The International Spectator 1/2006

Book reviews and Notes

Interfacing the with

Raffaella Del Sarto*

International relations and the European Union action, such as EU trade policy or the / edited by Christopher Hill and evolving European security and defence Michael Smith. - Oxford [etc.] : policy, or to concentrate on EU policy Oxford University Press, 2005. - xxiv, toward particular geographic areas or 469 p. - (The new European Union actors. Third, and more importantly, series). - ISBN [978-]0-19-927348-5 EU external relations continue to pose significant challenges to theory. Indeed, efforts to conceptualise the EU»s exter- In spite of a growing scholarly inter- nal activities have been sitting uneasily est, efforts to understand and explain between (European) integration studies the external actions of the European and the discipline of International Union still face a number of formidable Relations (IR). Accordingly, the existing problems. First, comprising a variety of literature has produced far more policies, actors, institutions and deci- descriptive than theory-informed stud- sion-making modes and levels, the ies of EU external relations so far. Union»s external relations are an With contributions from some of the extremely complex phenomenon. most renowned European Union spe- Second, the literature on the subject cialists and two distinguished IR schol- remains highly fragmented. Indeed, ars, this edited volume reflects the scholarly accounts tend either to focus recent trend of seeking to bridge the on specific subfields of EU external gap between the EU»s external actions

* Raffaella A. Del Sarto is Marie Curie Research Fellow at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, European University Institute, Florence.

Copyright © 2006 by the Istituto Affari Internazionali. 2 Interfacing the European Union with International Relations and IR. The eighteen chapters of the external actions, and vice versa. textbook, which aims at a readership of Thirdly, the EU may be conceptualised undergraduate and graduate students, as a power in world politics. It is intrin- discuss various aspects of EU external sic to edited volumes that the different relations, such as the theoretical and contributions engage unevenly with the institutional frameworks, the decision- proposed analytical framework, and this making processes, and the different book is no exception. Indeed, some activities and outcomes of EU foreign chapters are predominantly descriptive, policy. Hence, this volume provides an while others conduct their analysis encompassing, and therefore highly according to at least one of the analyti- valuable, account of the key aspects and cal propositions set out in the first issue areas of EU external relations. chapter. Examples of the latter include Published within the ≈New European the well-informed contribution of Union Series∆ of Oxford University Jolyon Howorth on the CFSP/ESDP, Press, this textbook is undoubtedly a the original discussion of the EU as a precious learning aid. All the chapters trade power by Sophie Meunier and of the book follow a clear and consis- Kalypso Nicoläidis, and the interesting tent format, which includes an opening analysis of the EU»s relations with for- abstract, boxes that provide illustrations mer European colonies by James or summaries of specific arguments, as Mayall. A similar observation applies, well as references to further reading and for instance, to the excellent chapter by web sites. In light of the growing stu- Michael Smith and Rebecca Steffenson dent interest in the role of the EU in on the Union»s relations with the US, as world affairs, and the increasing number well as to Loukas Tsoulakis» discussion of university courses offered on the sub- of the EU in the world economy. Still ject, this textbook meets a genuine other contributions, such as the fasci- demand, while closing an important nating chapter on the European civilis- lacuna in the existing body of literature. ing process by Andrew Linklater, or In order to place the EU»s external Reuben Wong»s excellent analysis of the actions in an international relations concept of ≈Europeanization∆ in the context, the analytical framework by context of foreign policy, offer theoreti- Christopher Hill and Michael Smith cal perspectives that go beyond the proposes three possible perspectives. proposed analytical framework. First, the EU can be understood as a The mix of descriptive accounts, theo- sub-system of international relations ry-informed analyses, and predominant- that permits the co-ordination of, and ly conceptual contributions is not prob- bargaining between, the interests of EU lematic per se. In fact, a good textbook on member states with the aim of collec- EU external relations needs to incorpo- tive action. Second, the Union can be rate detailed accounts of its elements analysed as a part of the process of and structures, particularly considering international relations at a global scale, the complex institutional setting of EU whereby the latter influence the EU»s external relations and the impressive Raffaella Del Sarto 3 developments in some of its subfields in press before the negative referenda in recent years. The chapter by Geoffrey and the were held. Edwards on the patterns of the EU»s Altogether, informed scholars may global activity, Sophie Vanhoonacker»s criticise that the book engages rather detailed description of the complex weakly with a number of ongoing theo- institutional framework of EU foreign retical debates in International Rela- policy-making, and the overview of the tions, revolving, for instance, around EU»s relations with different groups of the role and concept of rationalism, the states across geographic regions by conceptualisation of power, or the Nicole Alecu de Flers and Elfriede impact of institutions, identities, and Regelsberger (debatably termed ≈inter- socialisation processes on world poli- regional co-operation∆) are extremely tics. Certainly, many contributions, useful. What is a bit confusing, however, among them Karen Smith»s interesting is the book»s structure and the location chapter on EU enlargement and of the single chapters within the four European order, refer to some of these parts into which the book is subdivided. issues. Yet the chapters that explicitly Indeed, the reader is left wondering why deal with the nexus between the EU some of the rather descriptive chapters and IR, namely the survey provided by are located both within the part on Filippo Andreatta as well as the intro- ≈Frameworks∆ and under the headline of ductory and concluding chapter of the ≈Activities and Impact∆. Similarly, a editors, are sound, but remain some- number of contributions, which are far what focused on traditional IR theory more conceptual than empirical, have and rather conventional themes. Hence, been placed in the part on ≈Institutions they tend to disregard the significant and Process∆. Examples include Simon contributions that other approaches, Nuttall»s chapter on coherence and con- most notably constructivism in its vari- sistency within EU foreign policy, ous variants, have provided to both the Christopher Lord»s discussion of the development of IR theory and the study accountability and legitimacy of the lat- of EU external relations in recent years. ter, or the above-mentioned chapter of Indeed, from an IR perspective, there is Reuben Wong on ≈Europeanization∆. much more to say on the international Hence, for future editions of the text- relations of the European Union. But book, which will certainly follow, the then again, this book has a different editors may wish to rethink the book»s scope. Indeed, if editors and contribu- logical structure. A similar observation tors aimed at producing a comprehen- applies to the considerable attention sive and solid textbook that prompts that most chapters pay to the likely students to adopt an international rela- impact of the European Constitutional tions perspective when thinking of the Treaty on EU external relations. Alas, EU»s external actions, they have done the textbook most certainly went to an excellent job.