ABSTRACT
The European union (EU) is usually not described as a security and defence actor, let alone a military power. The Economist writes that ‘Europeans still seem better at producing bureaucracy than battalions’, referring to the attempts of the EU to increase cooperation in defence as a ‘paper Euro-army’. It was only in 2016 that member states agreed to new initiatives for cooperation in security and defence. In a changing international context with the election as President of Donald Trump in the United States (US), an assertive Russia and Brexit on the horizon, EU leaders pushed for more cooperation and spending in Common Security and Defence Policy. Research on militarism in EU policies, institutions and discourses and the study of security bottom-up have both to be informed by an intersectional understanding of gender (in)equality, taking other categories of discrimination such as class, race/ethnicity, religion and ability into account.
