Cooperation and conflict in the European defence-industrial field: the role of relative gains

Defence-industrial collaborative activities have gained a central stage in the current European debate, based on the simultaneous presence of two systemic pressures (unipolarity and “defence-industrial globalization”) that are pushing EU member states towards more cooperation in these issues. Nevertheless, the European defence-industrial panorama still continues to be characterized by both cooperation and conflict. Protectionism, oligopolistic market straining and primary resource to domestic suppliers have prevented a more structured defence-industrial cooperation.The aim of this article is to add empirical evidence to recent academic works that highlighted how relative gains play a key role in understanding the simultaneous presence of cooperation and conflict in the European security architecture. In doing so, this analysis focuses on the European defence-industrial landscape and specifically on British, French and Italian preferences towards armaments cooperation. To preview the conclusions, France, Italy and the UK have constantly pursued greater intra-European cooperation, in order to increase their power within the international defence-industrial market. However, they have refused to participate in European defence-industrial initiatives when other countries would have a greater advantage from this cooperation. This happened despite strong geopolitical and strategic incentives to cooperate.