The EU’s Joint Actions on anti-personnel mines and unexploded ordnance: Finding a security policy identity

Abstract:

Through the empirical lens of the EU’s Joint Actions and policies on landmines and unexploded ordinance this article seeks to draw wider conclusions about the nature and focus of the EU’s Common Foreign and Security Policy and the EU’s security identity. This research suggests that the EU has found a niche soft-security role in international affairs that is driven by an agreed set of normative assumptions. Further, this article explores the structural position of the EU in relation to the Ottawa Treaty. It suggests that because the EU does not have a state-like identity in foreign and security policy spheres it is at the whim of member governments advancing narrow national interests. However, the evidence from this case study demonstrates that the EU does have the ability to be an effective security actor in its own right.