THE WAR IN UKRAINE AS A STATEBUILDING FACTOR OF EUROPEAN INTEGRATION.

• Author: Grosse, Tomasz Grzegorz

INTRODUCTION

Jean Monnet's famous prediction assumed that Europe would be "forged in crises" as the sum of the solutions adopted for those crises. (1) According to this opinion, the development of regional integration will, to the greatest extent, progress in response to emerging challenges and problems. From this perspective, it is worth considering consequences of the Russian Federation's aggression against Ukraine that started in 2022. It has become the biggest geopolitical crisis in Europe since the end of World War II. Has the security threat from Russian imperialism prompted the EU to develop its own defense capabilities? Did it stimulate the development of the EU's state functions such as centralization or federalization to guarantee security to Member States, especially those along the bloc's eastern wing?

In terms of political science theories described as bellicist, security threat has been one of the most powerful factors of state-building mobilization in European history. Charles Tilly distinguishes two main phenomena that shaped contemporary states in Europe: military threat and the desire to ensure economic development alongside the related fiscal potential. (2) The threat of war was of primary importance. It urged the centralization and consolidation of political power, as well as the development of the tax system, to finance an army capable of defending against external threats. (3) This type of state-building process occurred relatively fast. Meanwhile, the creation of state functions under market logic was much slower and incremental. It was based on the development of legal regulations, the establishment of appropriate executive power, and the judiciary, which were to secure and facilitate economic progress. (4) Historically, both state-building factors-security and market regulation--most often complemented each other and thus created a mutual synergy that favored the creation of modern states.

Another similar theory is that advanced by William Riker on the development of a centralized federation. Any federal state, he claimed, emerges from a voluntary tender between regional and central elites. Should any war break out to possibly annihilate both, they conclude an agreement transferring power and necessary resources to the central level. Without an existential security threat, integration remains only partial and uneven. (5)

According to Daniel Kelemen and Kathleen McNamara, the European Union has so far developed on the basis of market logic. On the other hand, a security factor was much weaker and provided for the shaping of state functions within this organization only to a small extent. (6) The EU has built an extensive legal system as well as regulatory authorities, which today extend far beyond just economy. However, both scholars argue that it has remained a slightly centralized organization, especially in terms of administrative and fiscal potential, as well as in relation to repressive or coercive powers. (7) No geopolitical threat outside the bloc or, more precisely, a too-weak perception of this threat by the main political actors meant that the integration process in Western Europe proceeded gradually while state functions failed to develop sufficiently. Therefore, the EU remained an incomplete, unstable and crisis-prone organization. (8)

Kelemen and McNamara recognize the geopolitical motives underlying European integration. In their opinion, it was to a large extent a desire to solve a so-called "German problem," or excessive dominance of this country over other states while taming its imperial tendencies. (9) Interestingly, while these concerns initially drove the integration process, they were not fully achieved. After the reunification of Germany (1990) and with subsequent economic projects within the Communities, Germany became Europe's biggest economy, able to exert tremendous political influence in the EU. German dominance found reflection in how crucial integration principles were formed. First of all, there emerged economic regimes that deliberately or otherwise gave Germany more benefits than any other Member State (internal market, monetary union, climate policy, etc.). Furthermore, considerable importance arises from conditionality and financial sanctions in intra-EU relations, according to the principle that money is offered in exchange for fulfilling certain political expectations. Another German-backed idea consisted in the strengthening of technocracy and the EU judiciary. Consequently, central states dominated over peripheral ones. (10)

Kelemen and McNamara are right when they point to a relatively low sense of military threat in Western Europe, especially after the end of the Cold War and German reunification. They also rightly claim that since the 1950s, when integration processes began, security issues have been delegated to the U.S. and NATO. The European Communities, and then the EU, did not play a major role here. (11) NATO and the protective umbrella of the United States in fact weakened the tendency to build a European state in terms of security. (12)

Kelemen and McNamara also argue that even the growing migration pressure on Western Europe in the 21st century was not associated with a sense of external threat and thus was not placed in a state-building context. (13) Furthermore, that resulted from a liberal or left-wing approach to immigrants that urged proper assistance for the sake of human rights, often viewed as an indispensable cheap labor force in the EU's internal market. As there is no clear security threat outside, the EU centralization towards further state functions did not develop sufficiently.

CRITICISM OF BELLICIST STATE-BUILDING CONCEPTS

Other scholars have agreed with the opinion of Kelemen and McNamara that the main reason for a weak EU security and defense policy was caused by its handover to NATO as a military alliance. (14) Interestingly, NATO has never aspired to create federative structures, nor a super-state. It did not need a common fiscal, monetary, or even migration policy. It was based on cooperation of sovereign states whose coherence and effectiveness were guaranteed by the military and political power of the United States of America. Thus, security cooperation does not necessarily have to be a state-building factor. At the same time, not only was Washington's geopolitical advantage beneficial to Western European countries--able to replace a large part of their own defense spending with Washington's--but it also turned into a factor of strategic dependence that became more cumbersome for Western European elites.

The concept of an external threat is also criticized against the backdrop of history. One example is the growth of Prussia and the unification of Germany in the 19th century. (15) Otto von Bismarck's "blood and iron" policy was applied to German-speaking entities weaker than Prussia, therefore it is difficult to consider that the unification process was voluntary. This methodology is also more and more visible in the 21st century European integration, although the pressure of military power has now turned into legal coercion and financial sanctions. The unifying activities carried out by Prussia were met with a hostile reception from external geopolitical rivals, including the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy and the French Empire. Nevertheless, the rise of the German Empire after 1871 was not the result of an external threat. Rather, it was Prussia's expansive policy aimed at uniting smaller German-speaking entities, a strategy that nevertheless stirred conflict with its powerful neighbors.

Scholars reject the determinism of theories that recognize security as a factor of state-building mobilization in the EU. First of all, they consider the EU a sui generis entity, and therefore unique. It does not follow the same development trajectory as historical nation-states in Europe, nor does it aspire to the Westphalian concept of the state or Max Weber's definition. (16) The logic behind integration development was related to the emergence of the regulatory state, (17) which stemmed primarily from economic goals. Although the regulatory state in Europe was initially associated with the development of the internal market, strong legal and financial instruments of coercion came to light over time. In other words, economic logic turned out to be a sufficient state-building factor in Europe. Supranational elites, mainly technocratic and judiciary, followed and then vigorously sought to leverage their own power over integration processes.

The dysfunctions of the European regulatory state result from incomplete, poorly designed, or even dysfunctional economic projects. They were intended to deepen integration in the internal market, as was the case of the monetary union, the Green Deal, or the Schengen area. However, these projects turned out to be too ambitious or only partial, and therefore had serious structural flaws. As regards monetary union and climate policy, both regimes turned out to be strongly asymmetric in terms of costs and benefits redistributed among Member States. As a result, these examples of integration proved minimally crisis-resistant. At the same time, policies in the Euro zone, migration, Brexit, and rule of law crises were only partially successful, and to a large extent paved the way for further problems. This is best reflected in the concept of "failing forward" integration, (18) defined as gradually developing, but at huge costs, while sparking internal tensions and showing scarce resistance to crises.

Other scholars also believe that the concepts of Tilly and Riker are of very little importance to the processes of European integration. According to some, the era of state-building in Europe is long over. Nation-states have been formed for a long time and even constitute a certain obstacle to the development of the EU. Therefore, the concept of state-building in relation to the EU is...