As globalization and urbanization accelerate, cities seek collaborations across borders to address shared challenges and opportunities. Anecdotic evidence and some initial academic studies suggest that those relations are often built on social contacts established in business, academic, cultural or transnational city networks (TCNs). Personal links and engagement might be more important for developing city diplomacy than formal agreements or material interests.

This paper examines the dynamics of city-to-city cooperation between the European Union (EU) and the United States, trying to answer the question of to what extent networks and social relationships are drivers of these contacts. Drawing on survey data from nearly 750 European cities, supplemented by interviews with city officials, the paper explores different types of relations between cities assessing institutionalization, interdependencies, social contacts and the role of different networks as their drivers. To our knowledge, it will be the first large-N study to map transatlantic relations on the subnational level and employ a relational perspective, highlighting the roles of networks and social contacts.

By deciphering the labyrinthine interplay of these factors, the paper elevates the discourse on transatlantic urban diplomacy, amplifying the recognition of how interpersonal networks and social bonds contribute substantively to the intricate tapestry of cross-border municipal collaboration.

This paper analyses the interactions between ‘radical’ and ‘moderate’ actors and their discourses in the case of EU foreign policy towards Israel and Palestine. European politicians, civil society groups and other stakeholders have held divergent views on how theMiddle East conflict could or should be solved. While some have advocated a so-called ‘radical’ agenda by promoting the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign,others have engaged in more technical and ‘moderate’ discourses. In this paper we examine the positions of pro-Palestinian interest groups in relation to two cases that concern EUtrade and development policy respectively: labelling (2009-2021) and textbooks (2019-2023). While the former concerns the issue of labelling/banning trade imports from Israeli settlements, the latter concerns EU development aid to Palestine’s education sector. Specifically, we analyse how the temporal dimension (short-term and long-term impact), the external context (favourable and unfavourable), and the type of lobby topic (active versus reactive) matter for the moderate-radical interaction. Based on analysis of documents and semi-structured interviews, we find that while the radical flank initially strengthened the moderates in the case of labelling, this has proved to be a Pyrrhic victory in the longer term due to the relatively weak implementation of this measure and an increased call for more radical measures such as a trade ban. In contrast, the moderate flank has arguably strengthened the radical flank in the case of textbooks, preventing the latter from engaging in debates outside its core struggles. In doing so, we aim to contribute to the literature on EU external relations, on EU-Israel-Palestine relations and on the radical flank effect. The paper will also generate wider insights on the potential relevance of so-called radical and heterodox perspectives on European politics.

On 15 November 2023, representatives of the European Union (EU) and the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States (OACPS) met in Samoa to sign the successor to the Cotonou Agreement, which will govern their relations for at least 20 years across various policy areas, namely development, migration, environment and climate change, peace and security, human rights and democracy, trade and investment. Drawing on negotiation theory and capitalising on the author’s direct engagement with the two negotiating teams, this paper unravels the dynamics that characterised the making of the Samoa Agreement. More specifically, it posits that the process that led to the adoption of the new EU-OACPS cooperation framework can be characterised as an instance of deliberative negotiations.