Virtues and perils of forum-shopping in European Security

A prominent characteristic of contemporary global governance is simultaneous involvement of multiple regional and international organisations in governing a policy issue. When these organisations overlap without established hierarchy and differentiation between them, their member states can choose those organisations that are most favourable for their interests. Existing studies often approach this forum-shopping strategy as an opportunistic behaviour that prevents international cooperation. However, using insights from international relations and law scholarships, this article argues that a broad notion of forum-shopping is insufficient to account for the multiple and complex effects of forum-shopping on international cooperation. By examining the EU and NATO member states’ strategies in these two organisations’ overlapping crisis management operations, this article shows that the implications of forum-shopping for interorganisational cooperation depend on the type of forum-shopping taking place. As the analysis suggests, multiple and overlapping venues of governance can create opportunities for international cooperation when these venues are used based on their practical rather than political aspects.