Inter-organisational relations as a factor shaping the EU’s external identity

Abstract:

For many it is akin to heresy to call the EU an 'international organisation'. Since the abandonment of the early attempts at systematic comparative analysis of regional integration in the 1960s, the sui generis approach has been predominant. Unfortunately, however, it is a somewhat unhelpful standpoint: inhibiting the use of comparison as a method, it renders the understanding of the particularities of the EU, including those regarding its interaction with other organisations, more difficult, rather than easier.

Even though the Union undoubtedly has state-like capacities and goals, and a territorial dimension that is of greater importance when compared with most organisations of a 'functional' nature, it nevertheless seems useful to revert to general literature on international organisations to gauge some of its specificities more clearly.

A second reason for the existence of a gap in conceptual and theoretical analysis of inter-organisational relations is that a lot of work on international organisations gets caught up in the controversies regarding the question of whether international organisations can be considered independent actors in the first place.

Thirdly, in the empirical world, international organisations might only be starting to face up to a real need for, and the ensuing problems of, interaction with other organisations.

In this paper, the central claim is that international organisations exist and function in an environment which not only comprises states, but also other organisations. Organisations influence each other and shape each other’s identities and functions: this is exemplified in the paper through the relationship between the EU and NATO.