France and the EEAS: A give-and-take relationship in Ignacio Molina and Alicia Sorroza (eds.), Reviewing Member States' Commitment to the European External Action Service, EPIN Working Paper, No. 34, November 2012
Based on interviews with diplomats from a representative cross-section of nine member states and members of the EEAS (European External Action Service) itself, the research findings of this EPIN Working Paper confirm long-standing traditions and member state perceptions of cooperation with European institutions.
The paper also reveals new aspects of the intergovernmental method of foreign policy shaping and making in the European Union; in particular, how different national positions can positively or negatively affect the consolidation of the EEAS and the role of the EU (European Union) as an international actor. As such, the Working Paper makes an original contribution to the existing literature on one of most discussed actors in the European Union’s post-Lisbon architecture in the domain of EU external action.