EU Common Values in the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement: Anchor to Democracy?

Abstract

This article analyses the Association Agreement (AA) between the EU and Ukraine. It argues that this agreement constitutes a new legal framework which has the objective to establish a unique form of political association and economic integration, characterised by three specific features: comprehensiveness, complexity and conditionality, and to promote EU values into the legal systems of Ukraine. The article studies substantive and procedural means of promotion and protection of EU values in the AA. The article scrutinises objectives, institutional framework and mechanisms of enhanced conditionality and legislative approximation in the AA. In addition, the means to protect EU values (the EU’s response to security conflicts in Ukraine) are discussed.