The promotion of Human rights in the external action of the European Union

The promotion of Human rights and democracy is one of the main objectives of the European Union in accordance with its purpose and principles, provided in the Treaty on European Union. As a community based on values and principals, the EU attaches the utmost importance to the upholding of the Human rights within and outside its borders and throughout the years it has become a champion of the Human rights standards in the world. One of the many instruments of the EU for Human rights promotion in its external actions is the inclusion of the Human rights clause in trade agreements with third countries, which is in the main focus of this analysis. In theory, such Human rights provisions should follow a standard pattern, however in practice, significant variations remain across trade agreements with respect to the scope, stringency and enforceability of these provisions. This study aims at researching and explaining why this is the case, by offering a case study of the bilateral trade agreements that the EU has concluded with South Korea (2011), Singapore (2014) and Vietnam (2015).In order to achieve this results, Normative Power Europe, Rational Choice theory, and Bureaucratic Politics model were tested. The empirical analysis showed that the position of the EU had different approaches towards countries in question, which translates into variations in the human rights provisions from one agreement to another. In particular, I have found out that human rights clauses in trade agreement with Singapore were watered down and not as strong as in comparison with the Vietnam and South Korea trade agreements. I explain this lack of consistency as the result of the EU's different economic interests and different levels of issue salience in the European Parliament.