Moral policy entrepreneurship: the role of NGOs in the EU’s external human rights policy towards China

ABSTRACT

Although it is acknowledged that NGOs play an important role in the EU’s policymaking, their role in external action is less studied due to the often closed-off character of foreign policymaking. This study helps to fill this gap by analysing the role of NGOs in the EU’s external human rights policy towards China regarding the Xinjiang crisis. It is based on a content analysis of EU and NGO documents, as well as interviews with EU and NGO representatives. We find that NGOs act not just as policy entrepreneurs, but as moral policy entrepreneurs: they combine expertise with moral arguments about the EU’s responsibility as a human rights leader to push the Xinjiang crisis higher on the EU’s agenda and guide its response.

KEYWORDS:

• NGOs
• EU external action
• human rights
• China
• policy entrepreneurs

Introduction

Non-governmental organisations (NGOs) play an increasingly important role in the European Union. Although their involvement in internal EU policymaking has been well studied in the literature on lobbying and interest representation in the EU, the same cannot be said for the EU’s external action. NGOs’ roles in the implementation of external action and as contact points in third countries have been examined, but very little is known about the extent to which they try to influence this policymaking itself, and how they do so (Shapovalova 2019; Bossuyt 2021). Due to the closed-off character of foreign policymaking in the EU, there is a lack of information on its dynamics and the involvement of NGOs, despite growing calls for transparency (Vanhoonacker and Pomorska 2013). It has been argued that including NGOs in policymaking can enhance the democratic legitimacy and transparency of the process and outcome.

For this reason, this article aims to explore and qualify the role of NGOs in the development of the EU’s external human rights policy and the tactics that they use to try to shape the EU’s agenda, specifically regarding the case of Uyghur detention camps in Xinjiang, China.¹ Human rights are an important policy field for the EU and a longstanding issue in the EU-China relationship (Balme 2008), and one in which NGOs’ expertise gives them the opportunity to participate in policymaking. The case of Xinjiang is selected due to its topicality and the importance of minority rights for the EU’s human rights policy. Over the last years, the crisis in Xinjiang has gained increasingly more attention from policymakers in Brussels. The European Parliament has adopted multiple resolutions condemning the mass detention campaign in Xinjiang as well as a resolution declaring the crisis a crime against humanity (European Parliament 2020). For the first time in more than 30 years, the EU also took sanctions against Chinese individuals responsible for the human rights violations in Xinjiang (Council of the EU 2021). These are remarkable developments, since the EU has struggled for a long time to take a strong, unified position, not at least due to conflicting economic interests in the region. This difficult position of the EU might have created space for external actors – such as NGOs – to push for their preferences and influence the EU’s external policy. This paper will look into the initial stages of this policy development, examining the role and strategies of human rights NGOs in getting this topic so high on the policy agenda.

We find that NGOs act not only as policy entrepreneurs but as moral policy entrepreneurs, setting the agenda and providing policy advice to the policymakers, but also drawing on their moral authority to urge the EU to act. Nonetheless, like any policy entrepreneur, they remain dependent on the opening of a policy window for their actions to have an impact. Our results are both theoretically and empirically relevant. Theoretically, we build on the concepts of policy and moral entrepreneur to highlight the dual role that NGOs can play: not only playing an important role in the agenda-setting and policy formulation, but also using unique moral arguments to convince the EU to act. Empirically, this case study demonstrates that NGOs are active in pushing issues onto the EU’s external human rights agenda and can be effective. Finally, the topic is also societally relevant: the EU’s reaction to the human rights violations in Xinjiang is a milestone in the EU’s external human rights policy and EU-China relations. Exploring the possible catalyst role that NGOs have played in the recent EU policy shift is crucial to understand how EU external human rights policy might further develop, both towards the region and in other states.

The rest of this article proceeds as follows. We outline existing work on advocacy and NGOs in the EU’s external action, before developing the conceptual framework for this article – Kingdon’s multiple streams framework and the concepts of policy and moral entrepreneurs. After introducing the data and method of analysis, we present the results of the content analysis on NGO action on the EU’s external human rights policy towards Xinjiang. Finally, we discuss these results and their implications for how the role of NGOs should be understood.

NGOs in EU policymaking

Non-state actors such as NGOs have become increasingly prominent in national and international politics. Their roles have been frequently studied in political sciences and legal scholarship (Lord 2001; Yanacopulos 2015). In international politics, international NGOs (INGOs) have been characterised as norm advocates, who play an essential role in holding national governments accountable in various policy fields (Keck and Sikkink 1998). INGOs can do this both by directly advocating in international fora and organisations (Tallberg et al. 2018; Dellmuth and Tallberg 2017) and by targeting individual countries (Pallas, Fletcher, and Han 2017). By gathering information and using ‘information politics’ – often in cooperation with local NGOs on the ground – INGOs bring environmental, IHL or human rights violations to the attention of other governments (Hill, Moore, and Mukherjee 2013; Ron, Ramos, and Rodgers 2005). Research shows that INGOs strategically select their targets and their advocacy strategies, implying that their behaviour may not be so different to other interest groups (Bloodgood 2011; Stroup and Murdie 2012). In that sense, despite their normative goals, INGOs are also strategic actors in policymaking.

In the EU, both NGOs and INGOs have been shown to play active roles in agenda setting and in policy implementation (Pierobon 2017; Pelletier et al. 2012). Cooperation with civil society is a key feature of EU policymaking (European Commission 2001). NGOs are included in policymaking processes and use a variety of strategies to lobby politically on their issues (Junk 2016). Many contributions of NGOs have been described in the literature, such as the provision of information and expertise and framing issues in such a way to make them politically salient (Costa and Patrick 2019). This last technique is especially important in human rights policy as it fosters consensus about the gravity of human rights violations and triggers policy action (McEntire, Jo, and Krain 2015). In addition, Mintrom and Thomas (2018) studied the task of coalition-building between NGOs. By working together, NGOs might increase their chances of getting policymakers' attention. Once a problem has made its way to the policy agenda, the policy formulation phase begins. Here NGOs can contribute by countering resistance against the adoption of new norms (Elgstrom 2000). Lastly, NGOs also play an important role in keeping authorities accountable for their (in)actions (Pierobon 2017).

Most of these studies focus on NGOs’ lobbying towards the European Commission and the European Parliament as these two institutions are most accessible to NGOs (Uçarer 2014). However, this is not the case in EU external human rights policy, where the Council of the EU (the Council), its preparatory bodies and the European External Action Service (EEAS) are the most important players. The role of NGOs in external policy and relations with these institutions have only been occasionally researched (Shapovalova 2019). One recent exception is Bossuyt (2021), who concludes that NGOs have a moderate influence over the EU’s human rights policy in the post-Soviet space. However, she focuses mainly on the professionalised activities of NGOs, particularly information transmission; we build on this to add the moral arguments that NGOs can also use. Moreover, research on decision-making in sensitive areas of external action, like human rights promotion in China, is scarce. Although Hansen (2010) described the benefits of cooperation between NGOs and the EU institutions for human rights promotion in China, this focuses more on outcomes and influence than on NGO activities themselves. Given the increased global importance of China and its rise on the EU’s political agenda, further research on the topic is warranted.

Policy streams and entrepreneurship

We draw upon a well-known and thoroughly tested theory, the Multiple Streams Framework (MSF) developed by Kingdon (2003), to explore NGOs’ role in EU external human rights policymaking. The MSF explains political agenda-setting through the interconnections between three streams: the problem stream, the policies stream and the politics stream. These three streams act independently of each other; only when a policy window arises can the three streams be coupled together (Kingdon 2003). Policy windows are often the result of focusing events, which draw issues onto the public and political agenda and open an opportunity for action (Copeland and James 2014).

The policy entrepreneur is the central actor in this framework, bridging the streams by bringing a problem to the attention of decision-makers and advocating for a possible policy solution. To fulfil this role, a policy entrepreneur must not only bring information and expertise to the table, but also frame the problem in such a way that it will be politically salient. The term encompasses a range of actors, including think tanks, lobby groups, NGOs and other civil society organisations. The concept of policy entrepreneur has been extensively studied in the literature. Different activities have been described as typical for policy entrepreneurs such as provision of information, raising awareness and formulating policy recommendations (Roberts and King 1991), as well as strategies such as framing and coalition building (Mintrom 2019).

The MSF framework has frequently been applied to the EU’s institutional setting as it is seen to capture its institutional complexity, with multiple institutions and preferences increasing the possible venues and framing options for those seeking to influence the process (Ackrill, Kay, and Zahariadis 2013). However, most research focuses on the EU institutions themselves: the European Commission is considered to be the main policy entrepreneur due to its right of initiative (Nugent and Rhinard 2019), while in external policy the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy acts as an entrepreneur (Vanhoonacker and Pomorska 2013). There has only been a marginal application of the MSF and the corresponding concept of policy entrepreneur to NGOs in the EU (Rozbicka and Spohr 2016). This is somewhat surprising, as the concept has been applied to other private organisations such as think tanks (Sherrington 2000; Stone 2000). Multiple studies acknowledge the potential of NGOs to take on an entrepreneurial role but omit to test this hypothesis on a practical case (Rozbicka and Spohr 2016; Ackrill, Kay, and Zahariadis 2013). This article bridges this gap by applying the concept of policy entrepreneur to NGOs involved in the development of the EU’s external human rights policy towards the Xinjiang crisis.

Over time, the MSF has been adapted by various authors to include additional streams and different interpretations of the key concepts, including the policy entrepreneur. We draw particularly upon a closely related concept of ‘moral’ entrepreneur (Posner 1999; Becker 1963) to explain the role of NGOs. Moral entrepreneurs advocate for the inclusion of certain values and norms in agreements, as well as for the development of codes of conduct (Davies and True 2017; Mosley and Tello 2015). Like policy entrepreneurs, they frame a policy problem in a politically salient way; however, these frames and arguments are characterised by notions of appropriate behaviour and moral persuasion power (Nadelmann 1990; Elgstrom 2000; Busby 2007; Stoeckl 2016). While there does not seem to be a clear distinction between ‘norm’ and ‘moral’ entrepreneurs in the literature, with the labels used interchangeably, the key difference seems to the definitional emphasis on goal versus strategy. While norm entrepreneurs try to ‘influence how society thinks about an issue’ by reclassifying it as a particular norm (e.g. framing particular issues as a human rights issue), moral entrepreneurs rather draw upon altruistic arguments and use emotional appeals by framing action as ‘the right thing to do’ (Pozen 2008). INGOs seem to have a particularly advantageous position here due to their (albeit contested) reputation as independent, moral actors that are supposed to eschew national or economic interests to pursue a ‘greater good’ (Kjersti 2019).

The concept of moral entrepreneurship is particularly relevant for a case study on human rights because of the moral component in human rights policy. Human rights NGOs have been conceptualised as moral entrepreneurs in international criminal law (Kjersti 2019; Davies and True 2017) due to their emphasis on protecting human rights as the ‘moral’ or ‘right’ thing to do. This qualification as a moral entrepreneur does not necessarily exclude the qualification as a policy entrepreneur: the different terms do not refer to different actors per se, but rather to different stages in the policymaking process. While the moral entrepreneur’s contribution concerns solely with getting an issue on the policy agenda, the policy entrepreneur also puts forward policy solutions to this issue (Meier and Nicholson-Crotty 2012). In other words, we expect that INGOs acting as moral policy entrepreneurs use their reputation as independent, international norm advocates to frame the issue in a morally salient way, or as a moral obligation or responsibility for policymakers, in addition to providing relevant expertise to policymakers to contribute to policy formation. The question that this raises is: to what extent can INGOs in the EU perform both these tasks?

Method

To answer this question, we study the case of EU policy regarding human rights in Xinjiang. We look at the role and activities of NGOs in their interactions with the Council, the EEAS and the European Parliament. As mentioned above, the Council and the EEAS are the main players in EU external action, the first as decision-maker, the second as agenda-setter and executor. However, the role of the European Parliament cannot be underestimated in the case of Xinjiang, as this institution has been the most vocal on the issue.

We undertook a content analysis of publicly available documents related to the Xinjiang crisis. 143 documents were collected from the websites of EU institutions and international human rights NGOs.² The documents were selected within the time period of January 2017-February 2020. 2017 marked the start of mass detentions in Xinjiang (Maizland 2019) and therefore serves as an appropriate starting point for the analysis. February 2020 was chosen as the endpoint, as in this month the EU declared Xinjiang as one of its priorities in the HRC, putting Xinjiang firmly on its agenda.

Four semi-structured (phone) interviews were conducted in March, April and September 2020 to triangulate the information gathered from the documents: two with NGO representatives and two with EU officials. Four interviews are sufficient to capture the entire policy scene as the community of people working on the Xinjiang crisis in the EU is very small. For this same reason, the interviewees requested full anonymity.

All documents and interview transcripts were examined through the thematic analysis method (Saldaña 2016) using Nvivo. For the first round of coding, the codes developed by Roberts and King (1991) in their study of policy entrepreneurs were used to distinguish and classify the different activities of NGOs, including framing, dissemination and collaborative activities. To fully capture recurring themes in the documents, in a second round of coding, additional codes were added for activities and other noticeably returning elements, including references to human rights violations and other actors in the policymaking process. The full list of all documents, interviews and codes is available in the Annex.

The coding revealed that there were six main activities that NGOs used when trying to influence policymaking, outlined in the results section. Before presenting how NGOs influence the EU’s policy, we first sketch the EU external human rights policy itself and outline the tools that the EU currently possesses to promote human rights in China.

EU external human rights policy towards China

Previous studies of EU-China relations highlight the EU’s predominant use of ‘soft power’ to promote human rights, particularly since China’s economic rise (Balme 2008), with multiple tools available. The first set of tools consists of unilateral, bilateral and multilateral diplomatic measures. On a unilateral basis, the EU uses declaratory and communicative diplomacy, such as declarations, monitoring and shaming tactics. The European Parliament has adopted multiple declarations concerning the mass arbitrary detention of Uyghurs in Xinjiang (e.g. European Parliament 2020). The Parliament also awarded the 2019 Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought to Ilham Tohti, an Uyghur scholar advocating for the rights of the Uyghur minority. On a bilateral level, the EU organises human rights dialogues with third countries – including China – to promote fundamental human rights (European Council 2020a). In its dialogue of 2019, the EU raised the minority rights violations in Xinjiang and Tibet as extremely worrying (EEAS 2019a). Finally, the EU also uses multilateral diplomatic measures to promote human rights protection in Xinjiang, for example by adopting priorities at the UN human rights fora. In February 2020 the EU spoke in strong language at the HRC condemning the violations in Xinjiang and making it one of its priorities (Council of the EU 2020).

In addition to these diplomatic tools, the EU also uses its market power to promote human rights abroad. Although the EU now uses art. 207 TFEU to include human rights clauses in its bilateral and regional trade agreements, the 1985 cooperation agreement between China and the EU – which still constitutes the cornerstone of their trade relations – contains no such clause. During negotiations for an updated framework, China insists on keeping trade and human rights separate (Taneja 2010). The two have therefore been delinked and deprioritised, despite efforts by the European Parliament and Commission to include human rights in the new framework (Kaya 2014). Another economic tool to promote the respect of human rights is imposing targeted sanctions in response to grave human rights violations. In March 2021 the Council adopted strict sanctions against individuals involved in the imprisonment campaign in Xinjiang (Council of the EU 2021).

Notwithstanding the diplomatic and economic tools available, the EU faces some challenges regarding the promotion of human rights in China, which have been extensively discussed in the literature. First, China and the EU have a fundamentally different understanding of human rights (Balme 2008; Burnay, Hivonnet and Raube 2016; Geeraerts 2019). In contrast to the EU’s conception of universal and indivisible individual human rights, China highlights the primacy of the state and the collective over the interests of the individual (Pan 2012). China pushes back against the EU’s ‘Western’ conception of human rights (Kaplan 2018), expressing its disagreement through aggressive lobbying at the EU institutions and human rights fora (Rühlig et al. 2018). This makes it difficult for the EU to promote its idea of human rights in China. A second challenge is the lack of unity and consistency in the way that the EU approaches human rights issues. First, there is often inconsistency between the EU’s rhetoric and action on human rights issues (Egan and Pech 2017), giving the EU the image of a ‘lecturer on human rights’ without setting the right example (Mission of the People’s Republic of China to the EU 2019). Second, there is an apparent lack of unity between member states. Different national economic interests in China prevent member states from adopting common positions (Interview NGO1), particularly given the EU’s increasing economic dependence on China and shifts in the balance of power in the EU-China relationship. Member states take their own initiatives, without always coordinating their actions at EU level (Barigazzi 2020). In addition, disunity on human rights also exists within the EU, such as on LGBTQ rights (Interview EU2). This lack of consistency and cooperation diminishes the credibility of the EU as a human rights actor and geopolitical power.

However, it seems that this EU disunity on human rights in China is slowly improving, partly due to the increased global attention to the situation in Xinjiang and expectations of EU action (Interviews NGO1, EU2). As highlighted above, this renewed unity is visible in several recent public statements made by the EU, and by the imposition of sanctions. The following section examines the role that NGOs have played in the formation of policy solutions in the EU and pushing this issue onto the policy agenda.

Setting the stage: EU-NGO cooperation in external policy

The EU attaches a lot of importance to cooperation with civil society during the decision-making process, even in external policies. All interviewees pointed to the EU being very open to consultations with NGOs, with a regular exchange of views and information resulting in a relationship of mutual respect between the partners. Nonetheless, the relationship between NGOs and the EU institutions can be best be described as ‘critical allies’ (Thiel and Uçarer 2014; Interview NGO2). The two parties agree on the general policy lines but differ in their approaches and views due to their different roles (Interview EU1, Interview NGO2). Despite these differences, NGOs play a collaborative role in the EU rather than an opposing force (Marchetti 2017; Interview EU1). This cooperation takes place at multiple levels.

In the area of foreign policy – i.e. the EU’s diplomatic action – various EU institutions and member states work together to define a common policy. As this policy area remains intergovernmental, national capitals are one of the most important places for human rights NGOs to lobby. Similarly, the Council of the EU is high on NGOs’ agenda, as it is the EU institution with direct representation of national interests (Interview NGO1). However, the Council’s transparency and accessibility for NGOs are limited. Council meetings about human rights in China are prepared by two working parties: the Working Party on Human Rights (COHOM) on the one hand, and the Asia-Oceania Working Party (COASI) on the other. While COHOM deals with all human rights issues, COASI deals with all issues regarding the EU’s relations with China (Interview EU2). This pillarised structure makes lobbying on overarching topics more complicated (Interview NGO2). In addition, experts in these working parties have limited time for meetings with NGO representatives, and prefer input from national NGOs over input from large international human rights NGOs (Interview EU2).

In contrast to the Council, the European Parliament is more accessible to NGOs. It is also by far the most vocal institution on the human rights crisis in Xinjiang. This can be explained by its ongoing commitment to human rights (Uçarer 2014) and the fact that they represent the EU citizens and not the member states. Being less bound by national preferences allows them to go further than the standard negotiated EU position (Interview NGO1). In addition, the Parliament currently has a progressive majority (Interview EU2). Mainly the Sub-committee on Human Rights is involved in the external human rights policy, which makes it an excellent lobby venue (Interview NGO2). However, although the Parliament is very accessible and willing to talk about Xinjiang, in terms of competences it is rather weak compared to the Council. There seems to be an inverse relationship between the approachableness to NGOs and the power of the EU institution (Interview NGO1).

Finally, the EEAS is an important institution for human rights NGOs, as it serves as the EU’s diplomatic service and is involved in the agenda-setting process for external policies. Moreover, it is very approachable for NGOs: for example, before a human rights dialogue is held with a third country, the EEAS meets with NGOs to get their input (Interview EU1, EU2). Given the inaccessibility of the Council, these tasks make it the most important EU institution for NGOs to lobby in the case of Xinjiang (Interviews NGO1, NGO2).

Policy entrepreneurial activities of human rights NGOs

In their cooperation with the EU, NGOs engage in multiple activities when lobbying on the Xinjiang crisis. This section assesses the policy entrepreneurial activities of human rights NGOs on the issue and the specific activities that NGOs engage in at EU level based on the thematic analysis and interviews.

Framing was the activity that stood out the most in the thematic analysis – out of the 350 codes for different NGO activities, 121 (35%) concerned ways of framing the crisis (see Table 1). Framing here refers to how NGOs put the crisis in a specific, politically salient context, theoretically increasing the chances that policymakers will take action on the issue (Junk and Rasmussen 2019). Two types of framing are prevalent in NGOs’ advocacy on the Xinjiang crisis: framing of the human rights crisis, and the role of the EU. These frames underpin all other NGO activities, as they are the way that NGOs present the issue in their advocacy efforts.

Table 1. Activities of NGOs according to the thematic analysis of 149 documents.

Activity	Prevalence (out of 350)	Details
Framing	121	Framing of the human rights violations: geopolitical, economic and systemic challenge Framing of the role of the EU: moral responsibility to protect human rights
Raising awareness	16	Public and political awareness: demonstrations, rallies, campaigns, press releases, op-eds and website publications
Information provision	96	Conferences, EU consultations, hearings and documentation
Calls for action	57	Urge, advocate and follow up on commitments
Policy recommendations	33	Broad and concrete policy recommendations
Coalition building	19	Joint demonstrations and letters

There were three main ways of framing the human rights violations. First, they are often framed as a geopolitical challenge. The crisis is presented as a critical juncture, which will define whether the EU will be able to assert its human rights values in its external relations with China (e.g. Derderian 2019). The crisis is also linked to the general threat that China’s alternative governance model poses for human rights in the world (e.g. HRIC 2017). Second, this geopolitical framing is sometimes replaced by economic considerations for why the EU should act: only when there is progress on human rights will the EU be able to strengthen its economic relationship with China (e.g. Leicht and Richardson 2017). Finally, human rights violations in Xinjiang were presented in the context of other human rights violations in China. Documents on the human rights crisis in Xinjiang often also refer to the repressive Chinese policies towards Tibet, Hong Kong, and Taiwan.³ Putting Xinjiang in the context of these more well-known issues helps to raise awareness and highlight the severity of these human rights violations. Similarly, the analysed documents do not only refer to mass arbitrary detentions in Xinjiang, but link these to the violation of other human rights: minority rights, refugee rights, religious freedom, free speech, torture and the imprisonment and persecution of human rights defenders.⁴ All these human rights violations are part of the EU’s priorities on human rights (Council of the EU 2012). Emphasising these violations can therefore be seen as a tactic to lead the EU to put more pressure on China to stop the violations.

In terms of the role that the EU should play in advancing human rights in Xinjiang, many of the framing efforts speak to the moral responsibility of the EU.⁵ This is based on the EU’s reputation as the world leader on human rights and the importance of human rights to the EU’s self-image (Interview NGO2). This framing often concerns terms like core values and principles (e.g. HRW 2019b), responsibility (e.g. STP 2019a), duty (e.g. UNPO 2017b), leadership (HRIC 2017) and opportunity (e.g. HRW 2019c). NGOs often praise the efforts made by the EU on human rights protection but encourage the institutions to go one step further. Additionally, playing to the moral feelings of the EU is used to criticise EU inaction, framing it as a betrayal to human rights defenders worldwide (HRW 2019c). ‘Each missed opportunity to articulate specific human rights improvements is a message to China’s leadership – and people across China and the world – that those concerns remain subordinated to other issues.’ (HRW 2019b).

An important activity of NGOs is raising awareness about the situation in Xinjiang. Given the size of the crisis, it has taken some time to emerge on the public and political agenda of the EU. NGOs try to raise more awareness with the public and with EU institutions by organizing marches, demonstrations and rallies (UNPO 2018; FIDH 2019; Prososki 2019), writing reports and analyses, and publishing op-eds in newspapers. Since 2017, the human rights crisis in Xinjiang has gained momentum in the European Parliament; however, information remains scarce, as China restricts the flow of information coming from the area (Leibold 2020). This makes the task of raising public awareness in the EU a critical one for NGOs interested in shaping policy.

As information on the Xinjiang crisis is such a valuable commodity, the EU institutions put effort into making sure they are fully important. Providing information to policymakers is thereby seen as one of the most important ways for NGOs to shape policy on Xinjiang (Interview NGO1). Due to local connections and contacts with people from the Uyghur diaspora, NGOs often have unique and valuable information to add (Interviews NGO1, EU1). NGOs offer this information via consultations with EU officials (e.g. European Parliament 2020; Interview EU2), conferences and seminars (e.g. UNPO 2017a; EEAS 2018). Moreover, NGOs publish their own reports about the crisis, including their own assessment of the situation and policy recommendations for the EU (e.g. HRW 2019a; STP 2020). Sometimes the EU itself reaches out to NGOs with a request for more information to fill gaps in its knowledge (Interviews NGO1, NGO2). Generally, the more difficult the EU finds it to gather information, the larger the relative importance of NGOs becomes, if they can manage to provide information in a timely manner so that the issue does not lose momentum.

NGOs are often described as ‘watchdogs’ calling for action by policymakers to reform existing laws and point out discrepancies between commitments and actions (GLOBUS 2018). In his speech on the EU-NGO Human Rights Forum, HR/VP Borrell acknowledged this important role of civil society to push political organizations to take care of human rights issues (EEAS 2019b). This often goes together with providing information to the EU institutions, as is clearly visible in NGOs’ press releases, op-eds and website publications about the human rights crisis in Xinjiang, where they encourage EU institutions to take concrete action on the issue.

These calls to action are then translated into policy recommendations by NGOs. The literature attributes an important role for policy entrepreneurs in the policy formulation phase, as they translate issues on the policy agenda into concrete policies to be adopted by the decision-makers (Gunn 2017). In the case of Xinjiang, NGOs also seem to seek involvement in the formulation of EU policies, by giving several recommendations on how to react against the human rights violations. Although NGOs often make very broad recommendations to the EU, such as ‘stop China’s assault on the global rights system’ (HRW 2020), most of the time NGOs provide very concrete recommendations (22 out of the 33 codes). NGOs for example recommended that the European Parliament award the 2019 Sakharov Prize to the Uyghur scholar Tohti (STP 2019c), which the Parliament eventually did. Other examples of concrete recommendations are to impose travel bans and financial sanctions on the Chinese government officials responsible for the Xinjiang internments (STP 2019b), or to impose export bans on technology that could be used for the repression of the Uyghur minority (Haas 2019).

Although these examples indicate that NGOs’ policy recommendations are a valuable contribution to the policy formulation phase, the range of alternative explanations make it difficult to draw strong conclusions about their influence of NGOs in this stage of the policymaking process. The NGO interviewees indicate that it is not easy for NGOs to have a real influence, as the EU institutions are already very knowledgeable about their policy options (interview NGO2 and EU1). It is also important to note that the provision of policy recommendations is not clearly separated from other entrepreneurial activities, such as the provision of information and calls for actions. All these activities form one continuous and lengthy process. It might take years of feeding information to the EU before a policy window is created and the EU acts on all the given recommendations (Interview NGO1).

In the literature, a final activity of policy entrepreneurs is coalition-building. Since more awareness of the scale of the human rights crisis in Xinjiang is essential to increase policy efforts, NGOs often use coalition building to get the message about Xinjiang across (19 codes). Brussels-based NGOs organise joint demonstrations, conferences and write joint letters to the HR/VP (UNPO 2017a, 2018; HRW 2019b). These allow NGOs more access to scarce information by combining networks, which increases the quality of information that they offer to the EU and may make NGOs seem more credible. Although coalition building takes time, which can make it difficult to provide timely information to policymakers, NGOs see themselves as leading by example and showing the EU how to coordinate views on a topic (Interview NGO2).

NGOs as moral policy entrepreneurs

The thematic analysis and interviews indicate that human rights NGOs engage principally in framing the information that they provide on human rights violations in Xinjiang, raising awareness and calling for action at EU level. Although NGOs aim not only to shape the EU’s agenda but also to engage in the policy development phase, they have a more limited impact in the latter phase, as EU officials are often well aware of the available options by this stage.

These activities align with the tasks of a policy entrepreneur as described in the literature, as NGOs work hard to couple the problem, policy and politics streams together. Their involvement in the problem stream is very clear: working to raise awareness about human rights violations in Xinjiang and providing the EU with valuable contextualising information. NGOs also contribute to the policy stream by giving policy recommendations to the EU; however, it seems that the actual influence that NGOs can have on the development of policy remains limited. Moreover, NGOs do not always succeed in providing tangible policy advice, as their recommendations sometimes remain abstract or vague, limiting their role in the policy stream. However, the largest role of NGOs in the case of Xinjiang seems to lie in the politics stream, very broadly defined as the national mood and composition of the government (Kingdon 2003). NGOs in the Xinjiang case play a role in the politics stream by attempting to making the crisis more politically salient. They do this on the one hand by directly calling upon political leaders to take action, and on the other hand more indirectly by framing the Xinjiang crisis in a politically salient way. Through these activities, human rights NGOs undoubtedly act as policy entrepreneurs.

The in-depth thematic analysis, however, also indicates that NGOs predominantly frame action on the Xinjiang human rights crisis as a moral obligation for the EU. In other words, NGOs combine factual knowledge with strong moral appeals, focusing on humanitarian sentiments and moral feelings of compassion towards people whose rights are being violated. Building on previous work that indicates that NGOs can play a ‘double role’, combining objective information with moral framing (Kjersti 2019; Meier and Nicholson-Crotty. 2012), we suggest qualifying NGOs’ role in this case as that of a moral policy entrepreneur, as the concept of a policy entrepreneur does not completely cover their role. Like policy entrepreneurs, moral policy entrepreneurs frame and attempt to reshape the understanding of problems; however, they overwhelmingly use moral frames to encourage action and to support their arguments. In this sense, they create and push for new moral or normative obligations for the national governments or organisations that they target with their advocacy. Previous work has indicated that NGOs may struggle to combine these perhaps contradictory roles, as the combination of inherently subjective, emotive and moral arguments with professional advocacy can detract from their legitimacy in the eyes of policymakers (Kjersti 2019). However, this was not evident from either the thematic analysis or interviews, indicating that at least in the EU case, NGOs are able to act as moral policy entrepreneurs without facing this trade-off.

Conclusions

In the case of Xinjiang, human rights NGOs act as moral policy entrepreneurs, a subcategory of policy entrepreneurs whose focus lies with the moral framing of the policy problem. Existing literature suggests that these contradictory roles may be difficult to perform as a single actor, but NGOs in this case succeeded at both. We find that human rights NGOs act as policy entrepreneurs – bringing together the problem, policies and political will to act on the crisis. In their awareness-raising activities, however, they overwhelmingly use moral arguments to induce the EU to take action. This moral argument is a strategic choice by NGOs, who simultaneously provide policy recommendations and expertise to the EU institutions in developing their policy response.

Of course, NGOs do not always have full control over when a policy window will open, as it is influenced by focusing events and the state of international relations. However, they can anticipate and manipulate such policy windows by framing them as in a politically salient way. Indeed, NGOs – and perhaps especially INGOs – seem to have a privileged position, where they can combine expertise and their exclusive knowledge with their moral authority. This combination of activities, united in the concept of a to speak to their moral compass. In the case of Xinjiang, it seems that a policy window is opened. It is now up to the moral policy entrepreneurs to keep the EU institutions engaged until the policy window is opened further. Developments in the near future should be closely observed to evaluate the success of these NGOs as moral policy entrepreneur, captures the role of NGOs in the EU’s external human rights policy towards Xinjiang.

Like any single case study, the findings of this research may not be generalizable beyond the particularly sensitive case of Xinjiang. Future research could focus on other cases of human rights violations, for instance through comparative case studies of issues where the EU is at different policy stages. Case studies on a human rights crisis where a policy window has already opened – such as Myanmar – and ones where the opening of a policy window seems still far off would be particularly interesting. Such further research could also test the concept of moral policy entrepreneur, examining how NGOs’ roles fit within other subcategories of policy entrepreneurship, as well as how NGOs balance their multiple roles within their organisations.

The findings of this article are relevant in both academic and policy terms. First, the study confirms the importance of NGOs in the development of EU policy, even in more sensitive policy areas such as external action. Like other interest groups, specialised NGOs provide information and recommendations to EU policymakers in their policy area of expertise (Rozbicka and Spohr 2016; Thiel and Uçarer 2014). Moreover, the findings extend on findings in the literature on INGOs’ norm or moral entrepreneurial role in international relations (e.g. Keck and Sikkink 1998) to qualify how organisations can combine moral and policy entrepreneurial activities. Third, we contribute to the literature on EU-China human rights, both adding a new and recent case of how the EU approaches Chinese human rights violations and investigating the role of NGOs.

Finally, in policy terms, the Xinjiang case is a timely test for further EU leadership on human rights. Despite the challenges the EU faces when promoting human rights in China, such as disunity and conflicting interests, it still manages to come out with strong statements condemning the arbitrary detentions and violations of freedom of religion and culture – and, most recently, economic sanctions. The Xinjiang crisis can be seen as a test for the EU and for the NGOs driving its policy forward: if the EU can act this strongly in such a difficult case, it can surely do more in other human rights crises around the world.

Disclosure statement

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

Notes

1. Although the NGOs examined in this paper are all international NGOs, we use the generic term ‘NGO’ throughout the paper unless making a point specifically about international NGOs. We believe that the moral policy entrepreneur role can also be applied to local (or EU) NGOs, and therefore use the term without further qualification

2. 8 human rights NGOs were selected that are active on the Xinjiang case; these were selected based on their participation in a joint letter to the EU on the human rights crisis in Xinjiang (Amnesty International et al. 2017). On the websites of human rights NGOs, the search terms used are Xinjiang AND EU to find relevant documents. These were supplemented with documents from the websites of competent EU institutions.

3. In EU and NGO documents about the human rights violations in Xinjiang, Tibet was mentioned the most together with Xinjiang (27), followed by Hong Kong (13) and lastly, Taiwan (4).

4. References to these issues were: minority rights (23), refugee rights (2), freedom of religion (26), right to culture (10), free speech (20), torture and inhumane treatment (11) and violations against human rights defenders in the region (31).

5. 71 of the 121 framing efforts in the documents studied involved the portrayal of the crisis imposing a moral responsibility on the EU to take action.