Systemic Coordination of European Affairs: Middle-Sized Countries and the CFSP

Abstract

This study seeks to make a contribution to a limited research on the
systemic level of the national coordination of European affairs, which
involves both domestic institutions and a permanent representation at the
EU and national embassies in the EU member states and other countries.
We explore the issue through a case study which concentrates on 1) several
middle-sized EU member states and 2) coordination in the field of foreign
and security policy. The study argues that the coordination at the systemic
level has a rather a centralized character. The elements of decentralization,
which can be also identified at the systemic level, are primarily related to
information-gathering as well as representation at negotiations. Permanent
representations are considerably more involved in coordination than
national embassies, however.