The Role of the European Union in Conflict Resolution in Africa: Towards Comprehensive, Integrated and Long-Term Commitment?

The overall aim of this article is to provide an insight into EU’s engagement and increasing role in conflict resolution in Africa. The question addressed in this article is about the nature and scope of this commitment. To that end, this article provides an up-to-date analysis of the instruments committing the European Union to conflict resolution in Africa with a view to define and delimit, contextualize and measure its normative density. It takes a closer look at both unilateral instruments of the EU as well as those originating from the Union’s contractual relations with its African partners. It addresses a number of controversies generated by the normative: vertical and horizontal, institutional and functional fragmentation of the EU’s commitment to conflict resolution in Africa. The overarching argument presented in this article is that the European Union and its African partners need to move away from their dramatically fragmented partnership toward a more comprehensive, integrated and long-term regime for the EU’s engagement in conflict resolution in Africa.