'European Policing'? A Critical Approach to European Union Civilian Crisis Management with Special Reference to Macedonia

Abstract

The European Union, similar to other international actors engaged in peacebuilding efforts, has incorporated programmes on police restructuring and the deployment of police missions within its common foreign and security policy. These developments largely resulted from the EU's experience in the Yugoslav crises. It is in this region that the Union first tested its civilian crisis management capabilities and launched its first police operations. Is there a European way of doing policing? This paper examines the concept of 'European policing' theoretically from a critical theory perspective and empirically through the case of Macedonia. In doing so, it examines what and whose security is tackled in EU police programmes and operations and how this is done in practice. The paper draws examples from EU efforts in police reform in Macedonia. It argues that the EU lacks a global vision on crisis management and therefore on police reform. This absence of overall direction at a strategic level obstructs EU coherence and effectiveness at an operational level when implementing police reform in post-conflict societies.