Abstract
How does the European Union export its rules and regulations to its partners during free trade negotiations? While the research fields on EU foreign policy promotion abroad and external perceptions seem to have settled on the notion that the success of EU rule export increases with the internalization of the negotiation partner’s wants, this article challenges this academic consensus. Scrutinizing the EU-India free trade negotiations (2007–2013) where the perception of EU norms turned from positive to inherently negative, the article shows that the Commission successfully constructed the notion of congruence between European and Indian standards on multiple (international, bilateral, regional) fronts during an initial “honeymoon phase” (2007–2011). Yet, once the negotiations’ focus shifted to hard bargaining over core interests, the notion of congruence gave way to tensions and discrepancies, so that perceptions turned negative over the “cooldown” (2011–2013). Analysing claims made by EU and Indian policy officials in four Indian English-speaking quality newspapers—Times of India, Hindustan Times, Hindu Business Line and the Business Standard—the article suggests that the discursive construction of congruence with the local context, however successful, cannot prevail against battles over core interests. Hence, this article provides starting points for new academic junctures in that it introduces a more nuanced understanding of the EU’s approach to rule promotion abroad.
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Data availability
All data, including the transcripts of the interviews, are in the author’s possession and can be made available upon request. They have not been made public in order to protect and respect the interviewees’ right to privacy and anonymization.
Notes
A fourth frame, the regional frame (F4), was compiled out of “MISSING” values. Here, congruence is constructed by linking EU rules to regional policy structures. It emphasizes the perception of regional equivalence of standards and structures, for example, by referencing regional security norms of the SAARC or the SCO or by mentioning standards agreed upon by the ASEAN. Yet, as this frame accounted for a maximum of 5% of the total discourse per year, I excluded it from the empirical analysis
According to the literature on claims-making, claims contain seven variables: a location (where?), a date (when?), a claimant (who?), a form (how?), an addressee (at whom?), an issue (what?), an object (for or against whom?) and a justification (why?) (Koopman & Statham 1999:55). Yet, the “when”, “where” and “how” are usually self-explanatory as they refer to the newspaper, date of publication and addressee (Haunss and Kohlmorgen 2008: 5)
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Transcripts can be made available upon request
Abbreviations
- ASEAN:
-
Association of Southeast Asian Nations
- EU:
-
European Union
- FTA:
-
free trade agreement
- FICCI:
-
Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry
- IPR:
-
intellectual property rights
- WTO:
-
World Trade Organization
References
Interviews
Interview 1 (2019, June 11) Personal interview with former member of the European Parliament’s Delegation to India
Interview 2 (2019, June 14.) Personal interview with member of the Indian Embassy to Brussels
Interview 3 (2019, June 14) Telephone interview with former head of unit of DG Trade
Interview 4 (2019, June 20) Personal interview with deputy head of unit of DG Trade, Brussels
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The author, Mrs. Marie Sophie Peffenkover, developed and carried out the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by her between March and June 2019. The manuscript has been written by Mrs. Peffenkover as single author and reflects her original thoughts and contributions.
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Peffenköver, M.S. Congruence-building on multiple fronts: Indian elite perceptions of EU rule promotion in India during the EU-India FTA negotiations (2007–2013). Asia Eur J 19, 149–165 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10308-020-00591-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10308-020-00591-2