External democracy promotion in times of internal rule-of-law crisis: the EU and its neighbourhood
Journal: Journal of European Public Policy
Year: 2023

This article seeks to unpack the implications of the deteriorating rule of law within the EU’s eastern members for the EU’s external democracy promotion. We examine the legitimacy of the EU’s support for democracy in the European neighbourhood in light of the internal EU rule-of-law crisis. Adopting a sociological perspective, we emphasize local perceptions of the EU by tracing the legitimation dynamics at play in neighbouring societies. We adopt a tripartite conception of external legitimacy ba