Energy Discourse of the European Commission and the European Parliament and Its Effect on the Member States

Changes in the energy policies of the EU Member States cannot be explained solely by pressure exerted by the EU legislation or, more broadly, by research into the formal powers of the EU institutions in this area. The present project focuses on researching the impact of the EU energy discourse (reflecting particularly energy security) on selected EU Member States (the Czech Republic, Germany, France, Italy and Sweden) within the timeframe of 2014–2022 and uses the Discourse-Historical Approach in this. We argue that analysing the interaction between the energy discourses of the European institutions (specifically the European Commission and the European Parliament) and the energy discourses of the Member States explains fundamental changes in the Member States' view of the need for changes in energy policies (such as changes in the energy mix).