ABSTRACT
During the last five years, due to the multiple crises erupting in the region, the European Union’s (EU’s) neighbourhood has transformed from a ‘ring of friends’ to a ‘ring of fire’ (Taylor 2015). Simultaneously, the European Parliament (EP) was successful in enhancing its ability to influence the foreign policy of the EU. The adoption of the Lisbon Treaty played a key role in this process as it enlarged the EP’s formal prerogatives and gave members of the EP (MEPs) a better voice in external relations (Servent 2014). Since the mid–1990s, the EP has been aiming to increase its ability to shape EU foreign policy and becoming an actor in its own right. It has done this in three main ways: firstly, the EP has gradually constructed an original type of parliamentary diplomacy which draws on its strengths; secondly, it has mediated between (and bargained with) other EU institutions constructing a distinct identity; thirdly, MEPs have constantly advocated for more legal competencies to be allotted to the EP by the EU’s treaties. The latter means has recently registered noticeable results, whereby the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty aimed to reduce the democratic deficit of the EU (and of its foreign policy) and highlighted the EP’s role in assuring democratic legitimacy. Hence, the EP has gained various competencies in foreign policy with the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty, even though it is still falling far behind the power of national parliaments in Member States.
