The Trade-Development Nexus in the European Union. Differentiation, coherence and norms

This volume offers new perspectives on the evolution of the trade–development nexus in the European Union against dramatic changes in the international context. Without disregarding them, it seeks to go beyond the controversial and extensively researched Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs). In particular, it focuses on the reform of the Generalised System of Preferences, the negotiation of various Preferential Trade Agreements, the application of trade sanctions, the allegedly ambitious agendas on decent work, Aid for Trade and aid untying, and the implications of the changing balance of power in global economic relations.

Taking diverse approaches and, at times, reaching different conclusions, contributors directly or indirectly address one or more of the three general themes of the book: differentiation, coherence, and norms.

This book was published as a special issue of Contemporary Politics

Contents:
1. Beyond Economic Partnership Agreements: the European Union and the trade–development nexus
2. Trading in development: norms and institutions in the making/unmaking of European Union–African, Caribbean and Pacific trade and development cooperation
3. Decent work and indecent trade agendas: the European Union and ACP countries
4. Differentiation within reciprocity: the European Union approach to preferential trade agreements
5. EU trade and development policy beyond the ACP: subordinating developmental to commercial imperatives in the reform of GSP
6. Sanctions under the EU Generalised System of Preferences and foreign policy: coherence by accident?
7. Challenging the European Union: the rising powers and the USA in the Doha Round
8. Tensions in the discourse and practice of the European Union’s Aid for Trade
9. Much ado about nothing? The European Union and the global politics of untying aid
10. The value of pointillism? Integrating trade and development and the European Union as a global actor