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Security and defence

The Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) is an integral part of EU foreign policy. Through its military operations and civilian missions, the EU has contributed to regional and global stability. Since it's inception, the CSDP has responded to a shifting regional security context. It has played a vital role in crisis management in the EU's near and wider neighbourhood but it is also an essential part of the EU's broader approach to the protection of Europe and capacity building.

Although the Lisbon Treaty consolidated the EU's crisis management apparatus, the EU Global Strategy has set a new level of ambition for EU defence. In addition to the CSDP playing an operational role in the EU's integrated approach to crises, the EU Global Strategy has stressed the need for the EU to become a more capable and effective defence actor. Initiatives such as the European Defence Fund, the coordinated annual defence review (CARD) and more coherent financing for EU operations and capacity building efforts are all aimed at supporting the EU's strategic autonomy and the European Defence Technological and Industrial Base. The EUISS continues to support the development of CSDP through outreach activities and expert publications.

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    20December 2013
    European defence – to be continued
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    In the final alert of 2013, EUISS Director Antonio Missiroli offers his take on the Conclusions of the European Council on defence. Can its outcome be considered a turning point for European defence? And what developments lie on the horizon of a debate that is far from over?

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    19December 2013
    Peacebuilding in 3D: EU and US approaches
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    This Chaillot Paper examines the concept of peacebuilding and the emergence in recent years of a comprehensive approach to conflict management that combines both civilian and military instruments. It highlights the importance of peacebuilding as a foreign policy goal and analyses US and EU approaches to the issue, focusing on the likely future trajectory of transatlantic cooperation in this area.

  • 10December 2013
    The ESS@10: revisiting the European Security Strategy 2003-2013

    Opening with a speech by H.E. Linas Linkevičius, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Lithuania, this international conference was organised in order to mark the 10th anniversary of the adoption of the European Security Strategy (ESS) by the European Council.

  • 26November 2013
    The EUISS in Berlin - November 2013

    A delegation from the EUISS traveled to the German capital in order to promote the shortened German version of the EUISS Yearbook for European Security (YES) and attend the Berlin Security Conference.

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    22November 2013
    What EU citizens think about European defence
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    On the face of it, there is overwhelming support in Europe for a common foreign and defence policy. But is there agreement on what a 'European defence policy' might actually mean? Or do EU citizens only favour common action when it is 'common' on their own terms? To provide some answers, this brief takes a detailed look at the polls on the matter and explores the assumptions that underlie them.

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    22November 2013
    Broader challenges, smaller budgets: the future of the US military
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    This alert examines the priority reforms identified by Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel in order ensure that the US military remains ready to counter the full range of future threats. With smaller budgets forcing European governments to make difficult choices, are there lessons to be drawn from Hagel’s observations?

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    21November 2013
    YES 2013 – Gekürzte Ausgabe – deutsch
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    Die gekürzte Ausgabe des Yearbook of European Security (YES) auf Deutsch beinhaltet grundlegende Fakten, Grafiken, Chroniken und Karten mit Blick auf die externe Sicherheit der EU. Sie gibt einen umfassenden Überblick über die sicherheitspolitischen Aktivitäten der EU in den Jahren 2011 und 2012.

  • 21November 2013
    YES 2013 – Version abrégée – français
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    La version abrégée du Yearbook of European Security (YES) en français propose des faits, chiffres, chronologies, documents et cartes essentiels à la compréhension de la politique de sécurité de l’Union européenne au cours des années 2011 et 2012.

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    15November 2013
    EU Battlegroups – ready to go?
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    The EU Battlegroups (BGs) reached full operational capability on 1 January 2007. However, they have never been deployed since, raising serious doubts about the viability of the overall initiative. This brief examines how, if the EU member states really want the Battlegroups to be Europe’s flagship military rapid response tool, they may have to address the challenges that continue to plague the BGs’ credibility and effectiveness.

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    15November 2013
    Ten years of EU military operations
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    On the eve of the European Council´s summit on defence, the EU´s six military operations to date can be considered to have been carried out with a certain degree of success. This brief examines how the Union still has room to grow as a European security provider in the context of an international division of labour for military crisis management.

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  • 28March 2002
    Europa potenza civile
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    Che l'Unione europea non sia una potenza comparabile agli Stati Uniti risulta evidente dai fatti, a cominciare dal gap crescente - tecnologico e di bilancio - fra gli investimenti militari delle due sponde dell'Atlantico. Che neanche debba porsi l'obiettivo di emulare gli Stati Uniti è invece meno evidente.

  • 13March 2002
    It’s time for a trans-Atlantic summit
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    One of the most striking examples of the potential for new transatlantic solidarity after the September 11 terrorist attacks was the publication by the French newspaper Le Monde, not known to be reflexively pro-American, of an editorial entitled "We are all Americans." The degree to which that solidarity has now dissipated was illustrated by a rather different headline in that same newspaper five months later: "Has the United States gone crazy?"...

  • 27February 2002
    Un Telefono per l’Europa
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    Fra le oltre 50 domande sul futuro dell’Europa contenute nel testo della Dichiarazione di Laeken, un gruppo abbastanza consistente riguarda il ruolo internazionale dell’Unione e, in particolare, il possibile sviluppo di una politica estera e di difesa piu’ "coerente" ed efficace.

  • 25February 2002
    Europe, Etats-Unis : Eviter le pire des deux mondes
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    Aux Etats-Unis, l'explosion de l'effort militaire - 1 milliard de dollars de dépenses par jour - frappe autant par l'ampleur des chiffres annoncés que par l'implosion réciproque du discours politique américain. Comme si la stratégie militaire tenait lieu à elle seule de toute stratégie.

  • 01February 2002
    Stagnation of the ESDP
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    "Revolutionary", it was called, the development of EU defence after the famous Franco-British summit in St-Malo, early December 1998. In the period from St-Malo to Nice, we witnessed the creation of an elaborate and well-functioning EU defence institutional framework, working out EU defence policy.

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    01February 2002
    The old and the new
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    Having devoted the last quarter of 2001 to negotiations on a whole corpus of legal, administrative, social and financial provisions, the Institute is once again operational as an autonomous agency of the Union, financed by the fifteen Member States but still completely independent in the choice of issues it works on and its output.

  • 20January 2002
    Arming for the future
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    Europe needs to get its security and defense act together. What would have happened if the Sept. 11 attacks had targeted La Défense in Paris or London's Canary Wharf? Would the United States have waged war on their behalf in Afghanistan? Could the Europeans have done it themselves? Neither is probable. So what could the Europeans have done and what in the future should they aim to be able to do?

  • 01January 2002
    European and Transatlantic Defense Industrial Strategies: A European perspective
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    The history of transatlantic armaments cooperation goes back to the beginning of the Cold War. Since then, however, the nature of cooperation has changed considerably, from simple licensing of US systems to Western Europe in the 1950s and 1960s to co-production arrangements in the 1970s, followed by government-to-government joint development programs in the 1980s and 1990s. In recent years, industry-led cooperation has become the most prominent feature

  • 13December 2001
    Defence Spending in Europe: Is Europe Prepared to Pay for Improved Capabilities?
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    Paper given at the Conference on ESDP organised in Paris on 13-15 December 2001 by the Cicero Foundation

  • 01December 2001
    Defence Industry Consolidation - Time for Political Action
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    Over the last two years, cross-border consolidation of defence industries has been high on the agenda of European defence. However, public debate on this issue is often characterised by profound misunderstandings

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