Why the EEAS is fighting for its future

With a week of major articles looking at the EU's foreign policy branch, POLITICO asks whether budget constraints, a lack of tools and a turf war with the European Commission is threatening its survival.

By NICHOLAS VINOCUR and JACOPO BARIGAZZIin Brussels

Illustration by Natália Delgado/POLITICO

When EU leaders launched the bloc’s diplomatic service in 2011, the idea was to give Europe a much more powerful and unified voice on the world stage.

But in typical EU fashion, the leaders didn’t want that voice to be too strong. So they gave their new chief diplomat, the “high representative,” two bosses — themselves, and the European Commission.