Los derechos humanos y la democracia en la relación América Latina-Unión Europea

The purpose of this essay is to analyze the problems inside the European Union so as to present a unified definition of the concepts of human rights and democracy. lt also presents sorne of the instances of syrnmetry and asymmetry between the European Union and Latin America with respect to these concepts. Espinosa emphasizes the case of Mexico in each of the five sections of the paper. In the first section, the author distinguishes the transíormations undergone by the concepts ofhuman rights and democracy in terms of importance and definition, within the framework of the European Union-Latin America relationship from the time of the Cold War until the present. In the second section, he discusses how the many actors in the bi-regional relationship influence the treatment of human rights topies and democracy. In the third, he analyzes the syrnmetries and asymmetries between the European Union and Latin America in relation to human rights and demacracy; according to the author, the symmetries are essentially of a formal nature, while the asymmetries are of a practical one. In the fourth section, he reflects on the ambiguity of the European Union’s foreign policy with respect to the topics of human rights and democracy. As Espinosa points out in the conclusions, the importance of human rights and democracy in the European Union-Mexico relationship will depend on the nature of the interests in the relationship, as well as the specific weight of the actors involved.