Leading by Example? EU Confronts the Dynamics of International Change

As a number of strategic documents illustrate throughout the last decade, the EU has assumed a “leading role to be played in a new world order” (Laeken Declaration, 2001), conceived as an order of “norms over force” and promoted mostly through multilateral institutions. However, both the evolving structure of the international system and the European integration project are currently experiencing fast-paced and unpredictable crises, which have made evident the EU’s difficulties to carry out its policies on the international stage. Emerging powers, in particular, have challenged the EU’s role as a leader in multilateral institutions in both normative and traditional power terms. This paper examines the difficulties the EU is confronting in policy areas where it portrays itself as a front runner, leading by example. The paper concentrates on two cases of EU’s action in United Nations which lie at the intersection between security and human rights: the UN Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security and the UN Security Council Resolution 1674 on the Protection of civilians in armed conflicts. Both cases illustrate the difficulties the EU is facing in practical and normative terms, being rejected sometimes by the Global South as a neo-colonial or imperialist actor.