ABSTRACT
Rationalities or mentalities of government are the historically contingent ways in which political actors, citizens, and organizations think about why, how, when, and with respect to what government should happen. They are the conceptual modes by which we understand how the world works in terms of power relations. Following Owen Parker's work on governmentality within the European Union (EU), this chapter argues that in examining the EU's external trade/environment agenda, it is possible to discern two broad categories of governmental rationality: a market rationality stream and a rights rationality stream. In order to demonstrate the operation of these mentalities of government, the chapter explains the meanings of both the market and rights rationalities and their free market, human capital, sovereigntist, and cosmopolitan variants by outlining ideal-typical position statements from each of these perspectives with respect to the EU's external trade/environment agenda.
