This thesis examines the European Union's (EU) mainstreaming efforts of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) in its foreign operations. Despite its acceptance by all European member...Show moreThis thesis examines the European Union's (EU) mainstreaming efforts of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) in its foreign operations. Despite its acceptance by all European member states and an extensive rhetoric on promoting and protecting children's rights, the EU has received critique on its practical commitments. While previous studies have highlighted the challenges towards mainstreaming children's rights in the EU's general foreign policy, this article focuses on the EU’s mainstreaming efforts within specific operations, or more specifically the MENA region. The findings reveal that, while limited, the EU has mainstreamed children's rights into both policy processes and outcomes. However, this varies per operation. Moreover, it also reveals that the primary focus of the EU remains on protection and provision aspects rather than empowerment. Constructivism and norm cycle theory help explain the limited level of mainstreaming of the CRC in EU foreign policy and finding potential solutions towards effective mainstreaming of children’s rights. The findings contribute to the discourse on advancing children's rights mainstreaming in EU foreign policy and guiding the EU's rhetoric into action.Show less
Going beyond the Eurocentric perspective that is predominant in the discipline of International Relations (IR), this thesis demonstrates the valuable insights that can be gathered by starting an...Show moreGoing beyond the Eurocentric perspective that is predominant in the discipline of International Relations (IR), this thesis demonstrates the valuable insights that can be gathered by starting an analysis of an internationally relevant topic such as energy security from the viewpoint of commonly marginalised actors. The term ‘marginalised’ refers to actors geographically located in the ‘Global South’ (in this case North Africa) and previously analytically marginalised actors within IR, such as non-state actors. Moreover, this paper provides an informed response to the allegedly neocolonial character of the controversial Desertec project, a transnational energy partnership between the European Union and Middle Eastern and North African states. To be able to do so, the paper adopts an African (Moroccan) agency perspective based on the analytical framework provided by William Brown and a number of selected determinants of agency such as political bargaining power, image management or popular resistance. The paper finds that in its original form, that is, as Desertec was envisioned by its founding father Gerhard Trieb, the Desertec project cannot be described as a European neocolonial project. Yet, in its attempted realisation, Desertec – both the original large-scale project and the following individual projects – certainly had hegemonic features. Its hegemonic character, however, did not exclude and was even partly based upon African actors’ agency. Thus, while European actors still seem to determine the type of international relations held with African countries, North African state and non-state actors demonstrated significant, yet highly uneven agency in the Desertec context, thereby disproving generally held prejudices about African states’ passivity and inferiority in the international system.Show less
