Description
Civil–military relations (CMR) reflect the foundational balance of governance and defense within the state. In post–Cold War Europe, CMR has shifted from concerns over military intervention toward questions of coordination, governance, and operational effectiveness. Classical theories (Huntington, 1957; Janowitz, 1967) emphasized civilian control, while recent scholarship (Franke, 2006; Forster, 2022) highlights the policy dimension—how civil and military actors collaborate to achieve shared security goals. This evolution has profoundly shaped institutions such as NATO and the European Union (EU).
Within the EU, the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) has sought to bridge civilian and military efforts through joint planning and crisis management structures. Yet integration remains uneven, hindered by institutional silos, distinct funding mechanisms, and cultural divides. While Europe’s political stability has reduced the salience of CMR as an academic and policy issue, emerging hybrid threats—particularly in the cyber domain—are forcing a reevaluation of this relationship.
Cybersecurity transcends traditional institutional boundaries, intertwining civilian and military responsibilities in unprecedented ways. Cyber operations demand coordinated responses that combine strategic defense, technical expertise, and intelligence sharing across civil, military, and private sectors. As the EU Cybersecurity Strategy (2013) acknowledges, cyber resilience requires “safeguards and actions in both civilian and military fields.”
This article asks: How do cyber dynamics reshape civil–military relations within the EU’s CSDP framework?
It advances two hypotheses:
H1: Civil–military relations in the EU have not evolved into a coherent framework due to limited political and academic attention.
H2: Cybersecurity is fostering new mechanisms of coordination, shared protocols, and communication channels, gradually redefining the EU’s civil–military balance.
By triangulating CMR, cybersecurity, and the CSDP, this research illuminates how technological and institutional transformations are reshaping the EU’s role as a security actor and the broader balance between civilian authority and military power in Europe.
