Afrika und Europa

Adam Karlsson: African Union – European Union relations: untapped opportunity or unsolvable predicament? A look at the development of the relations between Europe and Africa in recent years, AIES Fokus 8/2018

PDF-Download

30.12.2018

Africa as a continent has long been closely connected to European history and it owes a lot of its current political and economic position to Europe. Today, when Africa is mentioned, it is mostly about conflict, human rights issues and, even more in recent events, migration. Many African migrants are making the journey for a better life in Europe on a road beset by hardship and personal tragedies. This has been an issue for many years and the European Union has been searching for a solution to the influx and has reached out to African governments to deal with the issues related to migration. The outcome was the “EU-Africa” summits, starting in 2000, aimed at tackling those problems. Since then six more summits have been held. However, the question remains: are the diplomatic talks successful and does the funding bring about change? This paper will focus on the strategies, the European Union (EU) has set into motion and what cooperation exists with the African Union (AU).