From European Political Cooperation (EPC) to the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) – A look back and forward
The Origins
After the Second World War almost no-one could have dreamed that European countries, including France and the Federal Republic of Germany, could coordinate the main thrust of their foreign policy. The process of European integration began with closer economic cooperation among the six founding states (Germany, France, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg) and for some years afterwards remained concentrated on this sphere (foundation of the European Coal and Steel Community in 1951, formation of the European Economic Community (EEC) and the European Atomic Energy Community (EURATOM) in 1958).
While the early efforts concentrated on coal and steel, the signing of the Treaties of Rome expanded cooperation to include agriculture, competition policy and foreign trade. The Common Market project was driven by the goal of increasing the prosperity of all its members through integration. Foreign and security policy, however, remained the sovereign affair of the nation-states (with specific exceptions in the case of the then Federal Republic).
Nonetheless, the issue of the extent to which Europe could integrate its foreign and security policy arose relatively quickly. In the early 1950s the project for a European Defence Community (EDC), the “Pleven Plan”, was debated, along with the idea of a European Political Community (EPC) combining the ECSC and the EDC, the objective being a federal Europe. However, this project was rejected by the French National Assembly in 1954.
The Heads of State and Government of the Member States did not take up the idea of enhanced cooperation on foreign policy again until the summit in The Hague on 2 December 1969. In their Luxembourg Report of 27 October 1970 (prepared by the Belgian diplomat Etienne Davignon and therefore sometimes called the Davignon Report), the foreign ministers presented their governments with a decision on cooperation in foreign policy. This led to the birth of European Political Cooperation (EPC). From today’s point of view this was a small beginning.
European Political Cooperation (EPC)
The core element of this cooperation was mutual information with a view to harmonizing standpoints on foreign-policy issues. This was followed by an agreed joint approach to a specific issue. It was decided that the foreign ministers should meet regularly (at least every six months), and that a Political Committee comprising the Political Directors (the heads of the political directorates-general at the national foreign ministries) be established. This “foreign policy cooperation” was purely intergovernmental, unlike that within the EC, which was aimed at integration. The Commission, the "integration organ" of the EC, was initially involved only marginally in the EPC. The seat of the EPC secretariat shifted every six months to the capital of the respective presidency of the EC.
The EPC was further developed at the Paris summit from 19 to 21 October 1972, where the term "European Union" first appeared as the goal for the process of integration. The foreign ministers of the member states were charged to investigate further possibilities for political cooperation with a view to continuing integration. The foreign ministers’ Copenhagen report on EPC of 23 July 1973 further consolidated EPC in institutional terms. Now foreign ministers meetings were to take place at least four times a year, and the work of the Political Committee was intensified through the establishment of a “Group of European Correspondents” and the creation of a direct system of communication, known as COREU (CORrespondance EUropéenne), between the foreign ministries. In addition, regional and thematic working groups on foreign-policy cooperation were set up. These structures remain to this day, although some have clearly changed since 1973.
Strengthening and expansion – the Single European Act
During the 1980s the EPC was continually expanded. For the time being, however, it remained, in principle, an area without a formal legal basis, outside the EC treaty text. In the Solemn Declaration on European Union made in Stuttgart on 19 June 1983, the Heads of State and Government of the EC member states – the European Council – announced their intention to strengthen and expand the EPC. For the first time, thought was also given to coordinating security-policy issues, albeit only the political and economic aspects of security. Defence and military issues were still excluded.
One milestone was the signing of the Single European Act (SEA) in 1986. It was also the foundation stone for the Treaty of Maastricht in 1992 and the third wave of accessions (Sweden, Austria and Finland). The SEA finally gave the EPC a legal basis. The EPC rules, which were previously common practice and which were developed in the reports of Luxembourg, Copenhagen and London and in the 1983 Solemn Declaration, were now expressly adopted as part of a Treaty text.
The EPC secretariat was given a permanent base in Brussels, ending the era of moving from capital to capital at the end of each Presidency. In Article 30 the governments pledged to elaborate and realize a European foreign policy and to avoid any action or position “which impairs (the Community’s) effectiveness in international relations”. Although further political efforts were still required before the CFSP was created, the institutional framework was in place and the road was clear. The dramatic upheavals of 1989 to 1991 provided the catalyst.
The Maastricht Treaty – the basis of the CFSP
Based on the conclusions of the Maastricht European Council in December 1991, the entry into force of the Treaty on European Union on 1 November 1993 turned European Political Cooperation (EPC) into the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP). Even the preamble to the Treaty emphasizes the CFSP’s importance: it helps to reinforce the European identity and its independence in order to promote peace, security and progress in Europe and in the world.
The European Union (EU) created by the Maastricht Treaty was able to take decisions in three different policy fields, the three "pillars" of the EU. The CFSP was the second pillar. It remained clearly separate from the first pillar’s “communitarized” field (the third pillar comprised the justice and home affairs field, which was also not communitarized). The CFSP is regulated in Title V of the Treaty on European Union. According to Article 11, the aims of the CFSP included the preservation of peace and the strengthening of international security, the promotion of international cooperation, the development and consolidation of democracy and the rule of law, and respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms.
To achieve these goals the “CFSP instruments” were introduced. Among these were the adoption of common positions (Article 15) and joint actions (Article 14). CFSP decisions could only be taken by the Council (later the Political and Security Committee (PSC) was also given such powers (see below)); the Member State currently holding the Presidency represented the Union abroad. The Presidency was supported by the Council Secretary-General, as well as by the Commission and, if necessary, by the country holding the next Presidency.
The Treaty of Amsterdam
This Treaty’s entry into force on 1 May 1999 further advanced the CFSP. It created the post of High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy.The High Representative was also Secretary-General of the Council. He was supported by the Policy Planning and Early Warning Unit, a newly-created body within the General Secretariat.
The High Representative assisted the current Council Presidency as regards contacts with third countries. By virtue of his position, he was a member of the “Troika” along with the foreign minister of the country holding the EU Presidency and the responsible representative of the Commission (generally the competent Commissioner or the Commission President himself). The foreign minister of the next country to hold the Presidency could also be asked to participate.
The new instruments
The Treaty of Amsterdam introduced a new legal instrument for the CFSP, the “common strategy” (Article 13 (2) in association with Article 23 (2) TEU).
A further indication of the continuing process of integration within the CFSP was the new competence of the Council (deriving from Amsterdam) to conclude agreements with third countries (Article 24 TEU), as well as a regulation laying down that the costs of measures under the CFSP were as a rule to be covered by the EU budget (Article 28 (3) TEU). Previously, such measures were financed by the participating states under the contribution procedure.
As a major precondition for the EU’s enhanced capacity for action in the field of non-military and military crisis management, the Treaty incorporated the “Petersberg tasks” of the Western European Union (WEU) into the CFSP and opens the prospect of the WEU’s full integration into the EU (Article 17 TEU).
The Treaty of Nice
The Nice Summit’s main task was to make the institutional changes required in the light of enlargement. While the CFSP was not fundamentally changed by the Treaty of Nice, the Treaty, signed on 26 February 2001, did contain some new regulations for that field:
References to the WEU were removed, that body having become obsolete through the development of the ESDP, defence policy was now an EU policy field in its own right (Article 17 TEU) although the close link to NATO was highlighted.
The Political Committee was replaced by the Political and Security Committee (PSC) meeting in Brussels; the Council could give the PSC operative decision-making powers for the command of crisis-management operations (Article 25 TEU).
EU Special Representatives could be appointed by a qualified majority (Article 23 (2) and Article 18 (5) TEU).
A Presidency Report on the European Security and Defence Policy, also adopted in Nice, further detailed the PSC’s composition and tasks, as well as those of a Military Committee (EUMC) and a Military Staff (EUMS) created to assist the PSC.
The CFSP in the Treaty of Lisbon
The Lisbon Treaty entered into force on 1 December 2009. The CFSP has been further strengthened. There is a new post of High Representative of the Union for the Foreign and Security Policy, who also acts as Vice-President of the Commission and functions as commissioner for external relations. He or she will be backed up by a new European External Action Service (EEAS). The post of High Representative is meant to increase the coherence of EU foreign-policy action, and combines the tasks performed under the Amsterdam Treaty by the (rotating) Presidency, the Commissioner for External Relations (who up to 2009 was Benita Ferrero-Waldner) and the High Representative for the CSFP (who from 1999 to November 2009 was Javier Solana).
Last updated 20.01.2010