Where collective security is concerned, the relationship between the European Union and the United Nations is at the heart of a paradox in the construction of Europe that has been there since the Schuman Declaration in 1950: that of an undertaking of a universal character but of regional application. This fundamental document for the building of Europe clearly establishes the link between a united Europe and the preservation of world peace. Transposed more than 50 years on, this concept resonates to the notion whereby the problems of our post-bipolar world are transnational and complex, and ought therefore to be resolved in multilateral and global fashion. Whilst obviously relevant, this link also has the merit of putting into perspective the distinction between regional and global security. Thus the security and the prosperity of European citizens depend on factors well beyond the Union’s own territorial limits, and beyond that, even, of its near-neighbours. In consequence, the development of European capabilities in security matters is not limited by their regional identity. This is why Chapter VIII of the UN Charter, devoted to collaboration with regional organizations, apart from its extreme vagueness, is of no help in the recent strengthening of relationships between the UN and the EU in many areas, including that of peacekeeping, or, in European terminology, in ‘crisis management’ operations. These are mounted randomly, initially at the instigation of the European Commission and then of the General Secretariat of the Council of the EU (GSC) from the year 2000, according to the institutional and bureaucratic appropriateness of the moment.

In the EU’s declaratory policy, this EU-UN relationship is presented as a ‘natural partnership’, as a part of the ‘added value’ that the EU brings to the UN. However, as we shall see, the reality is more complex. Closer analysis reveals the importation by the General Secretariat of UN rhetoric in the implementation of ‘European crisis management’, chiefly in its military aspects. It would therefore appear that the legitimising of Europe’s defence dimension has in large part benefited from UN impetus in a context where the use of military force was not taken for granted—was even something of a taboo subject—within the architecture of European security. This leads us to question the nature of Europe’s defence dimension under construction.

The EU and the UN: a ‘Natural Partnership’?

In the first instance, the nature of the EU/UN relationship might seem obvious, by virtue of the similarity in the values on which the two organizations are based. During his visit to European institutions in January 2004, Kofi Annan spoke of this relationship as a ‘natural partnership’. From the EU viewpoint, this is not limited to putting forward the Union’s experience as an organization for reconciliation on a continental scale, but equally the development of its know-how in a number of fields, as well as its ability to coordinate and be more effective. That means that in the area of conflict management, Europe aims to be able to do everything, offer everything, from conflict prevention to the post-conflict phase, through its own management, of course, which can include as necessary the use of armed force.