Jean Monnet Chair | Kaija Schilde

Jean Monnet Chair in European Security and Defense: A Stronger Europe in a Fragile World (2022-2024)

Project Summary

In January 2022, Prof. Kaija Schilde was awarded a Jean Monnet Chair in European Security and Defense. The Chair will further the agenda of Pardee School of Global Studies of preparing students to meet the international challenges of the 21st century through a rigorous and sustained presentation of the EU as a global power with responsibilities over European security, international order, and global security.

The aims of the Chair are encapsulated in the words of the former High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and Vice President of the European Commission Federica Mogherini: “A Fragile world calls for a more confident and responsible European Union; it calls for an outward- and forward-looking European foreign and security policy.”

A more multipolar and networked world is also more unstable and insecure, altering Europe’s global role and shaping its strategic priorities. The European project, historically inward-facing towards integration and subsequently oriented towards the “neighborhood” through enlargement, is now positioned as a global actor with governance responsibilities over matters of regional, national, and global significance, particularly in the realms of human security and global stability.

A key dimension of this project is internal: looking at the European defense industrial base. However, the Chair will also expand the study of European integration (past and future) and European foreign and security policy, opening up new dimensions of teaching and public discussion of the EU as a global and human security actor.

In addition to bringing new visibility and prestige to the study of Europe at BU, the Chair will launch a school wide effort to reorient teaching, research, and outreach on Europe toward the new realities of the EU as a global actor and as a current and future source of international governance and problem-solving in a more complex world.

One objective, by way of example, is to broaden the concept of security studies beyond military and national defense topics towards both regional security (EU as an internal defense market and security community) and human security (EU as global security provide), within the Pardee School’s mission of advancing human progress.

Background

As a global actor, the EU has emphasized the stability and security of its neighborhood, in addition to integrating and coordinating national, foreign, and security policy between member states. Increasingly, however, the EU has filled a global leadership vacuum as a security provider in terms of conflict and crisis management, climate change leadership, and humanitarian policy. it has also provided regional and human security stability in its near abroad, carving out a role as a whole-of-government actor drawing on civilian, diplomatic, economic, and military expertise in order to provide societal and political stability.

At the same time, however, vulnerabilities in the integration project, which the pandemic has highlighted, hinder Europe’s ability to lead globally and to champion the multilateralism and rules-baed global order it purports to represent. A key hindrance to coherent EU security and defense policies has been the slow political development of a European defense industrial market, which would reduce redundancies and coordinate common security and defense resources if and when required. Existing EU efforts to enhance European security via regional conflict management, international development, trade policy, and migration management have also produced human security tensions between Europeans and others. And on human security, the EU has faced a migration crisis that has forced it to grow into an imperfect global governor of issues often intentionally ungoverned by sovereign states.

The problem, as we see it, is twofold:

A still incomplete internal integration project in security and defense, especially in EU security institutions and the European defense industrial base, has brought about new tensions, both within Europe in terms of redundancy and organizational weakness, but also externally, as EU foreign and security policy sometimes imposes negative externalities upon other, non-European people and regions.
The EU has the power and potential to provide multilateral, rules-based global governance beyond Europe, a much needed source of global authority and stability, but there is a lack of awareness and appreciation of this power amongst both European policymakers and non-Europeans seeking sources of global governing authority.

Prof. Schilde’s Jean Monnet project addresses both of these issues. Her research creates knowledge and awareness of both the current status and future possibilities of European integration in EU security and defense institutions and markets, while her teaching activities foster university and public awareness of the possibilities and potential of the EU as global actor.

The Project

Teaching

The Chair’s teaching targets Boston University students in the social sciences (European Studies, International Relations, Political Science, and Law) as well as the larger community of students (including majors in humanities and natural sciences, as well as business, engineering, and fine arts) who do not automatically come into contact with EU studies. One of Prof. Schilde’s main efforts as Chair is to revise new and existing European Studies courses for approval as BU general education requirements.

Research

The Chair’s research builds upon Prof. Schilde’s expertise as a scholar of European security, the European defense industrial base, EU security and defense institutions, the political economy of security, and the economic and humanitarian causes and consequences of border security.

Prof. Schilde’s first book, The Political Economy of European Security (Cambridge University Press, 2017), traces the political development of EU security and defense institutions, identifying the importance of defense industrial markets and private sector support in sustaining the capacity of EU bureaucracies and the success of EU political agendas and implementation.

Schilde’s research expertise is therefore multidimensional, but intersects multiple aspects of EU strategic priorities: the necessary internal components of the EU as a global actor (high capacity institutions and a cohesive defense industrial base), the global dimensions of the EU as a significant global market provider and security governor, and the humanitarian consequences of EU action and inaction in its neighborhood and beyond, primarily in the domains of migration management and conflict prevention.

Whereas Prof. Schilde’s previous book traced the importance of private sector and market actors in the political development of EU defense and security policy, her Jean Monnet book project reverses this question and expands on it, taking on the questions:

What is the role of security in in modern states and the EU?
What are the tensions between national or regional/European security obligations and Europe’s security responsibilities in its neighborhood (near abroad) and beyond?
Where are the tensions between security as a public good provided by states/the EU and security outsourced to private, market, or non-state actors?

Schilde’s Jean Monnet research emphasizes the EU as a significant case, but it also compares the EU to other states and political entities with responsibilities to provide the global “public good” of security. It spans the history and logic of security and defense outsourcing over time in the US, European states, and the EU, touching on themes ranging from US private prisons, US and European logistics and services, EU defense and civilian research and innovation economies, EU internal and border security, US and European migration management (including migrant detention), as well as transnational diffusion of security practices via regional and global security markets and industries.

The overarching goal is to generate knowledge and insights that can support EU policy-making and strengthen the role of the EU in a globalized world.

Outreach

Europe in the World Lecture Series

These events, exploring human, national, and European security from specific disciplinary angles (political economy, EU law, global development policy, history and gender studies, comparative literature and politics, cultural history, and international relations), include works-in-progress talks showcasing the work of emerging scholars as well as lectures by EU-policy makers and security practitioners. The aim of the series is to prompt critical reflection by a larger public on human and regional security informed by cross-national experiences and a variety of disciplinary lenses as well as to introduce or emphasize EU perspectives into ongoing debates around security integration and global challenges.

Europe in the World Podcast

This student-led podcast, produced by students in Prof. Schilde’s European Integration courses (Fall 2022, Fall 2023), and published by the Center for the Study of Europe, is intended to engage students in the project, as well as to bring more visibility and awareness to the Chair by creating another outreach vehicle.