The end of the 'Euro-Mediterranean vision'

Abstract

Relations between the European Union and North Africa have veered away from the political vision expounded under the Barcelona Process. The Union for the Mediterranean will likely deepen this trend. The Euro-Mediterranean space is increasingly characterized by competitive, containment-based and exclusionary security strategies. The more political dimensions of the partnership are now given short shrift and the EU appears inattentive to the dynamics of change within North African societies. Countries such as Spain and the UK have been overly passive in rescuing the Euro-Med vision from French diplomacy and the nature of relations between Europe and North Africa are increasingly out of sync with the changing international system. © 2009 Blackwell Publishing Ltd/The Royal Institute of International Affairs.