Relations between the united nations and the European Union: Multilateral pragmatism in maintaining peace and security

• Main Author: Ateljević Vladimir
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: University of Belgrade, Faculty of Law, Belgrade, Serbia 2018-01-01
• Series: Anali Pravnog Fakulteta u Beogradu
• Subjects: international organizations; peace keeping missions and operations; peacful settlement of disputes; multilateralism; european union; united nations
• Online Access: https://scindeks-clanci.ceon.rs/data/pdf/0003-2565/2018/0003-25651803291A.pdf

The lesson learned about the EU says that the Union is not a hard power organization. This fact does not diminish the value and significance of its existence. In addition, the 28 Member States still see the EU in the majority of policy areas as the best format to achieve goals as a result of joint actions rather than the pure individual actions of its members. Put it simply, the EU is stronger whole and united, rather than a mere set of its parts. At the same time, the aforementioned 28 either individually or in groups are faced with a set of common challenges, risks and threats. These motivate the EU to define common external political and security priorities. One of the basic foreign policy priorities is multilateralism in external action. For authors and decision-makers of the EU's Global Strategy, this is one of the ways to make the EU more influential in international scene, and to achieve external relations objectives that are enlisted in Article 2 of the Lisbon Treaty. In the very heart of this system is the UN and that is asserted in the text of the EU Global Strategy. Do the EU and the UN jointly have the potential for multiplication of their influence, and can they serve as a platform for achieving the goals of both organizations on the international arena, and how these relations look in the contemporary and historical retrospective are all the main subject and content of this article.