Sweden in Middle East: a changing foreign policy

Résumé du document

Before the end of the Cold War, Sweden did not to engage in international relations, and especially in Middle East, which is often described as a burning area of international relations. Even though Sweden's foreign policy in the Middle East can appear less active than in other countries, a shift occurred in the Swedish involvement in this region, leading to the abandonment of its neutral position. The aim of this paper is, by using descriptions and analysis of Sweden's foreign policy, to show how the end of the Cold War and Sweden's membership in the European Union affected the Swedish foreign policy. The reason for pointing out the fall of the USSR and Sweden's membership to the European Union is that both events created dramatic changes in different areas, and especially regarding international relations. These two aspects are probably not enough to be able to understand how and why Sweden evolves in this area, but they are important enough to be concentrated on, as both of them are still affecting Swedish politics.

Extraits

[...] They should not support or favour war parties with military forces. Nor should they make their territory available to them, supply them with weapons or credits, or restrict private weapon exports in a one-sided way.”6 In these conditions, we will see that Sweden is obviously not neutral anymore (and has probably never been so) in international relations, mainly due to indirect interferences or interventions. Middle East is an example of the Swedish position in international relations and illustrates the recent shift in Sweden's foreign policy. [...]

[...] ( ) Sweden should align its competencies and its foreign policy tools to the constraints of the enabling environment and the achievement of its strategic vision. Selecting the right partners for the initiatives it decides to undertake will be critical.”12 Sweden has to make a compromise between its will of intervening internationally and its capacities to do so. Sweden, given its size, also has to compromise with its partners on most of the issues, and hence has to defend its views and objectives in a compromising way. [...]

[...] RIEKER Pernille, “Europeanization of the Nordic Security. The European Union and the Changing Security Identities of the Nordic States.” in Cooperation and Conflict (Journal of the Nordic International Studies Association). Volume 39, number 4. December 2004. ÅSELIUS Gunnar, “Swedish Strategic Culture after 1945.” in Cooperation and Conflict (Journal of the Nordic International Studies Association). Volume 40, number 1. March 2005. Government Communication 2000/01: Priorities for the future Regional priorities; 10.5 .2; Priorities in the Middle East in “Preventing Violent Conflict Swedish Policy for the 21st Century.” Ministry for Foreign Affairs. [...]

[...] ELGSTRÖM Ole, “Evaluating the Swedish Presidency” in Cooperation and Conflict (Journal of the Nordic International Studies Association). Volume 37, number 2. June 2002. GOESTSCHEL Laurent, “Neutrality, a Really Dead Concept?” in Cooperation and Conflict (Journal of the Nordic International Studies Association). Volume 34, number 2. June 1999. PICCIOTTO Robert, OLONISAKIN Funmi and CLARKE Michael, “Global Development and Human Security: Towards a Policy Agenda.” Chapter Sweden's future security and development strategy. Global Development Studies, EGDI Secretariat, Ministry for Foreign Affairs, Sweden. [...]

[...] Sweden in Middle East: a changing foreign policy Before the end of the Cold War, Sweden did not use to engage in international relations as actively as nowadays, and especially in Middle East, which is often described as a burning area of international relations. Even though Sweden's foreign policy in Middle East can appear less active than other countries, a shift occurred into the Swedish involvement in this region, leading to the abandonment of its neutral position. The aim of this paper is, by using descriptions and analysis of Sweden's foreign policy, to show how the end of the Cold War and Sweden's membership in the European Union affected the Swedish foreign policy. [...]