Contemporary EU-China relations and the challenge of achieving normative transference

Contemporary EU-China relations and the challenge of achieving normative transference - Paul Irwin Crookes

In a series of presentations and articles, Paul Irwin Crookes puts forward evidence to suggest that a major inhibitor towards achieving a true strategic partnership between the European Union and China is the predominantly values-based paradigm that continues to dominate the EU’s engagement patterns with China. Arguing that this is especially harmful given the increasingly global significance of China’s re-emergence, Paul’s research aims to present alternative strategies that may be useful to consider at a policy level but are themselves grounded in the concept of normative transference and the related theories of international relations. In August 2013, Paul presented a research paper that explored these ideas further at an international conference on China’s global course in international politics, organised by the New Zealand Contemporary China Research Centre and hosted by the Victoria University of Wellington.  In his presentation, Paul emphasised the need to understand the challenges implied by the continuation of a broadly values-based engagement with China and offered evidence to show how Chinese attitudes to technical assistance from the EU at key points in China’s economic development have successfully overcome some of these inhibitors to achieve meaningful examples of constructive progress.