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Why have European leaders repeatedly advocated an EU defence capacity yet so often fallen short of their ambitions, and how does EU defence function alongside NATO? Focusing on three defining periods of EU defence integration (1999, 2004, and 2016), this paper draws on archival material and elite interviews to reassess when and why integration advances. Building on insights from psychological approaches in International Relations, it shows that major institutional steps tend to cluster around moments of acute political strain rather than clear shifts in the external threat environment. This perspective unsettles dominant strategic and institutionalist accounts and opens new questions about the drivers, limits, and consequences of European defence cooperation.
Dr John Helferich is a researcher at Pembroke College’s Global Security Programme and a Lecturer in Politics at Hertford College, University of Oxford. His research focuses on Euro-Atlantic security cooperation and transformations in global order.
