ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the role of power, interests, and knowledge in the agenda-setting phase and in the negotiations of the three EU–US passenger name record (PNR) agreements. It shows that, in the agenda-formation stage, power interacted with knowledge in the form of the unilateral US measures, which were backed with the threat of penalties and which were based on the concept of 'smart borders'. The chapter also shows how the issue of PNR transfers entered the arena of EU–US relations and became the subject of EU–US negotiations. It addresses the research question of how the EU–US cooperation on internal security emerged by looking at the negotiations for the PNR agreements through a regime-theory perspective. The initial factor that triggered the regime-formation process was the 9/11 attacks, which prompted a change in the way the US officials thought and conceptualised border and transport security.
