Notions of the power associated with the European Union's foreign policy and its role in international relations are mostly liberal in origin. This explains the EU's special role in the Cold War era and that it has since emerged more as a moral, ethical and normative power. The EU's lack of military capability has probably been the main cause that prevents it from acting as a great or superpower. The distinction between materialistic and immaterial elements of power has been a crucial point of contention between realists and liberal thinkers. In international relations, we are also witnessing the trend of the EU increasingly using the geopolitical approach (such as in the Ukrainian crisis) besides the normative one. In the article, different concepts of EU foreign policy regarding power in the light of realism and liberalism are compared where, alongside the descriptive method, a SWOT analysis is performed. Keywords: realism, liberalism, power, European Union, Ukraine, foreign policy, international relations
Spremembe v mednarodni skupnosti po koncu hladne vojne so mednarodne institucije, ki delujejo na področju zagotavljanja miru in varnosti, postavile pred nove izzive, ki so izpostavili pomanjkljivost obstoječh norm, mehanizmov in konceptualnega aparata za naslavljanje novih varnostnih groženj. Mednarodne institucije se težko spopadajo z modernimi varnostnimi grožnjami, med katere spadajo tudi etnični konflikti, hkrati pa je proces prepoznavanja varnostnih groženj kompleksen. Magistrska naloga skozi študijo primera delovanja Varnostnega sveta in Organizacije za varnost in sodelovanje v Evropi v ukrajinskem konfliktu preučuje, kako pojmovanje varnosti mednarodnih institucij vpliva na upravljanje (etničnih) konfliktov. Naloga pokaže, da sodobno pojmovanje varnosti presega dojemanje države kot edinega relevatnega referenčnega objekta varnosti in da je varnost intersubjektivna kategorija, ki odpira vprašanje glede procesa prepoznavanja (novih) varnostnih groženj. Posledično pojmovanje varnosti vpliva na diskurz in delovanje akterjev. Na primeru Varnostnega sveta tako vidimo, da se države članice zavedajo pomena vzpostavljene prakse delovanja, ki izhaja iz pojmovanja varnosti dotične institucije, ter njenega vpliva na odločanje v Varnostnem svetu. OVSE pa kljub prepoznavanju kršitev določenih prvin varnosti v praksi te kršitve težko naslavlja. Naloga pokaže tudi, kako specializirano znanje posameznih institucij vpliva na diskurz držav v teh institucijah ter da pojmovanje varnosti v posameznih institucijah ni statično, temveč rezultat nenehnih (re)interpretacij. ; Changes in the international community after the end of the Cold War have led international institutions working in the field of peace and security to face new challenges that have highlighted the disadvantage of existing norms, mechanisms and conceptual apparatus for addressing new security threats. International institutions are struggling to deal with modern security threats, including ethnic conflicts, while the process of identifying security threats is complex. The master's thesis examines how the concept of security of international institutions influences the management of (ethnic) conflicts through a study of the functioning of the Security Council and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe in the Ukrainian conflict. Thesis demonstrates that modern concept surpasses the perception of the state as the only relevant referent object of security and that security is an intersubjective category that raises the issue of the process of identifying (new) security threats. As a consequence the concept of security affects the discourse and the functioning of the actors. In the case of the Security Council, we can see that Member States are aware of the importance of the established practice, which stems from the concept of security of the institution, and its impact on decision-making in the Security Council. Despite the recognition of violations of certain elements of security in practice, the OSCE has difficulty addressing this violation. The thesis also shows how the specialized knowledge of individual institutions influences the discourse of states in these institutions, and that the concept of security in individual institutions is not static, but the result of continuous (re)interpretations.
