Analizės lygmenų problema Europos Sąjungos užsienio politikos ir tarptautinio vaidmens studijose ; The level-of-analysis problem in studying the European union's foreign policy and international role
The European Union's international influence and external policies are very difficult to analyze using the traditional International Relations theoretical toolkit. Although the EU's international actorness is still disputed within the academic discourse, the study of its external actions and policies is nonetheless subject to the oldest methodological puzzle of IR discipline – the so-called level-of-analysis problem. This article provides an overview of the contemporary research programme on EU's international role as a selection of different levels of analysis. In the end it is suggested that studying the EU's external impacts and policies requires a modification of the level-of-analysis debate itself by putting a special emphasis on the regional level and regional actorness. There is also a call for integrating different levels of analysis and different (meta)theoretical traditions because contemporary racionalist and constructivist theories provide only partial explanation on every level.