Abstract
This paper seeks to assess the degree to which Poland exercises power and influence in the European Union. It employs Poland's policy towards its eastern neighbours as a case study, and, in doing so, contributes to two wider scholarly debates on how EU policy towards Russia, Ukraine and Belarus is made, and also the broader question of the evolving nature of the relationship between the European Union and its Member States. In doing so, it employs a synthetic framework that brings together the approaches for studying the power and influence of a given Member State that were developed by Wallace et al (2005), Tallberg (2008) and Moravcsik (1991, 1993, 1998). It concludes that Polish influence has been low.
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Notes
The terms ‘power’ and ‘influence’ are employed here interchangeably, although influence is, strictly speaking, just one element of Lukes’ second dimension of power. Particular emphasis is placed on the notion of ‘influence’ in this paper, which reflects the consensual nature of decision-making in the European Union. If it is evident that an actor has had particular ‘influence’ on the making of a particular decision, this is taken as a proxy for the exercise of power.
Cited as the second priority of the Polish government in the European Union after the ‘International Conference’ (that is, a Europe of nation-states). See http://www.msz.gov.pl and http://www.poland.gov.pl/The,priorities,of,Polish,European,policy,459.html.
Although it should be noted that the element of the CAP that Poland benefits most from is the price guarantee for Polish farmers.
There are, of course, circumstances where this political weakness may be exploited to the negotiating advantage of a Member State. Weak governments may be able to win concessions from their negotiating partners if, for example, it is feared that the government might fall if a suitable compromise is not offered and in consequence a new, even less accommodating government comes to power.
See George Parker's comment, ‘Suspect Maths and a Tricky Summit’, http://blogs.ft.com/brusselsblog/2007/03/suspect-polish-html/.
‘Polska/Karp: nie mamy w Europie konkurencji’, Warsaw 21 February 2003, http://www.euro.pap.pl/cgi-bin/europap.pl?grupa=1&ID=41424.
This comment was made by Jozef Oleksy (once a leading light in the post-Communist Democratic Left Alliance, in Polish Sojusz Lewicy Demokratycznej, better known by its acronym, the SLD) during a debate about Polish foreign policy held at the Batory Foundation in Warsaw (see (2004) Polska polityka zagraniczna: kontynuacja czy zerwanie? p. 77).
Interviews by the author, Warsaw 2005.
Although doubts exist as to whether Ukrainians or Belarusians with Schengen visas would find Poland sufficiently attractive as a destination for economic migration – unless they wished to be nearer their families in Ukraine.
The latter tendency was strengthened after the undemocratic conduct of elections in Belarus in 2006.
The consensus on eastern policy is shared by all the mainstream parties with representation in the Polish lower chamber of parliament, the Sejm: Civic Platform (centre-right), Law and Justice (centre-right), the SLD (centre-left), the PSL (centre) and the Democratic Party (centre).
Law and Justice was one of Poland's two principal parties of the centre-right in the 2000s. Its two key figureheads during the period with which this paper is concerned (2004–2008) were former Prime Minister Jarosław Kaczyński (in office 2005–2007) and his identical twin brother, President Lech Kaczyński (elected 2005). Law and Justice unexpectedly won the largest share of the vote in parliamentary and presidential elections of 2005, and controversially formed a coalition not with its expected partner on the centre-right, Civic Platform, but with two more populist right-wing parties: Self-Defence and the League of Polish Families. Law and Justice had more conservative standpoints on social issues than Civic Platform, and was more eurosceptic in tone.
Although with the benefit of hindsight, the Polish veto may have been less damaging, particularly in the light of the Georgia–Russia crisis of August 2008 that appeared to signal a new, expansionist and perhaps aggressive shift in Russian foreign policy – precisely what the Poles had argued was likely to happen all along.
Interview (no. 45).
Despite Polish protestations about the importance of the bi-lateral relationship with Israel.
Confirmed in several interviews with the MFA staff.
Unemployment in June 2008 was 9.6 per cent in Poland, down from the 2002 peak of around 18 per cent. Unemployment in the capital, Warsaw, was estimated to be far lower in both cases. See http://www.economist.com/countries/Poland/profile.cfm?folder=Profile%2DEconomic%20Data.
Author interview with MFA official in Warsaw on 8 May 2008.
See the report on the 2006 competition available at the web site of the UK Cabinet Office: http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/reports/faststream/~/media/assets/www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/publications/reports/faststream/2007/tables_full%20pdf.ashx.
The letter drew attention to the harassment of civil society in Belarus, and in particular of the UPB and the expulsions of three Polish diplomats.
Author interview with Bloomberg journalist, 10 April 2008.
A reputation for playing by the rules matters more for relatively new players in the Brussels game, as they have to establish themselves as reliable partners in a way that older Member States do not.
No cost-benefit analysis of the implications of Ukrainian integration with the European Union for Poland had been carried out in Spring 2008. Source: author interview with a senior official, Ministry of the Economy, Warsaw, 12 June 2008.
It could be argued that France does not have a reputation for playing by the rules all the time – but this is more than outweighed by the other factors.
While France held the rotating Presidency of the European Union at the time of the launch of the ‘Union pour la Méditerranée’ as the first in the trio of France, the Czech Republic and Sweden, it seems improbable that Poland would have been able to launch such an initiative even had it held the Presidency.
The proposal for the ‘Union pour la Mediterranean’ was, of course, modified at German insistence to ensure that all EU Member States and not just those of the Mediterranean became members.
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Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful to Anand Menon, Tim Haughton and the anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on earlier versions of this paper. Nathaniel Copsey is grateful to CEELBAS, the ESRC (Small Research Grant RES-000-22-2723), the Polish Academy of Sciences, the Polish Institute of International Affairs and the British Academy for their support.
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Copsey, N., Pomorska, K. Poland's power and influence in the European Union: The case of its eastern policy. Comp Eur Polit 8, 304–326 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1057/cep.2009.3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/cep.2009.3