GSTÖHL Sieglinde - EU Trade Policy and Emerging Economic Statecraft (20h)

This compulsory course examines the European Union’s (EU) trade policy in the current era of geoeconomics, where economic statecraft is gaining importance especially among major powers. It aims at understanding the EU’s trade policy in a broad sense by analysing the multilevel and multi-issue nature of its policy-making and international bargaining processes. First, the functioning of the Common Commercial Policy, its goals, actors and decision-making processes are examined. Second, an analytical approach to study the EU’s international trade negotiations and disputes is introduced. Third, the multilateral trade regime of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), in which the EU’s trade policy is embedded, as well as the challenges that the WTO is at present facing are addressed. In a fourth step, the EU’s changing trade strategy in the context of the evolving global trade environment is discussed. Over time, the EU’s trade policy has in fact become more closely intertwined with other policies ranging from development, human rights and environment to security that will be analysed in the following part of the course. The fifth session thus deals with issues at the intersection of trade and development such as the EU’s evolving relations with the group of African, Caribbean and Pacific countries and the Generalised System of Preferences. Sixth, the nexus between trade and human rights as well as sustainability norms is explored. The last session is dedicated to the growing link between trade and (economic) security and the EU’s emerging economic statecraft. 

Professor: Sieglinde GSTÖHL

ECTS Card 2026-2027