The Hour of Europe 2.0: The Common Foreign and Security Policy of the EU from Maastricht to the Strategic Compass through the Perspective of the Epistemic Community

• Acronym: VEZ
• Coordinator: Institute for Social Research in Zagreb
• Financed by: Institute for Social Research in Zagreb, VAL – Research Programme of Senior Research Assistants
• Project duration: 1 January 2026 – 1 July 2027

The project deals with the development of the Common Foreign and Security Policy of the European Union (CFSP) through an analysis of the way in which the epistemic community (political, professional and other actors who influenced the formation and definition of the CFSP) understood and shaped it in two historical periods: during the wars in former Yugoslavia in the 1990s, and during the current crisis caused by the war in Ukraine. The project reflects on the term “the Hour of Europe”, without evaluating the success or failure of the CFSP, nevertheless reconstructing the understandings, expectations and interpretive frameworks that followed its formation and transformation. Methodologically, the project applies a comparative diachronic approach. Empirical analysis will be carried out through: (1) work with archival material in the Historical Archives of the European Union (HAEU), including documents of EU institutions, private collections of relevant professional and political actors, and oral history databases; (2) analysis of secondary sources (official EU websites, scientific and professional journals and internet portals); (3) conducting ten semi-structured interviews with members of the epistemic community who possess policy-relevant knowledge about the CFSP. Using these sources, the project aims to determine how the epistemic community defines the CFSP in two crisis contexts – the 1990s and the 2020s – and which factors have influenced the definition, with a special emphasis on two important documents that define the CFSP normatively: the Maastricht Treaty (1992) and the Strategic Compass (2022).