Browsing by Author "Kaarakainen, Henri"

Today’s geopolitical situation seems to give the EU and NATO many reasons to combine their forces. Following Russia’s unlawful attack against Ukraine in February 2022, both clubs of sovereign states have found themselves dealing with the same question; how to ensure security of the European continent against external aggressions? While defence is traditionally strongly linked with the core functions of NATO, it is evident that the EU has shown a keen interest in operating in this field as well. While this development is understandable and necessary, it sparks a need to have a thorough relook at the work distribution of these two organizations. Therefore, this thesis concentrates on the following research question: Understanding that a significant majority of Member States of the European Union are also members of NATO, to what extent do these two organizations’ legal mandate to act within the field of security and defence overlap with each other? What could be possible ways to further promote the clarity between the EU’s and NATO’s legal competences in the field? This research is first and foremost rooted in international institutional law, meaning that all aspects of this research are meant to serve the understanding of the regulatory framework in an inter-institutional relationship. While political dimensions are always closely intertwined with this aspect and are thus extensively discussed within the thesis, their main purpose still remains to serve as a tool to grasp the essence of the legal-regulatory side of the relationship. Consequently, this research follows a multi-method approach. The benefit of utilising a combination of methodologies is that it allows me to examine my research question from several perspectives; as my research question is multifaceted and includes both legal, political, and historical dimensions, I believe that this is the best way to gain the most complete picture of the research subject.