Enhanced Cooperation and the Common Foreign and Security and Defence Policies of the EU

The aim of this paper is the study of the enhanced cooperation mechanism in the framework of the Lisbon Treaty as it applies to the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) of the EU. The concept of enhanced cooperation was introduced into the EU Treaty structure by the Treaty of Amsterdam, although initially the CFSP was excluded. The Treaty of Nice extended a limited possibility of enhanced cooperation to the CFSP, while still excluding from its scope all ‘matters having military or defence implications’. The Treaty of Lisbon, at the same time as emphasising solidarity and the building of a common policy, accepts the extension of enhanced cooperation and flexibility into the defence sphere. The object of this paper, as well as outlining the ways in which enhanced cooperation has applied to the CFSP and the ways in which this will be affected by the Treaty of Lisbon, is to examine the extent to which foreign policy, security and defence lend themselves to enhanced cooperation and other forms of flexibility. The conclusion is that there is a need to distinguish between foreign policy and defence; the development of an active and credible EU foreign policy cannot readily accommodate differentiated integration as it depends for its force not primarily on either legally binding instruments or coercion but on political weight. On the other hand, military and defence capacities and initiatives are perhaps inherently differentiated.