ABSTRACT
This conclusion presents some closing thoughts on the concepts covered in the preceding chapters of this book. The book discusses the external dimensions of EU energy security. The European Union’s (EU) commitment systematically to incorporate energy security into its foreign-policy cooperation has raised a number of policy challenges. The book outlines the way in which many experts have urged energy security to be understood as one element integrally embedded within the broader set of security challenges facing Europe. It outlines some of the general factors alleged by analysts to be pushing in the direction of deeper EU unity: the on-going processes of ‘socialization’ within CFSP; the emergence of a ‘network’ of common security perspectives within Europe; the influence of convergent ‘transborder’ linkages between functionaries, including in the energy sphere. The rules and regulations of the internal market were certainly presented as the key foundation to the EU’s international projection in energy matters.
