Research project funded by the NATO Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council Individual Research Fellowships – 2000-2002 Programme FINAL REPORT PEACE AND DEMOCRACY: THE REDISCOVERED LINK THE EU, NATO and the European System of Liberal-Democratic Security Communities Sonia Lucarelli Author’s addresses: Sonia Lucarelli, PhD Jean Monnet Fellow Forum on the Problems of Peace and War Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies Via G.P.Orsini 44 European University Institute I-50126 Firenze - Italy Via dei Roccettini 9 tel. (+39)055.6800165 I -50016 San Domenico di Fiesole (FI) - Italy Tel. (+39)055.4685.828; Fax (+39)055.4685.804 e-mail:
[email protected] FINAL REPORT PEACE AND DEMOCRACY: THE REDISCOVERED LINK THE EU, NATO and the European System of Liberal-Democratic Security Communities Sonia Lucarelli ABSTRACT Since the beginning of the last decade, the major actors of the Western European security community have been putting increasing or new emphasis on the need to develop liberal democracy as a form of foreign and/or security policy in the post-bipolar era. Apparently rediscovering the theory of democratic peace of Kantian memory, all institutions of the so- called European security architecture, plus the US, have dedicated a substantial part of their redefined (external) role to democratisation. This (re)discovered emphasis has clearly been a response to post-bipolar security (lack of clearly defined) challenges but has had implications that have gone beyond the specific interests of each actor involved. The discourse and practice of democracy-export has in fact contributed to creating the conditions for the definition of a system of democratic security communities characterised by different degrees of maturity and tightness (Adler & Barnett 1998), but with a common sense of “us”: liberal democracy.