The Cyprus Problem in the European Parliament:A Case of Successful or Superficial Europeanization?

Abstract: There is a vast literature on Europeanization but to date it has not concentrated on its impact on EU institutions. There is an emerging literature on the external relations of transnational parliaments (including the European Parliament’s external policies), some of it labelled ‘parliamentary diplomacy’, but it remains an under–studied area all the same. The original contribution of this article is to bring those trends together in a specific attempt to identify if there is a Europeanization of the European Parliament (EP) on a specific international issue: the Cyprus problem. That particular question is extremely important because the EU’s enlargement policy is considered to be its most effective Europeanization process. As the Republic of Cyprus has now joined the EU and Turkey has begun accession negotiations, the role of the EP is extremely relevant. After reviewing briefly the existing literature on Europeanization, and on the external relations of the EP, the article considers in more detail the EP’s empirical record on the Cyprus problem. It identifies three distinct stances and phases. It concludes by arguing that a shifting EP stance on the Cyprus problem shows signs not of a successful Europeanization, but rather of a superficial one, which depends largely on changing circumstances and national preferences.