"Det Europeiska Grannskapet: Mjuk makt och Demokratisering"

Sammanfattning: The European Neighbourhood policy is the union’s joint foreign policy framework for themajority of the nations in the Caucasus, Eastern European, Middle eastern and North african regions, which are divided into an eastern, and a southern region. One of the main goals of the policy is to foster democratic progress in the regions involved. This task has, however, proven to be a complex and difficult one which has seen mixed results. This study uses a frameworkbased on the theory of soft power to examine what strategy the union utilizes to achieve democratization in these regions. The use of a comparative approach allows the drawing of conclusions about the subject matter based on differences in the approach between the regions. The study found that a top-down strategy of democratization was utilized in the eastern region, while a grassroot, bottom-up approach was more prevalent in the southern.This study is thus a useful addition to the plentiful research regarding the Neighbourhood policy as its findings offer opportunities for further comparative study by highlighting that there are indeed relevant differences in the relationship of the EU to the two regions.