Crossing pillars, crossing disciplines? Comparing institutional logics and evolutions within the EU

Seidendorf, Stefan (2009) Crossing pillars, crossing disciplines? Comparing institutional logics and evolutions within the EU. In: UNSPECIFIED. (Unpublished)

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Abstract

This paper confronts established integration scholarship with evidence from CFSP, the EU’s attempt to work together in foreign and security policy. Why does integration theory refrain from analyzing the evolution in this sector? While CFSP experiences a growing popularity amongst researchers from IR and security studies, it seems to be neglected from classical integration theory. Two reasons for this are more closely scrutinized: Either these theoretical attempts are unable or unwilling to cope with CFSP, or CFSP is not integration and thus does not fall into their realm. Whereas I find evidence for ‘intergovernmental integration’ in CFSP, the problem seems to lie within integration theories. The classical dichotomies between supranational/intergovernmental approaches and between ‘high’ and ‘low’ politics can be advanced for this lacunae, as well as the overall diminishing interest of current theoretical approaches to deal with the EU integration process (instead of dealing with policy outcomes). Yet a closer empirical investigation of recent practices in the integration process substantiates the importance of the second pillar for the overall course of integration. CFSP comes close to an affirmation of a ‘second model’ of European integration, next to the Community Model of the economic sector. The establishment of a ‘second executive’ (next to the European Commission) in the Council Secretariat should be reason enough to reopen the discussion on the ‘nature of the beast’. Finally, some propositions for avenues of further research in this direction are advanced.

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