Emotions and norms in EU crisis diplomacy

The “emotional turn” in IR (Crawford 2000; Mercer 2005; Bleiker and Hutchison 2014; Hall & Ross, 2015; Sasley, 2011; Clément & Sanger, 2018; Koschut et al., 2017) has recently reached European studies (Manners 2021). In particular, in the crisis context since 2008, European studies scholars have developed a burgeoning interest in “emotions” to search for alternative explanations to several challenges the EU faced in the last decade (Capelos & Katsanidou, 2018 Curtis & Nielsen, 2018; Manners, 2018;). Yet, despite this recent interest, little research has been done on the role of emotions in European foreign policy. A few exceptions include Smith (2021) who highlighted an emotions-action gap in EU foreign policy, and Terzi, Palm and Gürkan (2021) who addressed the role of emotions in EU’s external relations by focusing on the interconnection between norms and emotions. This workshop aims to take this promising research agenda forward by bringing in emotions in the study of normativity in EU crisis diplomacy. This is important for three reasons: First, reading the norms in EU foreign policy through emotional reaction or inaction is a way to decipher which norms matter, and when, in EU foreign policy. If norms are “standards of appropriate behavior” (Finnemore and Sikkink 1998), their contestation is expected to trigger negative emotions. Therefore, by studying the emotional language in EU external action, we expect to find out which norms matter for the EU and whether/how the EU responds to their contestation. Second, the study of emotions is a promising entry point for decoding the constitutive elements of EU foreign policy. Emotions include a subjective experience (Mercer 2010; Holmes 2015). This subjective element derives from past experiences, history, shared culture and/or “reinvented memories of the past” (Manners 2018; Mercer 2014). Therefore, the study of emotions in EU foreign policy is expected to inform us of the collective experiences the EU member states have had or the meanings attached to these experiences at the group level, and which, in return, shape its foreign policy. Third, studying the EU foreign policy through emotions-norms nexus sheds light on the “emotions-action” gap (Smith 2021). This gap occurs when, the EU, confronted with a crisis, expresses emotions but fails to act. Investigating this puzzle is expected to shed light on the performative role of emotions in EU foreign policy. Against this backdrop, the purpose of the workshop is threefold: 1) to conceptualize the emotions-norms nexus in EU crisis diplomacy; 2) to understand the causal role of emotions in EU diplomacy in crisis situations (how/under which conditions do emotional norms create action in EU foreign policy?); and 3) to illustrate the role of emotions in the study of norms in EU crisis diplomacy through small-n or in-depth case studies (what is the role of emotions in enabling or constraining EU’s response to crisis situations?). In this way, the workshop aims to make an innovative contribution to the study of EU external relations by engaging with the literature on emotions and norms in IR as well as crisis diplomacy.