The EU’s Transformative Power on Human Rights: Correlation between Rigour and Compliance

EU accession conditionality has been noted to be one of the most powerful tools for changing human rights behaviour for many candidate countries within the EU. However, it has not worked perfectly, as some countries that have recently entered the EU continue to experience interrelated troubles with rule of law, liberal democracy and compliance with human rights standards. Conditionality has also been less effective for conflict-ridden states and neighbourhood states which are not on an accession path. The twilight of the influence of conditionality has inspired this research to examine EU pressure and leverage beyond conditionality. Utilizing a mixed quantitative (descriptive statistics) and qualitative analysis (case studies), this paper examines the relationship between the vigour and the type of pressure and the level of the state compliance. The external EU pressure examines various tools including diplomatic statements, rewards, naming and shaming, sanctions and isolation. The state’s willingness to comply is categorized between rejection, evasion, minimal acceptance and short- and long-term compliance. The research focuses on state’s willingness to adhere to EU norms on human rights in three key areas: freedom of press, respect for civil society and rights of minorities. In addition to the analysis of the data in EU member states, candidate states, potential candidate states and neighbourhood states, we conduct a process-tracing analysis of EU impact on states’ willingness to adhere to human rights standards in four diverse cases: Czech Republic, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Turkey and Israel. The research aims to contribute by constructing a novel framework on the effectiveness of the type and vigour of EU pressure tools on the degree of state acceptance. The paper assesses effectiveness of various EU pressure tools in relation to respective groups of states (EU member states, candidate states, potential candidate states and neighbourhood states).