EU to the Rescue? EU Support in National Foreign Policy Crises and the Danish Mohammed Cartoon Case

Abstract

This article attempts to understand the response of the EU to the Danish Cartoon Crisis that took place in early 2006. The puzzle is that at first, the EU only provided support for Denmark in relation to the immediate implications of the crisis - suggesting that the Member States disagreed on fundamental aspects of the crisis - but, after one month, the EU provided support to Denmark apparently accepting the official Danish view of the crisis in terms of principles. The article applies a constructivist framework for understanding the EU's response to national foreign policy crises in an analysis of the EU's response to the Danish Cartoon Crisis. The analysis indicates that the framework is useful for understanding how the EU responds to crises in general. The character of the response depends on the degree of EU acquis in the area of the crisis. The impact of the Lisbon Treaty and the broader implications of the framework are discussed.