This article does not question whether the EU has a strategic culture, but rather asks how one can investigate its nature. It creates and utilizes an analytical framework to demonstrate that the European Union's strategic culture is based on an extended concept of security and on a comprehensive, multilateral and internationally legitimated approach to threats, implying the use of military and civilian instruments in an integrated manner on over 20 common security and defence policy (CSDP) operations. It suggests that the analytical framework can also act as a stable reference point to compare and contrast the strategic cultures of a range of actors.

The present article argues that a strategic culture is rising at the moment within the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) and provides empirical evidence of its emergence. This research thus applies an original and multilevel analytical framework to the CSDP, based on the operational level, related to the study of the European Union (EU) field interventions, on the top-down institutional level, focused on the analysis of institutional documents and CSDP exercises, and on the bottom-up institutional level, concentrated on the socialization process among the political actors involved in the CSDP in the framework of the Political and Security Committee, taken as a case study. The present article shows that elements of an emergent strategic culture within the CSDP can be found among those that are consistent to these three levels of analysis. By using an innovative and structured research method backed up by empirical findings, this article aims at deepening the still restricted debate on the nature of the EU strategic culture.

L’Union européenne (UE) importe aujourd’hui environ 50% de l’énergie qu’elle consomme. La sécurisation de l’approvisionnement énergétique est désormais à l’ordre du jour de son agenda sécuritaire. Face à ce défi, l’UE développe une approche intégrée qui se fonde d’une part sur des politiques internes, promouvant, entre autres, l’efficacité énergétique, les énergies renouvelables et le marché intérieur de l’énergie. Elle se base, d’autre part, sur des politiques extérieures, visant à diversifier l’approvisionnement énergétique et à créer un cadre réglementé dans les relations énergétiques extérieures de l’UE. L’article dresse ainsi un bilan de ces actions. Il montre également dans quelle mesure, face à cette menace non conventionnelle, l’UE agit comme un acteur sui generis, transposant sur la scène internationale son modèle fondé sur le dialogue, la coopération et l’interdépendance constructive.

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