Introduction

The European Union (EU) has over the past decade been confronted with considerable internal and external challenges. The so-called migrant crisis of 2015, the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the EU (Brexit), the election of Donald J. Trump in 2016, the COVID-19 pandemic, the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014 as well as the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 are just some of the significant challenges that have placed demands on the EU to reshape its foreign and security policy. At the same time, the EU is also under pressure from within. Increasing contestation between member states can be identified in relation to issues such as human rights, sexual health, and reproductive rights, external aspects of migration and relations with major powers such as Russia, the US, and China (Balfour et al, 2016; Koenig, 2020; Müller et al, 2021; Barbé and Badell, 2023).

However, while EU foreign policy has been labelled as increasingly fragmented and politicized (Barbé and Morillas, 2019; Costa, 2019; Crombois, 2019; Hegemann and Schneckener, 2019; Johansson-Nogués et al, 2020; Juncos and Pomorska, 2021; Müller et al, 2021), there is a clear discrepancy between these challenges and what the EU actually does in practice. Within the sphere of the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP), the EU continues to produce strategy documents and council conclusions, and implement sanctions against individuals and companies. In other words, despite these challenges, the EU continues to produce a common foreign policy. How is this possible?

Because of the novel explanations it generates for states' security- and identity-related behavior, the concept of ontological security has been used increasingly in the International Relations (IR) literature in recent years. However, the abundance of interpretations of the concept means that it is often used in conflicting ways. To counter the risk of conceptual stretching and provide the foundation for a common research agenda, this article constructs a typology of ontological security mechanisms. Two dimensions of ontological insecurity are highlighted: the sources and the causes of anxiety. We argue that the source of anxiety can be reflexive, relational, or systemic, while the cause of anxiety can be either shame or discontinuity. These two dimensions produce six mechanisms of ontological insecurity that reflect how the concept is used in the contemporary ontological security literature in IR. By specifying these mechanisms, we argue that the typology offers IR scholars the ability to produce even more nuanced and fine-grained explanations of state behavior driven by ontological insecurity. Finally, to demonstrate the utility of this typology, the article provides an illustrative case study of Russia's engagement in the conflict in Syria in 2015-2017.

In this thesis, I study how crises impact diplomatic norms and practices. Diplomacy plays a fundamental role in enabling peaceful and constructive relations between states. When successful, it can provide global common goods, ranging from international security, trading rules, to peaceful enforcement of international agreements, as well as resolving collective action problems such as climate change mitigation. Despite this crucial role, we still know relatively little about diplomatic norms and practices, the unwritten rules that structure interactions between diplomats. In particular, we have an insufficient understanding of how and when these norms and practices change. The institution of diplomacy is often described as a conservative one – it upholds a system of conventions that ensure the stability and predictability of relations between states. However, in light of recent political developments that pose challenges to cooperation within the framework of international institutions, it is essential to comprehend the effects of crises on diplomatic practice.

Three independent empirical studies are conducted to analyze diplomatic practices in the context of heightened levels of international contestation and crisis. Two of these studies focus on the way in which diplomats responsible for negotiating EU foreign policy cope with increasing contestation between member states. This internal crisis necessitates the development and implementation of practices that ensure that the EU continues to produce common positions and policies. The third study analyzes the way in which the states and state leaders of the G20 dealt with the uncertainty that arose following the transition to virtual summitry during the COVID-19 crisis. The study finds that the transition to virtual summitry created opportunities for signaling status in new ways. Finally, a fourth essay focuses on how practices should be conceptualized and studied. This essay emphasizes the need to understand two dimensions of practices (the rules and logic of a practice) in order to study them and understand their effects.

Together, the essays show that diplomatic norms and practices can and do change as a result of crises, but that this change is limited by the dispositions and structural conditions that shape the selection of practices. Shifts in practices linked to crises can thus be likened to how a storm affects the movements of a buoy anchored to the ocean floor. When a storm hits, the buoy might sway, but its movement is ultimately restricted by the length and strength of the chain holding it in place.

This book is the result of a truly collaborative project based on the synergies ofour common interest in the everyday making of European Union (EU) foreignand security policy. In the past, we have all conducted research on the innerworkings of the Brussels foreign policy machinery, and our findings havecollectively pointed to the interplay of situated, practical knowledge and norminternalization. The fact that so many of our past informants displayed aware-ness of the social dynamics of the complex institutional environment in whichthey operate spurred an interest into how such interactions are enacted in theeveryday management of contestation. The Swedish Institute of InternationalAffairs, to which we are all associated, provided a forum to compare, discussand develop our previous findings through engagement with theoretical tenetsof practice approaches and socialization theory in international relations andEU studies. As a token of the collaborative spirit in which this book has beenwritten, the book and the chapters bear the names of the authors in alphabeticalorder.

On 26 March 2020, the leaders of the Group of twenty major economies (G20) convened in an emergency virtual meeting to discuss the extraordinary situation facing the world. Virtual summitry provided a stark visual contrast to the traditional staging of modern multilateral diplomacy – leaders were suddenly responsible for their own staging, leaving them with new opportunities to create a favourable impression of how they, and their respective state, would be seen. Taking the disruption of virtual summitry as a starting point, we focus on the resulting new opportunities for visual diplomacy. We draw on the symbolic interactionism of Erving Goffman and we argue that status signalling in this context was based on a shared understanding of the symbols and resources that have social value in the interaction order of summit diplomacy. Based on a visual analysis of 51 photographs from the G20 video conference, we find that the visual performances during the extraordinary meeting reflected evident, but not necessarily intentional, attempts at status seeking. The article thus contributes to an increased understanding of how visual performances contribute to uphold status distinctions in multilateral diplomacy.

Cooperation in international organizations (IOs) is sustained by the socialization of state agents and their internalization of the organizations’ norms and identity. This article builds on a structured comparison of the scope conditions for socialization among permanent representatives in two organs of the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization—the Political and Security Com-mittee (PSC) and the North Atlantic Council (NAC). In this study, we present some unexpected findings: First, the NAC is experiencing greater internalization (stronger socialization) than the PSC, normally held as a critical case of international sociali-zation. Second, unambiguous norms favour socialization to a larger degree than ambiguous norms, refuting a widely held assumption about the pro-internalization effect of diffuse norms. Given that member states seem to grant their representa-tives larger “room for manoeuvre” when the norms of the IO have material stakes, the socialization effect of an IO’s norms is dependent on the perceived utility of the organization’s mission.

Various crises have plagued the EU's foreign policy over the last decade. As some member states increasingly question the founding principles of the EU, it is reasonable to expect that national representatives serving in preparatory bodies in the EU are forced to operate under stricter instructions from their capitals. Nevertheless, strong adherence to the coordination reflex and problem‐solving ethos is still prevalent within the political and security committee (PSC), the main policy coordination body within EU foreign policy. In order to understand this counterintuitive puzzle we conducted interviews with 20 PSC representatives. We found that national representatives primarily internalize and adhere to the rules and practices at the level of the group (procedural norms) rather than the founding principles of the EU (constitutive norms). Contrary to existing research, we argue that a theoretical distinction between these norms is necessary in order to understand fully how crises and contestation affect microlevel socialization.