force (NRF) 65 74 101 109 129 146ndash7 149 165 226 (note 35) 234 (note 27) 235 (note 3)

SHAPE (Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe) 71 73 107 118ndash19 139 156 208 220 (note 47)

operations (military) 31 44 48 56 61 62 64 65 69 79ndash84 90ndash2 96 99 100 104 112 118ndash19 123 129 139 141 143 155 162 174 183 185 199 208 216 (note 4) 220 (note 48) 230 (note 12) 231 (note 20)

opinion polls 17 123 149 163 180

parsimony 177ndash8 181 187 203party politics 177ndash9Perle Richard 73Petersberg Tasks 48 61ndash3 65 79ndash82

84 97 100ndash1 108 174 182ndash3Pierson Paul 16 27ndash8 43 123 128

215 (note 12)pioneer groups 155

see also flexibility flexible arrangements two-speed Europe

plausibility probe 18 173 182 185ndash7 203 211 (notes 2 7) 212 (note 9)

pooling (of resources) 9 15 34ndash5 45 118 156 192 207

Poumlrtschach (Austria) 81 153 177 228 (note 25)

Potsdam 54 64 122 158


Index 267

preferencesdefinition 8 26 29 83for institutional depthdesignform

30 40ndash3 45ndash7 120 140 157 185ndash6 193ndash4 199ndash202 215 (note 13)

for substantive scope 8 13 30 38ndash40 42 44 47 67 86 101 174 180 182ndash4 192 194 196 198 199 204 214 (note 9) 215 (note 13) 226 (note 35) 235 (note 1)

timing 4 5 26 175ndash6 190 195typology 8 29ndash31 192

prisonerrsquos dilemma 206process-tracing 12 16 18 71 72 75

86 95 109 111 113 121 123ndash4 128ndash30 140 146 160 186 197 199 201

see also causal path(way) Structured focused comparison

qualified majority voting (QMV) 115ndash19 155 226 (note 3)

Rational-functionalism see functionalism

Realism 6 19 20ndash2 71 174ndash6 181 191 204 213 (note 5) 234 (note 1)

bandwagoning 21ndash2 158ndash9 204ndash5 212 (note 8)

preference formation 20ndash2 174ndash6soft balancing 21ndash2 71 174ndash6

204ndash5 212 (note 8) 214 (note 3)referendum 182 185ndash6(relational) contracting 8ndash9 31ndash2 36ndash7

41ndash2 47 130 214 (note 2) 215 (note 11) 228 (note 31)

Rice Condoleezza 69 105risks and threats 4 9 20 22 33 35 47

49 53ndash9 106 183 192 206 208 235 (note 6)

risks of opportunism 9 12ndash14 31 36ndash9 41ndash2 48ndash9 75 78 93 95 110 112 132 150 168 193ndash4 197ndash204

abandonment 9 14 36 122ndash3 127 132 142ndash3 158 160ndash1 166 167 169 202

entrapment 9 36ndash7 123 141ndash3 161 186 201 207

exploitation 9 14 36 122ndash3 141ndash3 158 159 161 166ndash7 176 201 202 207 211 (note 6) 236 (note 4)

see also Credible commitments Transaction costs

Robertson Lord George 81 83 137 226 (note 4)

Ruumlhe Volker 61ndash2 70ndash1 127Rumsfeld Donald 69 73 89 92 220

(note 47)

Scharpf Fritz 27 32 181Scharping Rudolf 63 64 70 116 218

(notes 28 35) 229 (note 35)Schroumlder Gerhard 63 64security

conceptualisation and definition 8 9 34ndash5 192 197 205ndash6

cooperation 6 11 21 27 31 35ndash41 43 92 120 131 174 176 191 193 204 206 234 (note 1)

institution 3 7ndash11 17 35ndash6 40ndash3 48 53 173 176 183ndash4 191 195 198

September 11 2001 (terrorist attacks of) 54 56 57 71 87 89 92 109 143 180

signalling 12 48ndash9 68 74ndash5 78 87 93 95 102 107 110 111 112 197

Smith Iain Duncan 89 92Smith Michael E 24 213 (note 8)solidarity clause 64ndash5 84 100 138

174 183Sophisticated falsificationism see

Lakatos ImreSoviet Union 55 206St Malo 12 16 39 63 66 72 79 80

81 95 98 100 108 116 121 122 136 141ndash3 149 150 153 158 160 175 177ndash8 197 205 220 (note 1) 223 (notes 36 37) 229 (note 3)

statedefence function 4 15 58 207ndash10monopoly on the legitimate use of

force 3ndash4 6ndash7 11 15 30ndash1 203 206ndash9 211 (note 4)

sovereignty 15 37 45 74 116 155 163 209

transformation of 3ndash6 15 17ndash18 190 206ndash10 211 (note 4)

Struck Hans-Peter 61 71


268 Index

Structured focused comparison 11 16 17 18 78 134 169 173 180 186 187 195 196 202 203

see also causal path(way) process-tracing

structured cooperation see flexibility flexible arrangements

superpower see hegemon

territorial defence 44ndash5 54 55 56 58 60ndash5 80 82 85 99 100 107 110 154 158 199 216 (notes 4 6) 224 (note 6)

terrorism terrorist attack 54 56ndash7 65 71 84 89ndash90 92 100 106ndash7 109 143 180 183 219 (note 45)

Thatcher Margaret 141 234 (note 2)theory development 11 15 27 35ndash41

173 189 203ndash6threats and risks 4 9 20 22 33 35 47

49 53ndash9 106 183 192 206 208 235 (note 6)

Tilly Charles 7transaction costs

anticipation of 4 10 13 36 38 40ndash1 75ndash6 122 144 149 194 202 208 210 228 (notes 19 30)

cheating 41 194conceptualisation and definition

7ndash11 27 31ndash5 36ndash41 42 47ndash50 204ndash7 214 (notes 3 7) 224 (note 14) 228ndash9 (note 31)

framework 9ndash10 12 14 15ndash18 26ndash7 29ndash43 47 50 53 75 77 83 102 120 124 131ndash3 151 168 173ndash88 190ndash203 204 208 211 (note 7) 214 (notes 5 6) 215 (note 10) 222 (note 22) 227 (note 18) 229 (note 32) 235 (note 6)

information 8 13ndash15 31 36 42 48ndash9 62 67 76 91 94ndash5 112 123 125 145 151 156 161 167 184 189 193 199 207 208 209 212 (note 12) 215 (note 10)

tradeoff 37 42 120ndash1 127 130 133 148ndash50 193ndash4 197 200ndash2 234 (note 1)

transactions 4 7ndash10 29 32 36ndash8 40ndash2 113 129 133 142 192ndash4 199 202 214 (note 6)

Treaty ofAmsterdam 61ndash3 80ndash1 97ndash8 114ndash16

135ndash6 152ndash3 160 185 195Maastricht 16 97 182Nice 72 80 84 108 117

155 182Turkey 72ndash3two-speed Europe136 155

see also flexibility flexible arrangements

unanimity 45 63 114ndash19 135ndash8 152 154 155 183 186

uncertainty 4 8ndash10 12ndash15 23 29 31 36ndash7 39 40ndash3 48ndash50 75 93 110 124 143 161 183 186 190 193ndash4 197 200ndash4 214 (note 6) 215 (note 1)

unipolarity 20 22 106 174ndash5 225 (note 22)

United Kingdom 5 12ndash15 50 55ndash6 79ndash96 108ndash10 116 117 122ndash3 130 135ndash51 158ndash60 164ndash5 169 174 175ndash9 197 205 208 220 (note 1) 221 (notes 10 14) 222 (notes 22 28) 223 (notes 36ndash38) 229 (note 3) 230 (notes 9ndash12) 231 (notes 18ndash21) 232

Conservative party 55 79 88 92ndash3 122 135 159 177 221 (note 14) 231 (note 18)

defence expenditure 145Labour party 55 79ndash81 88 122ndash3

135ndash6 145 175 177 229 (note 1)perceptions 55ndash6 58 87 89 183

195ndash6special relationship (with the United

States) 5 13 82 88ndash92 96 102 143ndash4 150 166 198

Strategic Defence Review 55ndash6 82 145

see also governance costs British governance costs

United Nations 37 45 162 182Security Council 105

United States of America 10 12ndash13 20ndash1 37 38ndash40 68ndash75 87ndash94 102ndash10 190ndash202 204ndash5

Congress 12 69 88 94 105ndash6 189 220 (note 51) 223 (note 37)


Index 269

United States of America ndash continued unilateralism 12 68 70ndash1 76ndash8 87

89ndash90 103 105 106ndash7 197ndash8 218 (note 29)

US isolationism see Isolationism

variable geometry see flexibility flexible arrangements

Veacutedrine Hubert 105 106Villepin de Dominique 100 155ndash6

160 234 (note 30)voice 38ndash40 49 68 75 87 88 94 95

104ndash7 110 111 198 214 (note 8) 220 (note 51) 235 (note 2)

Wallander Celeste 35 40 47 58 129

Waltz Kenneth 15 19 20 21 33 36ndash7 174 213 (note 11)

Weber Katja 33 45 214 (note 6)Weber Max 6 211 (note 4)Weizsaumlcker Commission 63Western European Union (WEU) 61

63 79 80ndash2 97 99 118 125 136 153 182

Williamson Oliver 3 7 8 9 31ndash2 36ndash9 40ndash3 47 76 129ndash30 131 148 193 203ndash4 211 (note 5) 214 (notes 2 6 7) 215 (note 11) 228ndash9 (note 31)

Wolfowitz Paul 73

Zangl Bernhard 15 209Zuumlrn Michael 23 26 43 227 (note 13)



Cover

Title

Copyright

Contents

Tables

Figures

Acronyms


Acknowledgements


1 Introduction

Two puzzles in ESDP




The research design


2 Theorising Preference Formation for Institution - Building in European Security









The causal pathways













Explaining British preferences on substance lsquoItrsquos Time to Repay America the Soldierrsquo





















Notes

References

Index

This illustration is taken from the original etching in Thomas Hobbesrsquo Leviathan of 1651 Palgrave Macmillan and the editors are grateful to Lucila Muntildeoz-Sanchez and Monika Sniegs for their help in redesigning the original to illustrate what ldquotransfor-mations of the staterdquo might mean The inscription at the top of the original frontis-piece reads ldquonon est potestas Super Terram quae Comparetur eirdquo (Job 4133) ldquothere is no power on earth which can be compared to himrdquo In the Bible this refers to the sea-monster Leviathan (Original Leviathan image reprinted courtesy of the British Library)

9780230_280120_01_prexivindd ii9780230_280120_01_prexivindd ii 1192011 65913 PM1192011 65913 PM


















10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 120 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11



v

Contents

List of Tables viii

List of Figures ix

List of Acronyms x




1 Introduction 3









vi Contents


















Contents vii






Notes 211

References 237

Index 263


viii

Tables








ix

Figures





x

Acronyms


Washington DC (USA)


xi












xii

Acknowledgements










October 2010



Part I




3

1Introduction







Two puzzles in ESDP




Introduction 5













Introduction 7













Introduction 9














Transactioncosts







Introduction 11












Introduction 13











Introduction 15



The research design










Introduction 17












19
























































SecurityPreferences



ANARCHY-Power






29











































frameworkrsquo






























































The causal pathways




























































































Part II




53






















































60
























































defence planning


defence planning


defence planning

Amsterdam(19956)

+ + ndash + +


++ + + + ndash

Convention(20034)

++ ++ + ++ + ndash






























































































79


























































defence planning


defence planning


defence planning





































































































97



































defence planning


defence planning


defence planning


+ + + + + + + +


+ + + + + + + + + +


+ + + + ++ + + + +














































































































114













































institutions




















































Reduced uncertainty

































Rede-ployability


Rede-ployability






Increasingly yes


Slightly increased


Yes
























Moderate to high















135










































institutions












































Constantly moderate







































Rede-ployability


Rede-ployability








Yes






















Basically zero












152






































institutions



















































Moderate increase


Constantly moderate


Constantly moderate


































Rede-ployability


Rede-ployability








Yes




Yes

















Basically zero













Part III




173































































































189















































Germany I

Germany IIFrance II

France I

UK II

UK I









































































211

Notes

1 Introduction









212 Notes











Notes 213












214 Notes












Notes 215











216 Notes
















Notes 217


















218 Notes



















Notes 219












220 Notes


















Notes 221



















222 Notes


















Notes 223
















224 Notes

















Notes 225























226 Notes














Notes 227












228 Notes















Notes 229


















230 Notes












Notes 231













232 Notes

















Notes 233

















234 Notes














Notes 235















236 Notes





237

References





















238 References




















References 239





















240 References



















References 241


















242 References





















References 243


















244 References



















References 245




















246 References


















References 247





















248 References





















References 249























250 References























References 251



















252 References
























References 253























254 References





















References 255






















256 References





















References 257



















258 References



















References 259



















260 References




















References 261



































263

Index









141 148 165ndash6 194 202ndash3 205 208 229 (note 41)





107 110 113 121 141ndash2 159 176 189 198 234 (note 2)



50 114 116 119 127ndash8 133 143 146 149 151 157 164 185ndash6 194 202





127 149 208Bush George W 69 71 73 89 92 103




55 75 77 87 109 112 133 150 168 175 180 186 194 201 213 (note 5)






187 191 203 213 (note 9) 235 (note 6)





264 Index









84 124 129 132 148ndash9 167 192 214 (note 5) 226 (note 6)



























government costs


Index 265














36ndash7 39 41 42 187 193ndash4 200 202 209 211 (note 5)








Hain Peter 90 139 141 147



Headline Goal 2010 85 145 101 129 145 149 162 200


91 93 94 96 102 103 106 108 175 176 197ndash8 204 206








12) 234 (note 2)








Iraq 71 73 89 90 91 92 106 109 122 123 142 160 227 (note 15)


266 Index



Italy 116 136 154 230 (note 9)
















45 46 176ndash7 182 204 211 (note 3) 214 (note 1)







142 146 176 190 201 204ndash5 212 (note 8) 224 (note 6)




opinion polls 17 123 149 163 180








Potsdam 54 64 122 158


Index 267






86 95 109 111 113 121 123ndash4 128ndash30 140 146 160 186 197 199 201










49 53ndash9 106 183 192 206 208 235 (note 6)








(note 47)














sovereignty 15 37 45 74 116 155 163 209




268 Index









49 53ndash9 106 183 192 206 208 235 (note 6)




























Index 269






160 234 (note 30)voice 38ndash40 49 68 75 87 88 94 95





63 79 80ndash2 97 99 118 125 136 153 182


Wolfowitz Paul 73




Cover

Title

Copyright

Contents

Tables

Figures

Acronyms


Acknowledgements


1 Introduction

Two puzzles in ESDP




The research design











The causal pathways


































Notes

References

Index


















10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 120 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11



v

Contents

List of Tables viii

List of Figures ix

List of Acronyms x




1 Introduction 3









vi Contents


















Contents vii






Notes 211

References 237

Index 263


viii

Tables








ix

Figures





x

Acronyms


Washington DC (USA)


xi












xii

Acknowledgements










October 2010



Part I




3

1Introduction







Two puzzles in ESDP




Introduction 5













Introduction 7













Introduction 9














Transactioncosts







Introduction 11












Introduction 13











Introduction 15



The research design










Introduction 17












19
























































SecurityPreferences



ANARCHY-Power






29











































frameworkrsquo






























































The causal pathways




























































































Part II




53






















































60
























































defence planning


defence planning


defence planning

Amsterdam(19956)

+ + ndash + +


++ + + + ndash

Convention(20034)

++ ++ + ++ + ndash






























































































79


























































defence planning


defence planning


defence planning





































































































97



































defence planning


defence planning


defence planning


+ + + + + + + +


+ + + + + + + + + +


+ + + + ++ + + + +














































































































114













































institutions




















































Reduced uncertainty

































Rede-ployability


Rede-ployability






Increasingly yes


Slightly increased


Yes
























Moderate to high















135










































institutions












































Constantly moderate







































Rede-ployability


Rede-ployability








Yes






















Basically zero












152






































institutions



















































Moderate increase


Constantly moderate


Constantly moderate


































Rede-ployability


Rede-ployability








Yes




Yes

















Basically zero













Part III




173































































































189















































Germany I

Germany IIFrance II

France I

UK II

UK I









































































211

Notes

1 Introduction









212 Notes











Notes 213












214 Notes












Notes 215











216 Notes
















Notes 217


















218 Notes



















Notes 219












220 Notes


















Notes 221



















222 Notes


















Notes 223
















224 Notes

















Notes 225























226 Notes














Notes 227












228 Notes















Notes 229


















230 Notes












Notes 231













232 Notes

















Notes 233

















234 Notes














Notes 235















236 Notes





237

References





















238 References




















References 239





















240 References



















References 241


















242 References





















References 243


















244 References



















References 245




















246 References


















References 247





















248 References





















References 249























250 References























References 251



















252 References
























References 253























254 References





















References 255






















256 References





















References 257



















258 References



















References 259



















260 References




















References 261



































263

Index









141 148 165ndash6 194 202ndash3 205 208 229 (note 41)





107 110 113 121 141ndash2 159 176 189 198 234 (note 2)



50 114 116 119 127ndash8 133 143 146 149 151 157 164 185ndash6 194 202





127 149 208Bush George W 69 71 73 89 92 103




55 75 77 87 109 112 133 150 168 175 180 186 194 201 213 (note 5)






187 191 203 213 (note 9) 235 (note 6)





264 Index









84 124 129 132 148ndash9 167 192 214 (note 5) 226 (note 6)



























government costs


Index 265














36ndash7 39 41 42 187 193ndash4 200 202 209 211 (note 5)








Hain Peter 90 139 141 147



Headline Goal 2010 85 145 101 129 145 149 162 200


91 93 94 96 102 103 106 108 175 176 197ndash8 204 206








12) 234 (note 2)








Iraq 71 73 89 90 91 92 106 109 122 123 142 160 227 (note 15)


266 Index



Italy 116 136 154 230 (note 9)
















45 46 176ndash7 182 204 211 (note 3) 214 (note 1)







142 146 176 190 201 204ndash5 212 (note 8) 224 (note 6)




opinion polls 17 123 149 163 180








Potsdam 54 64 122 158


Index 267






86 95 109 111 113 121 123ndash4 128ndash30 140 146 160 186 197 199 201










49 53ndash9 106 183 192 206 208 235 (note 6)








(note 47)














sovereignty 15 37 45 74 116 155 163 209




268 Index









49 53ndash9 106 183 192 206 208 235 (note 6)




























Index 269






160 234 (note 30)voice 38ndash40 49 68 75 87 88 94 95





63 79 80ndash2 97 99 118 125 136 153 182


Wolfowitz Paul 73




Cover

Title

Copyright

Contents

Tables

Figures

Acronyms


Acknowledgements


1 Introduction

Two puzzles in ESDP




The research design











The causal pathways


































Notes

References

Index

transaction costs and security institutions: unravelling the esdp (transformations of the state)

Documents