The EU as ‘norm entrepreneur’ in the Asian region: exploring the digital diplomacy aspect of the human rights toolbox

Abstract

The European Union (EU) is an entity in re-evolution in relation to the development of its human rights strategy. This paper will examine the EU’s human rights advocacy in external relations in the context of normative power Europe (NPE), particularly in relation to the notion of the EU becoming a ‘norm entrepreneur’ with its revised human rights ‘toolbox’. The promotion and protection of human rights is cited as being at the core of European values, together with democracy and the rule of law, having both an internal and external focus in rights promotion and protection. This paper endeavours to present an analysis of the EU as norm entrepreneur in the context of human rights advocate. In so doing, it will examine the question of EU visibility in terms of human rights promotion. In its external action, the EU has a number of ‘tools’ in its human rights toolbox. By applying a rights inclusion analysis to the tool of digital diplomacy in an Asian context, the question of EU as norm entrepreneur is seen to be driven by strategic interests and partnerships. This paper argues that the EU is an ‘inadvertent’ norm entrepreneur through its programmatic pursuit of being an entrepreneur for social good in its external action rather than norm diffusion as experienced in a European context.