"ESDP, enlargement and exclusion"

Webber, Mark (2003) "ESDP, enlargement and exclusion". In European Union Studies Association (EUSA) > Biennial Conference > 2003 (8th), March 27-29, 2003, pages 25, Nashville, TN.

Abstract

The association of non-EU members has been a major preoccupation of those invested with responsibility for the development of the EU's European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP). This so-called inclusion or "third-party" issue has taken up a considerably amount of diplomatic energy but has resulted in a set of institutional arrangements that have, to varying degrees, accommodated the interests of states both minor and major who be outside the EU's formal membership. In short, in the course of the few years since the launch of ESDP, a new institutional relationship has been constructed with NATO (and thus, by proxy, certain objections of the U.S. have been addressed), a special arrangement has been fashioned with Russia, and an artful compromise has been reached with Turkey. Add to this, the overcoming of less noted but no insignificant reservations held by Canada, Norway and Poland among others; and the case could be made that the development of ESDP has witnessed a concerted, wide¬ranging and, arguably, successful, exercise in EU foreign policy and institution building.