critical | decolonial | collaborative
by Laura Luciani
The EU’s policies of human rights ‘promotion’ in the South Caucasus region are loaded with coloniality. Rather than projecting a pre-set agenda with homogenising outcomes, the EU should recognise the ‘right to opacity’ of South Caucasus communities and create space for locally meaningful, emancipatory claims to emerge.
Continue reading “Beyond human rights ‘promotion’: reimagining the EU-South Caucasus relation”
by Camille Nessel
This contribution is part of a blog series seeking to explore how postdevelopment approaches can inform, infuse and potentially transform the study of EU (development) policies and relationships with the Global South.
European colonialism describes a complex period of economic exploitation, racial ideologies and cultural domination. In the last stages of colonialism towards the 1880’s, ideas of a philanthropic civilizing mission were institutionalized. During this civilizing mission, EU member countries like France began to systematically civilize indigenous people through Western “superior” values. This logic shows surprising parallels with sustainable development ideas in the EU’s trade agreements, as I will argue.
Continue reading “On the Colonial Problem in the EU’s ‘Sustainable’ Trade Agreements”
by Diāna Potjomkina
This contribution is part of a blog series seeking to explore how postdevelopment approaches can inform, infuse and potentially transform the study of EU (development) policies and relationships with the Global South.
The ways in which citizen participation is currently organized for “development” purposes have been questioned by critical observers including the post-development community but also by representatives of the mainstream development world, such as some of the World Bank’s lead economists. Criticism is – justifiably – directed at top-down approaches of the donors, ignoring local power relations, and at participatory fora which lack real impact. In too many cases, the search of “fast policy” and easy solutions has led to uncritical adoption of one-size-fits-all solutions which can easily fail in foreign contexts, even if they were genuinely successful in their place of origin.
Continue reading “EU trade policy and the “meta-participation” challenge”
by Valentina Brogna
In this blog Valentina Brogna explores how the concept of African Renaissance (AR) may reshape the relations between the European Union (EU) and Africa. Partly building on African and diasporic perspectives, she argues that EU-Africa relations are still imbued with coloniality, that there is unclarity as to what delinking from Western modernity would entail for Africa, and that the EU should first and foremost listen rather than proactively seek agreements.
This contribution is part of a blog series seeking to explore how postdevelopment approaches can inform, infuse and potentially transform the study of EU (development) policies and relationships with the Global South.
Continue reading “An African Renaissance perspective on EU-Africa relations”
by Nathan Vandeputte
This contribution is part of a blog series seeking to explore how postdevelopment approaches can inform, infuse and potentially transform the study of EU (development) policies and relationships with the Global South.
In 2018, Freedom House recorded the 13th consecutive decline in ‘global freedom’, otherwise described as an ‘unfolding third wave of autocratization’. A notable factor has allegedly been the complacency of the international community, in particular the US, Russia, and China. Yet, also the EU is admonished, particularly since its new foreign policy instrument – the Neighbourhood, Development and International Cooperation Instrument that was approved by the European Council in July 2020 – does not convincingly emphasize democracy.
by Sarah Delputte, Jan Orbie and Julia Schöneberg
This is the introduction to a blog series seeking to explore how Postdevelopment approaches can inform, infuse and potentially transform the study of EU (development) policies and relationships with the Global South. The aim is to stimulate thinking about different imaginaries of ‘another Europe’ and alternative role(s) the EU could/should play, inspired by insights from postdevelopment thinkers. The blog series results from various exchanges and discussions between the contributors since early 2019. It builds, amongst others, on the insights gained through a reading group on post-development at the Centre for Studies (CEUS) at Ghent University, a full-day workshop on bridging EU- & Post-Development in May 2019 and a visiting scholarship by Julia Schöneberg at CEUS in September-October 2019.
Although much research on the European Union (EU) and its ‘development policy’ can be considered ‘critical’ towards the EU’s policies and approaches, remarkably, post-development debates have remained largely off the radar in debating the EU’s global role. In line with a call by Manners & Whitman (2016) to advocate for more dissident voices in theorising Europe, and Schöneberg’s (2019) plea for ‘practical’ post-development, we argue that a post-development perspective towards EU ‘development’ can contribute to the field in important ways. In framing our approach, we want to use postdevelopment insights to imagine the EU as part of a ‘pluriverse’ and foster more creative and critical thinking on the EU and its relations with the so-called ‘Global South’.
Continue reading “How postdevelopment can transform EU (‘Development’) Studies”