The EU under a realist scope

Employing a neoclassical realist framework for the analysis of the EU's Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement offer to Ukraine

Bibliographic Data

ID4444772
AuthorsNicholas Ross Smith (0000-0003-1959-0365, University of Auckland, corresponding author)
Year2016
Volume30
Issue1
Pages29-48
Publication date2016-03-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueInternational Relations (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0047-1178 • E-ISSN: 1741-2862
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0047117815588117
OpenAlexW2341158173
LanguageEN
Citations received9

This article breaks from the dominant liberal-idealist literature and examines the European Union's (EU) foreign policy decisions from a realist perspective. Through employing a novel, EU-focussed neoclassical realist framework, the EU's offer of a Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement (DCFTA) to Ukraine is argued as being a result of the mediating influence of its normative power role identity, the (mis)perceptions held by its foreign policy decision-makers and the institutional constraints inherent to its foreign policy decision-making process, which filtered systemic pressures (emanating from the European geopolitical setting) into the final foreign policy decision. Thereafter, this article assesses the EU's responses to the Ukraine crisis, offering policy reflections and recommendations

Economics · European union · Foreign policy · Free trade · Geopolitics · International economics · International trade · Normative · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Power (physics) · Scope (computer science) · European Union Policy and Governance · International Relations and Foreign Policy · Law

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