“Can the EU be a credible international security actor without the integration of the Member States’ militaries?”

Abstract

Like a phoenix rising from the ashes, Europe emerged from World War Two as something akin to a new creation. Gone were the days of aggressive militarism and war, in its place would be civilian power and democracy; or so Europe hoped. The 20th and 21st Centuries have witnessed some of the most barbaric acts in human history; this barbarity has led Europe on a quest to form a truly integrated European defence force with which to bring peace and justice both within its own borders and also to the world. By utilising Jutta Weldes’ Constructivism framework, this thesis unravels and exposes the way in which the constructed identities of the European Union and its forbears have driven this quest in the post-war years; it also explores the interface between these identities and the EU’s relationship with NATO, the United States, and its own constituent Member States.