Abstract
Over the last decade, the European Union (EU) clearly came out as a Sustainable Development (SD) worldwide challenger. Is the Union's SD internal commitment enough to predispose it to become a global power in this field? Building on Ian Manners' concept of "Normative Power"(NP), we will first clarify why EU's internal commitment to SD alongside with its international ability to diffuse SD norms makes it a NP in this field.
We will then provide an explanation of EU's struggle to reach the SD global power status. The concept of "Normative Power" originates in Ian Manners' intention to "understand the shaping of the EU's role on the international stage away from traditional concerns over whether the EU should be a civilian or military power". Because the EU relies before all on normative basis, it is predisposed "to act in a normative way in world politics".
The originality of Manner's concept is that it "is built on the crucial observation that the most important factor shaping the international role of the EU is not what it does or what it says, but what it is". "What it is" referring to the primary and secondary law (respectively seminal and additional EU treaties, and unilateral acts and agreements) which found EU's very existence.
What is more important is that, Manners considers EU's normative basis as a catalyst of its vocation to extend its norms on a wider scale. In short, not only does Manners assert EU's internal policies but also shapes its actions at the international stage, and he also suggests that the mere existence of this communication norm prompts the Union to extend its geographical scope.
Tags: European Union, sustainable Development, global power, geographical scope, internal policies.
