‘United in Diversity’ on presidential recognition and sanctions? : An analysis of coherence in the EU’s foreign policy towards Venezuela

Abstract: Although the EU foreign policy is guided by the principle of coherence, previous research describes how cases of incoherence prevail. This thesis aims to contribute to the literature on under which conditions the EU acts coherently and not. It does so by studying the EU’s foreign policy making in Venezuela post the contested presidential elections in 2018 that left the country with two self-proclaimed presidents and a deteriorating democracy. What is puzzling about the EU’s response is that it imposed sanctions in a coherent manner but acted incoherently regarding the issue of presidential recognition. The outcomes hence varied within the same empirical context, which calls for further analysis of what caused this variation. The thesis utilizes a most similar systems design and qualitative content analysis of official EU-documents and news reporting of the empirical events to analyze if and how three variables - the level of institutionalization and socialization, and interests - were referred to by the actors involved in EU foreign policy making as reasons for its coherence and incoherence respectively. The findings indicate that all three variables were relevant for determining the in/coherence of the respective outcome, and that they reinforced each other to some extent.