CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2025
| Author | Tomanova, Barbora |
|---|---|
| Title | From Ambition to Constraint: The Limits of the EU's Geopolitical Strategy through the EIB in Zambia |
| Summary | This thesis examines the limits of the European Union’s (EU) new geopolitical strategy, focusing on its efforts to leverage the European Investment Bank (EIB) as a foreign policy instrument within broader initiatives like Global Gateway to secure critical raw materials and expand global influence. Although Zambia is strategically framed as a key partner within the Global Gateway and the EU’s critical raw materials strategy, no EIB investments have materialized in the country's critical raw materials sector, exposing a gap between geopolitical rhetoric and operational practice. Addressing this underexplored aspect of EU external action, the thesis asks why the EIB has failed to translate geopolitical ambition into practice. Employing a qualitative research design and institutional analysis, the study investigates how the EIB’s business model—centered on risk aversion, private sector co-financing, and credit rating preservation—constrains its ability to act in regions prioritized within the EU’s external strategy, particularly those characterized by economic volatility. The findings show that the EU’s reliance on an investment-driven model of development finance, prioritizing financial leverage and private sector involvement, structurally undermines its strategic autonomy by subordinating political flexibility to market logic. Furthermore, drawing on critical geopolitics, the thesis demonstrates that geopolitical agency is relationally constructed and that the EU’s strategic identity struggles to materialize without recognition and validation by partner countries. By revealing how market-oriented development models limit both developmental and geopolitical objectives, this thesis contributes to debates on the politicization and financialization of development finance and highlights the structural contradictions embedded in the EU’s evolving external action. |
| Supervisor | Piroska, Dóra |
| Department | International Relations MA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2025/tomanova_barbora.pdf |
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