Europa

The Ukraine War, the New Geopolitics of Energy, and Norway

This study aims to address the question of how Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 has changed patterns of regional and global energy interactions and how this influences perceptions of Norway as a major regional energy actor. To examine these important questions, we will proceed in the following manner. In the first part of this study, we will present our operational understanding of the key concepts shaping our thinking about the relationship between the geopolitical and geoeconomic aspects of international cooperation and rivalry. Here we also will discuss the role of various national instruments of power in the pursuit of geopolitical and geoeconomic objectives. In the second part we narrow the scope of this examination to shed light on the relationship between geopolitics and energy in global and regional contexts, paying special attention to trends shaping the international energy game. This includes the changing role of Russia; how green energy transition reshapes international energy cooperation and how old and new energy-related policy instruments are evolving in this rapidly changing energy landscape. In addition, we also examine the nature of the old and new threats to energy flows, particularly those related to critical energy infrastructure. In the third part of this study, we examine the direct and indirect impacts the Russian war against Ukraine has had on energy markets and what implications these recent developments have for the position of Norway as a major energy actor. Norway’s importance for energy consumers, especially in Europe, has increased because of the war. Although the global energy trends discussed in the previous section also influence Norway and Europe, the focus in the latter section is on the regional dimension as Norway’s energy supplies reach first and foremost Europe. Finally, we examine possible scenarios that may influence energy markets and geopolitical conditions, with special attention paid to global factors with the potential to cause serious shifts. Part of the focus is on possible technological breakthroughs that may change the parameters of the international energy interactions and undermine the position of traditional energy producers and exporters.

Fra partnere til allierte: Finland og Norge i en ny æra

Finlands beslutning om å søke NATO-medlemskap i 2022 endret nordisk sikkerhet og forsvarsdynamikk. Det påvirket også Finlands forhold til sine naboland, inkludert Norge. I denne policy briefen analyserer vi utviklingen i forholdet mellom Finland og Norge – historisk og i nyere tid. Naboskapet har alltid vært fredelig, men ulike sikkerhetspolitiske tilnærminger skapte politisk avstand mellom dem under den kalde krigen. Etter den kalde krigens slutt ble forskjellene mindre, noe som reflekteres også i økt nordisk sikkerhetssamarbeid, finsk og svensk deltakelse i NATO-øvelser, og, i senere år, nye forsvarsavtaler med hverandre og med Sverige og USA. Etter Finlands NATO-inntreden har begge land uttrykt en forventning om ytterligere forsterket finsk-norsk samarbeid. Vi identifiserer flere potensielle samarbeidsområder i årene som kommer, herunder forvaltningen av felles institusjonelle rammeverk, sikkerhetsutfordringer i Arktis og Østersjøregionene, den fremtidige relasjonen med USA og tilnærmingen til et mer uforutsigbart Russland.

The EU Trapped in the Venezuelan Labyrinth: Challenges to Finding a Way Out

This report explores how EU Foreign and Security Policy towards the political crisis in Venezuela can be assessed against the backdrop of diverging positions within the EU and as well as between the EU, the United States and other powers. The EU’s Venezuela policy has been anchored in three main pillars: first, supporting dialogue platforms between the government and the opposition; second, sanctioning the Maduro regime to force it to negotiate; and third, providing humanitarian aid helping neighbouring countries’ attend to the massive migratory flow of Venezuelans. Intra-EU contestation was linked to the recognition of opposition leader Guaidó as Venezuela’s interim president in 2019, but has eased since the EU dropped its recognition in 2021. Multipolar competition, and how it plays into patterns of regional fragmentation, has been another significant obstacle to the EU achieving its main foreign policy goal of free, fair and democratic elections. In the future, the EU approach should build on the renewed consensus between member states and focus on mediation, conditional sanctions relief, electoral observation, parliamentary diplomacy, support for regional governance and interregional cooperation.

Public Policy Europeanisation in Response to the Covid‐19 Crisis: The Case of Job Retention Schemes

To what extent and how did the Covid-19-pandemic trigger the Europeanisation of public policy in the EU member states? This article addresses this question by exploring member states’ responses to the labour market implications of the pandemic. Although the EU due to its free movement principles in effect has a common labour market, labour market policies have remained in the hands of the member states. Nonetheless, we find that they responded in a surprisingly similar manner to rising unemployment caused by lockdowns. Was this policy change linked to Europeanisation processes, and if so, in what way? We find that member states’ responses were related both to economic incentives and to contingent learning playing out in largely informal settings at the EU level. Our findings shed light on how crises may function as a critical juncture that triggers policy change, and how the EU may play a key role in such change. Our study thus also adds insights to our understanding of the mechanisms that underpin Europeanisation, in particular by shedding light on the importance of informal learning processes and the influence of the European Commission also in formally less integrated policy areas.

Constraints, Dilemmas and Challenges for EU Foreign Policy in Venezuela

Years of increasingly authoritarian rule and economic mismanagement by President Nicolás Maduro have turned Venezuela into a source of regional instability. The European Union’s (EU) main foreign policy objective towards the country has been a peaceful transition to free and transparent elections and its re-introduction into regional and global trade and political frameworks. The strategies pursued by the EU to mitigate the constraints on its foreign policy towards Venezuela have helped to bring about more EU unity, but have failed to have a significant impact in the country itself. Multipolar competition between the EU and the United States (US) on the one hand and between the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and Russia on the other, have undermined the EU’s attempts to contribute a peaceful solution to the process. Most recently, the war on Ukraine has created a new dilemma for the EU in its dealings with Venezuela, that is, having to navigate between maintaining pressure on the Maduro regime, keeping up momentum for negotiations and deciding whether to follow the US in resuming oil trade with Caracas to mitigate the energy crisis in Europe.

European Actorness in a Shifting Geopolitical Order. European Strategic Autonomy Through Differentiated Integration

This is an open access book. Over the past decade, the global geopolitical context has changed significantly, with a geopolitical power shift and a more assertive Russia and China. With the unprovoked Russian invasion of Ukraine, European security has been put on high alert. The implications of the Russian military invasion are many and difficult to grasp in full. But the need for greater European strategic autonomy appears increasingly evident. But how can this be achieved in the short run? The answer to this question is often that it is impossible and that this can only be achieved in the long run. The aim of this book is to present a different perspective. It aims at showing that it should be possible to make the most out of the current European system if we adjust our understanding of how it works. The book argues that strategic autonomy may be reached—also in the short run—if differentiated integration is seen as an asset rather than a challenge. While the EU remains the core in such a system (together with NATO in the military domain), there is a multitude of other (bilateral and minilateral) regional and sub-regional integration processes that need to be taken into account to get the full idea of how European strategic autonomy can be achieved. This book starts by presenting a theoretical framework for how to study European actorness beyond the EU, then this framework will be applied both to the development towards the EU as a foreign policy actor through the mechanisms of enlargement.

EUs respons på krigen i Ukraina