While many people dismiss the European Union as little more than a regional political project, this book reveals its quietly growing global influence. Mai'a K. Davis Cross argues that despite often flying under the radar, long-standing European global strategies have permeated the very fabric of the international system, upholding strong norms of stability, liberalism, and social consciousness from the deep sea to outer space. For the EU, grand strategy is not so much about pursuing a position at the top of the international hierarchy, but about shaping the international environment itself.

This book offers a globe-spanning, planetary perspective on how and why the European Union has deeply mattered to world order in the 21st century .With a fresh perspective on grand strategy, Cross argues that the EU's grand strategy should be understood on a planetary level, extending strategic thinking beyond traditional state-centric models to address multi-generational existential challenges that transcend borders. Utilizing nine case studies- from space exploration to human rights, the book states that at the heart of the EU's global impact is its social power, which operates through transnational networks, and whose activities are our best hope to sustain our planet over the next 50-100 years. In this deeply interconnected yet fragile world, it is time to move away from evaluating grand strategy merely for its achievement of national self-interest, and instead towards its capacity to safeguard the future of humanity. In this regard, the EU is the indispensable actor.

The Oxford Studies in Grand Strategy is a major new series of cutting-edge monographs that examine the grand strategies of states, and those intergovernmental organizations and nonstate actors who credibly aspire to sovereignty. Books concentrate on the contemporary aspects of grand strategy, while paying due respect to the historical antecedents of a nation's grand strategy and their relevance for a leadership's current choices. The series is pluralistic in terms of theory and method, and maintains a broad view of the ways, means, and ends that undergird a grand strategy. Analytical and explanatory in contribution, books in the series feature a rigorous analysis of the interaction between domestic factors and global forces and provide a clear understanding of how that interaction shapes a grand strategy's formulation, codification, and implementation.

Series Editors: Thierry Balzacq (Sciences Po, Paris), Peter Dombrowski (US Naval War College), and Simon Reich (Rutgers University, Newark)