"Understanding European Foreign Policy Cooperation"

[From the introduction] This paper examines questions about CFSP activity by studying it in the context of a random sample of world events. It asks to what kinds of events or issues does the Union respond, and compares the results with the Union’s Treaty-established interests. The results are somewhat surprising: the EU is not particularly sensitive to events in neighboring regions, nor is it particularly responsive to abuses of human rights. Human rights issues are actually much less likely to attract Union attention than almost any other type of issue, though this trend appears to decline with time. The impact of the 1995 expansion dissipates rapidly, and contrary to the conventional wisdom, the new members’ historic neutrality does not appear to have affected cooperation in any way. Two important conclusions emerge: first, cooperation does not appear to have expanded with time in either scope of issues addressed or volume of events addressed. At best, the development of the Union’s Common Foreign and Security Policy has kept pace with the growth of world interactions. Second, characteristics of the state holding the presidency are insignificant predictors of CFSP activity, suggesting at least moderate support for a norm of presidencies working for the general interest