ABSTRACT
Conventional wisdom in International Relations (IR) literature holds that, on the whole, realism is ill-suited to explain European integration and that liberalism or constructivism can better perform in accounting for this sui generis phenomenon (Gilbert 2003). While scholars such as Andrew Moravcsik (2013) have incorporated traditional realist variables into their analysis, their conclusion was that realism cannot, nevertheless, explain European integration and its underling institutional foundations.
