‘Solana Milieu’: Framing Security Policy

Abstract

The aim of this article is to contribute to a better understanding of the process of security policy production at the Brussels level. Two points are made. First, it is shown that in order to grasp the logic of policy outcomes it is crucial to analyse the major actors in the field, the patterns of the interaction they forge and the notions that inform their political action. I single out an entity, which I call the Solana milieu, and illustrate how this environment has become a significant policy entrepreneur in the realm of EU's security policy. I propose that a dynamic approach to frame analysis is useful to unravel the modus operandi of this ambience. In particular, it offers a way beyond the oft-repeated criticism of policy incoherence whose elimination would allegedly bring a remedy to the under-performance in the EU's security policy. It argues instead that policy controversies are inevitable due to the institutional identities that are at play. Secondly, the investigation into one security-making field illustrates the inherent politicisation of the process, which nuances the argument about the inevitable shift away from ‘normal politics’ when security questions arise.

Key Words:

• Security politics
• European Security and Defence Policy
• framing
• institutional entrepreneurship
• Solana milieu

Notes

¹ Article 26 of the Treaty on the EU.

² British–French Joint Declaration at the St Malo Summit, 3–4 December 1998, in: European Defence: Core Documents, Chaillot Paper 47 (Paris: Institute for Security Studies, Western European Union).

³ This premise derives from the assumption underlying symbolic interactionism that meaning arises out of social (institutional) interaction (Blumer, 1969).

⁴ ‘A Secure Europe in a Better World’, The EU Security Strategy, Brussels, 12 December 2003.

⁵ Financial Times, 15 April 2003.

⁶ For an argument along similar lines, see Menon (2004).

⁷ Interview with an EC research fellow, Florence, November 2005.

⁸ Interview within the team of EC Representative to the PSC, Brussels, November 2005.

⁹ Interview with a Council Secretariat functionary, Turin, 8 February 2007.

¹⁰ Based on the analysis of Solana speeches and interventions between 2000 and 2008, available at http://www.consilium.europa.eu/App/Solana/default.aspx?lang=EN&id=246.

¹¹ These summary conclusions are based on a series of repeated interviews between July 2005 and February 2007 with functionaries involved to different degrees in ESDP making.

¹² Interview with a functionary from Secretariat General of the Council of the EU, Policy Unit, Turin, 8 February 2007.

¹³ Interview with a functionary from DGE 5, Secretariat General of the Council of the EU, Brussels, 14 November 2005.

¹⁴ For an overview, see, e.g. ‘Introducing CPCC’, ESDP newsletter, 6, July 2008, pp. 24–5. Available at http://consilium.europa.eu/uedocs/cmsUpload/pages24-25-CEU8003ESDP6final_vers.pdf (accessed 10 July 2009).

¹⁵ Ibid.

¹⁶ See Kurowska (2008a) and Kurowska and Tallis (2009) for concrete illustrations of this.

¹⁷ Interview with an EC desk officer, Relex, Brussels, 11 April 2006.

¹⁸ As for the military operations, they are financed according to the ‘Athena’ framework finalised between February 2004 and January 2005.

¹⁹ Interview with a member state diplomat, Brussels, 14 November 2005.

²⁰ Interview with a functionary from DGE 9, Secretariat General of the Council of the EU, Turin, 10 February 2007.

²¹ Final Report, International Workshop ‘The Role of the EU in Civilian Crisis Management’, Vienna, 12 and 13 January 2006.

²² Article 47 of TEU reads as follows:

• Subject to the provisions amending the Treaty establishing the European Economic Community with a view to establishing the European Community, the Treaty establishing the European Coal and Steel Community and the Treaty establishing the European Atomic Energy Community, and to these final provisions, nothing in this Treaty shall affect the Treaties establishing the European Communities or the subsequent Treaties and Acts modifying or supplementing them.

²³ Action brought on 21 February 2005 by the European Commission against the Council of the EU, Official Journal C115, 14.05.2005, p. 10.

²⁴ I fail to engage in a thorough discussion here although the interpretation of the judgment is yet to prove crucial for this ambiguous situation. For a substantial analysis of the judgment and its possible implications, see van Vooren (2009).

²⁵ Interview with Professor Marise Cremona, Florence, 11 September 2007.

²⁶ Ibid.

²⁷ Interview with the EC representative to the CIVCOM, Brussels, 24 November 2005.