A quarter-century of studying Euro-Mediterranean relations: A systematic literature review

ABSTRACT

The year 2020 marked the 25^th anniversary of the Barcelona Process, an initiative which is celebrated as the beginning of a quarter of a century of dialogue and cooperation between the EU and its South Mediterranean partners. This article offers the first systematic analysis of the scholarly debate about the EU’s action in the Southern Mediterranean by using bibliometric data of studies from 1995 until 2020 from the Scopus database. The analysis reveals the following findings: first, regardless of the presence of several research networks, studies about Euro-Mediterranean relations remain mainly an individual enterprise. Second, after the Barcelona Process, the literature was marked by a creative synthesis between area studies and EU-wide trends leading to distinctive typologies of Euro-Mediterranean relations. Third, although there is a consensus among scholars about the EU’s Eurocentric approach towards Euro-Mediterranean relations, a social network analysis of the literature shows that scientific cooperation remains extremely Eurocentric. Fourth, despite the important contribution of women in this field, the discipline suffers from a significant gender gap.

KEYWORDS:

• Systematic literature review
• Euro-Mediterranean relations
• EMP
• ENP
• UfM

1. Introduction

The last three decades have witnessed a steady increase in the European Union’s (EU’s) efforts to shape its South neighbourhood’s setting. Key milestones include the launch of the Barcelona Process (or Euro-Mediterranean Partnership, EMP) in 1995, the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) in 2004, and the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) in 2008. The EU’s attempt to strengthen its relations with countries in the Mashriq and Maghreb regions was followed by increasing scholarly interest in Euro-Mediterranean relations. Especially in the aftermath of the aforementioned agreements, emphasis was placed on the assessment of their (potential) impact on regional cooperation and on how the EU builds its relationship with the South Mediterranean partners (Del Sarto & Schumacher, 2005; Gillespie, 1997, 2008; Gomez, 2003; Joffé, 1998; Johansson-Nogués, 2011; Reiterer, 2009; Vasconcelos & Joffé, 2000).

The euphoria of the 1990s – a result of the end of the Cold War, political support for the process of globalization, and the integration of the EU – was also found in (early) writings about the EMP (Brauch, 1996; Tanner, 1996). However, the dominant view that the EMP would accelerate time, in the sense that it offered a platform for the deeper integration of the South Mediterranean countries into EU (and global) markets, was replaced in the next decade by scepticism over the ramifications of the stability-security nexus.

Despite the increasing interest in Euro-Mediterranean relations, comprehensive accounts concerning the state of the debate are still lacking. An early review of the literature was published in 2003, in which Attinà classified the debate in two broad categories by utilizing theories of International Relations (IR) (Attinà, 2003). To some extent, this categorization of studies reflected the scholarly interest in globalization at the end of the 1990s. Titled ‘The Hegemony/Domination View’, the first category drew upon Marxist and Realist thought and included studies that perceived the EU as a dominant force trying to exploit the weakest links in the Mediterranean. In the second category, in turn, included papers that viewed the EU as a benevolent partner trying to modernize the region. Under this perspective, the EMP was perceived as a gap-reducing process, both in economic and political terms.

However, research about Euro-Mediterranean relations comes from a wider range of institutional contexts, comprising expertise in policy advice and comparative politics, which is not properly covered by reviews that conceptualize the literature in rather schematic terms. Other articles or books often include literature reviews, but these are either short (usually forming part of a section within academic articles) or they focus on particular aspects of Euro-Mediterranean relations. These traditional literature reviews do not have specific procedures for selecting, classifying, and analysing the scientific debate. They are usually designed to show gaps in the debate (which scholars seek to fill) or to support the construction of specific research puzzles. In such efforts, especially in studies that do not undergo a rigorous peer review process, it is not unlikely that important works are missed.

The contribution of this article is the construction of the first systematic literature review (SLR) on the study of the EU’s external action in the Southern Mediterranean over the last three decades. The use of new technologies in the analysis of bibliometric data has helped researchers to conduct SLRs – and there are currently a growing number of such reviews in research fields ranging from development studies to the banking sector (Ahmad et al., 2020; Asatullaeva et al., 2021).

SLRs have proven very useful and can complement traditional literature reviews. A critical element of SLRs is a bibliometric analysis, which can provide a structured picture of the debate about Euro-Mediterranean relations. The findings of this literature review lead to the following arguments about the scholarly debate. First, even if there are several established networks of research centres and universities, most academic publications are still single authored. Second, the impact of globalization did not lead to the erosion of area studies, but instead led global and/or EU wide challenges to be contextualized, generating new perspectives on Euro-Mediterranean relations. Third, although there are calls to offer more space to South Mediterranean partners (Cambini & Franzi, 2014; Keukeleire et al., 2021), scientific collaborations remain very much among scholars affiliated with European institutions. Fourth, despite significant contributions of women in the field, the area of Euro-Mediterranean relations still suffers from gender inequality.

In order to explain these findings the article proceeds as follows. The first section offers an overview of the SLR’s methodology, explaining the procedure for selecting the data as well as the research design. Next, the article discusses the bibliometric analysis. This section investigates the structure of the academic debate and is divided into two parts: the first illustrates the impact of scientific production and of key journals; and the second analyses the nature of academic collaborations in the field. The conclusion summarizes the findings of this research, explains the limitations of the analysis, and suggests directions for future research in the debate of Euro-Mediterranean relations.

2. Methodology

This SLR analyses studies that are found in Scopus. Importantly, Scopus is more inclusive than the Web of Science and includes a broader range of papers in a complete format and with complete reference sets. The programme that is used for this SLR is Bibliometrix, an R-type bibliometric tool. Compared to other tools, such as Gephi or NVivo, Bibliometrix offers a more comprehensive analysis of workflow, data collection, visualizations, and tabulations. The programme offers the opportunity to carry out a structured analysis of a large body of sources and to offer a ‘big picture’ overview of extant research.

2.1 Article selection process and criteria

The literature review covers studies written from 1995 to 2020. As the article focuses on studies of the multilateral component of the EU external action in the Southern Mediterranean, the keywords used for the search are the following: Euro-Mediterranean relations, Barcelona Process, EU-Middle East and North Africa (MENA), EMP, ENP, UfM (not only in acronyms) and with their English or American style (e.g., neighbourhood, neighbourhood).

At this point it is important to mention that there are many high quality studies that cover the relations between the EU and a single South Mediterranean Partner (e.g., EU-Egypt, EU-Morocco, or EU-Israel) (Del Sarto & Tovias, 2001; Kausch, 2009; Martín, 2009; Pinfari, 2013; Voltolini, 2016; Wolff, 2009) – however these are excluded from this review, as the focus of this article is to cover regional and not bilateral cooperation. Similarly, articles which focus on the external relations of specific EU Member States towards the South Mediterranean are not included in this analysis (the 1996 special issue in Mediterranean Politics is one of first contributions to this topic; the work of Gillespie is also significant in this debate). Keywords related to specific sectors, such as ‘energy’, ‘security’, ‘migration’, and ‘trade’ or geographical areas (e.g., Maghreb, Mashreq) were not used, as such keywords would prioritize specific (policy) areas of the EU’s external action in the Southern Mediterranean.

A search in Scopus with the aforementioned terms showed 2053 sources. Scopus offers the option to restrict the search by type of study and by discipline. In the second step of the process conference papers, working papers and reports were excluded as they are typically not subject to a review process.

English was the dominant language of this debate. Of the 2053 sources in Scopus, 1852 were in English. Unfortunately, the limited research budget does not allow the translation of articles in other languages in order to offer a more comprehensive picture of the debate. However, this language restriction is not atypical: analyses of SLRs in other disciplines have found out that 78 per cent of literature reviews have language restrictions (Jackson et al., 2019).

An alternative solution to overcome the language barrier would be to use Google Translate, as the use of it does not add any costs to the research budget. Yet, Google Translate is not a reliable tool for this type of research. Earlier studies on the use of Google Translate for SLRs found that data extraction from translated articles was less accurate than from English language articles (Balk et al., 2012).

These two parameters (the inclusion of studies in English and in the Social Sciences) formed the third step of the selection process and reduced the number of studies to 1169. However, a significant proportion of these studies proved to be irrelevant for our purposes, as they focused either on the Eastern dimension of the ENP or were concentrated on issues outside of the scope of politics and IR (e.g., studies on archaeology and tourism). In order to analyse the academic debate of the EU’s external action in the Southern Mediterranean two more criteria were therefore added.

First, articles that focused exclusively on the Eastern dimension of the ENP were excluded from this review (note that papers that discuss the ENP as a single framework for all the neighbouring countries, however, are included in this literature review). Second, the bibliometric analysis was restricted to articles from political science and IR. Pointers for the exclusion of these studies were the titles, abstracts, and conclusions of these analyses.

Three examples of articles that were excluded from this literature review are the following: The work of Christou focuses on the Eastern dimension of the ENP and on the problems that the new security creates, especially against Russia (Christou, 2010). Although the ENP is included in the keywords, the article does not form a part of this SLR as the study’s focus is exclusively on the Eastern Partnership.

A second example is the work of Valls and Sardá (2009), who analysed the view of tourism experts about the impact of climate change on Euro-Mediterranean tourism industry. Scopus included the paper in this search, as it belongs to the broader area of social sciences and of Euro-Mediterranean (tourism) industry (Valls & Sardá, 2009). However, this work does not belong to the areas of politics or IR, but to business studies.

Finally, Scopus included in the list of sources articles that use the acronym ‘EMP’ for different purposes. An example of this is the work of Foret and Rubio Grundell about European Morality Politics in the EU (Foret & Rubio Grundell, 2020). The inclusion of such articles can distort the findings of this research, and therefore, a manual screening process is necessary in order to ensure that all sources are relevant to the EU’s external action in the Southern Mediterranean.

The manual screening of these studies reduced the literature review to 330 academic sources. These include 309 journal articles and 21 books. The next section provides a summary of the data of the selected articles.

2.2 Data summary of selected articles

As stated above, this literature review gathered information about academic articles and books that were written from 1995 to 2020. The findings of this analysis show that academic sources on Euro-Mediterranean relations continue to be cited by other scholars for about 10.5 years after their publication. This indicates that the lifespan of publications about Euro-Mediterranean relations is considerably longer than the average longevity of papers in social sciences. Overall, the median age of articles for Social Sciences is 3–4 years (Davis, 2013). The average citations per document of this database is 12.78 and each year the average citations per document are about 1.23. In total, 16719 references (bibliographical sources) were used for the production of these articles.

Out of 330 documents, 237 were single-authored. The analysis identified 443 author’s keywords and 285 KeyWords Plus terms. KeyWords Plus are index terms automatically generated from the titles of cited articles. They must appear more than once in the bibliography and are ordered from multi-word phrases to single terms. KeyWords Plus augments traditional keywords or title retrievals. These terms increase the analytical power of Bibliometrix, cited-reference searching, and creating clusters within the existing literature.

The 330 academic sources of this literature review were written by 335 scholars, with 0.985 studies per author, 1.02 authors per study, and a collaboration index of 1.65. The Collaboration Index (CI) is calculated as Total Authors of Multi-Authored Articles/Total Multi-Authored Articles (Elango and Rajendran, 2012; Koseoglu, 2016). In other words, the Collaboration Index is a Co-authors per Article index calculated only using the multi-authored article set.

A key finding of this analysis is that despite the large community of scholars, most studies remain single-authored, indicating that research in this field is predominantly an individual enterprise. In fact, the percentage of single-authored studies in this area of Euro-Mediterranean relations is higher than in other domains of EU public policy (almost 72 per cent of studies in this SLR) (see for example the SLR by Bunea & Baumgartner, 2014). One hundred and eighty-two scholars authored single-cited studies and 153 analysts produced multi-authored documents. The next section offers an analysis of the scientific production and it explains in greater detail its key features and impact.

3. Bibliometric analysis

3.1 Scientific production and impact of studies about the EU’s external action in the Southern Mediterranean

The EMP is often portrayed as an initiative which laid the foundations for a new regional relationship between the EU and the South Mediterranean partners. Furthermore, the EMP is also perceived as a turning point in the study of regional cooperation, as the weak Global Mediterranean Policy (of 1972) was replaced by a more ambitious strategy that involved many actors and had clearer objectives (Barbé, 1996; Del Sarto & Schumacher, 2005; Gillespie, 1997; Marks, 1996). It is often taken for granted that the EMP increased scientific attention to Mediterranean affairs.

The findings of this research suggest that this is partially true, although the increase is not linear. Figure 1 shows the scientific production (of the 330 sources in this database) per year. The enthusiasm about the EMP waned within three years of its creation. From 1998 until 2002 the annual scientific production was very low. The scientific output increased after the first years of the 2000s and especially after analysts anticipated and obtained more information about the creation of the ENP. In 2004, for example, more than 15 studies covered different aspects of Euro-Mediterranean relations, either autonomously or as part of the wider debate about the ENP.

Figure 1. Annual Scientific Production.

The launch of the UfM in 2008 and the Arab uprisings that followed the self-immolation of Mohamed Buazizi in December 2010 generated more interest in the region. Soon after the revolts, however, fluctuations in the production of studies about the EU’s external action in the Southern Mediterranean reveal an ad hoc interest on the part of scholars. In the post-Arab revolts period, renewed interest in the region was triggered in 2014; this was further boosted after the second revision of the ENP in 2015. After 2016, however, the scientific output dropped sharply. This decline occurred during a period when EU policy makers showed less interest in the region (despite the different rhetoric) and when most Mediterranean countries slowed the reform process.

The links between policymaking and scientific production deserve more analysis, as other factors may shape the scientific production (e.g., changes in the academic labour market). Yet, the analysis of the frequency of publications by the same scholars shows that the vast majority of authors (about 80 per cent) engaged infrequently with this field and wrote but a single study on the EU’s external action in the Southern Mediterranean. If one adds the findings of Figure 1 and the fact that most studies are written in key periods of Euro-Mediterranean relations, it seems safe to assume that the stagnation of Euro-Mediterranean relations should be considered as an important factor for the fluctuation of the scientific production.

Regarding the frequency of publications, the dataset is tested against Lotka’s law about the frequency distribution of scientific productivity. Lotka’s law is based on an inverse square law and according to it ‘ … the number (of authors) making n contributions is about 1/n² of those making one; and the proportion of all contributors, that make a single contribution, is about 60 per cent’ (Potter, 1981).

The bibliometric analysis indicates that the number of authors with more than one publication in this area of Euro-Mediterranean relations is significantly lower than what is expected by Lotka (according to Lotka’s law 1/4 of authors in a field have two publications; 1/9 of authors have three publications in the same field). As stated above, almost 80 per cent of authors have published only one article and about 10 per cent of authors have published two studies. Less than five per cent of authors in this dataset have published more than three articles.

The differences (relative to Lotka’s law) in the publishing behaviour of analysts of the EU’s external action towards the Southern Mediterranean is followed by a specific pattern regarding the approach of the academic debate to the EU initiatives. Unsurprisingly, at the beginning of each arrangement most studies are programmatic (trying to explain their implications for Euro-Mediterranean relations) and investigate the reasons that led the EU to trigger these initiatives.

Early writings about the EMP and the ENP posed similar arguments. The two initiatives were widely considered as a reaction of the EU to external events: the end of the Cold War (for the EMP) (Attinà, 2004; Edis, 1998) and to the enlargement of the Union (for the ENP) (Baracani, 2007; Comelli et al., 2009). The UfM, a French initiative, was perceived to be a reaction to the creation of the Eastern Partnership and as a pragmatic solution to the problem of the differentiated speed of the ENP partners regarding the application of the EU-led reforms (Balfour, 2009; Bicchi, 2011; Hunt, 2011; Johansson-Nogués, 2011). Before the Arab revolts, Tunisia was considered one of the best Mediterranean partners; despite Ben Ali’s authoritative governance, the country applied swift administrative reforms, in order to benefit from increasing trade with the EU (Kourtelis, 2015).

The role of external shocks in the creation of the EMP and the ENP led many analysts (especially in the aftermath of these initiatives) to see them as opportunities for the EU to rise as an influential force that could shape the region for the benefit of all stakeholders (Comelli et al., 2007; Edis, 1998; Tocci, 2005). Emphasis was placed on the ideas of co-ownership and partnership and the need for their consistent application in different policy areas (especially regarding trade, political reforms, and security).

The initial euphoria of several analysts was quickly challenged by scholars who drew lessons from different theoretical models (Joffé, 2007; Kienle, 1998; Romeo, 1998). Despite their different views, the common question was whether or not the new initiatives marked a new beginning in Euro-Mediterranean affairs. Especially after the Arab revolts, the critical scholarship that much earlier had challenged the transformative role of the EU, became more attractive to a wider audience. Interesting research about the selective engagement of the EU in different policy areas and the limits of the security-stability nexus (Roccu & Voltolini, 2018), the performance of the EU as a normative empire (Del Sarto, 2016) and the need for decentring Euro-Mediterranean relations (Keukeleire et al., 2021) opened a new chapter in discussions about the future of Euro-Mediterranean relations.

Furthermore, the next Figure (Figure 2) indicates that studies about Euro-Mediterranean relations had a bigger impact in moments of crisis and of significant change.

Figure 2. Average Article Citations per Year.

The launch of the ENP, the changes in the institutional architecture of Euro-Mediterranean relations in 2008 and – in particular – the Arab revolts shifted more scholars’ attention to studies about Euro-Mediterranean relations. And although an increasing number of publications in 2016 (see Figure 1) was not followed by a corresponding interest in regional affairs in the same years, it should be noted that the publication of a Handbook on the ENP in 2016 (by Routledge) and a Special Issue on the selective engagement of the EU in the South Mediterranean countries (in Mediterranean Politics) in 2018 are the main reasons for the rise of average citations from 2017 to 18.

The increased attention on Euro-Mediterranean relations after the EMP coincided with the emergence of Mediterranean Politics as the most influential journal of Euro-Mediterranean studies (Figure 3). All other journals published about the same number of studies about multilateral cooperation between the EU and Mediterranean countries. Also worth noting, after the beginning of the 2000s, is the increasing presence of authors in The International Spectator – an Italian journal of IR.

Figure 3. Growth of most important Journals in the field.

At this point, it is important to mention that the increased attention to Euro-Mediterranean relations and the success of Mediterranean Politics occurred at a time when important boundary shifts occurred between disciplines (Franzinetti, 2015; Katzenstein, 2002). After the end of Cold War many research bodies began to transform area studies ‘by directing research away from areas and towards the changing configuration of global and regional space under late capitalism’ (Nugent, 2010, p. 26). As a result of this process, scholars started to place more emphasis on de-territorialized problems, such as globalization, security, democracy, development, human rights, and sustainability (Nugent, 2010). This process has been uneven among countries and across social sciences disciplines. The US has embraced change faster, due to its more competitive and market-oriented academic market (see Ford Foundation, 1999; Lewis & Wigen, 1999). In Europe, the response of many institutions was slower (universities in the UK were more receptive to this re-orientation). Yet, the increasing involvement of the EU in research funding accelerated further this process (Franzinetti, 2015).

The effects of this process are shown in the evolution and of the frequency of key terms in the studies of this database.¹ The bibliometric analysis shows that continuous emphasis of the relevant bibliography is placed on security (before and after the Arab revolts) highlighting the importance of the security-stability nexus. Democracy promotion appears as a significant key term only after 2011 in this set of studies. This reflects the increasing scholarly focus on the efforts of the EU to promote deep democracy in the region.

Bibliometrix performs multiple correspondence analysis in order to inflect words to their own word stem and to create clusters. The power of each term is determined by the frequency with which terms are found in the studies of this database. The clusters are then ranked depending on the links between terms and their frequency. The high frequency of key terms, such as regional security, foreign policy, trade agreements, and geopolitics, indicate the response of the scholarship to the restructuring of area studies – what Teti described (regarding the links between Middle East Studies and IR) as calls to ‘produce a new kind of interdisciplinary and policy-relevant scholarship’ (Teti, 2007, p. 118).

The analysis shows some seeds of cross-fertilization between different aspects of Euro-Mediterranean relations, especially between economic factors, security parameters, and EU foreign policy. The (changing) notions of regional security and geopolitics, especially the security of the EU, appear as very significant terms in this set of studies. Examples of these links are the work of Bicchi and Martin, who underlined the divergence of the EU and the Arab partners on security issues, which they say as undermining the coherence of Euro-Mediterranean relations despite signs of increasing cooperation (Bicchi & Martin, 2006). Discussions of the security-stability nexus continued after the Arab revolts, as scholars deployed new frameworks for highlighting the (problematic) reaction of the EU (see for example Roccu & Voltolini, 2018).

Other important, recurring terms in the literature are free trade and democracy promotion (as stated above the latter especially after 2011). Before the Arab revolts there was a strong view that the EU was a genuine supporter of values such as democracy, human rights, and good governance, and thereby contributed to the liberal security of the region (Joenniemi, 2007). Even as a ‘modest force for good’ (Barbé & Johansson-Nogués, 2008), the EU adopted an inclusive policy (despite several weaknesses) in order to transform its external borders from boundaries to borderlands (Comelli et al., 2007). Studies that tried to design/explain the new forms of democratic-cosmopolitan governance (Gstöhl & Schunz, 2016) were largely replaced by new more critical typologies of EU democracy promotion programmes in the region (Dandashly & Kourtelis, 2020; Dandashly, 2018). Less frequently appear terms related to specific countries of the MENA and the role of the EU vis-à-vis the national security of the Southern ENP partners.

Overall, the periodization of the scientific production about the EU’s external action in the Southern Mediterranean shows that the EMP attracted the attention of more scholars to the study of Euro-Mediterranean relations. Interest in the field fluctuates with, among different factors, the creation of new institutional arrangements and important events play an important role. Yet, the impact of most studies remain modest; many studies in Scopus lack even a single citation. In the last 25 years, 2006 was the year with the highest number of article citations (in average almost three per article).

Regarding the upsurge in the critical attention directed towards the area studies research, the prominence of Mediterranean Politics, as a journal of area studies, indicates that the gradual ‘geological change’ (Franzinetti, 2015, p. 837) between global and area studies did not reduce the significance of area studies as an enterprise. Yet, the area studies model has been influenced by (what analysts of anthropology and IR call) de-territorialized problems. In the last three decades, such de-territorialized challenges, especially related to security, trade, and democracy promotion, were contextualized and shaped the debate about Euro-Mediterranean relations. This does not indicate, however, that a vague globalism replaced place and political-economic specificity. Central to the efforts of the relevant scholarship was the goal of (re)imagining new interdisciplinary frameworks for understanding Euro-Mediterranean relations. The next section shows the main institutional locations of this research and it analyses the collaboration patterns between scholars of Euro-Mediterranean relations.

3.2 Geographical networks and collaboration patterns

The analysis of the geographical distribution of studies takes into account the institutional affiliation of their authors (at the time of their publications). It reveals an interesting picture of the scientific production. For both single country publications (SCP) and multiple country publications (MCP) the UK appears at the top of the list. More than 60 documents are written by scholars located in British universities (about 90 per cent of them are SCP).

It should be noticed that the position of the UK is not related to the significance of Euro-Mediterranean affairs to the British foreign policy, but to the dominance of the British academia in the scholarly debate and to the linguistic hegemony of English as a global language.

Based on this assumption it will not be a surprise to see the future publications from this country to decrease, as Brexit has already affected the British academia. In 2020 British universities lost £350 m from a decline in EU student recruitment and the COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the financial risks of the sector (McKie, 2020). Several universities have already adopted (or planned) restructuring strategies, which affect Schools of Social Sciences. Actually after the referendum there was a sharp increase in the number of academics from the EU who left the UK for a different university abroad (Makowski, 2019). Italy appears second in the list (almost 20 documents, 90 per cent of these are SCP); a fact which correlates with the significance of Euro-Mediterranean relations in the foreign policy of the country. Publications by scholars in German institutions (about 17 documents, 90 per cent are SCP) reveal mostly a primary interest in the ENP. France appears lower in this list, likely because many French academics prefer to write in their own language.

The centrality of the UK is evident in the following Figure of collaboration links between countries (Figure 4). As stated in the introduction, there is a wide consensus in the literature on Euro-Mediterranean relations that the EU’s approach remains Eurocentric. Similar features can be found in the collaborations among scholars/institutions. The UK is the strongest link in a chain of collaborations predominantly among European (or Western) institutions. More frequent collaborations are found between institutions in the UK and Italy; only Israel, as a South Mediterranean partner country, appears in these maps. The links of scholars who work in Israel are mainly with colleagues from British universities.

Figure 4. Collaboration links between countries (according to the institutional affiliation of authors).

At this point, it should be noted that more collaborations between analysts from both sides of the Mediterranean can be found in policy papers, usually produced by research centres, which focus on the EU’s external action or public policy. Two important networks of research centres that provide a platform for a dialogue between researchers from Europe and the South Mediterranean countries are EuroMeSCo and FEMISE. Their publications include joint policy studies, policy briefs, and reports over a wide range of policy areas of Euro-Mediterranean relations. The reader of these studies can find useful analyses about the performance of relevant actors and policy suggestions for the improvement of the EU initiatives in the MENA. As stated in the introduction, due to the different review process, these studies are not included in this literature review.

The dominance of the British academia is not only visible from the quantity of the scientific production, but also from the impact of the studies that are produced by analysts working in British universities. Manuscripts from British institutions have received 1179 citations. The highly cited work of Frank Schimmelfennig, who works for the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich and of Sandra Lavenex, who works at the University of Geneva, brings Switzerland high in the list (268 citations). Their research on the applicability of transgovernmentalism and on the impact of networks for the deeper integration of the partner countries help Switzerland to reach second place (see for example Lavenex & Schimmelfennig, 2009).

A closer look on the places of the scientific production shows the top ten institutions shaping the debate about the EU’s external action in the Southern Mediterranean. Primarily the work of Bicchi gives to LSE the first place (either as London School of Economics (five publications) or with its full name London School of Economics and Political Science (seven publications)). EUI is second with 11 publications, while the work of Gillespie at the University of Liverpool places the institution in third place.

At this point, it is important to note that universities in peripheral regions (especially in the UK and the Netherlands) are also important features of the literature of Euro-Mediterranean affairs. Examples of this are the University of Aberdeen (primarily due to the work of Andrea Teti the University of Aberdeen was ranked tenth in the list of most important sites of scientific production (in this database)) and the University of Maastricht, which (at least for a certain period of time) brought together scholars focused on different aspects of Euro-Mediterranean affairs (such as Assem Dandashly, Anna Heranz-Suralles, Christos Kourtelis, Gergana Noutcheva, Benedetta Voltolini) and ranked sixth in the same list. However, the volatility of the academic market and the increasing casualization of the academic workforce can very quickly erode the concentration of such intellectual capital. Universities and institutes located in South Europe (e.g., EUI (second most important place of scientific production), University of Malta (eighth most important place of scientific production), by contrast, have tended to have more figure presence in the literature of Euro-Mediterranean relations.

Residence in the same university appears as a significant factor for the establishment of links between scholars. The analysis of the affiliation of authors (at the time of publication) of the 93 co-authored studies shows that 30 studies have been done by scholars who work in the same university (in six of the 93 studies, two out of three (or more) authors worked in the same institution) (see for example Beauguitte et al., 2015; Keukeleire et al., 2021; Michou et al., 2014).

Further analysis of the profiles of authors who collaborated on the remaining 63 studies suggests that, despite appearing to work at different universities, their connection was built while they worked/studied in the same institution before the time of the publication (see for example Dandashly & Kourtelis, 2020; Freyburg et al., 2011; Kern & Salhi, 2011; Roccu & Voltolini, 2018). More systematic research on these collaborations is difficult due to the limited information in the profiles of many scholars, but it is safe to assume that under these circumstances the Eurocentric cooperation between scholars should not come as a surprise. Academic conferences may provide the social space for people to present their work, but more initiatives (such as the Jean Monnet Network ‘EUMENIA’) should be developed to enhance collaboration between scholars from the two sides of the Mediterranean Sea.

Besides the Eurocentric cooperation between scholars, the SLR reveals the persistence of a gender gap in the discipline (for more information on the gender gap in the academia see Abreu & Grinevich, 2017). Thirty-seven per cent of the 335 authors are women (125 female scholars) and the other 210 scholars are male authors. A more detailed analysis of the positions that the authors of this set of studies hold (at the time of writing this SLR) reveals more substantial differences between female and male authors.

In order to better elucidate the gender differences a manual search of the researchers’ positions was done. The positions of scholars are divided into three categories: authors who are in their Ph.D. or post-doc stage, lecturers and assistant professors are categorized as junior scholars; senior lecturers and associate professors are considered as middle-level academics; and readers, professors and senior researchers are classified as holding senior positions.

According to the findings of this database, 46 women (37 per cent) still hold a junior position, 24 (19 per cent) are in the middle level, and 46 (37 per cent) hold senior positions in universities or other institutions. It was not possible to find the seniority of nine women, who either abandoned research or work(ed) for public institutions that do not list details about positions.

The occupational trajectory of men is different. Fewer men are junior researchers (44 men or almost 21 per cent of the male researchers), 36 men are senior lecturers or associate professors (about 17 per cent of male scholars), and 110 men (more than 52 per cent of male scholars) hold senior positions. As in the case of some female researchers, it was impossible to find the position of 20 male researchers.

The existence of the gender gap in this discipline is even more visible when one compares the aforementioned findings with the co-citation patterns. The next Figure (Figure 5) visualizes the co-citation patterns among the most cited articles and associated authors. Fifteen of the forty most-cited authors are women despite their limited promotion opportunities. In fact, the impact of some (established) female academics in the field is substantial. As it can be seen by the size of the nodes in Figure 5, the work of Bicchi, Pace, Del Sarto, and Lavenex has been an important source for other studies in this field (by definition, an article is coded as co-cited when two articles cite the third document in their references).

Figure 5. Intellectual Network.

The results of the analysis in this section highlights the Eurocentric cooperation of scholars of the EU’s external action in the Southern Mediterranean. Within this Eurocentric circle, the UK appears as a top performer; yet, scholars in universities in peripheral regions in Europe have considerable impact on this field. Another key conclusion is that there is a significant gender gap, despite the importance of women’s research.

The work of Barbe (with Richard Gillespie and Roberto Aliboni) within the subnetwork at the top side of Figure 5 indicates the emphasis that is placed on patterns of continuity and change in the institutions that govern Euro-Mediterranean affairs. A significant contribution is by Lavenex (connected mostly to the subnetwork at the centre right of Figure 5), who focuses on the role of networks in the development of Euro-Mediterranean relations. In the same subnetwork, the work of men, such as Manners and Schimmelfennig, who examined the significance of NPE and the role of conditionality in the EU’s external action should not be neglected – while the work of Smith on enlargement and ‘the outsiders’ of the EU is another well-cited study (mostly for scholars who focus on the ENP). Finally, a very strong female presence can be found in the subnetwork at the left of Figure 5: the work of Bicchi, Pace, and Del Sarto form the largest nodes in this subnetwork (though the work of men, such as Youngs, is also very important). Their work on the EU’s foreign policy towards the Mediterranean has significantly influenced scholars who focus on various aspects of Euro-Mediterranean relations.

Conclusion

This article offers the first systematic review of the literature of Euro-Mediterranean relations, incorporating 330 sources focused on the study of EU external action in the Southern Mediterranean. The findings of this search suggest that attention to this field fluctuates and is higher in key moments of Euro-Mediterranean affairs.

Especially after the Arab revolts, there has been a strong call by several scholars for more collaboration with local actors. These suggestions should not be taken into account only by policymakers, but also by analysts of Euro-Mediterranean relations: a key finding of this analysis is that research remains an individual enterprise and collaborations between scholars are very much between (or within) European institutions. Much more needs to be done in order to generate a more inclusive and interculturally responsive debate (at least in terms of collaboration among institutions from both sides of the Mediterranean).

The next finding of this literature review is related to the debate about the erosion of area studies by institutional forces, which advance alternative ways of seeing the (emergent) relationship between the EU and its Southern partners. The success of area studies journals (especially Mediterranean Politics) shows that questions about security, trade, and democracy have become vantage points, which at the same time have helped the revitalization of the field. The network of key terms suggests that scholars adopted a more interdisciplinary approach to the research of Euro-Mediterranean relations.

The last finding is the existence of a significant gender gap in the scientific production and gender inequalities in career trajectory. Despite serious efforts of women to shape the debate, their research performance does not appear to be fairly rewarded.

The aim of this SLR is to encourage a debate about the scientific production regarding Euro-Mediterranean relations. Certain limitations nevertheless remain, and a more comprehensive analysis of the literature in this field should take into account the following points. First, the inclusion of studies in different languages, in different key sectors of Euro-Mediterranean relations (e.g., migration, security, and energy), and focussed on bilateral relations between the EU and the ENP partner countries can help (1) to compare the literatures on multilateral and bilateral components of the EU’s external action and (2) to test the existing findings about the degree of eurocentrism and the magnitude of the gender gap and see to what extent the aforementioned picture of the literature of Euro-Mediterranean relations looks different.

Second, a more thorough investigation of a wider range of sources could investigate underlying inequalities (e.g., in citation patterns of studies by men and women, junior and senior researchers, scholars who work in European and Arab Mediterranean institutions) that cannot be addressed in this SLR. Such labourious data gathering process has been done by large groups of researchers in other fields of EU affairs (Bunea & Baumgartner, 2014) and can be combined with additional methodological tools (e.g., questionnaires and interviews with scholars). Doing so would allow research to shed additional light on how the scientific community of Euro-Mediterranean relations operates (e.g., regarding the key drivers of scholarly attention in (different periods and aspects of) Euro-Mediterranean relations) and offer a more detailed analysis of the links between scientific production, key events, and other parameters. By taking into account the different quality indicators of journals and publishing houses, future scientometric analyses can produce interesting data that can improve transparency and objectivity about researchers’ performance and knowledge diffusion.

In sum, although this literature review has revealed significant weaknesses regarding the level of scientific cooperation between European and South Mediterranean institutions and gender inequalities, the development of Euro-Mediterranean relations as an area study suggests that there are strong prospects for interdisciplinary cross-fertilization.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Term frequency: Total no. of times a keyword and keywords plus are found in the abstract, titles and keywords of studies. To calculate term frequency Bibliometrix adds up all the occurrences of keywords and keywords plus in all the documents of the database.