Beyond the Posture, Beyond the Pale – Assessing the EU’s Real Record as An International Human Rights Actor

The recent portrayal of legal evolutions in the last 70-odd years by the Legal Service of the European Commission paints a remarkably rosy picture of the European Union’s (EU) role as a promotor of the universality and indivisibility of human rights. With all due respect, an educated reader may easily come under the impression that it was conjured up in a lawyerly cloud-cuckoo land. The positivistic vantage point that the study relies upon comes across as particularly limited, overestimating the actual success of the policy, while neglecting to pay evidence-based attention to the status quo. The present paper unpacks the premises of the analysis to offer a radically opposite view, highlighting defects in both the theory and the practice of the Union’s human rights protection. Thereby, in order to pierce through the Commission’s bubble, it illustrates how the construction shaped up as a patchwork, rather than a continuum that emanated from a single coherent vision, flagging moreover its mostly limited impact vis-à-vis the facts on the ground. In addition, the paper rehearses a series of blind spots and organisational path dependencies that have given rise to largely siloed initiatives, referring inter alia to the treatment of the Roma, rule of law backsliding, the functioning of the European Border and Coast Guard Agency (FRONTEX), and the establishment of the Human Rights Sanctions Regime. Finally, it seeks to explain why the Legal Service ostensibly neglected to proffer a more moderate account, owning up to fallibility. The upshot is a considerably less panegyrical exposé of the Union’s accomplishments, questioning why the powers-that-be appear to take greater comfort in talking the talk, instead of walking the walk.