Trading Partners or Trading Deals? The EU & US in Southern Africa

Both the European Union (EU) and the US are currently pursuing trade agreements with weak economies, quite separate from the negotiations in the context of the World Trade Organisation (WTO). Often the motives for seeking trade agreements with a particular region reflect as much the competition between the two power blocs for market access as a desire for any new relations with the trading partners. The approaches or tactics of the EU and the US differ, but their goals seem to be similar: maximising trade dominance. This paper compares the EU's negotiations for ‘economic partnership agreements’ (EPAs) with southern Africa with US negotiations for a free trade agreement with the Southern African Customs Union (SACU).1