Abstract
The EU’s enlargement policy has successfully strengthened state institutions in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), while failing to do so in the Western Balkans (WB). This is often attributed to domestic political factors, or the ineffectiveness of the EU’s political conditionality in the WB, with its detrimental effects on democracy promotion. This paper instead focuses on the EU’s governance of economic integration and its impact on state-society relations in candidate countries. Based on a comparative analysis of EU strategy in Romania and Serbia, the paper argues that differences in the EU’s governance of market integration shape, in diverse ways, candidate states’ ability to extricate themselves from capture by rent-seeking elites and to create new developmental alliances. These differences impact prospects for both development and democracy. Managing developmental consequences of integration and strengthening state institutions should, therefore, be a priority for the EU’s future enlargement to Ukraine and beyond.
| Originalsprache | Englisch |
|---|---|
| Seiten (von - bis) | 3059-3084 |
| Seitenumfang | 26 |
| Fachzeitschrift | Journal of European Public Policy |
| Jahrgang | 32 |
| Ausgabenummer | 12 |
| DOIs | |
| Publikationsstatus | Veröffentlicht - 2025 |
Fördermittel
I would like to thank the special issue editor and three anonymous reviewers, as well as Magnus Schoeller, Juliet Johnson, Tatiana Cojocari, Mihai Varga, Ihor Moshenets and Igor Guardiancich for their most helpful comments on an earlier version of this manuscript. I also thank the participants at the events where this paper was presented: Viennese workshop in political economy at the CEU in Vienna, Lessons for EU enlargement to Ukraine and beyond workshop at the CEU DI in Budapest, Joint sessions workshop European Union Eastern Enlargement(s) at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies in Florence, and the Seminari di Politica at the University of Padova. Financial support of the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Vienna for language editing is gratefully acknowledged. Pre-accession assistance in Serbia was initially distributed through CARDS and IPA programmes, none of which had a strong emphasis on economic restructuring and market reforms. The first one – Community Assistance for Reconstruction, Development and Stabilisation Programme – was focused mainly on reconstruction and regional cooperation among WB countries, as well as strengthening their democratic institutions. With the region emerging from war, this was a logical EU priority. After 2006, CARDS was replaced with Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance (IPA), with its later iterations known as IPA II (2014–2020) and IPA III (2021–2027). IPA funds had much broader goals than PHARE, with a strong focus on democratic institutions and the rule of law, rather than a more specific focus on preparing the economy and institutions for EU accession. The link between assistance and accession preparations has been particularly weakened after IPA reform in 2013 (Koeth, ). Serbia also benefited from the Economic Investment Plan, as well as the Growth Plan for the WB, primarily financing investment in infrastructure. Most of the EU financial assistance to Serbia thus financed infrastructure development – similar to cohesion funds within the EU – rather than preparation of domestic economic actors for participation in the EU market. According to the official data, almost half of EU funds in Serbia (46 per cent) were devoted to environment, energy and transport, areas where projects were focused on infrastructure improvements (, online resource). Only 1.2 per cent was devoted to jobs and economic growth, 2 per cent to social inclusion, while promotion of rule of law, public administration and democracy received a little less than 10 per cent. Hence, whereas the EU assistance contributed to growth and infrastructure development, it was much less focused on making Serbia’s economy or institutions more aligned with EU rules and participation in the EU market.
ÖFOS 2012
- 506004 Europäische Integration
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