ABSTRACT
The aim of Chapter 6 is to explore the coherence between the EU’s application of its trade agreements with developing countries (the “regulation” dimension of the EU rule of law promotion through trade liberalization) and the related unilateral trade, financial and technical assistance instruments (the “action” dimension) in the Enlargement, Neighbourhood and Development contexts. We found that the degree of the EU’s support of the RTAs’ implementation through the relevant assistance instruments has significantly varied across the researched policy contexts, dependent on the envisaged degree of partner countries’ integration into the Single Market. Nonetheless, in all the policy contexts, the coherence between the “regulation” and “action” dimensions has been hampered by conceptual issues, such as the “politics-only” understanding of the rule of law and a strict demarcation line between the political and economic cooperation domains, as well as between the values and acquis conditionality.
