Abstract
During the last two decades, the European Union has tried to emerge as a global political player without following the realist Great Powers’ pattern: its discursive identity has been the one of a democratic and multicultural union of states that promote universal values. Sub-Saharan African states provide the true litmus test for the EU’s identity projection, given the colonial past and the postcolonial legacy of most Western European countries.
In this chapter, we will examine the EU’s efforts to refine its strategy as a different global actor in relation to states of sub-Saharan Africa. We will detail what the new EU-Africa Strategy entails and comment on its merits and shortcomings in distinct, theoretical, thematic parts.
In another, empirical part, we will assess the validity of the nascent strategy and how it is perceived by relevant national stakeholders in the region, through a series of semi-directed interviews.
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Notes
- 1.
European Parliament, EPRS (2021).
- 2.
European Commission (2020).
- 3.
European Commission (2020), p. 1.
- 4.
European Commission (2020), p. 1.
- 5.
European Commission (2020), p. 1.
- 6.
European Commission (2020), p. 1.
- 7.
European Commission (2020), p. 1.
- 8.
European Commission (2020), p. 1.
- 9.
European Commission (2020), pp. 1–2.
- 10.
European Commission (2020), p. 16.
- 11.
European Parliament (2021), para. 4.
- 12.
European Parliament (2021), para. 4.
- 13.
Amare and Melly (2017).
- 14.
European Parliament (2021).
- 15.
Mabera (2020).
- 16.
European Parliament (2021), para. 4.
- 17.
European Parliament (2021), para. 12.
- 18.
Petrica (2020), p. 602.
- 19.
Jișa et al. (2021).
- 20.
European Commission (2020), p. 9.
- 21.
European Commission (2020), p. 9.
- 22.
European Commission (2020), p. 2.
- 23.
European Commission (2020), p. 2.
- 24.
China has sent 700 peacekeeping troops in the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) in 2015, it has a logistics base in Djibouti and is currently the second largest financial contributor to UN peacekeeping.
- 25.
Nyabiage (2020).
- 26.
Pirozzi and Godsäter (2015), p. 26.
- 27.
Faleg and Palleschi (2020), pp. 74–76.
- 28.
Select Committee on International Relations and Defence, House of Lords (2020), p. 6.
- 29.
Mișcoiu (2018b), pp. 19–30.
- 30.
- 31.
European Commission (2020), p. 7.
- 32.
De Waele and Kuipers (2013).
- 33.
Wallerstein (1974), pp. 387–415.
- 34.
Mișcoiu (2018a), pp. 345–348.
- 35.
Pessot et al. (2021).
- 36.
Skolimowska (2015), pp. 111–131.
- 37.
Hyde-Price (2008), pp. 29–44.
- 38.
European Commission (2020), p. 13.
- 39.
European Parliament (2021), para. 11.
- 40.
European Commission (2020), p. 17.
- 41.
Faleg and Palleschi (2020), pp. 11–13.
- 42.
Faleg and Palleschi (2020), pp. 78–79.
- 43.
Creswell (2014).
- 44.
Mișcoiu et al. (2015), pp. 7–19.
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Mișcoiu, S., Petrica, D. (2023). The New EU-Africa Relations’ Strategy: Soft Power or Neoliberalist Power?. In: Akande, A. (eds) Politics Between Nations. Contributions to International Relations. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-24896-2_26
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