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221. Transition as a Legacy

Author:
Maximilian Spinner
Publication Date:
01-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Romanian Journal of Political Science
Institution:
Romanian Academic Society
Abstract:
Almost two decades after their transition to democracy it is no longer questioned whether the new EU member states of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) are democratic in the minimalist, procedural sense. Academic attention has turned to analysing various pathways of democratic development in the region and the consolidation of democracy (CoD). CoD in the broadest sense investigates the stability and survival of democratic regimes. In opposition to transitologists (which focuses on the regime question), CoD addresses the question of what kind of democracy is actually developing in various countries. Next to institutional and behavioural factors cultural or attitudinal variables are increasingly considered in this context. Elite commitment to the existing democratic system is seen as a crucial component of CoD.
Topic:
Democratization
Political Geography:
Eastern Europe

222. How Media and Politics Shape Each Other in the New Europe

Author:
Alina Mungiu Pippidi
Publication Date:
01-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Romanian Journal of Political Science
Institution:
Romanian Academic Society
Abstract:
Denying the huge influence of 'new' media over politics in our times would be foolish: and since politicians are no fools the development of the new media seems to be accompanied by the development of new strategies to control media contents and influence. While it remains undeniable that the social control patterns of a given society have a considerable influence over how the media system is shaped, I believe that globalization has opened the door to outside influences on a scale undreamed at the times of Four Theories of the Press.
Topic:
Civil Society and Democratization
Political Geography:
Europe and Eastern Europe

223. The Romanian Revolution of December 1989

Author:
Milena Marin
Publication Date:
01-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Romanian Journal of Political Science
Institution:
Romanian Academic Society
Abstract:
After almost 10 years since the Romanian revolution of December 1989, both the academic community and public opinion of Romania, have still many doubts regarding the nature and the exact unfolding of those events. Peter Siani- Davies, one of the few western researchers involved in the study of the Romanian society, through his excellent work “The Romanian Revolution of December 1989”, offers a detailed account of the Romanian revolutionary upheaval and of the difficult birth of democracy in Romania, giving at the same time an important contribution on the elucidation of the myths and realities of the Romanian revolution.
Topic:
Civil Society
Political Geography:
Europe, Eastern Europe, Romania, and Sydney

224. Europe's Eastern Promise: Rethinking NATO and EU Enlargement

Author:
Ronald D. Asmus
Publication Date:
01-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Foreign Affairs
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
After the Cold War, NATO and the EU opened their doors to central and Eastern Europe, making the continent safer and freer than ever before. Today, NATO and the EU must articulate a new rationale for enlarging still further, once again extending democracy and prosperity to the East, this time in the face of a more powerful and defiant Russia.
Topic:
NATO
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, and Eastern Europe

225. Opening the European Commission's Delegation in Minsk: Do EU-Belarus relations need a rethink?

Author:
Alena Vysotskaya and Guedes Vieira
Publication Date:
04-2008
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Finnish Institute of International Affairs
Abstract:
In the first months of 2008, the Belarusian leadership made some unprecedented declarations, demonstrating its willingness to cooperate with the EU. In contrast to similar declarations in the past, the current statements were supported by tangible cooperation-oriented steps on the part of the official Minsk, including the decision on the opening of the Delegation of the European Commission in the country and the release of several political prisoners. The recent attempts of the Belarusian leadership to establish its own terms for the fulfilment of EU demands on the one hand and the establishment of the Commission's Delegation in Minsk on the other, invite further consideration of EU-Belarus relations. Nevertheless, the existence of concessions as far as the official Minsk is concerned should not be mistaken for a fundamental change in the Belarusian approach towards the EU. As before, the official Minsk is not simply promoting cooperation with the EU, but cooperation of a very special type, namely one whereby it defines its own conditions, rather than adopting those defined by the EU, thus developing something of a reverse conditionality. The EU should clarify whether it can reward the Belarusian leadership for single cooperation-oriented steps, and to what extent such rewards can be granted. In other words, the EU needs an inventory of the instruments that are, or can be, employed in its policy towards Belarus. As far as the character of different instruments is concerned, the EU approach might appear contradictory, but this strategy is paradoxically the only way to move forward in its relations with Belarus. If the EU wants to promote the democratisation of Belarus, it should try to find synergies among its own measures and the policies of other actors. As the recent changes have demonstrated, only a combination of pressures from different sides will create a sufficient basis for EU leverage in Belarus.
Topic:
Democratization, Diplomacy, and International Cooperation
Political Geography:
Europe, Eastern Europe, and Belarus

226. EC Visa Facilitation and Readmission Agreements: Implementing a New EU Security Approach in the Neighbourhood

Author:
Imke Kruse and Florian Trauner
Publication Date:
04-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for European Policy Studies
Abstract:
With the Eastern Enlargement successfully completed, the EU is searching for a proper balance between internal security and external stabilisation that is acceptable to all sides. This paper focuses on an EU foreign policy instrument that is a case in point for this struggle: EC visa facilitation and readmission agreements. By looking at the EU's strategy on visa facilitation and readmission, this paper aims to offer a first systematic analysis of the objectives, substance and political implications of these agreements. The analysis considers the instrument of EC visa facilitation and readmission agreements as a means to implement a new EU security approach in the neighbourhood. In offering more relaxed travel conditions in exchange for the signing of an EC readmission agreement and reforming domestic justice and home affairs, the EU has found a new way to press for reforms in neighbouring countries while addressing a major source of discontent in these countries. The analysis concludes with the broader implications of these agreements and argues that even if the facilitated travel opportunities are beneficial for the citizens of the target countries, the positive achievements are undermined by the Schengen enlargement, which makes the new member states tie up their borders to those of their neighbours.
Topic:
Security, Foreign Policy, International Political Economy, and Regional Cooperation
Political Geography:
Europe and Eastern Europe

227. Is European democracy promotion on the wane?

Author:
Richard Youngs
Publication Date:
05-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for European Policy Studies
Abstract:
The EU routinely asserts that the promotion of democracy and human rights is central to its international identity. However, while in some places the EU has a relatively strong record as a supporter of democratic values, it is failing to respond effectively to the emergence of a vastly more challenging environment for democracy promotion. This paper reveals serious limits across three strands of democracy policy – the magnitude of incentives offered in return for democratic change, the degree of critical pressure exerted for democratic reform and the scale of European democracy funding. Even where the EU is building on the initiatives it has pursued for the last two decades, the paper demonstrates that these policies fail to measure up to the challenges posed by the new international context.
Topic:
Democratization, Human Rights, and International Political Economy
Political Geography:
Europe and Eastern Europe

228. The EU's New Black Sea Policy - What kind of regionalism is this?

Author:
Michael Emerson
Publication Date:
06-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for European Policy Studies
Abstract:
After the accession of Bulgaria and Romania in 2007 the European Union moved quickly to fill an obvious gap in its vision of the regions to its periphery, proposing the 'Black Sea Synergy'. The EU shows a certain degree of commonality in its approaches to each of the three enclosed seas in this region–the Baltic, the Mediterranean and now the Black Sea. While the political profiles of these maritime regions are of course very different, they naturally give rise to many common policy challenges, including those issues that are based on the technical, non-political matters of regional maritime geography. This paper sets out a typology of regionalisms and examines where in this the EU's Black Sea Synergy is going to find its place. While the Commission's initial proposals were highly 'eclectic', with various examples of 'technical regionalism' combined with 'security regionalism', there is already a diplomatic ballet in evidence between the EU and Russia, with the EU countering Russia's pursuit of its own 'geopolitical regionalism'. The EU would like in theory to see its efforts lead to a 'transformative regionalism', but the lack of agreement so far over further extending membership perspectives to countries of the region risks the outcome being placed more in the category of 'compensatory regionalism'.
Topic:
Regional Cooperation
Political Geography:
Russia, Eastern Europe, and Romania

229. Mobility of Labor and Services across the Baltic Sea after EU Enlargement: Trends and Consequences

Author:
Jon Erik Dølvik
Publication Date:
01-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies, Harvard University
Abstract:
The enlargement of the EU / EEA area on 1 May 2004 to comprise 28 countries – including eight Central and Eastern European countries, in 2007 followed by Bulgaria and Romania – was a milestone. The subsequent opening of the markets for labor and services between countries with gaps in wages and living conditions comparable to those along the U.S./Mexican border has no modern precedent, prompting new patterns of competition, migration and adjustment in national labor market regimes. This paper reviews developments in labor migration after enlargement and the implications for the labor markets in the Baltic states and Poland, which have accounted for a predominant share of the intra- EU / EEA migration flows since 2004. Besides the UK and Ireland, where almost one million EU 8 citizens had registered in 2007, the booming Nordic economies have become important destinations, having granted more than 250,000 permits and seen sizeable additional flows of service providers and self-employed from the Baltic states and Poland. In the sending countries, rising demand for labor has, alongside strong outmigration – especially among young and well-educated groups – engendered falling unemployment, soaring wage growth, and made shortages of skills and labor an obstacle to further economic recovery. Yet, while better paid temporary work abroad may weaken the incentives for employment, mobility and training in the home country, aging will lead to shrinking working-age populations in the coming years. Unless the Baltic states and Poland can entice a larger share of the population to work in their home countries – and/or can attract substantial labor migration from third countries – the declining work force may easily entail economic stagnation and reinforce the outflow of human resources. These countries are thereby facing a critical juncture in their economic and social development. In the recipient Nordic countries, the growing labor and service mobility, low cost production, and competition for labor in Europe, as well as emerging lines of division in the labor markets, have, on the other hand, raised new questions as to how the principles of free movement and the egalitarian Nordic models can be made reconcilable in the open European markets.
Topic:
International Political Economy and Markets
Political Geography:
United States, United Kingdom, Europe, Eastern Europe, Poland, Bulgaria, Romania, and Ireland

230. From Communism to Capitalism: A World Transformed

Author:
Valerio Fabbri
Publication Date:
06-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
The International Spectator
Institution:
Istituto Affari Internazionali
Abstract:
Review of: How capitalism was built : the transformation of Central and Eastern Europe, Russia, and Central Asia, Anders Åslund, Cambridge University Press, 2007
Political Geography:
Russia, Central Asia, and Eastern Europe