Between Conflict Resolution and Limited Sovereignty: The European Union and Contested States

This paper investigates EU policies towards unrecognised states, in the context of conflict resolution. Drawing on conceptual debates on EU policy-making, sociological institutionalism and sovereignty, this is an investigation of how ideas about what constitutes a state shape the policies of the EU towards unrecognised states and conflict resolution. In more specific, research looks at three main narratives of what makes a states: a) the idea of ‘external sovereignty’ (i.e. international recognition and integration), b) the idea of ‘internal sovereignty’ (i.e. effective state structures and authority) and also c) the idea of ‘Westphalian’ sovereignty (i.e. independence from other states). In this regard, this paper aims to be an important contribution to the literature on the international role of the EU, which has overlooked unrecognised states for the sake of ‘conventional’ states or conflict resolution in general. Yet, unrecognised states are increasingly found at the centre of European and international politics. Since the accession of Cyprus in 2004, the unrecognised Turkish Republic of northern Cyprus has been part of EU territory posing major challenges to how the EU is run, while the EU’s involvement in Kosovo, which remains only partially recognised, has also been extensive. At the same time many unrecognised states (Abkhazia, south Ossetia, Transnistria or Nagorno-Karabakh) emerged in the post- Soviet space and often with the assistance of Russia, which has also been involved in more recent armed conflict over the efforts for independence from various regions of Ukraine (e.g. Crimea, Donetsk, Lugansk). Indeed, the Ukraine crisis but also renewed tension in the Arab-Israeli conflict and the partially recognised state of Palestine show the continuous importance of unrecognised statehood for the (in)stability of the wider European neighbourhood and the EU’s relations to major international actors, such as the UN, NATO, Russia, Israel or Turkey and broader regional security.