This article draws upon poststructuralist and postcolonial theories to examine the European Union’s (EU’s) policies of human rights promotion in the South Caucasus – notably, the EU’s engagement with local human rights activists and organisations in Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia. Contrary to most literature, which has been concerned with policy (in)effectiveness, this article is interested in problematising the discursive foundations of this EU-civil society ‘partnership’ in the realm of human rights promotion, as well as in retrieving the agency of actors who are ‘at the receiving end’ of EU policies. It is argued that the discursive construction of ‘civil’ society as a ‘good-Other’ of the EU-Self serves as a means to depoliticise the EU’s interventions, aiming at the approximation of ‘transitioning’ countries to the EU’s human rights standards. Although the hegemonic relation requires subaltern actors to perform the ‘civil’ society identity, processes of hybridisation and subversion arise as external interventions interact with local realities and meanings. Building on in-depth interviews and ethnographic observations, the article shows how the hegemonic identity of ‘civil’ society is negotiated by South Caucasus ‘not-quite-civil’ actors striving for local legitimacy, financial survival or ownership of their human rights work.

中文翻译：

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欧盟对南高加索地区的霸权干预：建设“公民”社会，将人权非政治化？

本文借鉴后结构主义和后殖民理论，研究了欧盟在南高加索地区的人权促进政策，特别是欧盟与亚美尼亚，阿塞拜疆和乔治亚州的地方人权活动家和组织的接触。与大多数关注政策有效性的文献相反，本文感兴趣的是在促进人权领域对这种欧盟公民社会“伙伴关系”的话语基础进行质疑，以及如何寻求人权的代理。处于欧盟政策“接受端”的参与者。有人认为，将“公民”社会作为欧盟自身的“善良他人”进行话语建设，是使欧盟干预措施非政治化的一种手段，旨在使“过渡中”的国家接近欧盟的人权标准。尽管霸权关系要求次要角色扮演“公民”社会身份，但随着外部干预与当地现实和意义的相互作用，杂交和颠覆的过程也会出现。该文章以深入的访谈和人种学观察为基础，展示了南高加索“非相当公民”参与者如何争取“公民”社会的霸权身份，这些参与者争取地方合法性，经济生存或对人权工作的所有权。