This article was downloaded by: [Universite De Paris 1] On: 16 September 2013, At: 13:18 Publisher: Routledge Informa Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK Southeast European and Black Sea Studies Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/fbss20 Russian and European neighbourhood policies compared Andrew Wilson a & Nicu Popescu a a European Council on Foreign Relations, London, UK Published online: 18 Sep 2009. To cite this article: Andrew Wilson & Nicu Popescu (2009) Russian and European neighbourhood policies compared, Southeast European and Black Sea Studies, 9:3, 317-331, DOI: 10.1080/14683850902934317 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14683850902934317 PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (the “Content”) contained in the publications on our platform. However, Taylor & Francis, our agents, and our licensors make no representations or warranties whatsoever as to the accuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of the Content. Any opinions and views expressed in this publication are the opinions and views of the authors, and are not the views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. The accuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and should be independently verified with primary sources of information. Taylor and Francis shall not be liable for any losses, actions, claims, proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages, and other liabilities whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with, in relation to or arising out of the use of the Content. This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing, systematic supply, or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/page/terms- and-conditions
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This article was downloaded by: [Universite De Paris 1]On: 16 September 2013, At: 13:18Publisher: RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registeredoffice: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK
Southeast European and Black SeaStudiesPublication details, including instructions for authors andsubscription information:http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/fbss20
Russian and European neighbourhoodpolicies comparedAndrew Wilson a & Nicu Popescu aa European Council on Foreign Relations, London, UKPublished online: 18 Sep 2009.
To cite this article: Andrew Wilson & Nicu Popescu (2009) Russian and European neighbourhoodpolicies compared, Southeast European and Black Sea Studies, 9:3, 317-331, DOI:10.1080/14683850902934317
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14683850902934317
PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE
Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (the“Content”) contained in the publications on our platform. However, Taylor & Francis,our agents, and our licensors make no representations or warranties whatsoever as tothe accuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of the Content. Any opinionsand views expressed in this publication are the opinions and views of the authors,and are not the views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. The accuracy of the Contentshould not be relied upon and should be independently verified with primary sourcesof information. Taylor and Francis shall not be liable for any losses, actions, claims,proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages, and other liabilities whatsoeveror howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with, in relation to orarising out of the use of the Content.
This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Anysubstantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing,systematic supply, or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. Terms &Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/page/terms-and-conditions
Russian and European neighbourhood policies compared
Andrew Wilson* and Nicu Popescu
European Council on Foreign Relations, London, UKTaylor and FrancisFBSS_A_393603.sgm10.1080/14683850902934317Journal of Southeast European and Black Sea Studies1468-3857 (print)/1743-9639 (online)Original Article2009Taylor & Francis93000000September [email protected]
The European neighbourhood policy (ENP) has been unable to shift the politicaland security processes in the Eastern neighbourhood of the European Union. Thisis partly to do with the fact that ENP has been developed as if the EU is the ‘onlygame in town’ and that its neighbours are keen to adopt the European model, justas Central Europe was in the 1990s. In reality, however, the ENP faces a well-resourced, albeit informal, Russian neighbourhood policy. Both Russia and the EUhave used soft and hard power to achieve their objectives in the neighbourhood,and have often undermined each others’ policies in the region. Improving theeffectiveness of the ENP will require more EU commitment to deliver on itspromises, as well as an understanding that there can be no stable EU–Russiapartnership without greater cooperation, not disengagement, in the sharedneighbourhood.
Keywords: European Union; Russia; neighbourhood policy; soft power; hardpower; civilian power
Despite its six years of existence, the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) hasbeen unable to shift the bigger political and security picture in the region. Russia’sdesire for a sphere of influence raises the spectre of a bipolar Europe that would leaveall of Europe less secure. There is a real risk of the ENP’s window of opportunityclosing as neighbours consolidate increasingly authoritarian political systems andEU–Russia relations deteriorate. Instability in the neighbourhood disrupts the EU–Russia partnership, undermines EU solidarity and undermines EU energy security.Frustration with the ENP seems widespread. EU member states have advanced asuccession of branded initiatives or slogans to patch it up, such as New Ostpolitik,enhanced ENP, ENP plus, Black Sea Synergy or the Eastern Partnership; but the EUas a whole is still in search of a formula to fix its neighbours. The EU’s biggest short-coming is its failure to match internal assets and external goals, by committing thenecessary ingredients that will make the ENP successful – opening markets andborders and playing a greater political and security role in the region. The EU hasmade many of the right promises to its neighbours: support for free trade, transporta-tion networks, energy security, student exchanges and travel facilitation have all beenon offer. But when it comes to concrete discussions on visa facilitation deals orinvolvement in conflict settlement efforts, EU member states have persistentlyblocked or delayed implementation.
The East has changed. But the EU’s policy towards Eastern Europe is stuck in amind-set formed in the 1990s, based on three key assumptions: that the EU is the
sole pole of power in a concentric Europe; that its neighbours are keen to adopt itsvalues and standards; and that this process is long-term and irreversible – the EU’s jobbeing solely to regulate the pace of osmosis. All three assumptions are now underchallenge. First, Russia wants to be the centre of its own sphere of influence, and hasdeveloped a neighbourhood policy of its own that combines soft and hard power andis backed by more time and resources than the EU is currently willing to commit. Inthe context of the global economic crisis, Russia’s (and the EU’s) resources to pursueits neighbourhood policy will decrease, but its underlying motives will not change.Moscow’s interest in maintaining a sphere of influence survived the much deepercrisis of the 1990s, and will certainly survive the current one. Russia’s project for theneighbourhood was not an opportunistic endeavour fuelled by high oil prices; itstemmed from a deeply engrained Russian view of itself as a pole of influence in amultipolar world.
Second is the rise of a ‘sovereign neighbourhood’ – a belt of states that are lesswilling than their accession equivalents of the 1990s to pool their newly won sover-eignty with the EU or see it undermined by Russia, and that therefore seek to play oneagainst the other. The region is in a ‘long transition’ at best, or stuck in an equilibriumof partial reform. Third, the EU’s technocratic approach has not kept pace with therapidly deteriorating political and security environment in the Eastern neighbourhood.All the EU’s Eastern neighbours are states in a hurry, facing stark existential chal-lenges from demography to territorial conflicts. The ENP is no match for their burningproblems of state survival, especially in times of economic crisis. Even the potentiallong-term effects of the ENP are often cancelled out by Russia’s more effective short-term manoeuvring in the shared neighbourhood.
Two neighbourhood policies
ENP is no longer the only game in town, and faces an uphill struggle against forcesnever envisaged in the expansion model of the 1990s. Whereas the EU pursues anunder-resourced technocratic neighbourhood policy, Russia pursues a well-resourcedgeopolitical neighbourhood policy that touches raw nerves throughout the neighbour-hood. A sphere of influence in its new ‘near abroad’ has been Russia’s aim ever since1991; but it now has the means to pursue this aim more effectively. Since the‘coloured revolutions’ in 2003–2004, Russia has realized that it cannot rely on thepost-Soviet space passively remaining ‘post-Soviet’, but must work proactively toassert its influence. The European neighbourhood policy now faces a Russian neigh-bourhood policy (RNP).
The two neighbourhood policies are enormously different, but that in itself is areason why ‘RNP’ often undercuts ENP. ENP is formal, but weak on substance;Russian neighbourhood policy is informal (often extremely informal), but has moresubstance. The EU has a strategy, but no tactics. Russia may have less strategic appealas a long-term model of society, but it is tactically adroit. Russia sees itself as meetingan explicit challenge on ‘home’ territory; the EU is often not even aware it is in acompetition in a neighbourhood that often seems far from home.
The EU and Russia deploy different types of soft and hard power. The EU needsto develop an analysis of how they engage and counteract one another, and reshape itsinstruments accordingly. Rather than accepting the reality of spheres-of-influencepolitics, and competing over where to draw the line, the EU should concentrate oncompeting against the very different political and business culture that underlies the
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Russian offer to the EU’s eastern neighbours. The competition will define how theshared neighbourhood will look for decades to come.
Russian soft power
Russia is not a soft power, but it has some soft power. However striking this maysound to many in Europe in the wake of the war in Georgia, Russian power is not onlyhard and coercive. Russian soft power does not make any of its neighbours want tojoin the Russian Federation. Nor does it help sell Russia as a model for modernization.But soft power is not only about positive things such as democracy and integration.Soft power is about making others want what you want, even if that means buildingilliberal capitalism, not allowing the OSCE to monitor elections or sustaining corruptcross-border networks.
Some Russian soft power is residual – such as the omnipresence of the RussianOrthodox Church (ROC), historical links or media influence. The ROC maintains bothstrong residual loyalties and an institutional presence (churches, parishes, hierarchies,all technically part of the ROC) in at least five of the 15 post-Soviet states. The ROCremains the majority church in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Moldova, and is themajority church among the Orthodox in Estonia. The ROC’s influence is strengthenedby the fact that it is the most trusted institution (more than the media, army and thegovernment) in countries like Ukraine and Moldova, and it is often openly involvedin politics, as with the Moscow Patriarchate’s strong backing for Viktor Yanukovychin the 2004 Ukrainian election, or President Voronin in Moldova.
But much of Russia’s soft power is newly acquired and promoted throughout thepost-Soviet space through increasing Russian support for NGOs, political parties, spindoctors, cultural foundations and even local governments in places like Crimea orGagauzia.1
Russia’s new activism is the result of a strategic rethink of its modus operandiconducted after the Orange Revolution, which Russia interpreted as a ‘NGO specialoperation’, and therefore responded with its own investment in soft instruments ofinfluence. According to Gleb Pavlovsky,
[T]his was a very useful catastrophe for Russia. We learnt a lot […] It very quicklybecame clear that they [the West] would try to export this [type of soft power revolution]to us and that we should prepare for this, and very quickly strengthen our politicalsystem […] In a year we had stopped the wave of Coloured Revolutions and turned itback.2
If Russia felt initially that it was being outplayed by Western soft power,3 it has nowtaken up these methods, distorted them in its own image and turned them back againstthe West (Panarin 2006). Russia now supports ‘its’ NGOs, uses ‘its’ web technolo-gies, and exports its own particular brand of ‘political technology’ and the ‘kickbackeconomy’. The Russian foreign policy concept openly states that Russia will offergovernmental support to ‘non-governmental organizations interested in promotingRussia’s foreign policy interests’,4 both at home and in the CIS.
Russia’s push into the neighbourhood has been assisted by Putin’s high ratings inmost of the neighbourhood states, bar Georgia (and even in some EU member states,such as Bulgaria, where Putin’s rating is 73%). The ‘Russian model’ also has itssupporters. Belarus, Azerbaijan and Armenia all replicate to varying degrees the
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Russian discourse on ‘sovereign democracy’ – albeit under local brand names, suchas ‘responsible democracy’ in Azerbaijan. Immediately after Medvedev proposed inNovember 2008 that Russia move to a six-year presidency, pro-government forces inAzerbaijan started to do the same.
The ideology of ‘sovereign democracy’ is often dismissed as mere window-dressing. Certainly, Putin’s Russia is highly eclectic ideologically.5 But the conceptfulfils certain core needs: it helps legitimate the idea of a ‘national path’ towardsdemocracy and disguises local authoritarian features; it establishes a link betweendomestic and foreign policy – countries have to be strong at home to be strongabroad; and it is available for export. The message to other post-Soviet elites is to bea ruthless survivor like Putin or Lukashenka, rather than a loser like Kuchma orShevardnadze. The message to local masses is pride in not being lectured by thehypocritical West.
In Belarus, Lukashenka claims to have invented the idea. Azerbaijan talks of‘responsible democracy’ (Mekhtiuev 2007). In May 2008, for example, the head of theAzerbaijani presidential administration Ramiz Mehdiyev said after visiting Moscowthat Baku could learn from the way in which ‘they [the Russians] control practicallyevery development in every field – construction, social policies, industry and defencesectors. This is a very useful experience. I think we should use this experience andshould organize such control mechanisms in the activity of all structures which arevitally important for the country’.6
Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia are not building sovereign democracies and aremuch more open to the West; but they have learned how to use ‘political technology’and other Russian techniques to harass political adversaries, mass media and evennon-governmental organizations. ‘Political technology’ is a peculiarly local term forthe ‘art’ of manipulating elections through a wide array of cynical and often illegalinstruments. It works on two levels. First, there are Russian ‘technologists’ workingon Russian terms for local political parties. Second, Russia has long sought to workthrough friendly or front parties in the ‘near abroad’. In Ukraine, and to a lesserextent in Moldova, Russia has ironically reaped the benefit of the Orange Revolutionand the existence of more pluralistic political spaces. Its most effective channelsof influence run through the divided ruling political and economic elites, and insupporting local parties, civil society and media. Russia finds it harder to operate inthe relatively closed societies of Belarus or Azerbaijan, though it is better attuned tolocal conditions and the narrow interstices of political economy and the kickbackeconomy.
After the shock of the 2004 Orange Revolution in Ukraine, Russia opened a new‘NGO front’. In the words of Sergey Markov:
Russia should use political technology internationally in Georgia and Ukraine – I don’tthink of these countries as independent – we should repeat what the United States isdoing there. If we do ten times less than what US is doing now, the result will be a pro-Russian government will be in power in Ukraine. Now we are doing one hundred less.The majority of the nation is in favour of Russia in Ukraine, so we just should help [setup] think-tanks, round tables, conferences, supporting media, exchanges, all thesenormal things.7
Russia has set up a series of umbrella organizations to project its ‘soft power’ abroad.Konstantin Zatulin’s older Institute of CIS Countries (see www.materik.ru) has beenexpanded. Its Ukrainian branch under Vladimir Kornilov has supported Crimean and
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Rusyn separatists (see www.otechestvo.org.ua). Post-Orange start-ups include theFund of Strategic Culture set up in February 2005 at www.fondsk.ru (linked to theUkrainian site www.odnarodyna.ru); Vyacheslav Nikonov’s Russian World atwww.russkiymir.ru, set up in June 2007; Sergey Glazyev’s National Institute ofDevelopment; and the Russian International Centre at www.rusintercenter.ru. InSeptember 2008, Putin even suggested that Russia support civil society in Georgia,saying ‘it would be incorrect to leave Georgia to nationalists and irresponsible people,allowing them to tear it to pieces’.8
Russian soft power also offers benefits to the average citizen, albeit of a differenttype than it offers to elites: including visa-free travel, access to a relatively openlabour market, and the promise of authoritarian public goods that are still valued inlocal political culture, like stability, law-and-order and generous welfare. The Putinregime’s demonization of the ‘anarchic’ 1990s resonates throughout the region,undermining many of the new states’ foundation myths.
Russia’s soft power also shapes how ENP publics perceive international events.Many in the European neighbourhood are convinced that Russia is on the rise, and theWest is in decline; that Russian actions in Georgia were simple peacekeeping; and thatthe EU is about to disintegrate after the failure of the Lisbon treaty – in other words,that Russia is more relevant in the region than the EU.
However, Russia’s soft power has its limits. Many types of Russian power aredouble-edged. Local regimes have learnt how to deploy the methodologies of politicaltechnology and sovereign democracy themselves. Azerbaijan has used its abundant oilmoney to co-opt parties and NGOs (Ismailzade 2007). Moreover, the same methodscan be used to keep the Russians out. Political parties in neighbourhood states mightuse their Russian connections for an electoral campaign, but are very opportunisticallies. In many cases, the impact of soft power is ‘small compared to Russia’s imageas a country which uses force to promote its interests’.9
Russian hard power
As with Russia’s soft power, Russian hard power is both old and new, though it ismostly based on nineteenth-century paradigms like a strong military presence,managed instability and economic coercion. Russia has little use for ‘targeted’ or‘smart’ sanctions. In fact, the necessarily broad demonstration effect of Russianhard power is often as important as the use of such power itself. Cutting the gassupply to countries like Ukraine and Moldova, or deploying troops in SouthOssetia and Abkhazia, sends strong signals to all of Russia’s neighbours, includingits allies.
Russia has maintained a military presence in various forms in all the countries ofthe EU’s eastern neighbourhood (Table 1). Belarus and Armenia are close Russianallies that rely on Russian military bases to ensure their security; Belarus against theWest and potential domestic threats, Armenia against Azerbaijan, a country withwhich it is still formally at war over Nagorno–Karabakh, another ‘not so frozen’conflict.
Azerbaijan and Ukraine are less happy with their Russian military presence, buthave consented to it. Azerbaijan hosts the radio-location station in Gabala until 2012at least, which allows Russia to monitor the airspace across much of the MiddleEast. Russia’s lease agreement for its Black Sea Fleet in Crimea is due to expire in2017, but Russia has expressed a clear desire to remain.10 Ukraine has tried to push
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for a road map for Russian withdrawal in the run-up to 2017, but so far withoutsuccess.
In Moldova and Georgia, the Russian military presence is ensured under thebanner of ‘peacekeepers’ in conflict zones, stationed without the consent of the hoststates and against its own commitments for a ‘complete, unconditional and ordered’withdrawal undertaken at the OSCE summit in Istanbul in 1999. In Moldova, the mili-tary presence is used to push for a settlement of the conflict in Transnistria on Russianterms. With Georgia, the situation is less clear-cut. Russia withdrew its troops from‘Georgia proper’ in late 2007, but has been constantly increasing its military presencein Abkhazia and South Ossetia. This was the case even before 26 August 2008, whenRussia still recognized the territorial integrity of Georgia.
Russian military power has achieved a variety of foreign policy goals. In the1990s, Georgia accepted Russian military bases, hoping that Russia would help it toreintegrate. In 2008, the Russian–Georgian war put an end to Georgian hopes of join-ing NATO in the foreseeable future. Moldova stays neutral to try and negotiate aRussian withdrawal. The Nagorno–Karabakh conflict has forced Armenia into anarrow paradigm of state survival as a Russian military ally and economic satellite,and forced Azerbaijan to pursue a ‘multivectoral’ policy to avoid upsetting Russia.Other simmering territorial tensions in Crimea (Ukraine) or Gagauzia (Moldova) andnascent ‘Matryoshka nationalisms’ (Russian support for sub-state ethnic groups)provide potential future leverage. Russia has deliberately adopted an expansive notionof citizenship, actively expanding passport holder populations in many neighbourhoodstates, which it then claims the right to protect.
In recent years Russia has increasingly added economic coercion as a tool ofhard power. Russia has widely used energy cut-offs in politically sensitivemoments. Nevertheless, the effectiveness of these measures has varied from countryto country. Throughout the 1990s, Russia supplied gas at discount rates to try andkeep the post-Soviet economy as a whole relatively integrated. Since 2000, Russiahas gradually but forcibly adopted the opposite approach: using expensive gas as aninstrument for infrastructure takeover and the punishment of ‘unfriendly’ states.There is clearly nothing wrong with a desire to sell gas at market prices. But thetiming and pace of gas price increases has been clearly political. In Ukraine underpresident Kuchma, Russia agreed to sell gas for $50 per 1000 m3 until 2010, butimmediately after the Orange Revolution pushed for an increase to $240. When theparties did not agree, Russia drastically reduced supplies to Ukraine for a few daysin January 2006. It simultaneously cut gas supplies to Moldova precisely at amoment of increased Russian–Moldovan tensions over Transnistria. Russia’s goalshave always been a combination of commercial and strategic interests. Every time
Table 1. Russian troops in the six ENP countries (2008).
Russia pushed for higher prices, it also offered the target countries a political wayout: either by ceding energy infrastructure or by fulfilling non-economic Russianobjectives. As a result, Gazprom now controls majority stakes in the gas distributioncompanies in Moldova and Armenia, and 50% of Beltransgaz in Belarus, while non-transparent intermediaries, shell companies and corrupt schemes have penetrateddeeply into the Ukrainian gas infrastructure to an extent that is not obvious even toinsiders.
Trade embargoes have accompanied energy pressures. Russia introduced a wineblockade against Georgia (from 2005) and Moldova (in 2005–2007). It has alsoimposed bans at various stages on Moldovan, Ukrainian and Georgian vegetables,meat and dairy products. Even Armenia, Russia’s close ally, saw its brandy exports toRussia locked out of the market in March–September 2006. The most comprehensiveeconomic pressures were applied on Georgia after Tbilisi arrested four Russian spiesin September 2006. Russia introduced transportation, postal and air blockade,expelled several hundred Georgians and closed Verkhniy Lars, the only land-bordercrossing between Georgia and Russia (two other land passages are controlled byAbkhazia and South Ossetia).
But Russia’s hard and soft power also has its limits. The war in Georgia wasperhaps the peak of its use of hard power, but also the biggest failure of Russian power– as no amount of economic, political or ideological efforts, short of war, had up tothat point been able to alter Georgia’s domestic and foreign policies. The use of hardpower also undermines Russia’s soft power ambitions, and has scared neighboursinto seeking to diversify their foreign policy options. Russian embargoes have oftenled to a successful search for new export markets. After Russia introduced the ban onMoldovan and Georgian wines, their economies still grew by 3–5% and 9–12%,respectively.11 Georgia successfully reoriented most of its wine exports, while thelimited effects of the Russian blockade on Moldova only underscored the fact thatRussia had only 15% of the country’s external trade, compared with the EU’s 50%.Russian pressures on Georgia strengthened rather than weakened Saakashvili in thebuild-up to the August 2008 war. Russia’s sanctions have also diminished its futureeconomic leverage by driving the targets to diversify their economies. By 2008, all ofthe EU’s eastern neighbours, except for Belarus on the import side, traded more withthe EU than with Russia.
Russia’s military presence in the region has often undermined state-buildingefforts, but has never been strong enough to reassert Russian hegemony. Russiantroops actually pulled out of Georgia (albeit temporarily) in late 2007. Despite yearsof pressure on Moldova to accept a permanent Russian military presence in exchangefor reunification with Transnistria, Moldova still insists that Russian forces shouldwithdraw. If anything, Russia’s exploitation of secessionist conflicts has encouragedeven greater international involvement in the post-Soviet space. Moldova is trying tojoin the EU and replace Russian military peacekeepers with a civilian mission wherethe EU would be the main actor.
EU soft power
The EU is hubristic about its soft power. It sees itself as a superior embodiment of softpower and a model of peace, democracy and prosperity in the region – and takes thispower for granted. The EU sought strength in expansion; and for previous rings of‘neighbours’, following the rules of the club was as important as membership. But the
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ENP is designed to provide many of the benefits of integration with the EU, whilefending off attempts actually to join. Push is as weak as pull. Pro-EU sentiments inthe neighbourhood are broad, but shallow and confused. Moldova is one of the mostpro-EU countries, with some 75% support for EU integration; but half of the popula-tion also thinks that Russia should be the country’s main ‘strategic partner’. Publicsand governments tend to see a ‘European choice’ as a geopolitical realignment, ratherthan a choice to put their own houses in order. EU integration strategies mean lots ofpro-EU foreign policy statements and a certain dose of anti-Russianism, rather thandeep programmes of reforms, strengthening democracy and fighting corruption. TheEU’s ultra-polite way of raising ‘concerns’ about insufficient democracy and reformsis often hijacked by neighbouring governments and presented as EU praise, ratherthan shaming them into action.
The EU’s soft power is also undermined by internal EU factors such as a lack ofcommitment by the EU member states to make the ENP a priority. In the absence ofhard power, EU soft power is supposed to be the driving force of the ENP. But thereare few European leaders or institutions to drive it. As a Commission official argues,‘We announced the ENP but never had the political will to do it. Neither EU memberstates, nor directorates general in the European Commission are mobilized to supportENP’.12 As a senior official from a new EU member state argues in frustration, ‘InBrussels when you try to propose something on the Eastern neighbourhood, the firstthing you hear is “It’s not possible”’.13
Even when it comes to financing governmental projects, the EU’s slow andcomplicated funding procedures limit the EU’s impact on the ground. For example, inMoldova there are three European information centres: one is funded by GeorgeSoros, and two by the Eurasia Foundation with money from USAID, Ministry ofForeign Affairs of Norway and the Swedish International Development Agency(SIDA). None is funded by the EU itself.
The Directorate General (DG) for External Relations in charge of the ENP hasgreat difficulties in convincing other DGs that ENP is a priority. As one officialexplains:
In order to boost the EU’s export of the acquis to the neighbourhood, the EU could startby screening the legislation of its neighbours. But for that we need each directorategeneral to dedicate between two and six persons who could do that. But since ENP is nota priority, we cannot get human resources across the European Commission to work onthe ENP.14
A similar cleavage between sectoral ministries runs across EU member states. Evenif foreign affairs ministries are ready to agree visa facilitation deals with the EU’sneighbours, home affairs ministries often block them.
The ENP also suffers from a structural imbalance in the amount of politicalattention paid to the southern and eastern neighbours. The primary responsibilitywith this imbalance lies with EU member states. The EU has a longer history ofinteracting with the southern neighbours, because the Eastern states have onlyrecently become a ‘neighbourhood’. Southern countries like France, Spain and Italyare natural lobbyists for the southern neighbourhood, but there is no similar group oflike-minded states in the east. Germany is primarily interested in Russia and viewsrelations with most eastern neighbours through the prism of its partnership withRussia. The new EU member states are mostly small, do not act as a group, are lessskilled at playing the internal EU machinery, and have little experience in advancing
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ideas; they are much more focused on managing the financial crisis, getting intoSchengen, the Euro zone and overcoming restrictions on free movement of labourthan in pushing for ENP.
All these factors result in a strongly imbalanced engagement by EU institutions inthe neighbourhood. The geography of foreign trips of senior European officials is verytelling. Between 1999 and 2008 the high representative for CFSP, Javier Solana, hasbeen only once to Moldova, Azerbaijan and Armenia (in 2001 during a Troika tour ofthe region organized by the Swedish presidency), five times to Georgia (twice in2008), though with 16 visits to Russia and the same to Ukraine (thanks to the OrangeRevolution). In comparison, Solana made 119 visits to the Middle East and NorthAfrica. Even if the European Commission seems better at balancing the eastern andsouthern dimension of the ENP, its diplomatic presence in the world is similarlyskewed. The EU Commission has bigger delegations in some African countries thanin its own stated neighbourhood.
The more technical aspects of ENP also undercut its potential impact. The ENPoffer is not always as attractive as it seems, even with supposed jewels in the crownlike deep free trade and visa facilitation. Mikheil Saakashvili has declared that‘Georgia doesn’t need a European model, we want a Singapore or Dubai modelhere’.15 An oil-exporting country like Azerbaijan has less need for access to EUmarkets. If Europeans see the EU as an empire of rules, from the outside it sometimeslooks like an empire of red tape. Neighbourhood states have to compete with the ‘oldneighbours’ in low-regulation ‘New Europe’ rather than with Germany or France.Visa facilitation benefits only a small percentage of the population, and is currentlypoorly implemented by EU member states, while readmission agreements will imposehuge costs on the neighbours. After Romania, Poland and Slovakia joined the EU,they had the potential to become role models driving the Europeanization of Moldova,Ukraine and maybe Belarus; but their restrictive visa policies have made themsymbols of isolation to those behind the Schengen wall.
The lumping together of the Eastern and Southern neighbourhoods symbolicallyundermines the value of the ENP in states like Ukraine and Moldova. However, theimportance of this factor is exaggerated. The ENP as it is currently conceived facili-tates synergies and package deals among EU member states with different geograph-ical priorities. The Eastern Partnership became possible because the Union of theMediterranean was launched. On many technical and economic issues – from deepfree trade to visa facilitation – the EU is more open to its eastern than its southernneighbours. The real problem for the eastern neighbourhood is limited EU politicalengagement. EU member states have some 7000 peacekeepers in Lebanon, but haverefused for years to make any contribution to peacekeeping efforts in the easternneighbourhood. Even after the Georgia war, member states’ support for EU involve-ment in conflict resolution in Georgia, Moldova and Azerbaijan remains patchy atbest.
EU civilian power
The EU is not a hard power; but this does not mean that the EU does not use coercionin its foreign policy, nor that it entirely avoids getting involved in conflict settlementefforts. Visa bans have been imposed against Belarusian and Transnistrian officials –though most of the former were lifted for six months in October 2008, with no realagreement on precise conditionality. Even though the EU’s civilian power is no match
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for Russian hard power in the neighbourhood, the EU has sought to play some role inconflict resolution efforts in the neighbourhood.
Until the Georgian war, the EU was mainly involved in conflict settlement effortsin Transnistria. In 2003, the EU started to take a more proactive stance: introducing atravel ban against Transnistrian leaders, appointing a EU Special Representative onMoldova, joining the 5+2 negotiating format, and launching a hundred-strong EUBorder Assistance Mission (EUBAM) to Moldova and Ukraine in order to curb thesmuggling networks that helped sustain Transnistria. However, the EU shied awayfrom seeking to replace the dysfunctional Russian-dominated peacekeeping force orpushing Russia to respect its commitments on troop withdrawal. A possible EUcontribution to a peacekeeping mission was discussed twice, in 2003 and 2006. Thefirst time, the idea was rejected by Russia; the second time, the problem was EUmember states’ own refusal to consider sending peacekeepers. In 2006, the then EUSpecial Representative on Moldova, Adriaan Jacobovits de Szeged, lobbied memberstates to press Russia to accept a change in the peacekeeping format; but he wasopposed by Cyprus, Germany, Greece, Finland, France, Italy, Portugal, Spain andSlovakia. Jacobovits was practically fired for pushing the issue. As one EU officialhas stated ‘After the war in Georgia it would be stupid to pretend that the Russianmilitaries in Transnistria are just peacekeepers’,16 but the EU remains unwilling toget involved, despite Russia pressing for a new settlement on its own terms (seebelow).
In Georgia, the EU’s record of contribution to crisis management is perhaps evenless impressive (Popescu 2007). The list of measures the EU has refused to take inSouth Ossetia and Abkhazia is even longer than in Transnistria. Since the RoseRevolution in 2003, Georgia has been a persistent demandeur for greater EU involve-ment in conflict resolution; but the EU has been reluctant to get involved, to avoidtensions with Russia. On the one hand, the EU has appointed a Special Representative,launched an EU Rule of Law Mission, and a Border Support Team. In 2006 theEuropean Commission became the biggest international donor supporting post-conflict rehabilitation in Abkhazia and South Ossetia (excluding Russia’s non-transparent financial and military support for the secessionist governments), with atotal of €33 million in 1997–2005. On the other hand, when Russia vetoed a 150-person OSCE Border Monitoring Operation and Georgia invited the EU to take over,the EU sent three experts (later extended to 12) to help Georgia write a border reformstrategy. When the Directorate General for External Relations worked on a non-paperon an ‘Increased EU role in conflict resolution and prevention’ in the neighbourhood(which contained no revolutionary ideas), the paper was not even published or takenfurther for fear of irritating Russia. The contrast between the scale of the task and thelevel of EU involvement has rarely been so striking. EU institutions never raised theprospect of sending peacekeepers to Georgia until the Russia–Georgia war in August2008.
Perhaps even more indicative has been the persistent delay by EU member statesof low level measures proposed by EU institutions, as when they tried to deploy twoexperts in Georgia to develop a dialogue on customs management with the secession-ist authorities in 2008. The EU’s obvious reluctance to play a bigger role in conflictmanagement in Georgia was at least partly responsible for the escalation of theconflict by both sides, and also taught Georgia that the international communitywas not willing to get involved in conflict settlement efforts and the only means torecapture Abkhazia and South Ossetia were military.
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Even more notable has been the EU’s reluctance to act on Nagorno–Karabakh. TheEU has not disbursed any funds to help with reconstruction (unlike South Ossetia andAbkhazia), partly because France, which is a co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group anda mediator in the conflict settlement process, prefers to keep EU institutions out of thesettlement process. Despite the EU’s expressed readiness to send peacekeepers ifAzerbaijan and Armenia agree on a solution to the conflict, there is little the EU wantsor can do to bring that solution closer. In the aftermath of the Georgia war, Azerbaijanhas become more sceptical of the EU:
The confused and haphazard approach with which the EU reacted to the crisis in Georgiahas damaged its image as a power which can make any tangible difference on theground. The EU is remembered in Azerbaijan for its toothless statements and poorlynegotiated and poorly enforced agreement with Russia on the withdrawal of Russianforces from Georgia.17
While Russia thinks about its neighbours all the time, and plays them with skill, theEU thinks about its neighbours only in times of crisis. As one senior Moldovan officialclaimed:
When we discuss Transnistria with Russia we speak at the highest political level – withthe Russian president. There is no similar level of interest in the EU. There is no seniorEuropean politician – from the EU or the EU presidency – that would support advancingthe conflict resolution agenda at a political level.18
It is often felt in the neighbourhood that the EU has also failed to speak frankly toRussia to articulate its interests in solving the secessionist conflicts. As one senior EUofficial puts it:
In no EU–Russia summit have we spoken clearly to Russia on the frozen conflicts.Never, never, never. If the EU wants to be respected I should speak clearly to Russia.Otherwise they play with us.19
How RNP undermines ENP
ENP is no longer the only game in town, and faces an uphill struggle against forcesnever envisaged in the 1990s expansion model. Whereas the EU pursues an under-resourced technocratic neighbourhood policy, Russia pursues a well-resourced geopo-litical neighbourhood policy that touches the core nerves of all the countries in theshared neighbourhood. If the ENP is formalized but without much substance, Russianneighbourhood policy has substance but is much less formal. Where the EU offersspeeches, Russia offers material interests and hard bargains (Table 2).
The EU tries to export itself through the ENP. The ENP’s three core objectives aretherefore to foster stability, increase prosperity and promote democracy in the neigh-bourhood. But all three are challenged by the very different model that Russia offersto the neighbourhood. On conflict resolution, for example, Russia has tried to lock theEU out of the negotiations on Transnistria by creating a 2+1 format (Moldova andTransnistria + Russia) instead of 5+2. Russia would like to see EUBAM out of theregion as soon as possible, and has encouraged Transnistria to request an increase inthe Russia military presence from 1300 to 3000. Russian experts have also started toargue that Moldova’s efforts to get closer to the EU will complicate conflict settlementin Transnistria. In Georgia, Russia has for years blocked the EU’s shy efforts to play
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a bigger role in conflict settlement in Abkhazia and South Ossetia, and now limits themonitoring of the conflict zone by the EU Monitoring Mission (EUMM). Many of theEU’s efforts to support Georgia after the Rose Revolution through the ENP stumbledbecause Georgia was entirely consumed by its territorial conflicts and tensions withRussia.
Russia’s export of ‘political technology’; and ‘sovereign democracy’ has under-mined the EU’s attempts to support democracy and pluralism in the neighbourhood,and decreased the potential effectiveness of EU conditionality. Russia has evenchallenged the presumption that the EU can define what is democratic and what isnot. Undemocratic mechanisms of political manipulation have permeated the politi-cal culture of all Russia’s neighbours. Armenia modelled its ‘operation successor’on that of Russia, with the former president Robert Kocharian passing on his sceptreto a chosen successor Serzh Sarkisian in February 2008 after elections marred byirregularities. Even in relatively pluralist Moldova, the Communist presidentVladimir Voronin has announced that he is grooming a successor for the April 2009elections. Azerbaijan, where succession has remained within the Aliev family, hasreplicated Russian discourse on the inadmissibility of foreigners interfering withAzerbaijan’s ‘democratic process’. Both of the region’s democracy poster boys nowhave a tarnished image. Georgia’s President Saakashvili imposed a state of emer-gency in November 2007 and has replicated some of the mechanisms of Russian-style control of the political spectrum. Ukraine’s Viktor Yushchenko has allowedhis chief of staff Viktor Baloha to use the kind of tactics (abuse of ‘administrativeresources’, closing of courts, artificial party projects) that have turned him into‘Kuchma-lite’.
As tension has increased with Russia, the neighbourhood states have expectedrapprochement with the West for geopolitical reasons – whether or not they have imple-mented democratic reforms. The likely outcome of such an environment is not a 1990s-style Central Europe that irreversibly moves towards the EU even if they temporarilystumble across authoritarian rulers (such as Me[ccaron] iar in Slovakia or Tudjman in Croatia).Nor is it a Finlandization model – where a democratic and free market country has a
c
Table 2. ENP and RNP compared.
Russia European Union
Hard power • Blockades of wine, vegetables, meat
• Oil and gas embargoes• Raising energy prices• Infrastructure takeovers• Secessionist conflicts• Military pressures• Non-withdrawal of troops
• Financial assistance• Protectionist on sensitive products,
but offers a distant perspective of free trade
• Inactive in secessionist conflicts before EUMM
• Active in border controls Moldova–Ukraine
Soft power • Cheap energy• Economic growth• Visa-free regime• Open labour market• Protection of authoritarian
regimes• Exporting ‘sovereign democracy’• Russian citizenship and pensions
• Negative on enlargement but provides an attractive but ‘unachievable’ model
• Tough visa policies• Supports democracy• Perceived as being weak and in a
deep crisis• Image of economic protectionism
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very careful foreign policy, though in all other respects is part of the West. The neigh-bourhood is much more likely to follow a Tito-style model – where authoritarianregimes play the West against the East, reaping the geopolitical benefits of cooperationwith both.
Russia also undermines the ENP’s economic objectives. Brussels has held out thevision of a new European Economic Area, where, through the export of the acquiscommunautaire, the EU sits at the centre of concentric circles of wider Europe thatshare everything (markets, infrastructure, regulations and acquis) bar institutions,based on the model of Norway’s or Switzerland’s relationship with the EU. Russia’svision of the neighbourhood, however, is a Russo-centric area driven by economicintegration (meaning Russian control of key economic sectors and infrastructure) thatnegotiates as an equal but separate partner with the EU. Through the CIS Parliamen-tary Assembly, Russia is clearly in the business of exporting its own acquis. Theattempt to include Moldova and Ukraine into the European Energy Community,which implies a full adoption of the energy acquis by the two countries, strictercompetition rules, some degree of unbundling of energy companies and more trans-parent regulation, obviously clashes with Gazprom’s monopolistic domination of theMoldovan gas market through MoldovaGaz, as well as with Gazprom’s non-transpar-ent inroads into Ukraine’s energy infrastructure.
At least before the global economic crisis, Russia offered its neighbours increasedprosperity in exchange for geopolitical alliances through economic integration, differ-entiated gas prices and access to the Russian labour market; but Russia is also offeringtotally different rules of the game to those the EU tries to export to the region. Thepost-Soviet business model is much more opaque, which is bad news for EU investorswho are much less competitive in corrupt post-Soviet environments, and bad for thecountries themselves, which risk remaining stuck – like many Latin American states– in an equilibrium of partial reform.
Conclusions: no ‘business as usual’ in the neighbourhood
The East has changed dramatically since the launch of ENP in 2003: with the‘coloured revolutions’ in Georgia and Ukraine and their disappointing aftermath,the resurgence of Russia, war in Georgia, recurrent gas crises and the shock waves ofthe global financial crisis. But the EU’s policy towards Eastern Europe remains stuckin a mind-set formed in the 1990s, based on three key assumptions: that the EU is theonly pole of power in a concentric Europe; that its neighbours are keen to adopt itsvalues and standards; and that this process is long-term and irreversible, the EU’s jobbeing solely to regulate the pace of osmosis. All three assumptions are now underchallenge. Russia also has a neighbourhood policy that combines hard and soft power.This policy might be moderately effective in reasserting a Russian sphere of influencein the region, but it is very effective in undermining the ENP’s objectives.
Maintaining the current levels of (dis)engagement with the ENP will threaten theEU’s own interests in the region and disrupt EU–Russia relations. There can be nostable EU–Russia partnership for modernization without stronger EU engagement inthe neighbourhood, otherwise instability in the region will always threaten to disruptEU–Russia relations. Similarly, if the EU does not play a stronger role in solvingsecessionist conflicts in the neighbourhood or support reforms in countries likeUkraine, Georgia or Moldova, this will increase these countries’ reliance on NATOand the US, which again complicates relations with Russia.
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At the same time, an ENP driven by anti-Russian sentiments and objectives hasno chance of success. As an official from a new EU member state explains: ‘Theneighbourhood debate often ends in the pro-Russia versus anti-Russia trap. If youframe the ENP as anti-Russian, it is immediately blocked. The only way to push theENP is to avoid being anti-Russian’. The ENP should not be designed as an anti-Russian project, but as a policy to export the European rules of the game. But thisexport needs better back-up. Playing only the long-term game with the neighbours isnot enough. Neighbouring states cannot afford and do not have the capacity to playsuch a long-term game, particularly in times of global crisis.
Notes1. In September 2008, Russia set up a Federal Agency for CIS Affairs, which is designed to
operate like USAID.2. Interview, 12 December 2007; Pavlovsky, quoted in ‘Dancing with the Russian bear: The
jilted lover’, BBC Radio 4, 5 October 2008.3. See, inter alia, Narochnitskaya and Bondaerva 2008, and the many works by the Evropa
publishing house linked to Sergey Markov and Gleb Pavlovsky which has established aproduction line in ‘coloured revolution studies’.
4. The Foreign Policy Concept of the Russian Federation, 12 July 2008, http://www.kremlin.ru/eng/text/docs/2008/07/204750.shtml.
5. Evgeny Morozov, ‘Russian ideology becomes a mash-up’, www.opendemocracy.net/russia/article/russia-ideology-becomes-a-mashup, 5 August 2008.
6. See www.echo-az.info/archive/2008_05/1809/news01.shtml and Daniel Kimmage,‘Kazakhstan: Sovereign democracy in Almaty and Moscow’, 10 July 2006, www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2006/07/6129be69-8044-4ead-a401-3ac4d549a134.html.
7. Author’s interview, Moscow, 19 December 2007.8. See ‘Moscow to develop ties with Georgian civil society’, 25 September 2008, http://
civil.ge/eng/print.php?id=19602.9. Author’s interview with Masha Lipman, Moscow, 21 October 2008.
10. Interview with Russian defence minister Anatolii Serdyukov, 23 September 2008. http://echo.msk.ru/news/542405-echo.html
11. According to World Bank figures, Moldovan GDP growth in 2006 was 4.8%, and 3.0% in2007: http://devdata.worldbank.org/AAG/mda_aag.pdf; Georgian GDP growth was 9.4%in 2006 and 12.4% in 2007, see http://devdata.worldbank.org/AAG/geo_aag.pdf.
12. Author’s interview with a European Commission official, October 2008, Brussels.13. Author’s interview with a diplomat, Prague, October 2008.14. Author’s interview with a European Commission official, October 2008, Brussels.15. Author’s interview with Mikhail Saakashvili, April 2008, Tbilisi.16. Author’s interview with an EU official, Brussels, October 2008.17. Author’s phone interview with an Azeri expert, October 2008.18. Author’s interview with a senior Moldovan official, Chisinau, October 2008.19. Author’s interview with EU official, Brussels, October 2008.
Notes on contributorsAndrew Wilson and Nicu Popescu are Policy Fellows at the European Council on ForeignRelations.
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Daily Monitor 4, no. 167.Mekhtiuev, R. 2007. Na puti k demokratii: Razmyshlyaya o nasledii. Baku: Serq-Qerb.
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Panarin, I. 2006. Informatsionnaia voina i geopolityka. Moscow: Evropa.Popescu, N. 2007. Europe’s unrecognised neighbours: The EU in Abkhazia and South
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