Conclusion

Abstract

This study has shown how European security cooperation developed into a regime in its own right during the postwar era. Throughout this time, European security cooperation was mainly driven by two external dynamics: the superpower squeeze and the Soviet threat. Chapters 2 to 5 show that the internal dynamics behind security cooperation during the Cold War have been repeatedly weak in each period. These chapters also show that European security cooperation has by and large been an unconscious or informal process of integration, which has not been pursued as an end in itself. In contrast, the chapter on the 1990s shows an erosion of the external dynamics which shaped much of European security cooperation during the Cold War, with the emergence of internal dynamics as the main driving force behind European security cooperation in the 1990s. Also in contrast to Chapters 2 to 5, Chapter 6 shows that European security cooperation is evolving into a conscious or formal process of integration with the institutional dimension gaining prominence.