Cooperation and conflict in the European defence-industrial field: the role of relative gains

Defence-industrial collaborative activities have gained a central stage in the current European debate, based on the simultaneous presence of two systemic pressures (unipolarity and "defence-industrial globalization") that are pushing EU member states towards more cooperation in these issu...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inDefence studies Vol. 18; no. 4; pp. 474 - 497
Main Author Calcara, Antonio
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Abingdon Routledge 02.10.2018
Taylor & Francis Ltd
Subjects
Conflict
Cooperation
defence industry
Defense industry
Empirical analysis
Europe
Geopolitics
Globalization
Incentives
International cooperation
Labor relations
Markets
Military weapons
National security
Protectionism
relative gains
security
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Summary:Defence-industrial collaborative activities have gained a central stage in the current European debate, based on the simultaneous presence of two systemic pressures (unipolarity and "defence-industrial globalization") that are pushing EU member states towards more cooperation in these issues. Nevertheless, the European defence-industrial panorama still continues to be characterized by both cooperation and conflict. Protectionism, oligopolistic market straining and primary resource to domestic suppliers have prevented a more structured defence-industrial cooperation. The aim of this article is to add empirical evidence to recent academic works that highlighted how relative gains play a key role in understanding the simultaneous presence of cooperation and conflict in the European security architecture. In doing so, this analysis focuses on the European defence-industrial landscape and specifically on British, French and Italian preferences towards armaments cooperation. To preview the conclusions, France, Italy and the UK have constantly pursued greater intra-European cooperation, in order to increase their power within the international defence-industrial market. However, they have refused to participate in European defence-industrial initiatives when other countries would have a greater advantage from this cooperation. This happened despite strong geopolitical and strategic incentives to cooperate.
ISSN:1470-2436
1743-9698
DOI:10.1080/14702436.2018.1487766