The EU as a Multilateral Security Actor after Lisbon: Constitutional and Institutional Aspects

Abstract

Two years since the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty the implementation of the constitutional and institutional changes it introduced is ongoing. This paper examines the potential and actual implications of these novelties for the capacity of the European Union (EU) to act as an effective multilateral security actor, placing special emphasis on coordination, flexibility and coherence in the areas of Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP). The structure is twofold. First, the main constitutional changes to the areas of CFSP and CSDP will be examined in a critical light. The legal personality of the EU, its crosscutting external relations objectives,

Democratization of the United Nations: What is Expected of India and the European Union?

“…The participation of the HR and, in practice, of the head of the Union delegation at the UN in New Yorkis, from the UN side, founded on Rule 39 of the provisional rules of procedure of the UNSC, which still, remains a weak basis. The facts that other EU Member States sitting in the UNSC also took the floor, just after the HR, mostly repeating what the HR had said, demonstrates that Member States are not willing to give up their national voice, even after an EU stance is reached and Article 34(2) TEU does notprovide for coordination between all Member States, but only for concertation between those sitting on the UNSC and for full information vis-à-vis the others, remain a serious handicap for EU 'actorness' in the UNSC [4].…”