Differentiated Approach and Benign Hegemony in EU Relations with Neighbouring Countries. Between Voluntary Submission and Voluntary Mitigation of Power

The main aim of this paper would be to assess the nature of relationship between the EU and its neighbours with regards to specific power relations and especially constrains that the EU is putting on its own power. When speaking about the EU vis-à-vis its neighbourhood, the concept of Normative Power Europe (NPE) instantly comes to mind. This power should be non-coercive, based on rules and focused on spreading EU values – an external reflection of the EU internal order, to which the ENP countries submitted voluntarily. On the other hand, one might argue that the power relations in the EU neighbourhood and the concept of the NPE in fact are asymmetrical and of purely hegemonic nature. The vast asymmetry between the EU and its neighbours, and weak legitimization of the ENP strengthen this way of looking at the NPE in the EU neighbourhood. It however seems that the image of being a hegemon (even if benign one) is not very consistent with how the European Union perceives itself and its role in the international relations. This paper main focus is to look at mechanisms and practices which the EU is employing to mitigate the hegemonic nature of the relationship within the ENP and how these practices are translated into differentiated approach solidified within ENP instruments and institutions. The paper consists of a theoretical part, in which we examine the conditions of EU dominance over its neighbourhood as well as discuss to what extent the ENP countries voluntarily submit to this dominance and how this is impacting differentiated approach. We also introduce a model of non-dominant voluntary submission. In the empirical part we identify and analyse selected mechanisms through which the EU is trying to mitigate its domination (or perhaps hegemony) in the neighbourhood. We mainly look at two institutional tools: (1) consultations over the ENP reform and (2) the ENP Interparliamentary Assemblies (PAUFM and EuroNEST).