Transatlantic Challenges:Ukraine,TTIPand the Struggle to be Strategic

The Role of the European Parliament and the US Congress in Shaping Transatlantic Relations: TTIP, NSA Surveillance, and CIA Renditions

“…Aiming to create the world's largest free trade area, TTIP is the ‘new binding element for the transatlantic partnership’ (Hamilton, , p. 32). Committing to a higher level of economic interlacement between the EU and the US is significant because it engenders patterns of trade politics that greatly affect the nature of government–business interactions (Hocking and McGuire, , p. 449).…”

“…Committing to a higher level of economic interlacement between the EU and the US is significant because it engenders patterns of trade politics that greatly affect the nature of government–business interactions (Hocking and McGuire, , p. 449). Since the New Transatlantic Agenda has already contributed to what Pollack rightly describes as deep integration without deep institutionalization (, p. 902), the fear of yet another disconnect between the citizens and the corporate world on the one hand, and the intergovernmental processes of transatlantic market liberalization on the other, is palpable (Hamilton, , p. 38). The questions of democracy and the role of parliaments in narrowing this gap thus become salient (Bartl and Fahey, , p. 231).…”

Europe as a Global Actor: Searching for a New Strategic Approach

“…In these countries, NGOs and civil society organizations have been very successful in mobilizing public fears, especially in sensitive fields such as food security, environmental issues as well as the earlier mentioned ISDS. Stories about American chlorinated chickens (‘ Chlorhühnchen ’) conveyed the picture of TTIP as a threat to the high European food safety standards and did little good to its overall image (Hamilton, ; Hamilton and Blockmans, ). The national debates about TTIP clearly illustrate that, even if the Commission is the key negotiator of this international trade deal, domestic politics still matter greatly.…”

The West and the Global Power Shift

“…Obama has viewed European issues less as a problem in US foreign policy and has judged the effectiveness of the transatlantic relationship as dependent on the internal dynamics of the EU itself (Hamilton 2014 ). Concern about Russian aggression has brought to the fore the importance of European security and American support in dealing with the still volatile geopolitics of the region.…”