La construcción de la política ártica de la Unión Europea

Abstract

Using as a backdrop the socio-political context of the Arctic region, marked by the process of climate change and the events and expectations derived from this process, this article aims to provide a critical analysis of the main political documents that have shaped the design of EU Arctic Policy. Several inconsistencies have been found among EU institutions along with some incoherence in relation to the political expectations of the EU towards the Arctic region and its legal options. The recent development of an EU Integrated Arctic Policy, in existence since 2016 but still under revision, reveals that the EU is more confident in its capacities as an influential soft power in research and the fight against climate change, and represents a clear step to productive economic cooperation between the European Arctic and its cooperation fora and the EU itself.