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The EU Normative Power as a Shield of Dependency?

Publication Name: 
Discussion Paper
Year of Publication: 
2015
Author(s): 
GIORGETTI Vittorio
Organization Name: 
Institute of International Relations Prague
Acronym: 
IIR
Publisher: 
IIR
City: 
Prague
Country of Publication: 
Czech Republic
Full Date: 
January 2015
Considered Countries: 
Colombia
Category: 
Academic articles
Theme: 
BILATERAL RELATIONS UE - LAC
Country - European Union
BIREGIONAL RELATIONS UE - LAC
Association Agreeements
Keyword(s): 
European Union
Foreign Policy
Political Dialogue
Development Co-operation
FTA
Human Rights
Norms
Andean Community
Agreement
Abstract: 
This paper aims to assess the substance of the claim that the European Union acts like a normative power in its relations with Colombia. The first section explains the reasoning behind selecting Ian Manners’ normative power theory for approaching this topic, and compares the relevance of this theory to alternatives. The second section examines the EU’s normative influence over Colombia based on the sub-regional and bilateral agreements made over the last 20 years. The third section contains a critical analysis of political and economic relations between the EU and Colombia, based on EU Country Strategy Papers, the EU-Colombia-Peru FTA, and EU-CAN relations in general. Having established that there is a gap between pure intentions and actual outcomes, the final section proposes the restoration of dependency theory as a useful means for examining this discrepancy.