Europeanization of Foreign Policy in the Field of Nuclear Non-proliferation: the Portuguese Case
Europeanization is an increasingly fashionable research area within the field of European integration, particularly for studying the impact of European processes and institutions on EU Member and non-Member States. In the last decade, the concept of Europeanization has been commonly used in the study of national foreign policies, despite their distinctive intergovernmental nature, but there is still limited knowledge regarding the dynamics of the process. In this work, we use the aforementioned concept as an analytical approach to determine the nature of the Europeanization process in the field of nuclear non-proliferation, with Portugal as a study case. Much of the literature concerning the EU and its role as a non-proliferation actor engages only minimally with theory, consisting mostly of empirical research, and the concept of Europeanization has not yet been applied to the study of national non-proliferation policies. Additionally, Portugal is still one of the least researched countries in Europeanization literature, a reason believed to be anchored on its small size and semi-peripheral location. As such, this work intends to close a gap, not only in terms of research on Europeanization of Portuguese foreign policy, but also regarding theoretically-based studies in the field of nuclear non-proliferation.
David Ferreira . dsfaa11@iscte.pt
ISCTE – Instituto Universitário de Lisboa
David Ferreira is a 2nd year student of the Master in International Studies at the Instituto Universitário de Lisboa (ISCTE-IUL), specializing in Europe and Transatlantic Studies. He completed a Bachelor’s degree in Public Administration at the School of Economics and Management of the University of Minho and currently participates in a research project regarding Europeanization of foreign policy and nuclear non-proliferation. His main research interests fall within the fields of European Security and Defense, Terrorism, and European Integration.