Case Studies of the EU’s CFSP Activity

Viktor Szép, Ramses A. Wessel, Marie Vandendriessche, Ezgi Uzun, Carlota Moreno Villar, Hanna Ojanen, Henna Kakko, Lucia Rybnikárová, Vladislava Gubalova & Juraj Kuruc

A new geopolitical reality and challenges in the EU’s close neighbourhood, especially the war in Ukraine, have drawn attention once again towards examining whether the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and its instruments work.

This working paper re-assesses the effectiveness, coherence and sustainability of EU CFSP actions through case studies.

In doing so, this paper tests and refines a set of assessment criteria – developed partially in ENGAGE Working Paper 10 on intelligence and security cooperation, and partially in these pages – to identify specific obstacles to, as well as possibilities for, coherent EU foreign policy.

The paper examines two geographical-oriented case studies (Western Balkans and Iran) and three thematic case studies (EU sanctions against Russia, the EU’s role in international organisations and EU intelligence cooperation).

Building on more theoretical notions in previous ENGAGE papers, this study assesses CFSP in action by applying, whenever possible, at least one effectiveness, one coherence, and one sustainability-related assessment criterion.

The paper further analyses, when relevant, the decision-making procedures applied in the case studies, focusing on whether decisions were made by unanimity or by qualified majority voting.