The EU’s ontological (in)security: stabilising the ENP area … and the EU-self?

Abstract

The 2016 EU Global Strategy and the 2015 European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) review have made stabilisation of the ENP area one of their main priorities. Our argument here, however, is that the Global Strategy and the ENP review not only seek to mitigate the numerous crises currently affecting the neighbourhood; they also aim to address a set of intra-EU vulnerabilities linked to events in the ENP area that are threatening the EU’s own ontological security. We employ narrative analysis to explore how insecurity in the EU and in the ENP area is affecting the EU’s relation to the neighbourhood-other and its understanding of the EU-self. Our main findings point to the Global Strategy and the ENP review providing ample measures to stabilise the neighbourhood. However, whether they have provided a sufficiently compelling narrative to enable the emergence of new emotional structures for the EU and its member states to make sense of themselves and their relation to the neighbourhood-other remains an open question.