The Observatori researcher, Adrià Rivera (IBEI) publishes the article ‘Populist challenges to EU foreign policy in the Southern Neighbourhood: an informal and illiberal Europeanisation?’ in Journal of European Public Policy.
Abstract: Populist parties in government, such as
Lega and Fidesz, have a declared interest in European Union (EU) foreign policy
in the Southern Neighbourhood. Their main focus is on migration control, border
management and security issues for these countries. It is thus relevant to
investigate to what extent populism is shaping the development of the European
Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) as it evolves from a normative-based policy towards
a much more ‘interest-based’ policy. This article will examine the implications
of Italian and Hungarian populist pressure on the ENP in third country
contexts, using Tunisia and Egypt as in-depth case studies. The article also
aims to contribute conceptually to current debates on the de-Europeanisation
-or not- of EU foreign policy. The two cases illustrate how, under the
influence of member states with populist radical right parties (PRRPs) in
government, informal and illiberal Europeanisation is not a contradiction in
terms but a real possibility.