Cosmic top secret Europe? The legacy of North Atlantic Treaty Organization and cold war US policy on European Union information policy

Abstract

As the EU has expanded its authority into areas of high politics such as monetary, defense, and foreign policy, it has simultaneously developed procedures for handling more sensitive and classified information. These critical policy domains require standards regulating secure information and personnel, but the concept of official secrets is in tension with the treaty norms of the EU. Observers allege that the classified information policy of the EU was imposed through the coercion of external actors such as North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the USA in a significant historical departure from the information security policies of European member states. This article evaluates the content of EU-classified information policies and compares them to the content of European member states, NATO, and the USA, in an effort to clarify the mechanisms of policy diffusion in the area of information security. IntroductionAs the European Union has matured as a political institution, it has increasingly struggled with matters of information security and the handling of sensitive documents. Policy domains previously at the level of the nation state, including defense and homeland security, are critical areas that inevitably require the protection of information and the regulation of personnel for information access. EU policy activity in internal and external security has necessitated a system of classifying sensitive documents and personnel. EU counterterrorism policies such as the 2010 Terrorist Finance Tracking Program (TFTP) and the 2006 Data Retention Directive have expanded the scope of EU security authority and intensified direct EU interaction with third parties such as the USA. Sensitive policy domains require trusted documents, vetted personnel, and carefully regulated channels of information sharing between individuals, states, and agencies.Although the EU has developed security and defense capabilities for over a decade, current EU-US developments such as the agreement on terrorist financing highlighted EU information policy. A debate in 2010 over TFTP attracted the attention of transparency groups over the implementation of the EU-US Agreement. TFTP is a US Treasury Department program designed to track suspected terrorist financial transactions, and the Agreement over TFTP bank data exchange with the EU was negotiated with the *

Organizational Competence of Nato Information Security Policy

“…Today, they have become their foundation, first source, main resource and primary weapon. A volume research on country's information security policies and activity in the security aspect of the North Atlantic Alliance is presented in (Geers, 2011;Glyn, 2018;Kaija, Schilde 2014;Kempf, 2011;Shipan and Volden, 2008;Ključnikov, Mura, Sklenár, 2019).…”

Secrecy and the making of CFSP

“…Scholars often refer to the fact that NATO's old classification system was imported into the EU, and not sufficiently updated since (Curtin 2014). For example, Kaija Schilde (2015) argues that the European classification system tends to conflict with EU norms espoused in the treaties, which grant EU citizens the 'widest possible access' to documents. Indeed, it is clear that the number of documents kept secret from the public is growing over time.…”

“…In a time when populist groups frequently attack the European Union (EU) for its lack of transparency and elitism, citizens in other countries readily buy the narrative that the EU is opaque and unaccountable, and the term 'democratic deficit' is routinely invoked among EU experts to describe its problems, questions surrounding the role of secrecy in EU governance have taken on a new sense of urgency. Even though public opinion consistently favors strengthening CFSP (Howorth 2007;Eurobarometer), numerous studies have documented the degree to which it lacks full transparency compared to other areas of EU policy for which public scrutiny is much more possible (Bicchi 2014;Curtin 2014;Galloway 2014;Huff 2015;Schilde 2015;Stie 2010). There certainly exists a 'secret EU' in the security, defense, and foreign policy realm.…”

Europe's Foreign Policy and the Nature of Secrecy

“…In a time when populist groups frequently attack the European Union (EU) for its elitism and lack of transparency, questions surrounding the role of secrecy in EU governance have taken on a new sense of urgency. Citizens in other countries readily buy the narrative that the EU is opaque and unaccountable, and the term 'democratic deficit' is routinely invoked among EU experts to describe its problems, Even though public opinion consistently favors strengthening the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) (Howorth 2007; European Commission 2016, numerous studies have documented the degree to which it lacks full transparency compared to other areas of EU policy for which public scrutiny is much more possible (Bicchi 2014;Curtin 2014;Galloway 2014;Huff 2015;Schilde 2015;Stie 2010). There certainly exists a 'secret EU' in the security, defense, and foreign policy realm.…”