The EU’s promotion of human rights in the South Caucasus : underpinning logics and alternative imaginations
- Author
- Laura Luciani (UGent)
- Organization
- Project
- Abstract
- Under the Eastern Partnership, the European Union (EU) has stepped up its transnational cooperation with civil society in the South Caucasus, considering it as a partner in the promotion of human rights and an asset for bottom-up democratization. This chapter proposes a transnational and relational analysis of human rights politics in the South Caucasus, revealing how the multi-scalar combination of EU interventions, post-socialist domestic conditions and grassroots agency creates particular challenges and tensions for civil society groups. First, the chapter deconstructs the dominant categories of human rights promotion as they are mainstreamed in EU transnational cooperation with civil society in the South Caucasus, by exposing their depoliticizing, homogenizing and geopoliticizing underpinnings. Second, it engages with alternative vocabularies, forms of socio-political organizing and emancipatory struggles that are voiced by activist groups across the South Caucasus region. By juxtaposing the EU’s paradigms with the contestation emerging on the ground, this chapter sketches out an alternative politics of human rights promotion. This would be based on different forms of socio-political organizing oriented towards the grassroots, the recognition of justice claims beyond rights-based legal frameworks, the rejection of the capitalist development logic of ‘catching up’ and a critical rethinking of the EU’s global engagement.
- Keywords
- Civil society, European Union, Human rights promotion, Norm contestation, South Caucasus, Post-socialism
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Citation
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication: http://hdl.handle.net/1854/LU-01JP02CHJFEZ7P3WE4JCHVGAZP
- MLA
- Luciani, Laura. “The EU’s Promotion of Human Rights in the South Caucasus : Underpinning Logics and Alternative Imaginations.” Contentious Politics in the Transnational Arena : Political Contention in Europe and Its Wider Neighbourhood, edited by Chiara Milan and Aron Buzogány, Palgrave Macmillan, 2025, pp. 165–88, doi:10.1007/978-3-031-86209-0.
- APA
- Luciani, L. (2025). The EU’s promotion of human rights in the South Caucasus : underpinning logics and alternative imaginations. In C. Milan & A. Buzogány (Eds.), Contentious politics in the transnational arena : political contention in Europe and its wider neighbourhood (pp. 165–188). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-86209-0
- Chicago author-date
- Luciani, Laura. 2025. “The EU’s Promotion of Human Rights in the South Caucasus : Underpinning Logics and Alternative Imaginations.” In Contentious Politics in the Transnational Arena : Political Contention in Europe and Its Wider Neighbourhood, edited by Chiara Milan and Aron Buzogány, 165–88. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-86209-0.
- Chicago author-date (all authors)
- Luciani, Laura. 2025. “The EU’s Promotion of Human Rights in the South Caucasus : Underpinning Logics and Alternative Imaginations.” In Contentious Politics in the Transnational Arena : Political Contention in Europe and Its Wider Neighbourhood, ed by. Chiara Milan and Aron Buzogány, 165–188. Palgrave Macmillan. doi:10.1007/978-3-031-86209-0.
- Vancouver
- 1.Luciani L. The EU’s promotion of human rights in the South Caucasus : underpinning logics and alternative imaginations. In: Milan C, Buzogány A, editors. Contentious politics in the transnational arena : political contention in Europe and its wider neighbourhood. Palgrave Macmillan; 2025. p. 165–88.
- IEEE
- [1]L. Luciani, “The EU’s promotion of human rights in the South Caucasus : underpinning logics and alternative imaginations,” in Contentious politics in the transnational arena : political contention in Europe and its wider neighbourhood, C. Milan and A. Buzogány, Eds. Palgrave Macmillan, 2025, pp. 165–188.
@incollection{01JP02CHJFEZ7P3WE4JCHVGAZP,
abstract = {{Under the Eastern Partnership, the European Union (EU) has stepped up its transnational cooperation with civil society in the South Caucasus, considering it as a partner in the promotion of human rights and an asset for bottom-up democratization. This chapter proposes a transnational and relational analysis of human rights politics in the South Caucasus, revealing how the multi-scalar combination of EU interventions, post-socialist domestic conditions and grassroots agency creates particular challenges and tensions for civil society groups. First, the chapter deconstructs the dominant categories of human rights promotion as they are mainstreamed in EU transnational cooperation with civil society in the South Caucasus, by exposing their depoliticizing, homogenizing and geopoliticizing underpinnings. Second, it engages with alternative vocabularies, forms of socio-political organizing and emancipatory struggles that are voiced by activist groups across the South Caucasus region. By juxtaposing the EU’s paradigms with the contestation emerging on the ground, this chapter sketches out an alternative politics of human rights promotion. This would be based on different forms of socio-political organizing oriented towards the grassroots, the recognition of justice claims beyond rights-based legal frameworks, the rejection of the capitalist development logic of ‘catching up’ and a critical rethinking of the EU’s global engagement.}},
author = {{Luciani, Laura}},
booktitle = {{Contentious politics in the transnational arena : political contention in Europe and its wider neighbourhood}},
editor = {{Milan, Chiara and Buzogány, Aron}},
isbn = {{9783031862083}},
issn = {{2946-6016}},
keywords = {{Civil society,European Union,Human rights promotion,Norm contestation,South Caucasus,Post-socialism}},
language = {{eng}},
pages = {{165--188}},
publisher = {{Palgrave Macmillan}},
series = {{Palgrave Studies in European Political Sociology}},
title = {{The EU’s promotion of human rights in the South Caucasus : underpinning logics and alternative imaginations}},
url = {{http://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-86209-0}},
year = {{2025}},
}
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