european union

In the last hundred days, the world has seen not only how weak and divided are the European members of NATO, but also how the once-celebrated European notion of "soft power" means very little in the world of perpetually savage nations. What stops China from carving out a new co-prosperity sphere in Asian waters...

Proposals to reorient European policy have come from the European Commission and..European External Action Service...through advocacy of a “Partnership for Democracy and Shared Prosperity” and...to create a European Endowment for Democracy and a Civil Society Facility...

The European Union proudly claims to be more than the sum of its 27 parts, with a collective wealth and influence that gives it elephant status in the global zoo...The “cradle of democracy” had recently cast off six years of military dictatorship. Spain and Portugal had been invited to join the club specifically to help consolidate their emerging democracies

The Netherlands... became the first EU member state to enshrine in law the concept of net neutrality, the idea that there should be no hierarchy of information or services in the internet.Net neutrality is one of the hottest global regulatory issues around...

Public diplomacy has become an important mechanism for Beijing to promote bilateral relations. China has already established 130 Confucius Institutes in 20 European countries and signed educational partnership agreements with all 27 member states of the EU.

It is hard to remember the time when the Georgian leader was the reform darling of the Euro-Atlantic community, blitzing corruption with one hand, building infrastructure with another and trying to use soft power to win back the loyalties of people in the breakaway territories of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

It looks great on paper. But there is no transparency. There are no benchmarks and no opportunities for public input or oversight...The talks are used as a public relations exercise that allow the EU to isolate human rights issues from other top-level negotiations.

By no means has Turkey emerged as a mature power. Its handling of events in Syria and other countries - consisting mostly of rhetoric - shows that it is has yet to assume a position to influence, let alone manage, events on its periphery. But it is still early in the game.

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