Mostly in its Backyard: Security Provisions in EU Economic Agreements

Economic agreements concluded between the EU and third parties increasingly take on security matters, such as counter-terrorism, nuclear proliferation and international criminal law. Highlighting the remarkable variation in the presence and content of these security non-trade issues (SNTIs), we argue that it is best explained by the EU's intensity of foreign policy interests vis-à-vis its partners. Specifically, different stakeholders have divergent views on this matter: some advocate strong linkage between trade and security, while others prefer to tackle these issues separately. We expect the former perspective to determine the content of economic agreements when the partner is in the EU's backyard. The latter perspective will dominate in negotiations with more distant partners. We test these expectations with a new data set of SNTIs in EU agreements. Employing quantitative methods and controlling for several alternative explanations, we find ample support for the theoretical framework.