Frédéric Mérand | The Struggle for European Sovereignty: A Battle of Ideas

The Moynihan Institute's Center for European Studies welcomes Frédéric Mérand from the University of Montreal Centre for International Studies (CÉRIUM).

Traditionally viewed as a “post-sovereign” project, the European Union is undergoing a profound semantic shift. While the term sovereignty was long the rallying cry of anti-EU nationalists, it has recently been reclaimed by mainstream leaders to advocate for “strategic autonomy” in a fragmenting global order.

This research explores the ideational struggles shaping the European project from its inception to the present. By analyzing sovereignty as “meta-capital”—the ultimate political authority—I track how different coalitions have vied to define Europe’s strategic nature. I argue that the recent rise of “European sovereignty” is a deliberate framing strategy used to unite an unlikely coalition of geopolitical Europeanists and nationalist Europeans. Through a political sociology lens, this paper examines three pivotal “battles of ideas” to explain how the concept of sovereignty has moved from the fringes to the center of European power, and what its dominance implies for the continent’s future.

Frédéric Mérand is a professor of political science and scientific director of the University of Montreal Centre for International Studies (CÉRIUM). Specializing in European politics and International Relations, he was visiting professor at Sciences Po Paris, McGill University and at the universities of Toronto, Strasbourg, Toulouse, Lille and Guido Carli in Rome. Previously, he worked as foreign policy advisor for the Canadian government. 

His current research projects focus on relations between Europe and Russia, European political economy and the decline of great powers. He is the author of European Defence Policy: Beyond the Nation State (Oxford University Press, 2008) and coauthored Introduction à l’Union européenne. Institutions, politiques et sociétés (De Boeck, 2011). He has published in academic journals such as Security Studies, Journal of Common Market Studies, West European Politics, International Studies Quarterly, Cooperation and Conflict, Politique Européenne, Canadian Foreign Policy, and International Journal.