Europe and the Maghreb: Its Impact and Importance in US Foreign Policy. Jean Monnet/Robert Schuman Paper Series Vol. 11, No. 7, October 2011

It is recognized transatlantically that the United States will not single-handedly shape a New World Order as some speculated at the turn of this century. Instead, a neo-regionalism appears to be developing in many parts of the world, including the Euro-Mediterranean, with aspiring potential regional hegemons, such as Turkey, Iran, possibly Syria, as well as an enhanced presence in the Mediterranean of Russian and Chinese non-commercial vessels. This rapidly changing greater Euro-Mediterranean region has the potential for a more democratic paradigm in which to approach new and old security threats of neighboring countries – and yet perhaps a fear of an all-too powerful America being replaced by a fear of its imminent weakening (British Council 2008). The role of the expected continued presence of the U.S. in the (greater) Mediterranean and Middle East, through NATO, the Mediterranean Dialogue, the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative, as well as a number of (ad hoc) peacekeeping missions (such as in and off the coast of Somalia) are analyzed from its bilateral as well multilateral structural embeddedness in the Euro-Mediterranean region. Especially the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM)1 would fit Van Langenhove‟s (2007) concept of a (hypothetical) “Third Regionalism”, whereby the institutional environment for dealing with "out of area" consequences of regional policies would become fully consolidated, regions become more proactive in engaging with inter-regional arrangements and agreements, going beyond purely trade issues with a multidimensional character, and having the potential to affect more relations at the global level. The UfM‟s potential in contributing to regional security and stability (i.a. as nested in the EU‟s permanent delegation to the UN beyond its goal in terms of political, economic and social-cultural development), has the potential to consolidate competing preferences intra-regionally, while building on the shared history and cultural and institutional structures existing today in the Euro-Mediterranean “region”. This chapter will extrapolate the security implications of this region in terms of the revision, which previous research suggested (e.g. Boening 2008; 2009), to a Euro-Mediterranean Regional Security Complex (in light of the complexity of the internal securitization processes and the degree of security interdependence in the region) from the Middle Eastern Regional Security Complex, which Buzan and Waever‟s (2003) had proposed