Role Change after Brexit? A Comparative Case Study of the United Kingdom in the 2014 and 2022 Ukraine Crises

Abstract

Since British former Prime Minister David Cameron promised to throw a referendum on Britain's EU membership in January 2013, how the United Kingdom (UK) would position itself in the UK-European Union (EU) relations and in world politics has been debated among scholars of International Relations (IR) and commentators. The surprising outcome of Brexit referendum on 23 June 2016 marked an unprecedented event when the country voted to leave the EU by 51.9% to 48.1%. Despite a narrow victory of the Leave side, the result was perceived as the climax of right-wing populist trend (Koller, Kopf, and Miglbauer 2019). After months of negotiations and a couple of changes in leadership, the UK finally concluded a Withdrawal Agreement with the EU on 17 October 2019, followed by a EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement signed on 30 December 2020. Despite the conclusion of bilateral agreements, the two parties did not put forward any future arrangement concerning the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) or the Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP). Such developments seem to suggest a 'hard-Brexit' on the UK-EU foreign policy and defence cooperation. Following this logic, Lehne (2021) put forward three potential changes in the dynamic of the EU foreign policy-making. Firstly, France and Germany may take a bigger...