Security culture and the construction of security partnerships : the European Union and China compared

Abstract

Important transformations are taking place in the security of states. Among these transformations, the formation of a new security culture at the single state and group-of-state level and the construction of a new generation of regional security arrangements are of great importance. The new security culture is based on the concepts of co-operative and comprehensive security. The new generation of regional arrangements is based on the substitution of military alliance alignments with security partnership agreements. In this paper, the focus is on the new security cultures of Europe and China and on the role of the European Union and China in the present state of the construction of the regional security systems of Europe and Asia.