On 17th and 18th of February, the African Union (AU) and the European Union (EU) met for the long-awaited summit. But since the event was planned back in 2020, the world has been ravaged by a pandemic that has stalled a decade of continuous growth and human capital improvement on the African continent.
It is becoming increasingly clear that Europe’s future wellbeing will depend more and more on the future wellbeing of its closest neighbour, Africa. So, can this summit still do what it originally set out to—and what it must set a course for— and reset the EU’s relationship with Africa as a “true partnership of equals”?
In this blog series, CGD colleagues present proposals on the joint priorities set out by the AU and the EU and offer commentary on whether a meaningful reconstruction of the relationships between the two continents is likely to materialise.