Nornative Power Europe and the reality of the Ukrainian events

Abstract

The article is dedicated to the study of the concept of Normative Power Europe as well as to the critical analysis of this concept against the background of the negotiation process as for the conclusion of the Association Agreement between the EU and Ukraine. Normative Power Europe has been often offered as a major explanatory tool for understanding EU’s foreign policy, particularly with regards to its relations with the countries included in the Neighborhood Policy. The article offers analysis of the transformation of the internal political situation in Ukraine against the background of the continuation of these negotiations as well as of the initiatives and priorities that the EU had in this process. The article provides insight into the dramatic period of the negotiation process within years 2010-2014 and explains different aspects of the bargaining instruments utilized for the negotiation process. Separately, EU relations with Russia are analyzed against the background of the mentioned negotiations. The major conclusion of the offered analysis is the thesis that the concept of Normative Power Europe was not the basis of the EU policies towards Ukraine during the negotiation process as for the conclusion of the Association Agreement. Furthermore, the EU relations with Russia in the context of the development of the “Ukrainian crisis” reinforce the limitations of the use of the concept of Normative Power Europe both due to the absence of asymmetry in EU relations with other global actors and due to the priority of EU’s own interests over the moral and philosophical principles put at the foundations of the concept of Normative Power Europe.