Russia, Crimea – and Europe’s Foreign Economic Policy

The European Union is the largest economy in the world. But it is not the most powerful. It has shown its capacity for economic statecraft by reshaping the regional conditions for peace, security, and economic development through its expansion – through greater economic and political interdependence manifested by EU membership. Yet its attempts in the past decade to use its economic size, or the attractiveness of having uninterrupted access to Europe’s consumers, for operative non-economic purposes have erred on the side of failure rather than success. Is this a good time to build up a new type of foreign economy policy in Europe?