Title_ The EU as an Influencing Force of East African Community Integration? An Analysis of Local Stakeholders’ Perceptions and the Study of Consent

Author_ Nathan VANDEPUTTE & Fabienne BOSSUYT

Pages 127-166

Abstract_ There is consensus in the literature that the European Union (EU) influences the integration processes in Africa, including the East African Community (EAC), through the promotion of its norms and own understanding of integration. With regard to the EAC, the EU promotes a liberal narrative of progressive trade opening and economic liberalization, with a focus on making trade work through infrastructure development (mainly road building) and functional institutions. However, existing research is predominantly EU-centered, and therefore does not take into account the perceptions of the various local stakeholders or it limits itself to the study of the elite, thereby ignoring the internal state–society complexes of regional integration. This article seeks to advance the existing literature by examining to what extent local actors—state and non-state—in Uganda consent with the EU’s promotion of regional integration in its relations with the EAC. This article finds that consent differs from actor to actor and consent differs according to the substance of the EU promotion of regional integration of the EAC, namely infrastructure or institutions.

Keywords_ East African Community, Integration, Local stakeholders, Consent, Economic Partnership Agreement