Discursively (de-)constructing European foreign policy: Theoretical and methodological challenges

Abstract

This article is about European foreign policy, specifically an examination of ways in which discourse analysis and foreign policy analysis can be brought together. The first aim of this article is to explicate the explanandum in some detail. Before we know what we are looking for, it gives limited meaning to consider procedures for methodological procedures. Once the explanandum has been identified, the article examines theoretical approaches and critically discusses their promises and limitations. Priority is given to the option of applying constructivist discursive theories that might (or might not) have been developed with a view to analysing foreign policy, including European foreign policy. In doing so, the article aims at bridging several sometimes very different fields of study: discourse theory, which is sometimes utterly unaware of or uninterested in foreign affairs; and foreign policy analysis, which is frequently descriptive in orientation and at times characterized by less-than-benign neglect of discourse theory.