Transworld. Transatlantic Relations and the Future of Global Governance

Project funded under the European Union’s 7th Framework Programme

TRANSWORLD is a consortium of 13 academic and research centres from the EU, the US and Turkey formed to research the evolution of the transatlantic relationship and its role in shaping global governance architectures. TRANSWORLD is going to unfold for three and a half years, started in March 2012.

In an era of global flux, emerging powers and growing interconnectedness, transatlantic relations appear to have lost their bearings. As the international system fragments into different constellations of state and non-state powers across different policy domains, the US and the EU can no longer claim exclusive leadership in global governance. Not only the ability, but also the willingness of the US and the EU to exercise leadership together can no longer be taken for granted. Political, economic, and social elites on both shores of the Atlantic express different views on whether the US and the EU should be bound together, freelance, or seek alternative partnerships in a confusing multipolar world. Traditional paradigms to understand the transatlantic relationship are thus wanting. A new approach is needed to pinpoint the direction transatlantic relations are taking.

By combining an inter-disciplinary analysis of transatlantic relations, including desk research, in-depth interviews, an elite survey and a sophisticated Delphi exercise to elaborate solid policy proposals, TRANSWORLD would:

a) ascertain, differentiating among four policy domains (economic, security, environment, and human rights/democracy), whether transatlantic relations are drifting apart, adapting along an ad hoc cooperation-based pattern, or evolving into a different but resilient special partnership;

b) assess the role of a re-defined transatlantic relationship in the global governance architecture; c) provide tested policy recommendations on how the US and the EU could best cooperate to enhance the viability, effectiveness, and accountability of governance structures. In so doing, TRANSWORLD would contribute to an inter-disciplinary transatlantic research area, with in-built connections to policy-making.

Sciences Po and TRANSWORLD

Sciences Po’s CERI is the leader of Work Package 3 (WP3) that deals with transatlantic security relations. Within CERI the leading researchers working in Transworld are Anne-Marie Le Gloannec, Bastien Irondelle (✝), David Cadier, and Manuel Muniz. American University in Washington DC, Charles University in Prague, the European University Institute in Florence, the Free University of Berlin and Sabanci University of Istanbul are the other partners within this Work Package.

WP3’s main objective is to, focusing on long-term trends in the global security context and policy adjustments made by the US and the EU, assess whether in the field of international security the transatlantic relationship is:

a) drifting apart;
b) a functional partnership;
c) an enduring partnership.

In order to arrive at conclusions regarding the three main hypotheses being tested by the TRANSWORLD project, WP3 will produce various pieces of research and build upon the work of other Work Packages.

Firstly, CERI, will review and analyse the principal trends and leadership challenges within international security. Based on a secondary 
literature review, the first task of WP3 is to assess how the international security context has changed, and whether it could be described as multipolar, non-polar or interpolar. The product of this research is a report that was completed at the end of 2012 and is now available here.

Secondly, WP3 will analyse EU and US adjustment policies to emerging and changing trends in international security, assessing the extent to which the two (including EU member states) have coordinated their policies. Methodologically, WP3 researchers will draw on official sources, secondary literature and interviews with government, EU institutions and NATO officials, as well as crosschecking interviews with academics, journalists and analysts. The final product, due in mid 2013, will be two separate but easily comparable documents; one on EU adjustment policies drafted by Charles University, and a second on US adjustment written by American University.

Thirdly, CERI and its partners will contribute to the elaboration of a questionnaire for the elite survey that will be undertaken by Work Package 8 at the end of 2013 and beginning of 2014. This ambitious survey of close to 1.000 policymakers and academics will be an important component of TRANSWORLD, and will elite perceptions about key issues across the Atlantic. WP3 has completed its contribution to this questionnaire and made sure that it probes into the actors and factors shaping EU and US external security policies, as well as the goals, means and action patterns embedded in these policies.

Fourthly, WP3, led by the Free University of Berlin, will produce in early 2014 a report on US-EU convergence/divergence patterns in the various security conflicts of the 1990s and 2000s on the basis of the newspaper analysis.

With al the work above completed, WP3 will be in a position to produce its capstone paper in mid 2014. Drawing on the results of
tasks 1, 2 and 4, and the analysis of the survey results, WP3 will consider how the
transatlantic security relationship has changed, in terms of policies and perceptions, identifying EU and US patterns of convergence and divergence. As a result, WP3 would be in the position to validate one or more of the hypotheses driving TRANSWORLD’s work, thereby proceeding to a redefinition of the transatlantic security relationship as:

a) structural drift;
b) functional partnership;
c) enduring partnership.

Publications of Workpackage 3

Transworld Paper n° 13
Edited by Anne Marie Le Gloannec, Bastien Irondelle (✝) and David Cadier

Transworld Working Papers n°38: Redifining the Transatlantic Security Relationship by Anne Marie Le Gloannec and Manuel Ruiz

Document prepared for the Istituto Affari Internazionali (IAI) in the framework of theTransworld project.

Abstract: The transatlantic security relationship is built on strong and enduring shared values. Americans and Europeans share, on the whole, similar perceptions about the nature of power, the norms that should guide relations among states, as well as a desire to promote democracy and basic human rights. The US and Europe also share most of their security objectives, this being particularly true when speaking of non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and tackling state weakness around the world. Not surprisingly, therefore, our elite survey revealed that elites across the Atlantic are supportive of each other's role in maintaining international security, and wish to remain partners through NATO. However, the partnership is exposed to a serious risk of fragmentation driven by changes in the international landscape, mainly the rise of multipolarity and the emergence of China as a major security player in East Asia, and by events with significant internal implications such as the financial crisis that started in 2007 and the subsequent Eurozone crisis and the emergence or multiplication of crises from Libya and Mali to the Middle East and Ukraine. These developments could easily pull the transatlantic partners in different directions, perhaps more so than any other change of the past half-century, creating tensions between the two, and bringing into question the usefulness of their alliance.

Click here to download the full version of the paper: http://www.iai.it/content.asp?langid=2&contentid=1172

See also Transworld Op-Ed "Article 5 under stress?"  by Anne Marie Le Gloannec, published on October 13th  : http://www.transworld-fp7.eu/?cat=20

For further information, go to the program website