It all comes down to identity: An examination of the European Union’s stance on Ukrainian sovereignty

Abstract: That sovereignty is losing its importance within international politics is a commonly occurring claim. When adopted by realists it is used as describing the end of an era where predictions of state behaviour were easily made. When concluded by liberalists, it is seen as marking the transit to a new era where the view on an international system as defined by cooperation due to common interests. This essay will examine the way we look at sovereignty today in order to find an alternative explanation to the above mentioned competing views. Is it possible to use a model to describe sovereignty in all its complexity or will we have to accept that it is a constructed concept which will never truly be definable? By focusing on the sanctions imposed by the EU towards Russia due to the Ukraine conflict, this essay will take a stance on a framework developed by Stephen Krasner, dividing sovereignty into four categories: Westphalian sovereignty, domestic sovereignty, legal international sovereignty and interdependence sovereignty. The purpose is to examine to what extent this model provides a reliable explanation for sovereignty in an international context. By analysing the rhetoric used by the EU in explaining the situation in Ukraine, the idea of the importance of a national identity will also be added into the discussion. Concluding that Krasner’s model fails to take into account all dimensions of the concept of sovereignty, a suggestion will be made that we do also take into consideration social sovereignty.