The EU as a Global Actor in the Korean Conflict : Rising Stature Under External Restraints

Sammanfattning: Following the 2017-2018 North Korea nuclear crisis and a decade of disinterest, scholarly attention to the EU’s involvement in the Korean conflict has steadily increased. This thesis compares EU actorness in the Korean conflict, spanning the periods 2011-2012 and 2018-2019, using parts of Rhinard’s and Sjöstedt’s (2019) new actorness framework. Following recent developments in Actorness studies and heeding calls for a greater focus on external factors, it situates the analysis within the Korean conflict's broader context. It concludes that while the EU has deepened its overall engagement in the Northeast Asia region – shifting focus from North to South Korea – the EU has shown little interest in getting involved, despite other actors perceiving further EU involvement favorably. Brussels has continuously been unable to define what role it wants to play. Internal disunity concerning how the EU should balance its troubled relationship with the US with commitments to Seoul has led to the embrace of a traditional passive status quo approach, hindering proactive engagement. The EU’s stance on North Korea remains hardened, making all further cooperation and engagement entirely conditional on progress in the denuclearization talks with the US. The analytical variables borrowed from Rhinard and Sjöstedt’s actorness framework address key concerns in previous actorness studies, allowing for a detailed analysis even when no comprehensive EU-DPRK relations are found.