(EUBAM) Libya

ReSHAPE Online Papers Series, no. 03/13 – June 2013
The EU’s crisis management actorness and the Libyan crisis
The European Union’s role and capability in international actions has been changing
considerably in the last years. In 1992, the Maastricht Treaty created a range of mechanisms such as
the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and the European Security and Defense Policy
(ESDP). In 1999, at Helsinki, the European Council increased its commitment in building the EU’s
military and civilian capabilities in peace operations and post-conflict reconstruction.
Will the EU become a global actor in international crisis management
Since 2003, the EU has conducted civilian and military crisis management operations in the
framework of the European Security and Defense Policy (CSDP), spanning from police and border
assistance missions to robust military operations. In 2004, the EU created the border agency
FRONTEX to coordinate operations between member states in securing the external borders of the
Schengen area.
In 2007, the Lisbon Treaty, signed also to allow the EU to become a more effective global
actor, strengthened the role of the Common Security and Defense Policy (CSDP). Its remit was
expanded to include the processes of post-conflict stabilization, joint disarmament operations and
the “fight against terrorism”. Also, the Lisbon Treaty made two significant changes to the
framework established by the Amsterdam one: the advancement of the powers of the High
Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and the introduction of the
European External Action Service (EEAS), the diplomatic service of the Union under the authority
of the new High Representative. These changes represented an attempt to introduce new elements to
make the European Council more effective, consistent and transparent for the management of
foreign affairs and the CFSP. The gradual establishment of additional foreign and defense policy
competences at the European level, like crisis management, has been accomplished through a
progressive movement from intergovernmentalism to supranational decision-making, a disclosed
commitment to multilateralism and an increased role for supranational actors and institutions in
Brussels. Briefly, the European Union has “high strategic ambitions”. The question is “how to shift
from words to deeds”. Up to now, the accomplishments of such ambitions have been very modest,
sometimes insignificant. “Rubber stamping” and “upgrading documents” produced by diplomats
and the Ministers of Foreign Affairs, as Youri Devuyust remarks (2012).
Such a view some scholars share about the actorness of the EU and its legitimacy, however,
acknowledges the institutional changes introduced by the Treaty of Lisbon in the current years, and
looks at whether the Union is able to meet its ambitions to become “an actor capable of intervening
in all theatres of the world and of playing responsibility in all the major global institutions” (Attinà,
2011: 10). In other terms, it looks at understanding if the innovations introduced in 2009 will
improve the decision-making and leadership of the European Union, namely its effectiveness as a
global player in international crisis management.
Did the EU response to the 2011 Libyan crisis undermine the credibility of the CSDP
The EU response to the crisis situation in Lybia led some analysts to underline the lack of
unanimity and joint decisions and the Member States’ unilateralism in action. Some of them called
the Libyan crisis as the “death sentence” of the CSDP, or at least highlighted that the EU’s reaction
has undermined the credibility and effectiveness of the CSDP and of the newly-founded European
External Action Service (EEAS).
The crisis in Libya escalated at the beginning of 2011, less than 2 years after the Lisbon
Treaty came into force. On 1 April 2011, the Council of the EU adopted the decision to dispatch a
European Union military operation (EUFOR Libya) in “support of humanitarian assistance
Francesca Arcidiacono, EU Border Assistance Mission (EUBAM) Libya: Testing EU Actorness - 2