This article explores the empirical relevance of researching outside‐in politicization processes in European studies. To this end, it examines to what extent and how civil society organizations (CSOs) have contributed to the politicization of EU policies towards Western Africa in two cases: the negotiation of Economic Partnership Agreements and the EU's engagement with the G5 Sahel. CSOs were strongly engaged in the trade negotiations, while they were largely excluded from the G5 Sahel process. In both cases this was due to CSOs' own initiatives, or the absence thereof, with these strongly linked to being either invited or discouraged by official actors. The article argues that authority transfer and the domestic context – including state fragility and state–society relations – are relevant to explaining the (non‐)involvement of CSOs in outside‐in politicization.

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欧盟与西非关系的政治外部化：民间社会组织的作用是什么？

本文探讨了在欧洲研究中研究外部政治化过程的经验相关性。为此，本文研究了公民社会组织（CSO）在两种情况下对欧盟对西非政策政治化做出了何种贡献以及在何种程度上做出了贡献：经济伙伴关系协定的谈判以及欧盟与萨赫勒五国集团的接触。公民社会组织积极参与贸易谈判，而它们在很大程度上被排除在萨赫勒五国集团的进程之外。在这两种情况下，这都是由于公民社会组织的主动行动，或者是由于缺乏主动行动，而这些行动与官方行为者的邀请或劝阻紧密相关。