In these concluding pages, I will cover a number of topical issues that do not necessarily belong to the domain of external relations per se but that do have important areas of overlap. In any case, it is my belief that these issues will partly determine the context within which the EU manages (or fails) to manifest itself as a global player in the coming years.

Throughout this book, I have only occasionally paid attention to the issue of climate change. The theme is of such a magnitude from a social point of view, and technically so complex, that it would not be appropriate to rank it alongside the aspects of the EU's external relations discussed here. Global warming is a problem that far exceeds the importance of European integration. It hangs like the mythical sword of Damocles above our heads. All the major policy areas and challenges addressed in this book—regarding economic growth, socio-economic inequality, development, world trade, security, enlargement and neighbourliness—shrink into insignificance compared to this overriding and overarching threat. Fortunately, environmental awareness is spreading rapidly across the Earth—if only because larger and larger groups of people are experiencing the physical and economic impacts of climate change in their daily lives. The question, however, is whether things are going fast enough and whether we humans will leave the party in time, as Damocles once wisely decided.

Nonetheless, the fight against human-induced global warming is continuously present in this book's examination of the EU and its external relations, albeit indirectly. European policy in the context of climate change is typical of the overall problem of the EU's capacity to act as an international actor. This has an external and an internal dimension. In the decades preceding the Copenhagen climate summit in 2009, the EU appeared to be playing a leading role in international fora, but it became painfully clear that the EU was not taken seriously by the US and a number of emerging countries. There are famous photos in which the political leaders of the BRICS and President Barack Obama consult each other, while the EU and its member states are conspicuous by their absence.