Between 'soft power' and a hard place: European Union Foreign and Security Policy between the Islamic world and the United States

This paper explores the pressures operating on European Union Foreign and Security Policy in the ‘triangle of forces’ created by the European integration process, developments in the Islamic world and the responses of the United States. In the first section, the paper explores ideas about foreign policy and power in the European Union (EU), as exemplified in debates about the Lisbon Treaty and the future role of the Union. The second part of the paper sets out three logics inherent in the development of the Common Foreign and Security Policy, distinguishing between the ‘internal’ logic of the European integration process, the ‘external’ logic reflecting the opportunity structure in the world arena, which creates challenges and opportunities for the EU and its Member States, and the ‘identity’ logic, which creates a move towards self-realisation and ‘self-recognition’ on the part of the EU in international politics, and relates this to recent developments in European foreign and security policy. The paper then argues that the multi-dimensional ‘triangle of forces’ between European integration, the Islamic world and the United States has played a key role in focusing these developments, by posing challenges to the three logics and creating complex linkages between them. The Conclusion asks whether as a result EU foreign policy has been ‘catalysed’ (given new impetus and direction) or ‘constrained’ (subject to a process of external or self-limitation), and points to some early indications of the impact of the Obama Administration in the United States.