Applying Foucault’s Toolkit to CSDP

Abstract

Michel Foucault was not a student of the international and Foucauldian approaches to international relations (IR) and European Union (EU) studies do not constitute a school. The toolkit of concepts for social analysis he and those inspired by him have developed do not aim at building a substantive theory of anything, and Foucault did not pretend otherwise when he declared: `I would like my books to be a kind of tool-box which others can rummage through to find a tool which they can use however they wish in their own area' (Foucault 1994: 523). The strength of Foucault's tools is their critical edge. They have the power to cut deep into conventional wisdom (academic and popular). This chapter introduces readers who have little or no knowledge of Foucault to his toolkit. It argues that the toolkit can be used productively, albeit within limits, to investigate the EU's Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP).