The EU's Role in Global Development: Still Calling the Tune in Africa?

This paper focuses on the EU’s role and capacity to drive a policy for “global development” and sketch out collaborative agreements with other international organisations and third countries in this field. Particular emphasis is placed on the EU’s role in Africa. The main objective of the “European Consensus on Development” is said to be the eradication of poverty in the context of sustainable development, including the pursuit of the MDGs. The paper shows how intimately related the EU’s internal dimensions are with its capacity to act externally (actorness). Although many European politicians and policymakers frequently emphasise that the EU is the world’s biggest aid player, this can often be understood in terms of “presence” rather than a capacity to act. While, on the one hand, the EU plays a role in the international policy discussion in multilateral fora and on global development policy (e.g. Paris Agenda, MDG, budget support etc), on the other hand, the EU is not acting as one ‘on the ground’ in the developing countries. In fact, in contrast to its official policy the EU is not a unified actor in global development, at least when focus is placed on development cooperation in Africa. In practice the European Commission often acts as “the 28 th ” member state, conducting its own aid policies, rather than serving as the hub for donor coordination within the EU as a whole. The European Consensus is, as one donor official in an EU member state put it, “ice thin.” The fragmented administrative responsibility within the EU’s “foreign policy complex” is another factor that severely limits the EU’s actorness in this field.