The External Relation of the European Community

As the European Community continues to grow, its external face becomes increasingly important in the outside world. Surveys of the EC's external relations are relatively rare but the final run-up to the completion of the EC's internal market seems a particularly appropriate point in time at which to carry out such a project. The fact that it happens to coincide with the agreement of a new Lomé Convention and the remarkable changes in the non-Community part of Europe in the late 1980s and early 1990s strengthens the case. Of course, it is not possible to provide complete coverage and examine the EC's relations with every part of the rest of the world but the choice of countries and regions here includes the more important ones and others for which the main issues arising are typical of those considered important by excluded countries. Similarly, events in some parts of the world are moving so quickly that it is only possible to provide a snapshot in time and the contributions included here were all completed in the first half of 1991.