Beyond Intergovernmentalism: the Governance Approach to the European Security and Defence Policy

2 DRAFT: Comments welcome. Not to be cited without author’s permission (8337 words including bibliography). 3 ver the last decade, the EU has developed into a regional institution with military ambitions that extend well beyond Europe. As such, it has evolved in a way that seems to counteract the assumptions of realist and intergovernmental theories, which is still by many viewed as providing valid explanations for the lack of inter-state cooperation on security and defence. This raises the question whether other concepts are more appropriate for understanding security and defence policy in the EU. One approach that has been applied to other areas of EU policy is the concept of governance, a term with many connotations, but one that, in a growing literature on security governance, has proved helpful for understanding contemporary security trends (Krahmann 2003; Webber, Croft et al. 2004; Krahmann 2005; Schroeder 2006). In fact, a security governance approach could seem particularly helpful for studying ESDP, since the trends that recognise what has been referred to as a general move from government to governance in European security can perhaps b