With the incorporation of the Petersberg Tasks and the launch of the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP) at the end of the 1990s, the European Union sought to carve out its own role and niche as an international security actor. The operationalization of ESDP between 2003 and 2008 –with 6 military and 18 civilian operations- revealed the EU’s strategy of positioning itself as a visible and active player in the field of ‘military and civilian crisis management’. However, with the institutional changes introduced by the Treaty of Lisbon, new leadership and the pressures of the economic crisis, the EU has begun to shift its focus from classical CSDP ‘crisis management’ to an altogether different approach: crisis response. This paper traces the shift in the EU’s approach to international security and analyses the institutional, political and personality-driven changes in the EU’s security-related external relations. It will be argued that current developments point towards the end of CSDP as developed under Solana and signify a deliberate move towards a more integrated crisis response approach under Catherine Ashton, with far-reaching implications for the overall role and impact of the EU as an International Security Actor in the coming years. (with Joachim Koops, Vrije Universiteit Brussels)
