More than Cheap Talk? Euro-Mediterranean Cooperation on Human Rights and Democracy
Vera van Hüllen – 2010
Despite the EU’s democracy promotion efforts and a joint commitment to democracy and human rights in the EMP, there are no signs of convergence towards the liberal democratic model advocated by the EU. However, the scope and intensity of multilateral, transnational, and bilateral cooperation have steadily increased across the region since the mid 1990s. Cooperation in the field of democracy promotion is marked by strong dynamics of sectoral, normative, and geographical differentiation, but it is clearly situated in a regional and highly standardised framework. While policy or polity convergence seems unlikely in the short or medium term, democracy and human rights are firmly established on a joint regional agenda.