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Despite growing scholarly interest in the EU's flagship policy towards its Eastern and Southern neighbours, serious attempts at theory-building on the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) have been largely absent from the academic debate. This book aims at contributing to fill this research gap in a three-fold manner: first and foremost it aims at theorizing the ENP as such, explaining the origins, development and effectiveness of this policy. Building on this effort, it also pursues the broader objective of addressing certain shortcomings in EU external relations theory, and even beyond, in International Relations theory. Finally, it aspires to provide new insights for European policy-makers. It is one of the first volumes to provide different theoretical perspectives on the ENP by revisiting and building bridges between mainstream and critical theories, stimulating academic and policy debates and thus setting a novel, less EU-centric research agenda. This text will be of key interest to scholars, students and practitioners in EU external relations, EU foreign policy, the European Neighbourhood Policy, and more broadly in European Union Politics and International Relations. --

The debate about the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) has, in essence, been about borders and bordering. Such departures could contribute — and often do so — to a rather fixed geopolitical vision of what the EU is about and how it aims to run and to organize the broader European space. However, this article aims to retain space for viewing the ENP as a developmental and somewhat fluid process. A conceptual framework, based on outlining three geopolitical models and a series of different geopolitical strategies employed by the EU in regard to its borders, is hence employed in order to be able to tell a more dynamic story regarding the developing nature of the ENP and the EU's evolving nature more generally. The complexity traced informs us that various geostrategies may be held at the same time at the external border. Moreover, the dominance of one geostrategy may be replaced by another or a different combination of them with regard to the same neighbourhood. It is, more generally, argued that if anything it is precisely this dynamism that should be championed as a valuable resource, avoiding the tendency to close off options through the reification of particular visions of the nature of the EU and its borders.

Introduction : how to study the politics of the European Neighbourhood Policy? -- ENP narratives : reproduction and reconstruction under crises -- Narratives and strategies of EU actors -- External responses and usages of ENP narratives -- Conclusion : politics, legitimacy and beyond.

The debate about the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) has, in essence, been about borders and bordering. Such departures often contribute to rather fixed geopolitical visions of what the EU is about and how it aims at running and organising the broader European space. In contrast, this paper aims at retaining space for viewing the ENP as a developmental and somewhat fluid process. A conceptual framework, based on the outlining of three geopolitical models and a series of different geostrategies employed by the EU in regard to its borders, is hence utilized in order to tell a more dynamic story regarding the developing nature of the ENP and the EU's evolving nature more generally. The complexity traced informs that various geostrategies may be held at the same time at the external border. Moreover, the dominance of one geostrategy may be replaced by another or a different combination of them with regard to the same neighbourhood. It is, more generally, argued that if anything it is precisely this dynamism that should be championed as a valuable resource and as such avoiding the tendency to close off options through the reification of particular visions of the nature of the EU and ist borders.

"This book examines the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) in the context of internal functions performed with regards to the European Union (EU) political system and its key actors. It argues that the ENP has been formulated not only in reaction to external challenges and threats, but also in response to EU internal legitimacy needs at systemic, institutional and actor level. Looking beyond governance approaches and the power of norms, this book follows a sociological approach to the politics of legitimation. Using Bourdieu's field theory, it bridges the rationalist-constructivist divide inherent in much of the ENP scholarship. While analysing articulations of EU institutions in terms of narrative production, reproduction and reconstruction, it sheds valuable light on where the conflicting goals, ambiguity and incoherence stem from. By highlighting third countries' responses and usages of ENP narratives for domestic and international legitimacy-seeking, the book calls for a more outside-in perspective on EU foreign policy. With the European integration project being increasingly contested, both internally and externally, this book provides a timely focus on the topic of legitimation and delegitimation dynamics with regards to EU foreign policy. This book is of key interest to scholars and students of European integration, EU Foreign Policy, and more broadly EU Studies and International Relations"--

This article offers a comparative analysis of the European Union (EU)'s agreements and institutional links with Jordan and Lebanon within the framework of the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP). This article suggests that the ENP agreements can be termed pragmatic bilateralism, claiming that the EU has altered its foreign policy agenda from a policy with an emphasis on democracy promotion to a post-normative and pragmatic, bilateral agenda. Drawing on a neoinstitutionalist framework (focusing on 'rules, routines, norms and identities'), this article argues that the different conditions for the relations between the EU and Jordan and Lebanon, respectively, in principle should have consequences in the sense that the EU would be expected not to implement similar policies or engage the two Middle East and North Africa (MENA) regimes in a similar manner. However, the complexity of the scenarios in Jordan and Lebanon in combination with the regional and international dimensions of the recent situation in the Middle East instead leads the EU to pursue post-normative and pragmatic policies characterized by more or less identical wording and non-committal goals. A certain uniformity of the EU's ENP agreements can thus be explained by a deliberate vagueness, emphasizing the pragmatism of the EU's ENP policies.

The European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) which can be viewed as the most significant geopolitical project of the European Union (EU) after 2004 enlargement, also constitutes one of the key issues of the external agenda of the Union. The ENP is a new policy initiated in 2003 and implemented in 2005 and it offers a new partnership between the enlarged EU and wider Europe, the latter including both the EU's old Southern neighbours and the new Eastern ones as well as the Southern Caucasus countries. Central to this partnership is the notion of shared values, economic benefits, cooperation against security challenges or simply said, sharing everything but institutions. Indeed, what the ENP offers to these neighbours is a closer relationship which is compatible with increased interdependence and common needs of a wider Europe, yet short of EU membership. Even though the ENP is inspired by the instruments and mechanisms of EU enlargement, the policy aims at preventing or postponing a new wave of enlargement for the Union. As for the neighbours, commitment to shared values and how to sustain such commitment with required political and economic reforms in the absence of an eventual membership remains a major dilemma.

ÖZETBu tezin ana sorunsalı Avrupa bütünleşmesi kapsamında, Avrupa Komşuluk Politikası'nın bir dış politika aracı olarak işlevinin doğru bir şekilde ortaya koyulmasıdır. Tezin araştırması; "Avrupa Birliği, Avrupa Komşuluk Politikası'nı çevresinde gücünü maksimize etmek için kullandığı jeostratejik bir araç mı yoksa çevresini stabilize etmek ve değiştirmek için kullandığı bir sosyalizasyon aracı mıdır?" sorusu üzerine kurulmuştur. Metodolojik olarak, iki sistemik teori olan neorealizm ve konstrüktivizm Avrupa Komşuluk Politikası örneğine uygulanmış ve tezin bölümlerinde "ne", "neden" ve "nasıl" soruları sorularak politikanın üç boyutlu bir resmi çekilmeye çalışılmıştır.Tezin ilk bölümünde, "Avrupa Komşuluk Politikası nedir" sorusuna yanıt aranmıştır. Burada kavramsal olarak "komşuluk" tanımı üzerinde durulmuş daha sonra politikanın gelişimi, amaçları ve araçları ele alınmıştır. Bu bölümün ikinci kısmında ise politikanın alanı coğrafi ve tematik olarak incelenmiştir. Tezin ikinci bölümünde, "Avrupa Komşuluk Politikası neden yaratılmıştır?" sorusuna genel olarak yanıt aranmaktadır. Genişleme ve enerji ilişkileri bu bölümde iki ayrı temel değişken olarak ele alınmıştır.Tezin üçüncü bölümünde ise, "Avrupa Komşuluk Politikası süreci nasıl işlemektedir?" sorusuna cevap aranmıştır. AB sosyal yapısının çevresine sosyalizasyon ve modernizasyonu nasıl ihraç ettiği sorunsalı "demokrasi ihracı" ve "sınır etkileşimleri" örnekleri üzerinden analiz edilmeye çalışılmıştır. Bu bölümde ele alınan tüm süreçler iki yönlü bir şekilde analiz edilmiştir.*Avrupa Birliği *Avrupa Komşuluk Politikası *Neorealizm *Konstrüktivizm ABSTRACTIn this thesis, the main problematic is to put forward the function of European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) as a foreign policy tool in the framework of European integration in an appropriate way. The research question of the thesis is whether the EU uses ENP as a geostrategic tool to maximize its power in the periphery, or as a modernization and a socialization tool to stabilize and change the region. In this thesis, two systemic theories, namely, constructivism and neorealism, have been applied for the case of ENP and the questions of "what", "why" and "how" are asked to take a three dimensional picture of the policy.In the first part, the question of 'what is neighbourhood policy' is answered. In the first chapter of this part, genesis of the concept 'neighbourhood' is considered. After the conceptualization part, the development, tools and aims of the European Neighbourhood Policy is explained. Moreover, the scope of the policy is analyzed under the titles of thematic and geographic.In the second part, the 'why-questions' are asked and the reasons lying behind the creation of the ENP is questioned in neorealist perspective. The evolution of the ENP is focused in the framework of power struggle between the great powers in the sense of balance of power. In this international environment the EU is considered as a sub-system and the relationship between the sub-system and international system is assessed. In the chapter of field of activity, the cases of 'widening' and 'energy relations' are examined.In the third part, how-questions are asked and the process of ENP is examined in constructivist perspective. In this part, the EU is considered as a social structure and it is objected to find out how to categorize the agents of the ENP and how the democracy promotion capacity of the EU, in the region in the case of the ENP could be measured and how the ENP could have an impact on stability and change in the defined area. With the cases of democracy promotion and border relations, the effect of the ENP and the socialization process are tried to be measured.*European Union *European Neighbourhood Policy *Neorealism *Constructivism

Chan Wai Shun. ; Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2009. ; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 193-216). ; Abstracts in English and Chinese. ; ABSTRACT --- p.III ; 緒論 --- p.IV ; ACKNOWLEDGEMENT --- p.V ; TABLE OF CONTENT --- p.VII ; ABBREVIATIONS / LIST OF TABLES / LISTS OF FIGURES --- p.XII ; Chapter CHAPTER 1: --- INTRODUCTION --- p.1 ; Chapter 1.1 --- Policy Background --- p.4 ; Chapter 1.2 --- Research Questions and Hypotheses --- p.6 ; Chapter 1.3 --- Conceptualization of Terms --- p.8 ; Chapter 1.4 --- Thematic Framework of the Whole Dissertation --- p.11 ; Chapter 1.5 --- Methodology and Research Limitations --- p.14 ; Chapter 1.5.1 --- The Selection of Case --- p.16 ; Chapter 1.5.2 --- The Articulation of Narratives and Discourses --- p.17 ; Chapter 1.5.3 --- The Source of Narratives and Discourses --- p.18 ; Chapter 1.5.4 --- The Methodological Limitations --- p.20 ; Chapter 1.6 --- Potential Contributions --- p.21 ; Chapter 1.6.1 --- Contributions to Academic Community --- p.21 ; Chapter 1.6.2 --- Contributions to the Diplomatic Community --- p.23 ; Chapter 1.7 --- Chapter Summary and the Preview of the Dissertation --- p.24 ; Chapter CHAPTER 2: --- A THEORETICAL REVIEW ON EUROPEAN NEIGHBOURHOOD POLICY --- p.25 ; Chapter 2.1 --- IR Theories and their Application in European Neighbourhood Policy --- p.25 ; Chapter 2.1.1 --- Realism and its Variation --- p.26 ; Chapter 2.1.2 --- Liberal Institutionalism and Liberal Intergovernmentalism --- p.28 ; Chapter 2.1.3 --- Constructivism and its Application --- p.30 ; Chapter 2.2 --- Problems of the Traditional IR Theories --- p.34 ; Chapter 2.2.1 --- The Maltreatment of Bargaining Game within EU --- p.35 ; Chapter 2.2.2 --- The Maltreatment of EU Polity --- p.37 ; Chapter 2.2.3 --- The Maltreatment of EU Foreign Policy --- p.38 ; Chapter 2.3 --- From IR ThEories to Policy-oriented Analysis --- p.40 ; Chapter 2.3.1 --- The Enlargement Experience of the Usual Reference --- p.41 ; Chapter 2.3.2 --- The Cross-pillar Characteristics of ENP ...

The paper discusses the current and potential role of the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) in anchoring economic reforms in the countries of the EU's Eastern Neighbourhood. It claims that it is too early to assess the success of the ENP in this sphere especially given that the actual progress of the ENP agenda has been limited. A review of the empirical evidence on external reform anchors confirms that the ENP shares some features with the EU accession process that has proven to be an effective mechanism supporting major economic, political and social changes in the countries concerned. The eventual ENP economic offer is meaningful and integration with the EU is getting stronger public support in several CIS countries and among their political elites. On the other hand several factors limit the reform anchoring potential of the ENP. This paper offers recommendations on policies that could strengthen this potential.