Competitiveness, Cooperation, and Fragility: Centres and Frontiers of European Policy in Safeguarding Values

Abstract

The article conceptualises the interrelationship between competitiveness, cooperation, and fragility as key characteristics of contemporary European policy through the spatial lens of “centres” and “frontiers.” The relevance of the study is determined by the transformation of the EU security environment, the growing role of border areas in shaping resilience policies, and the need to rethink the value foundations of integration in the context of multi-level crises. The aim of the article is to identify how the combination of cooperative and competitive practices influences the reproduction of European values and the formation of anti-fragile political systems. The methodological framework of the research is based on a combination of neo-institutional, spatial, and value-based approaches, as well as the use of comparative analysis, conceptual modelling, and index data to empirically illustrate the differences between decision-making centres and EU frontier regions. The theoretical analysis makes it possible to characterise the concepts of capacity, resilience, and anti-fragility and to demonstrate their functional interaction within the processes of European integration.

The study demonstrates that the competitiveness of the EU’s political centres is grounded in a high level of institutional capacity and low fragility, which ensures their ability to form cooperation networks and reproduce a value-based order. At the same time, the frontiers emerge as areas of increased sensitivity to crises that function as laboratories of institutional innovation and catalysts of anti-fragile development. It is substantiated that the interaction between centres and frontiers determines the dynamics of security policy and expands opportunities for the EU’s transformation towards greater adaptability. It is concluded that the combination of cooperation and competition is not a contradiction but a mechanism for increasing the anti-fragility of European policy, while EU values are reproduced through institutional capacity, spatial interaction, practices of solidarity, commemorative experiences, educational prospects. The results obtained can be used for further research on EU enlargement policy and European Union security strategies.