Germany, Poland and the European Security Strategy: Analysing Continuity and Change

Abstract

This chapter will look in more detail at Germany’s and Poland’s security and defence elites’ conceptions of CSDP by using the European Security Strategy (ESS). The ESS and the report on its implementation provide a good basis on which to assess Germany’s and Poland’s security and defence elites’ views and changes towards CSDP. Security strategies generally outline a country’s, or in this case, an organisation’s, aims, objectives and interests in the security and defence realm. It acts as a starting point for considering a state’s or organisation’s role in the world. In this way it is possible to compare the ESS and the 2008 report on its implementation with German and Polish security and defence elites’ perceptions of not only their own security and defence policies but also how they want CSDP to progress. Therefore this chapter seeks to outline continuity and change in both countries’ security and defence policy and to ascertain whether the political rhetoric, outlined in various speeches as highlighted in the previous chapter, match the reality.