NOREF - The Lisbon enigma: crisis management and coherence in the European Union

Home > Themes > Peacebuilding in practice > The Lisbon enigma: crisis management and coherence in the European Union

Author

Federico Santopinto

Federico Santopinto is a researcher at the Groupe de recherche et d’information sur la paix et la sécurité, Brussels (GRIP). He occasionally writes for Le Monde Diplomatique. He specialises in the European integration process in the field of defence and foreign policy, as well as in development c...
More

Related publications

Adapting Norwegian Civilian Capacity for the Future: Implications of the Guéhenno Report: John Karlsrud , 12 September 2011
Supranational governance: a challenge to building resilient states and peace: David Sogge , 8 September 2011
“We want our money back”: illicit financial outflows and political fragility as failures of global governance: David Sogge , 12 July 2011
Rethinking policy responses on fragile states: Fernanda Faria , 11 July 2011
Fragile states: a fluid concept for peacebuilding and statebuilding: Fernanda Faria , 6 July 2011
Measuring peacebuilding: challenges, tools, actions: Svein Erik Stave , 24 May 2011
The International Criminal Court in Africa: challenges and opportunities: Makau Mutua , 27 September 2010

Download full text

The Lisbon enigma: crisis management and coherence in the European Union

Federico Santopinto , 20 May 2010

Summary:

Before the adoption of the Treaty of Lisbon, the several crisis management tools at the European Union's disposal were divided between two institutions: the European Commission and the European Council. The commission represented the community (the first pillar), and the council the intergovernmental systems (the second pillar).

The creation of a new post of High Representative of the Union and the institution of a new External Action Service are intended to put an end to this commission-council dualism. The target of the reforms is clear: providing the EU with the capacity to adopt a comprehensive approach linking its several assets (including the military one) under a common, coherent, crisis management approach.

In reality the new provisions build a bridge between the competences of the commission and of the council. In particular, the coherence problem has been tackled by reinforcing the intergovernmental nature of the union’s external action, to the detriment of the community and supranational dimension.

However, several unanswered questions surround the Lisbon treaty, which show that the problem of coherence is still far from solved. The result is that beyond Europe’s borders, the commission could become now a two-headed creature.