Neorealism and the scope for efficiency in European military cooperation
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the policies of the second Trump administration have forced NATO’s European allies to reconsider how they cooperate for their security and how they might do so more efficiently. Yet while their rationale for deeper military cooperation is clear, the scope for its realisation is far less so. Where are the opportunities? What are its limits? Neither scholars nor analysts have yet explained why the existing patchwork of intra-European initiatives for the generation and use of military capabilities takes the form it does. Theoretical explanation is difficult because although Europeans jealously guard their autonomy in some areas, in others they are content to accept mutual dependence. This article therefore develops and deploys a model based on neorealist theory which can explain these patterns of cooperation, and thus its scope, actual and potential, among European NATO allies. It shows how cooperative initiatives can be identified, classified and explained according to the effects of specific configurations of system-level variables. In doing so, the article demonstrates that while there are profound structural limits on deeper military cooperation, variable systemic conditions may allow for efficiency gains through mutually dependent forms of capability cooperation such as specialisation and sharing.
Meet our speaker
Dr Ben Jones is Teaching Fellow in European Foreign Policy. He holds a BA Politics from the University of Sheffield (1999) and an MPhil in History of Political Thought from the University of Cambridge (2000). He was awarded his PhD in European Studies at King's College, London with a thesis on military capability cooperation in contemporary Europe (2018). Prior to his return to academia, he worked in various roles in politics and public affairs in Brussels and London, including positions in the European Commission and European Parliament, and as Foreign Affairs and Defence Adviser to the Liberal Democrats at Westminster. He is an alumnus of the US ‘Young European Leader’ International Visitor Leadership Programme and was a Visiting Fellow at the EU Institute for Security Studies, where he authored an Occasional Paper, the first major analysis of the Franco-British ‘Lancaster House’ treaties on defence and security cooperation (2011).
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