European Foreign Policy
Full course description
This course focuses on the development of the EU as a foreign policy actor. It does so by first conceptualising the EU and its foreign policy through the lenses of international relations, political science, and history. It also discusses the various institutions underpinning EU foreign policy. It then goes on to look at a variety of issues, such as the interaction between European integration on the one hand and the problems of global security and trade as well as challenges in the European neighbourhood and global governance. In the research workshop that is integrated in the course students do empirical research on a question relating to the external relations of the European Union and combine their empirical findings with theoretical insights gained during the seminars. Students are expected to apply either qualitative or quantitative research methods, which are taught in the methodology track. Hence the workshop is open to two types of research questions: first to those questions that are focused on specific instances of EU external relations that can be researched in case studies with process-tracing methods, such as the role of the European Parliament in the EU’s external relations, the evolution of the European External Action Service, or the coherence of EU policies in the Caucasus; or, second, on questions that aim to understand the systematic conditions that contextualize EU external action, for example in the field of humanitarian missions or international sanctions, which can be investigated in a large-n study.
Course objectives
- to acquire in-depth knowledge of the EU as an international actor in the context of a changing global environment;
- to acquire in-depth knowledge of the institutional architecture of EU external relations and governance, and its bilateral political and trade relations with major partners, as well as global challenges facing the EU
- to autonomously select and integrate the appropriate theories, concepts and scientific research methods from history, political science, international relations to analyse new research puzzles and questions related to the EU as an international actor in a changing global environment;
- to present a research project orally and in a written paper
Prerequisites
-
Recommended reading
Hill, Christopher, Smith, Michael and Vanhoonacker, Sophie (2023), International Relations and the European Union (4th edition) (Oxford: Oxford U.P.). Keukeleire, Stephan and Delreux, Tom (2022): The Foreign Policy of the European Union (3rd ed.) (London: Bloomsbury Academic).