Overview

As the European Union is not a nation state, it is not generally perceived to have a foreign policy. However, Hazel Smith argues that quite the reverse is true: that an over-emphasis on procedure and structures has disguised the fact that the EU has a clear foreign policy that can be analysed in much the same way as that of the sovereign state. Conventional assessments of the EU focus on the mechanisms, institutions and treaties through which policies are implemented. Smith shows how this can lead to a massive underestimation of the capacities of the EU. Rather than concentrating on how the policy of the EU is made, Smith investigates the action that it has engaged in abroad, and the nature of its diverse global interventions - in relation to the United States and the industrialized North, the various regions of the South and, most recently, its huge involvement in east and central Europe and the entire European continent.

Full Product Details

9780745318691

Table of Contents

Reviews

'Indispensable for students and scholars alike' -- Professor Chris Hill, London School of Economics 'A practical and informative account of what the European Union actually does in the world, and how it goes about it. I welcome Hazel Smith's level-headed contribution to a literature too often characterised by polemics and special pleading' -- Commissioner Chris Patten

'This is a practical and informative account of what the European Union actually does in the world, and how it goes about it. I welcome Hazel Smith's level-headed contribution to a literature too often characterised by polemics and special pleading.' Commissioner Chris Patten'Indispensable for students and scholars alike.' Professor Chris Hill, London School of Economics

'A practical and informative account of what the European Union actually does in the world, and how it goes about it. I welcome Hazel Smith's level-headed contribution to a literature too often characterised by polemics and special pleading' -- Commissioner Chris Patten 'Indispensable for students and scholars alike' -- Professor Chris Hill, London School of Economics

Author Information

Hazel Smith is a Professorial Research Associate at SOAS. She has previously worked on secondment to the United Nations World Food Programme in North Korea. Her books include European Union Foreign Policy: What It is and What It Does (Pluto, 2002) and Democracy and International Relations (Palgrave, 2000).

Tab Content 6

Countries Available