This panel will look at space policy as a a particulary active and innovative field of European integration in recent years. It will feature analysis of the history of European space policy, trends of its militarisation, for example, and the corresponding questions in European law and more widely questions of justice an equality. The papers originate in the works of the ESSCA standing research group on European space policies which has been rearching in this field for more than 10 years with regular panels and workshops in UACES.

Safety, resilience and sustainability of space activities have become priorities for the European Commission, as affirmed by President von der Leyen in September 2024. In this context, the European Commission launched a targeted stakeholder consultation on EU legislative initiative (EU Space Law). Several policy options were proposed, each of them with a degree of integration that varies, and significant differences in terms of legal implications for the private and public actors involved.

This paper focuses on the different options proposed on sustainable Space Policy and its legal framework, based on a matrix organized around the intersection of different approaches: on the one hand, moving from soft law to hard law, and their possible complementarity; on the other hand, moving from national coordination to supranational integration, and its possible impact on the global environment.

As a matter of fact, the concepts of safety, resilience and sustainability require a global approach by nature, because they deal with issues that cannot be solved locally, even more so with regards to space activities. Legislative initiatives at the regional level are beneficial and necessary but cannot replace the ultimate objective of a consensus among space powers. Would the adoption of an EU Space Law contribute to reinforce the EU’s role as an international, influent, actor? It will likely depend on the will of the EU, and its Member States, to continue to seek dialogue at the multilateral level, even when it appears to be sluggish, if not dead-end.

Identification of key actors in the governance of European Union space policy highlights the complexity of the governance architecture in this domain. The context of the commercialisation of space, involving non-state actors; the ongoing securitisation of space and concomitant processes of militarisation, directing attention to security and defence policy dimensions of EU space policy are factors affecting the evolution of this architecture. The EU’s External Action Service (EEAS) was established by the Treaty of Lisbon (2007) and formally launched in 2011. It is the EU’s diplomatic service. To date, attention on the EEAS has been in relation to, for example, the creation of new European administrative space, a consideration of the EEAS role and activities in the space domain in the literature may be described as fleeting. However, the role of the EEAS in space is expanding. Recent developments in the EEAS include the creation of a dedicated role of Special Envoy for Space (SES) and the release by the High Representative of the EU for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy of a Communication, jointly with the European Commission, the EU space strategy for security and defence (JOIN (2023) 9). This paper charts key features of the evolving EEAS role in the development of European Union space policy.

A new frontier is emerging, offering infinite potential and new challenges. Technology is not the main obstacle but it is the question of political-budgetary prioritization of access to space resources that arises. So, what resources are we talking about? For what purposes? Are these resources an essential complement to the depletion of terrestrial resources or do they complement them? Is their in situ exploitation a necessary condition for exploring the distant universe? Is their operation profitable? What knowledge and technologies will be needed? will it impact our environment and generate new pollution? What are the geopolitical and economic issues? will they generate new tensions and conflicts? what is the benefit/risk ratio? Is the existing legal framework sufficient to allow the exploitation of resources or does it need to be modified in a substantial and restrictive manner? What cooperation can we consider? Does man, whether as a representative of a State or as a private actor, have the right to exploit the natural resources that exist in space?

This body of questions finds answers in the recognized existence of space resources in large quantities, or rare for some, with probable in situ exploitation potential, based on the experience accumulated since the beginnings of the space adventure under reserve of profitability studies. Access to these resources could alleviate certain emerging terrestrial shortages, while promoting the exploration of deep space by establishing permanent bases on certain celestial bodies, as we experience the fragility of our planet more and more clearly, but also whet commercial appetites.

Current developments lead to the consideration of pollution that could result from active exploitation of these resources. This new extra-terrestrial race is also the transposed expression of the multiple secular geopolitical challenges of the terrestrial world. In this essentially evolving context, private actors, supported by national laws that are both modernist and contested, are disrupting an international spatial legal order that has been frozen for too long. As such, the exemplary nature of the Artémis agreements open the way to a major legal debate, but essential to clarify the conditions of access to space resources by increasingly numerous and varied actors.

Space and security have gained increasing importance at European Union level in recent years, which is reflected in Regulation (EU) 2021/696 and related legislative acts. The aforementioned Regulation establishes the new EU Space Programme and the European Union Agency for the Space Programme (EUSPA) and revolutionises its governance and components. Particularly, it transforms former space initiatives into proper security components of the EU Space Programme and turns EUSPA into the security guarantor of the programme. These developments are part, on the one hand, of a broader framework of redefinition of the EU’s position in the space sector aimed at increasing its competitiveness at European and international level and, on the other, of a different EU approach to the security and protection of its space assets that is more oriented towards resilience rather than physical protection. In view of the preeminent importance that security has acquired in the regulation of space activities in Europe, this research will firstly analyse the evolution of the EU’s competence in space and security. Secondly, it will explore the role of EUSPA in the security governance of the Programme. Finally, it will investigate the regulation of Space Situational Awareness (SSA) and its sub-component Space Surveillance and Tracking (SST), which are the essential tool among the programme components to ensure the protection and resilience of all the EU’s space infrastructures and, more generally, the safety, security and sustainability of space activities.

In contrast to recent trends for more European militarisation, Telò emphasised Europe as a civilian power (see also Duchêne, 1972, Maull, 1990, Majone, 2009, Sweeney, 2022). Telò’s definition is very perceptive here: “A political entity can be termed a civilian power not only if it does not intend, but also if it is not able, for various historical or structural reasons, to become a classic politico-military power and pursues its international peaceful objectives using other methods.” (Telò, 2006: 51). Telò points out that contrary to the negative perspective of lacking military capabilities, Europe must be seen as a very effective and indeed powerful international actor, because it has shown that it is well able to turn to good account its well-versed abilities as a civilian power (Telò, 2006: 57, see also Hoerber, Bohas, Valdemarin, 2023). Again, in contrast to the US perspective of using its military as a direct power tool, the EU has agreed to increased military capabilities under the Petersberg tasks only as a means of making its civilian engagement more credible; that is, military intervention as a possibility of last resort, the existence of which might make opponents more susceptible to preceding peaceful exercise of influence (Telò, 2006: 75). That leads to the question whether Europe can go a third way with its space policy and the increasing militarization of space.