Bordering and Polity Formation: the European Union in Perspective

The theory of European integration struggles to apply concepts and mechanisms of state formation. This paper engages the theoretical and historical literature on state building to explore the association between boundary and polity formation in the European Union. On the hand, we put in question the relevance of armed conflict and military security threats in the classical literature on state formation (Tilly) and federalism (Riker), and the concomitant concept of the “Westphalian state”, for the EU case. Interstate war has not only all but disappeared from international politics; its conduct is also absent from the policies and capabilities of the EU. On the other hand, theories of state formation and political development as market regulation (Poggi, Skowronek, and the concomitant concept of the regulatory state by Majone), which fit the story of European integration better, typically focus on polity-internal relations at the expense of external borders and bordering. We argue that a Rokkanian approach addresses the lacunae in both accounts. Whereas it starts from the assumption that the consolidation of external boundaries is a prerequisite of the formation of the modern (democratic welfare) state, it goes beyond the classical focus on military bordering. The paper finally discusses ways in which external boundary formation and transactions, and crises related to these processes, affect the political development of the EU, and how EU external bordering differs from that of the modern state.