Actions Speak Louder Than Norms A Thematic Analysis on the European Union’s Support towards Gaza, Ukraine and Sudan

Abstract

When international crises require EU decisive action, the gap between the Union’s normative identity and actual global behaviour often sharpens. This thesis examines the systematic inconsistency in EU response across the crises of Ukraine, Gaza and Sudan. Through the qualitative multiple-case study, this study explores the Norms-Action Variation Framework (NAVF), which combines the Normative Power Theory and the Foreign Policy Analysis to assess how EU identity develops into practice. The document and thematic analysis reveals that even though the EU functions as a primary humanitarian donor for the crisis, the Union's ability to enforce political and coercive action is substantially constrained by the institutional dynamics, member state preferences and intensive media pressure. As a result, the EU aligned entirely with Ukraine through strong policy alignment, was polarised over Gaza and experienced strategic detachment from the Sudanese crisis. Overall, this thesis concludes that the EU as a normative power is conditional instead of universally applicable with consensus-building requiring a reformation in order to maintain global credibility and address the selective normativity claims.