Abstract
As the previous chapter has demonstrated, if the world of diplomacy has changed, the issue of whether the foreign ministry per se is in decline, or is enmeshed in more subtle processes of change and adaptation remains to be determined. But the evidence provided in this book suggests that despite many predicaments and forms of adaptation common to foreign ministries around the world, there are aspects of uniqueness in the European experience. The EU institutional and decision-making structures clearly influence national administrative arrangements. So, the challenge presented to the contributors was to review how two specific EU-related tasks performed by European foreign ministries could lead us to telling conclusions about their current condition. The first is the coordination of European and international aspects of domestic policy, and the second the provision of national input to EU external relations. The term ‘external relations’ covers three areas: traditional ‘first pillar’ areas of trade, development, EU enlargement and technical assistance; ‘second pillar’ policies — the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP); and finally the international aspects of the EU’s justice and home affairs cooperation in the so-called ‘third pillar’.1
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Notes
The Maastricht Treaty introduced the three-pillar system in 1993. The first, European Community, pillar is based on ‘the community method’, where the Commission has the sole right of legislative initiative and where the Council of Ministers decides, largely, by qualified majority in a process of co-decision with the European Parliament. The second pillar covers the intergovernmental Common Foreign and Security policy, in which the European Commission is fully associated, but where decisions of principle are taken unanimously, though the possibility of qualified majority voting exists, in theory, for operational matters. The third, justice and home affairs pillar is also intergovernmental, but many of the subject areas are set to be folded into the European Community pillar in the coming years. See J. W. de Zwaan and M. Vrouenraets, ‘The Future of the Third Pillar: an evaluation of the Treaty of Amsterdam’ in T. Heukels, N. Blokker and M. Brus (eds) The European Union after Amsterdam (Kluwer, 1998).
See D. Spence ‘The Coordination of National Policy-Making’ in M. Westlake The Council of Ministers (Cartermill, 1998) and 2nd edition (Harper) forthcoming.
W. Wallace, Britain’s Bilateral Links Within Western Europe (London: Royal Institute of International Affairs/Routledge, 1984).
D. Rometsch and W. Wessels (eds) The European Union and Member States; towards institutional fusion? (Manchester University Press, 1996) p. XIII.
S. Peers, ‘Justice and Home Affairs: decision-making after Amsterdam’, European Law Review, 25 (2) 2000, April pp. 190–1.
Council of the European Union, ‘European priorities and Policy Objectives for External Relations in the Field of Justice and Home Affairs’, doc 7653/00 JAI 35, Brussels, 6 June 2000.
F. Pastore ‘Reconciling the Prince’s Two “Arms”: Internal-external security policy coordination in the European Union’, Institute for Security Studies, Western European Union September 2001.
See L. Barber, ‘The Men Who Run Europe’, Financial Times 11 /12 March 1995.
See, in particular, C. Lequesne, Paris-Bruxelles: Comment se fait la Politique européenne de la France (Paris: Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques, 1993).
See L. Metcalfe, ‘Comparing Policy Coordination Systems: Do the Differences Matter?’ unpublished paper to the Fifth Erenstein Colloquium 30–31 October 1987
L. Metcalfe and E. Zapico Goni, Action or Reaction? The role of national administration in European policy-making (London: Sage, 1991). A recent official adumbration of the same line can be found in Report from the Secretary-General/ High representative, op. cit.
H. Grabbe and W. Munchau ‘Europe’s New partnership: the relationship between Britain and Germany could reshape the EU’s Future’ in Financial Times 13 February 2002.
For a good overview of the origins of CFSP and the problematic issues, see F. Cameron, European Foreign and Security Policy — Past, Present and Future (Sheffield Academic Press, 1999).
The term ‘actorness’ is usually attributed to G. Sjöstedt, as outlined in his The External Role of the European Community (Farnborough: Saxon House, 1977).
For a development of his ideas see ‘Actors and Actorness: locating the European Union’ in C. Bretherton and J. Vogler, The European Union as a Global Actor (Routledge, 1999) pp. 15–45.
On the political attitudes of member states, C. Hill (ed.) The Actors in Europe’s Foreign Policy (Routledge, 1996).
S. Nuttall, European Political Cooperation (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992).
See M. E. Smith ‘Rules, Transgovernmentalism, and the Expansion of European Political Cooperation’ in W. Sandholtz and A. S. Sweet (eds) European Integration and Supranational Governance (OUP, 1998) p. 304.
S. Hoffman, ‘Towards a Common European Foreign and Security Policy?’, Journal of Common Market Studies, 38 (2), 2000, pp. 189–98.
For a discussion of the shortcomings of the CFSP see A. Spence and D. Spence ‘The Common Foreign and Security Policy from Maastricht to Amsterdam’ in K. Eliasen (ed.) Foreign and Security Policy in the European Union (Sage, 1998).
See G. Andréani, C. Bertram and C. Grant, Europe’s Military Revolution (London: Centre for European Reform, 2001).
David Allen, ‘Who Speaks for Europe?: The Search for an Effective and Coherent External Policy’ in J. Peterson and H. Sjursen (eds) A Common Foreign Policy for Europe? Competing Visions of the CFSP (Routledge, 1998) pp. 41–58.
C. Patten, Speech to the Institute for European Studies, Dublin, Brian Lenihan Memorial Lecture, 7 March 2001.
Recommendation contained in a list of general CFSP/ESDP recommendations in G. Andréani, C. Bertram and C. Grant, Europe’s Military Revolution (London: Centre for European Reform, 2001).
P. de Schoutheete, interviewed in European Voice, 4–10 December 1997.
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Spence, D. (2005). The Evolving Role of Foreign Ministries in the Conduct of European Union Affairs. In: Hocking, B., Spence, D. (eds) Foreign Ministries in the European Union. Studies in Diplomacy and International Relations. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-230-28783-9_2
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