Revolutions among the Southern Neighbors

 by greensefa under CC Licence

Time for a new EU Policy towards the Arab World

The Arab world is experiencing historic moments. It is still too early to judge whether the changes will lead to a sustainable democratic development, but the dynamics of the movement point into that direction. The people of Tunisia, Egypt and Libya, and also in other countries such as Yemen, Bahrain and Algeria are revolting against encrusted structures. Which direction the movement will take is still open, but one thing has become clear during the last few weeks: Neither the EU nor the EU Member States can claim that the current transition process in Tunisia or Egypt is a direct result of the European democratization policy, although for more than fifteen years, through various policy instruments and approaches (such as the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership and European Neighborhood Policy) the EU has made a lot of efforts and has invested not only in economic cooperation, but also in democratization projects. The success of the Arab revolution up to now - the overthrow of the despots - is due above all to the courage of the people. Now, the EU must ask itself why it has continued so long to cooperate with these rulers, and has not been more consistent in demanding democratic reforms. At the same time, it would be too easy to denounce the EU policy in its entirety. Under international law, the possibility of interfering in the internal affairs of other countries is very limited. Also, by using the positive conditionality, the EU wanted to avoid an “index finger policy”. In the context of what was possible (internal restrictions by weakening positions of the EU Member States, external restriction by international law), the EU was trying to achieve much. But obviously, it did not do so strongly enough and had relatively little success. Many attempts to advance the political dialogue and to promote reforms have failed.

Click here to read Revolutions among the Southern Neighbors (6 pages, pdf, 499KB)

Isabel Schäfer is member of the commission "The EU and its Neighbors: European Enlargement and Neighbourhood Policy" at the Heinrich Böll Foundation