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Liberal IR theory and EU foreign policy
Out of the writings on the EU of scholars such as Ernst Haas, Leon Lindberg, and Joseph Nye, modern liberal IR theory was born (Haas, 1958, 1961; Lindberg, 1963; Nye, 1970). While the study of the EU is no longer an area of concentration for IR scholars, liberal theories still provide significant contributions to our understanding of EU integration and the impact of the EU in the world. This chapter adopts a relatively broad understanding of both liberal IR theory and EU foreign policy. Regarding liberal IR theories, I define liberalism as theories that investigate how explanatory factors such as institutions, interdependence and democracy enable cooperation in the state of anarchy, and in some variants, even enable states to transcend anarchy. I distinguish between ‘weak’ and ‘strong’ variants of liberalism, with the critical demarcation drawn between theories that claim that fundamental transformations in the nature of IR can take place (strong), or theories that are closer to realism but where certain factors like institutions can mitigate the worst effects of anarchy (weak). While strong liberal theories such as neofunctionalism overlap somewhat with social constructivist theorization when dealing with norms and socialization processes, the crucial difference deals with how deep the effects of norms are. I return to this point several times in the article, discussing whether norms merely are resources that can be used by actors to compel actors to do something they otherwise would not do as in liberal theories, or whether they form part of actor identities and therefore have deeper, constitutive effects as in constructivism? Regarding EU foreign policy, I use the term to denote both traditional foreign and security policy, but in keeping in line with liberal theoretical arguments about the non-hierarchical nature of different issue-areas in IR, I also include other non-diplomatic aspects of the EUs role in the world, including external trade policies, and most importantly, enlargement of the Union itself as a case of EU foreign policy. The chapter starts with a presentation of the major variants of liberal IR theorization as used in the study of the EU, differentiating into between different positions within both weak and strong liberal theorization. This is followed by a
discussion of the findings of liberal-based studies of EU foreign policy, focusing on the debates about the EU as a collective actor in world affairs, and the impact of the EU in the world. It is argued that while liberal-based accounts provide strong explanations for the significant effects of the EU in Central- and Eastern Europe due to enlargment, and for the lack of effects further abroad, the dearth of studies applying strong liberalism, and in particular hypotheses about political spill-over, have ceded to constructivism the study of the more subtle but substantially more important effects of the interaction of member state officials with each other in forging a form of common European foreign policy interests and identities supplementing but not fully replacing national ones.
1. Liberal IR theory and the study of the EU Liberal theories can for heuristic reasons be divided into ‘weak’ and ‘strong’ variants, where the crucial distinction is whether IR is the ‘same damn things’ happening over and over’ (weak), or whether transformations of the character of IR are possible (strong). Weak liberal theories share many of the same arguments as realist theories but diverge regarding questions such as: whether the worst effects of anarchy can be mitigated through institutions, the importance of interdependence as a source of state power and interests, the importance of domestic groups in determining state preferences, and whether economic interests can trump security interests. In contrast, the core of strong liberal theories is the contention that factors such as strong institutions and interdependence can transform the very nature of international politics from anarchy to a more civilized cooperative state of affairs, where absolute gains and cooperation are more prevalent. The following reviews liberal IR theories as they have been used to study the EU and its role in the world, focusing on both the ties that bind the two variants together, along with the theoretical differences within each variant. The chapter ends with a discussion of whether the inclusion of norms in many variants of liberal theorization on the EU means that we should better think of them as social constructivist theories, and where we should draw the distinction between the two approaches.
groups and interstate negotiations, although at some points in his work he accords chief executives and economic officials some importance. The integrative steps agreed by governments in interstate bargaining are determined by national preferences and the relative power of governments. Power is determined by how dependent a government is upon agreement, with governments that gain the most offering the most concessions. Bargaining is purely intergovernmental, with institutions such as the European Commission play no role in the negotiations. Therefore, Moravcsik accords little importance to the actions of actors such as the High Representative in pushing for stronger foreign policy cooperation. In order to account for post-SEA integration, which increasingly dealt with non-market issues such as foreign policy and immigration, Moravcsik has expanded the LI theory of preferences to include policy interdependence as a source of preferences, or more accurately, levels of dependence of a government upon cooperation with other states in order to achieve preferred outcomes (Moravcsik and Nicolaïdis, 1999). Here the key is whether a state can achieve its preferred goals unilaterally or not. For example, in the context of the Treaty of Amsterdam negotiations (1996-97) they write that, ‘Germany, with limited unilateral foreign policy autonomy and no prerogatives such as a set on the UN Security Council, favoured deeper binding co-operation in foreign policy. States with a viable unilateral policy and distinctive policy preferences – such as Greece and Britain – were keen to preserve some unilateral veto.’ (p. 64). Note however that here Moravcsik steps away from the core of his liberal IR argument that state preferences are determined primarily by important domestic groups (Moravcsik, 1997), focusing instead on the perceptions of preferential policy outcomes held by chief executives and bureaucracies. Soft socialization and LI In recent years a number of scholars have used interest-driven, weak liberal theories such as LI as the starting point, but have incorporated as a supplementary factor the role of norms seen as a bargaining resource (Schimmelfennig, 2001; Kelley, 2004, 2006). A good example of this kind of theoretical model is seen in Schimmelfennig’s work on Eastern enlargement
(2001). At the core of Schimmelfennig’s eclectic theoretical model is a LI, interest-driven explanation of why states do what they do. However, norms are also seen as a strategic resource that can be exploited to compel other states to change their behavior. This can only occur when a norm is commonly shared amongst actors, for example commitments to democracy and good governance. Once a norm is commonly shared, egoistic actors are able to strategically exploit these socialized norms through ‘rhetorical action’ to shame other actors to push them to accept outcomes they otherwise would not have done. Note that behavior is still dominated by logics of consequences instead of logics of appropriate action (March and Olsen, 1998), given that reluctant actors only comply with a norm because they have been publically shamed, not because they feel compelled to comply due to it being the ‘correct’ thing to do. Institution-rich weak liberal theory – a world of principals and agents Weak liberal IR theories developed since the institutional turn in the mid-1990s include institutional power and positions as important explanatory factors between state preferences and outcomes. The primary theory here is Rational Choice Institutionalism, and in particular principal-agent (PA) theorization as it has been applied to the study of the EU and international institutions more generally. Whereas LI is a broad theory of integration, PA theorization more narrowly focuses on why principals decide to delegate authority to agents, and the effects that this delegation can have both in terms of agency losses and the broader effectiveness of delegated policies, for example enabling the EU to speak with a single voice in world affairs (e.g. Tallberg, 2006; Dür and Elsig, 2011). First, principals decide to delegate to agents for a variety of functionalist reasons, primarily the need to gain agent expertise and to avoid agenda failure in order to enhance collective decision-making. Once agents have been delegated powers, there is however the risk that the agent will exploit them to follow own preferences instead of those of the principal, resulting in policy outcomes that diverge from what principals wanted – termed agency costs in the literature. Finally, delegation can not only entail agency costs, but also can impact on policy
focus only on the elements of the theory that are specifically applicable to the study of EU foreign policy. There are three widely accepted distinct dimensions of the concept of spill- over: functional, political and cultivated (Niemann, 2006). Regarding functional spill-over , the core argument in relation to EU foreign policy is that as internal policies become integrated, there is a pull towards also developing an external dimension. Although not termed spill-over by Schmitter, he captures the argument well in his ‘externalization’ hypothesis when he writes that ‘Once agreement is reached and made operative on a policy or set of policies pertaining to intermember or intraregional relations, participants will find themselves compelled – regardless of their original intentions – to adopt common policies vis-à-vis nonparticipant third countries.’ (1969: 165). The greater the degree of internal policy coordination, the greater the spillover pressures in the direction of a common external (foreign) policy in both the issue area itself and more generally. Political spill-over deals with the learning and socialization of elite actors, be they political actors or interest groups and lobbyists towards the new EU center. The shift is theorized first to involve a refocusing of political activities towards new integrated center, but over time can even impact on the very identities of actors, bringing in theories of the impact of norms and social learning. Regarding the later, in the work of Lindberg governmental elites in their interactions with each other slowly became socialized towards a form of common interests and even identities, termed engrenage (Lindberg, 1963; also Lindberg and Scheingold, 1970: 119). The result is that actor perceptions of state interests become increasingly European, focusing more on common interests. Interestingly, when applied to foreign policy, the neofunctionalist hypothesis on engrenage has significant overlap with constructivist work on the impact that foreign policy cooperation has upon governmental elites, creating a new more European foreign policy identity (e.g. Tonra and Christiansen, 2004; Glarbo, 1999; Jørgensen, 2004a, 2004b). I return to this point below. Finally, institutions created by states have interests in pushing for more integration – termed cultivated spill-over in the literature. Interestingly, while predating it, this thesis overlaps to some degree with PA theory (see above). The
difference is that cultivated spill-over deals less with exploiting delegated competences as in PA theory, and more with the efforts of institutions to persuade governments that functional spill-over is present and that they need to take further integrative steps. Transactionalism – moving towards a pluralistic security community While not a theory of institutional integration per se, Deutsch’s liberal theory of the effects of interdependence has been a source of inspiration for scholars focusing on the impacts of interaction between states on their identities and interests, including in recent studies about the socializing impact of EU membership (Smith, 2011). The term ‘transactionalism’ refers to the broader patterns of communication and interaction between societies and how increased intrasociety transactions could hypothetically transform the nature of interstate relations. Deutsch theorized that as the level of communication between two societies increased, this can result in a growing sense of community between states that changes their perceptions of core national interests as they relate to each other, contingent upon three factors: 1) the two societies having compatible values; 2) the capacity of governments to respond to one another’s messages, needs and actions without resort to violence; and 3) the mutual predictability of the relevant aspects of one another’s political, economic and social behavior (Deutsch 1968: 281). As the level of interaction increases, so does the mutual relevance of each society to the other. If the interaction is perceived of as beneficial, then the result is a further increase in interaction. When high levels of transaction (interdependence) occur, the result can be a qualitative transformation in the nature of the involved states’ relations with each other. The involved states become part of what Deutsch (1968) terms a ‘pluralistic security community’, defined as a situation where the component governments retain their legal identity but where the sense of community is so strong that it makes war unthinkable amongst its members, in effect replacing ‘anarchy’ between states with a form of ‘society’ of shared interests and even identity. Smith in a recent study has contended that the creation of a pluralistic security community within the EU has been the most significant effect of the
more constitutive aspects of power and the (mostly) unintentional attraction of ideas to make actors change what they want (Nye, 2004), whereas most liberal theories of EU foreign policy use the term soft power to refer to the types of foreign policy instruments used by the EU. For example, Smith defines soft power as being when ‘normative and ideational factors play a large role in the content and implementation’ of EU foreign policy (Smith, 2011: 146). Therefore most uses of the term soft power in relation to EU foreign policy are what can be termed using Barnett and Duvall’s terms as a form of ‘compulsory power’, whereas Nye’s definition is more in line with what they describe as ‘constitutive power’, where nonmaterial factors are most important in constructing and reconstructing actor interests and identities (Barnett and Duvall, 2005). At the same time, given the stronger constitutive effects attributed to non-material factors, it can be argued that Nye’s theory is more closely aligned with constructivist approaches than is widely acknowledged.
2. Liberal theories applied to the study of EU foreign policy Most IR scholarship on the EU was until the mid-1990s inwards-looking, explaining the integration process and why states choose to transfer sovereignty to the EU-level. Little attention was given to the external dimension of the EU, i.e. the EUs role and impact on the world. In recent years significant literatures have developed on this topic, dealing with both EU foreign and security policy, narrowly understood, but also broader definitions of foreign policy to include external trade policy and the impact of the EU enlargement process upon neighboring states. The following will discuss the two core debates to which liberal theories have especially contributed: 1) are the EU’s external policies anything more than the sum of its parts, and 2) have the EU’s foreign policies had any impact? Is the EU anything more than the sum of its parts? Actorness and liberal theory Are the EU’s foreign economic and political policies merely the sum of member state foreign policies, or does the EU have a form of ‘actorness’ beyond the state (White 2004)? In particular, this debate is centered on the question of whether we can speak of the EU having its own set of interests (and even identity),
making its foreign policy more than just the sum of its states, enabling us to argue that it has a foreign policy that is distinct from those of the member states. LI answers this question, not surprisingly, with a resounding ‘No’. LI contends that the EU has no autonomous interests or identity in foreign affairs and is, and is predicted to remain, strictly intergovernmental (Wagner, 2003). Instead, it is seen merely as an institutional tool of the larger member states to pool resources to enable them to have a greater punch in world affairs, or to allow them to conduct policies that they otherwise would not be able to do unilaterally. Ginsberg uses the term ‘politics of scale’ to refer to the first situation, defined as instances where a common foreign policy enables states to gain greater influence on the world (Ginsberg, 1999). A good example of the second situation is German foreign policy in the 1990s, where it used the EU’s common foreign policy as a tool to assert its foreign policy interests through a multilateral forum like the EU which is seen as more acceptable by its neighbors than the same policies would be if they were made unilaterally by Germany (Ginsberg 1999). However, the EU is not seen as an autonomous foreign policy actor, and there is only a single policy when all larger member states agree on one. Strong liberal theorists such as neofunctionalism counter by arguing that, despite the weakness of the institutional framework for the EU’s CFSP, we are actually witnessing the gradual development of a form of ‘actorness’ in the EU that is created by the close interaction of national foreign policy civil servants from different member states, resulting in an incremental transformation of the foreign policy interests and perhaps very identities of the member states (e.g. Øhrgaard 2004; Niemann, 2006). The result is the beginning of what can be termed an autonomous EU foreign policy that is not merely the sum of member state interests and that does not necessarily replace member state policies, but instead represents a form of foreign policy beyond the state. These theorists contend that we are not witnessing a zero-sum game, where policies at the state level are merely replaced by EU-level policies. Instead we are seeing a positive- sum transformation, with policies being pursued at both levels. Strong liberal theories such as neofunctionalism focus upon interactions that trigger political spill-over processes. Neofunctionalists contend that
and through conditionality and the offer of membership the EU was able to have enormous leverage over the policies of non-member countries. Compared with the fears in 1989 of many scholars and politicians that Central- and Eastern Europe would become a region dominated by hyper-nationalism, crisis and wars between neighboring states that could spark great power conflicts (e.g. Mearsheimer, 1990), the creation of a zone of peace and prosperity under the shadow of enlargement that stretches eastwards from Eastern Germany to Russia’s near abroad is unprecedented in international history. Naturally the EU does not have sole responsibility, with many of the domestic reforms driven by endogenous factors instead of due to external pressure from the EU, but a significant part of the changes were due to the EU’s enlargement policies. There are three liberal positions regarding the external impact of the EU in relation to the enlargement process. First are purely interest-driven arguments, whereas a number of other scholars accord some importance to norms and ‘soft’ socialization. Finally, there have been a handful of studies applying neofunctionalism to enlargement processes. Vachudova is a good illustrative example of purely interest-driven arguments, with a theoretical model that to a large degree overlaps with LI arguments about asymmetric interdependence and power (Vachudova, 2005). Her theoretical model deals with the active leverage that the EU had vis-à-vis the candidate countries, based on the relative dependence of the candidate countries upon gaining membership in relation to how dependent EU member states were on ensuring that the candidates joined the EU. Here there is an enormous power differential that enabled the EU to dictate strict conditions for membership, as the candidates were extremely dependent on access whereas many EU member states such as France would actually prefer non-membership for the candidate countries. The benefits for the candidates of membership created enormous incentives for them to attempt to satisfy the strict entry conditions, resulting in far-reaching political, administrative and economic reforms that would not have been undertaken without the external pressure. Other scholars have argued that norms and ‘soft’ socialization also had some impact alongside material incentives. Kelley discusses ‘soft’ socialization processes, where EU officials in dialogue with candidate countries exploited
norms to shame and persuade officials to push extensive domestic reforms (Kelley, 2004, 2006). For instance, through annual progress reports produced by the Commission, the EU praises ‘progress’ and attempts to shame offenders in order to gain influence over neighboring states. However, norms are not enough, and Kelley clearly flags the importance of the incentive of membership as a driver of successful reforms, illustrating that when these are absent there is not much impact of EU conditionality. Here material incentives in the form of potential membership can be understood as a necessary condition for the EU to impact the policies of neighboring states, whereas ‘soft’ socialization is a supplementary factor that together with incentives is sufficient to produce compliance with EU conditions. Finally, neofunctionalist studies of the enlargement process accord greater importance to process dynamics in creating stronger common policies than governments would otherwise have chosen. Niemann (2006) describes how functional spillover pushed governments to accept large increases in the budget of the early accession instruments (PHARE). Drawing on Schmitter, Niemann also discusses how ‘exogenous spillover’, where the success of internal policies creates expectations and demands amongst outsiders for more common policies, ‘left European leaders little choice but to hammer out a common policy and to rely on the Commission to do it.’ (2006: 71). Finally, given that the Commission was granted a strong position, the Commission then exploited the position through cultivated spillover, resulting in stronger common policies than otherwise would have been adopted. Macmillan applies neofunctionalism to the Turkish accession process, arguing that the theory can explain why the process ‘so far’ has continued despite strong countervailing pressures from reluctant governments within the EU (Macmillan, 2009). She contends that there was strong functional and exogenous spillover, political spillover amongst civil servants and political elites, and a strong leadership role played by the Commission. However, given that the article was published in 2009, the article does not take into account more recent events that have illustrated that governments remain strongly in control of enlargement policies – for example seen in the Austrian decision to put any future Turkish referendum to a public referendum, where the outcome is quite
EU in the world. Jupille captures the essence of the argument when he writes that different institutions yield different results out of the same set of governmental preferences (1999). When the EU is able to take positions using majority voting in issues like the environment, more revisionist common policies can be promoted abroad, helping the EU push international outcomes away from the status quo (SQ). This naturally assumes a distribution of preferences where a majority supports ambitious positions far from the SQ. When there is unanimous decision-making, the EU has little impact. Second, liberal theories for the most agree that the EU has little impact in more intergovernmental issues. Liberal scholars have investigated the impact of the EU on its immediate neighbors outside of enlargement. In a recent study Cengiz and Hoffmann (2013) have investigated the impact of EU policies on Turkey after the carrot of membership has receded. They found that the lack of credible material incentives (membership) was very important, finding little influence of EU policies on Turkey in recent years, with the reform process slowing and even regressing. Kelley has also investigated the impact of the EU’s neighborhood policies in countries where membership was not a credible tool using a combined material incentives and norms as resources model. She finds that soft socialization is not effective when it is not coupled with the carrot of potential membership. Despite the EU praising progress and attempting to shame offenders, the results have been negligible due to the fact that the benefits of reforms (carrots offered by the EU in the form of preferential market access) do not trump the domestic adjustment costs (Kelley, 2006). Turning to the EU’s impact more broadly, scholars like Moravcsik have contended that the EU’s foreign policy has little effect given a lack of converging interests (1998). Wagner (2003) describes the CFSP in LI terms when he defines it as an international regime used to realize common gains. He suggests that there is an effective common foreign policy only when member states have shared interests in using CFSP (politics of scale). For example, he contends that the EU had a successful foreign policy in the crisis in 2001 in Macedonia that dealt with the Albanian minority given common interests amongst member states.
3. Conclusions Liberal IR theory has made a significant contribution to our understanding of the EUs role in the world, both in terms of why the EU had decided (or not decided) to integrate particular policy areas, and in terms of the impact of the EU. What types of conclusions can we draw about the EUs role in the world based on the two variants of liberal IR theory? First, weak liberal theory tells us that it all boils down to possessing significant sticks and carrots. Here the story is one where the most significant impact of the EU has been through using the carrot of membership to compel foreign governments to adopt policies in-line with EU interests that they otherwise would not have done, with Eastern enlargement the poster-child of EU success in the world. In certain circumstances, norms can also be deployed strategically as a bargaining resource to compel external actors to change their behavior, although the impact of this is quite weak when not coupled with significant material incentives (e.g. membership) In contrast, stronger liberal theories tell us both that there are process dynamics that push towards stronger common policies than weak liberal theories would expect. For example, through interstate transactions common interests can be developed that can even lead to a common identity as a ‘pluralistic security community’, where the use of antagonistic foreign policy instruments becomes unthinkable (Deutsch, 1968). Unfortunately for liberal approaches to EU foreign policy, the study of the stronger, constitutive effects of norms and socialization processes on the very identity of actors engaged in EU foreign policy that is gradually transforming actor interests and identities, has been ceded to constructivist scholarship (e.g. Christiansen, Jørgensen and Tonra). Yet if we view theories as heuristic tools to gain greater understanding of the world, we should be less concerned with this type of theoretical turf-war between strong liberal theories like neofunctionalism and constructivism. Here we could continue down the path offered originally by Haas, and continued by Niemann and others, in pragmatically exploring the fertile grey area in-between liberalism and constructivism in order to gain greater traction on understanding the complex
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