The external policy of the EU is generally considered to consist largely of trade negotiations on various bilateral and multilateral stages. There is much debate over the effectiveness of policy with respect to the developing world; in the context of this discussion I have used the term 'developing world' in its widest sense, although I will most commonly focus on the Mediterranean counties, ACP, and Latin America. It should also be made clear that for these purposes I will not be drawing too much on historical background, rather examining the issue over the last fifteen to twenty years, and how the changes in political climate within Europe may be affecting the developing world in the future.
             It is interesting to note that this essay comes at a time when increasing pressure from the USA and other member of the WTO to liberalise trade are in direct opposition to the talks currently being held on the successor to the Fourth Lomé Convention. This in turn comes into some conflict with the Union's own goals of increasing its scope as a Single Market, and makes for an apparently unyielding division of loyalty
             This essay falls naturally into two main sections; I shall concentrate first on External and then Internal policy of the EU. In the first section I shall devote some time to exploring the economic arguments surrounding the individual trading preferences granted to many developing countries, before looking more closely at the wider implications of such systems and how some countries stand to gain more than others from the system.
             The second section covers the far-reaching effects of internal EU policy on the developing world, touching briefly on the implications of the Common Agricultural Policy before analysing the effects (both realised and potential) of widening and deepening the Union in terms of the developing countries.
             I hope to demonstrate that, despite being a complex and multi-faceted issue, the overall c...