The Eu’s Voice Beyond Its Borders: The European Union’s External Communication (original) (raw)
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Mistrust of the European Union is increasing—but why? EU officials claim it is because insufficient information is creating a gulf between EU institutions and citizens. However, we argue in this paper that citizens mistrust the EU because it has sacrificed the will of the people on the altar of governance. If this is the case, there is little point in trying to convince citizens that a union built up without them is democratic. On the other hand, if we look at the lessons from the debate on the 2005 EU referendum, and if we therefore accept that democracy is an integrative battle that demands citizens’ participation, then we can put forward a different communication policy for the EU. We refer to this new approach as institutional communication, where the aim is to produce conflict, which we consider to be a “deliberative” approach, in contrast to the “marketing” approach where the aim is to produce consent.
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As part of the European Union’s current ‘geopolitical turn’, strategic communication – combining reactive messaging and proactive narrative-building – is a key element of the EU’s response to increasing global contestation. Through its reactive component, the EU’s strategic communication is very much focussed on Russia, but still largely neglects that many other foreign and domestic actors deploy disinformation techniques, too. Through its proactive component, the EU uses narrative-building and, in so doing, resorts to aggressive ‘othering’ – disregarding the role of ‘listening’ practices in building trust and mutual understanding with third parties. Instead of focussing on Eurocentric and securitising narratives, the EU should engage with the world on an equal footing in order to communicate even more strategically. To this end, a more self-reflexive top-level political discourse should be coupled with a joined-up approach to disinformation and a greater emphasis on ‘listening’ practices.
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