Resisting domestic and external pressure towards de-Europeanization of foreign policy? The case of Estonia

ABSTRACT

Up to 2019, Estonia’s EU policy and foreign policy were based on a strong domestic political consensus. From April 2019 to January 2021, Estonia was led by a government coalition including a Eurosceptic populist party, which brought visible cracks to this consensus. The coalition agreement assured continuity in Estonia’s foreign and EU policies, but the statements of some representatives of the coalition repeatedly brought this into question. During the same period, Estonia was faced with external pressure to de-Europeanize: the change and volatility of US foreign policy under Donald Trump put Estonia in a very uncomfortable position, on the one hand, striving to maintain strong relations with its most important security ally, while on the other hand trying to resist the negative impact of Trump’s policies on the EU, NATO and multilateral cooperation. This article analyzes the drivers, indicators and consequences of the de-Europeanization of Estonian foreign policy, resulting from these internal and external pressures.

KEYWORDS:

• Estonia
• Europeanization
• de-Europeanization
• foreign policy
• identity politics

Acknowledgments

This article is based upon work from COST-Action ENTER (CA17119), supported by COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. 67% of citizens voted for EU membership in the referendum on 14 September 2003, but throughout 1995–2002, opinion polls indicated considerably lower levels of support (Raik 2003, 237).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the European Cooperation in Science and Technology [COST Action EU Foreign Policy Facing New Realities].