Approximation to EU Technical Standards with and without the Promise of Membership: the Cases of Slovakia and Ukraine. EU Diplomacy Paper 02/2013

This paper aims to identify the extent to which the non-promise of membership of the European Union (EU) precludes the motivation of Ukraine as European Neighbourhood Policy country to adopt EU policies in the field of market access, namely technical standards and regulations. Its approximation approach is compared to the fast-tracked accession of Slovakia, which was driven by a clear-cut membership promise. Furthermore, the paper elaborates whether the conclusion of an Association Agreement between the EU and Ukraine, including a Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement, provides sufficient incentives for Ukraine to continue reforming its quality infrastructure in order to gain access to the Single European Market. Finally, scenarios of possible developments of EU-Ukraine relations are deliberated in the context of the EU-Ukraine-Russia triangle. The paper argues that market access provides sufficient stimulus for third countries to adhere to EU technical standards – even in the absence of a clear and credible promise of future EU membership. Yet, in the case of Ukraine, the country’s relations with Russia appear to compete with its EU approximation process, resulting for the time being in Ukraine attempting to pursue a balanced dual cooperation with both the EU and Russia.

EU democratization policies in the Neighbourhood countries and Russia’s reaction as a destabilizing factor. A comparative case study of Georgia and Moldova. Bruges Political Research Papers 45/2015.

The EU democratization policies have not achieved the expected results in Eastern Partnership (EaP) countries. On the contrary, they have led to the outbreak of the most important crisis in Europe after the end of the cold war. A new vision of cooperation in the field of democracy is necessary in the East, as long as even Georgia and Moldova, countries considered to be the most advanced among the EaP states, have not registered essential progress in the democratization of their societies. Assuming that democratization, as part of EU’s neighbourhood policies, can be considered a threat to Russia and hence a ‘destabilizing factor’ for the EU partners, this thesis tried to understand what changes can be made to EU policies and to what extent cooperation between EU and Russia is possible in the process developing democratization policies in Georgia and Moldova. While arguing for the revitalization of the instruments used for the implementation of the democratization policies, this thesis finds that cooperation between the EU and Russia in the field of democracy is excluded as long as the two geo-political actors have different values and different views on the notion of democracy. The most likely cooperation that might occur between EU and Russia is the establishment of a Common Economic Space ‘from Lisbon to Vladivostok’. Even though such a scenario would have the potential to reduce confrontation between the two actors in the common neighbourhood, this cooperation would, however, have a negative impact on the on-going democratic reforms in Georgia and Moldova.