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Webber, Mark --- "The Common Security and Defence Policy in a multilateral world" [2011] ELECD 226; in Koutrakos, Panos (ed), "European Foreign Policy" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2011)

Book Title: European Foreign Policy

Editor(s): Koutrakos, Panos

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781849804097

Section: Chapter 7

Section Title: The Common Security and Defence Policy in a multilateral world

Author(s): Webber, Mark

Number of pages: 30

Extract:

7. The Common Security and Defence
Policy in a multilateral world
Mark Webber*

INTRODUCTION
The Cologne European Council of June 1999 took what many at the time and
since have regarded as a historic step ­ namely, the launch of the European
Security and Defence Policy (ESDP).1 Conceived within the framework of the
existing Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP), ESDP marked a step-
change in the ambitiousness of EU external action (it would allow the EU to
`play its full role on the international stage') and, by extension, the nature of
the European project (ESDP was hailed as `a new step in the construction of
the European Union').2 Ten years on, the official position remained highly
positive. Javier Solana, the EU High Representative for the CFSP, noted in
June 2009 that ESDP was `the missing link' of international peace and secu-
rity; numerous missions across four continents had demonstrated the `crucial
role [of the EU] in bringing stability to different parts of the world'.3 ESDP,
he suggested a little later, has brought `unique added value', a `joint civilian­
military approach' meaning that `the EU remains the only organisation that
can call on a full panoply of instruments and resources [to] complement the
traditional foreign policy tools of its member states'.4


* The author would like to thank Lorenzo Cladi for research assistance provided
in the preparation of this chapter.
1 The Lisbon Treaty uses the term Common Security and Defence Policy
(CSDP). This chapter, however, will refer ...