Elements of Comparison and Synthesis / Chapter 6 of Europeanization and Conflict Resolution: Case Studies from the European Periphery

Abstract

This last chapter is a summary of main ideas developed in the rest of the study, with emphasis on setting out the analytical approach, comparisons of the four case studies, and some general observations that result from the comparisons. The project has privileged the 'Europeanization' aspect of the processes of conflict settlement and resolution in secessionist crises, while acknowledging that other important aspects could not be covered thoroughly. In particular this chapter applies to the four cases the matrix developed in Chapter 1, which set out three models of EU conditionality and socialization in relation to the pursuit of conflict settlement and resolution. The four cases show that conventional notions of how the EU is acting in relation to secessionist conflicts in its periphery need a more rigorous and complex specification. The EU's revealed preference in practice is not always its official first preference according to official discourse. Moreover there emerge some negative unexpected effects of EU actions, which have to be borne in mind alongside the presumption of a beneficial influence.

Keywords

• European Union
• Europeanization
• conditionality
• conflict resolution
• theory-building