For authoritarian states without EU membership prospects, 'neo-enlightenment' may be more plausible than democratization.
The European Union’s strategy for supporting democracy in its neighborhood must address two different clusters of states, a new report suggests. But a reluctance to extend the prospect of EU accession has taken the momentum out of the gravity model of democratization.
“In the last five years, there has been a virulent intellectual debate about the backlash against democracy,” said Richard Youngs, presenting the report, Democracy’s Plight in the European Neighbourhood, in Brussels last week.
But ”the EU’s unwillingness to extend official membership perspectives dampens the incentive for democratic reforms,” said Youngs, recently-appointed director-general of FRIDE, the Madrid-based think-tank.
Democracy is alive if chaotic in the “struggling transitions” of the Balkans, Turkey, Georgia, Ukraine, Armenia and Moldova, the study suggests. But in a second cluster of Russia, Belarus, the Central Asian states of Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, and North Africa, “there is a contrary trend of ‘proliferating dynasties’,” said analyst Michael Emerson, the report’s co-editor.
The EU has arguably been the principal driver of democratization over the last twenty years, with the accession process for EU membership providing compelling incentives for formerly authoritarian states to consolidate their transition to democracy.
The EU is a force for democracy through what it is as much as through what it does, according to Robert Cooper, its Director General for External Relations. “We’re the people who do regime change – just look at Turkey or Ukraine, and you can see how far we got by just being [what we are],” he said.
With over 450 million European citizens “assured of the democratic common destiny of their 25 nations”, the EU is certainly the actor with the best record for promoting democracy over recent years, argues Nicole Gnesotto, former director of the EU Institute for Security Studies.
Europe’s record in supporting democracy is impressive when the prospect of accession to the EU creates a compelling imperative for aspirant regimes to implement governance reform and respect basic human rights and democratic norms. But the EU’s record is less impressive beyond its own neighborhood, especially when accession is not an option.
“For the authoritarian states without a European perspective, there may well be a long period ahead when a brand of ‘neo-enlightenment’ may be the most plausible scenario,” analyst Emerson told the Brussels meeting.
The study includes analyses of democratic prospects in Algeria, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Egypt, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Moldova, Morocco, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Turkey and Ukraine.
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