On 25 October 2024, the Department of EU International Relations and Diplomacy Studies at the College of Europe, Bruges campus, organized a roundtable to discuss “‘Europe’s Choice’? Strategic Outlook on the EU’s New External Action Agenda”.
Amidst challenging times characterised by a more confrontational and transactional world and domestic contestation, the European Union (EU) is undergoing an institutional transition following the European Parliament elections of June 2024. How is this impacting the strategic outlook of the EU’s external action? Hardly ever has the EU faced a more volatile external environment, with great power competition and escalating conflicts looming in its neighbourhood, as well as long-term challenges like climate change and irregular migration, to name just a few. The forthcoming US presidential elections add another element of uncertainty for Europe. These developments create a strong need for effective EU responses.
This crucial moment of transition calls for a reflection on the EU’s external action for the second half of the 2020s. In its Strategic Agenda 2024-2029, the European Council indicates the willingness to create a “strong and secure Europe” by “ensuring coherent and influential external action”, notably through investing into defence and enlargement policies, as well as a “prosperous and competitive Europe”, inter alia by “making a success of the green and digital transitions” while upholding the social dimension and the EU’s core values. In her July 2024 Political Guidelines for the next European Commission 2024-2029, entitled ‘Europe’s Choice’, Commission President von der Leyen elaborates on this Strategic Agenda by underscoring that a “turbulent and potentially seismic period for Europe” lies ahead. Her Guidelines offer the prospects of an EU external action that, on the one hand, will continue to pursue earlier work around the 2022 Strategic Compass in the domain of security and defence policies while developing a “European Defence Union” – including the creation of the post of a “Commissioner for Defence” – and a “Preparedness Union Strategy”. On the other hand, EU external action is to be more generally geared towards a “global Europe” leveraging its power and partnerships by investing more resources into the enlargement process as a “geopolitical imperative”, developing a more strategic approach to the neighbourhood – including with a new Commissioner for the Mediterranean – and designing a “new economic foreign policy” that better integrates foreign and economic policies. What will these strategic impetuses mean for the EU’s global role and for those who represent it abroad, especially the new High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and Vice-President of the Commission (HR/VP)?
The roundtable discussion organised by the Department of EU International Relations and Diplomacy Studies (IRD) aimed to critically assess current plans and discuss the likely and desirable developments for the years to come. A first panel focussed on the ‘global Europe’ aspect, considering EU diplomacy and external action more broadly, whereas a second panel specifically zoomed in on security and defence matters (CFSP/CSDP). The roundtable braught together key experts of EU external action from the IRD faculty alongside IRD students to engage in a strategic outlook discussion. It in particular addressed the following guiding questions:
- What are the defining challenges for EU external action during the second half of the 2020s?
- To what extent are the priorities of the EU’s foreign policy agenda adequate in light of the challenges identified?
- What are likely elements of continuity and change in the EU’s strategic outlook and action, taking into account both external and internal preconditions for different scenarios?
- Finally, what should the new leadership team around Commission President von der Leyen, the designated HR/VP Kaja Kallas, and the new European Council President António Costa do to promote a coherent and strong external action?
The roundtable was open to all College of Europe students.
