EU Global Actorness in a World of Contested Leadership

This book contributes to the literature on the EU’s role in the international system by engaging with the debates on global actorness and mapping new conceptual and theoretical avenues to better understand how agency and power are exerted at the global and regional levels, in a context of increased contestation of the international liberal order. Organised around three main lines, the book first looks at how the EU positions itself internationally in different policy areas, providing a multi-dimensional reading of EU policies, instruments, and practices; secondly, it engages with the EU’s own perspective toward its regional contexts and with the perspectives of regional actors on the EU; and, thirdly, it explores non-European perspectives on EU actorness, as the way the EU is perceived by others in this system of contested leadership is central to how it is understood in terms of policies, instruments, and overall capability to lead and act as a global power.

• European Union Politics
• international actorness
• regional actorness
• policy areas
• external perceptions

“This timely edited collection features a rich and stimulating analysis of EU actorness across policy areas and regions, and also features chapters on the external perceptions of key international partners, such as China and the US. It is essential reading for those who want to better understand the EU’s role as an international actor in the context of an increasingly contested international liberal order.”

“Ever since its formulation, the capabilities-expectations gap has informed discussions of EU actorness. It led the effort to improve and increase capabilities. But, so the editors suggest, what if the issue was the increasingly difficult task to determine for which coherent purpose(s) all these capabilities are supposed to serve? The volume’s wide coverage of the often conflicting aims across different policy sectors and regional dynamics testifies to this formidable challenge. The task is further complicated, so the volume demonstrates, by the frequent mismatch between the role-expectations by other members of the international society, divergent among each other, and the EU’s self-understanding. The EU’s actorness remains caught between a pragmatic call to become a normal actor which undermines its specific identity to represent other than normal world politics, and a normative power that suffers however from not having yet succeeded to propose a coherent purpose across policy sectors and regions.”

— Stefano Guzzini, Uppsala University, Sweden & Pontifícia Universidade Católica (PUC) do Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

“Despite and even because of its many challenges, the European Union remains the paragon of regional integration.  This rich collection, originating from seasoned scholars at Portugal’s ancient University of Coimbra, offers truly international perspectives on the EU and its relations with countries and regions. EU specialists and comparative regionalists and those intrigued by contending forms of actorness in world politics will benefit from the rich and diverse perspectives offered, ones often overlooked and worth hearing.”

• Faculty of Economics and Centre for Social Studies, University of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal

  Maria Raquel Freire, Paula Duarte Lopes, Daniela Nascimento, Licínia Simão

Maria Raquel Freire is Professor of International Relations at the Faculty of Economics and Researcher at the Centre for Social Studies, University of Coimbra, Portugal.

Paula Duarte Lopes is Assistant Professor of International Relations at the Faculty of Economics and Researcher at the Centre for Social Studies, University of Coimbra, Portugal. 

Daniela Nascimento is Assistant Professor of International Relations at the Faculty of Economics and Researcher at the Centre for Social Studies, University of Coimbra, Portugal. 

Licínia Simão is Assistant Professor of International Relations at the Faculty of Economics and Researcher at the Centre for Social Studies, University of Coimbra, Portugal.