HANDBOOK ON CSDP
3.4. THE CIVILIAN CSDP COMPACT by Crista Huisman and Deirdre Clarke Lyster
Following a negotiation process that lasted a year, the Civilian CSDP Compact was formally established by the Council of the EU and Member States on 19 November 2018, with the aim of strengthening the EU’s Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP). To be implemented by early summer 2023 at the latest, at its heart is a set of 22 coherent commitments by the Council and MS to make civilian CSDP more capable, more effective, flexible and responsive, and more joined-up with other EU instruments and with partners. Bringing together for the first time political ambition, strategic direction and the necessary capability development targets, the Compact is a milestone in civilian CSDP development that will enhance the EU’s role as a comprehensive security provider. This paper will trace the development of the Compact, highlight the key elements that make it markedly different from its predecessors, and note progress on its implementation so far.
BACKGROUND Building on principles elaborated in Feira in 2000, civilian CSDP initially focused on areas related to policing, rule of law, civilian administration and civil protection1. Three years later, the establishment of the first EU civilian mission, the EU Police Mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina (EUPM BiH), saw the operationalisation of civilian CSDP. Civilian missions now account for eleven out of the EU’s seventeen civilian and military missions and operations across Europe, the Middle East and Africa. By 2016, the external security environment in which the civilian CSDP was conceived had evolved considerably, with new threats identified in the EU’s
neighbourhood and beyond. The EU Global Strategy, adopted that year, recognised this altered security context, giving emphasis to new approaches, such as the Integrated Approach to Conflict and Crises, and new imperatives, such as the internal-external security nexus, while providing a new level of ambition in terms of the EU’s Common Foreign and Security Policy and, particularly, the CSDP. In light of this new Global Strategy, policy-makers saw the need to strenghten the civilian CSDP including by expanding and deepening the foundational Feira principles (and the subsequent Civilian Headline Goals of 2008 and 2010) in order to be able to address new and emerging challenges. Following a year-long negotiation process, the Civilian CSDP Compact was formally adopted on 19 November 2018.
THE COMPACT COMMITMENTS The Civilian CSDP Compact is structured into three parts: a) Strategic guidelines, b) Commitments by the Council and the Member States, and c) the Way Forward. The first part, strategic guidelines, sets the political priorities. While retaining the core functions originally identified in Feira – strengthening police, rule of law and civil administration as well as security sector reform (SSR) and monitoring tasks – this initial section moves beyond these agreed principles, stressing for the first time the importance of providing support for the EU’s wider response to new and emerging security challenges. Recognising security challenges related to irregular migration, hybrid
1 Civil protection was later removed as a core CSDP task, while security sector reform (SSR) and monitoring tasks were added.
100
