The Participation of CEECs in EU Twinning Projects: Offering Specific Added Value for EU Transgovernmental Cooperation in the Eastern Neighbourhood?

Country-Specific Comparative Advantages

One of the most obvious comparative advantages that CEECs may offer for EU transgovernmental cooperation in the Eastern neighbourhood is their transition experience, or rather, recent transition experience. ²⁴ The process of transition typically involves a two-folded path from autocracy and centrally planned economy to democratic and market-based institutions. ²⁵ The transition experience within the EU context refers to the institutional memory of democratic change and economic transformation of post-communist states of Eastern and Central Europe, most of which became members of the EU in the 2004 and 2007 enlargement rounds. ²⁶ After having been themselves the beneficiaries of EU democracy promotion and transgovernmental programmes in the recent past, these new MSs have acquired a baggage of experience related to their political and institutional reforms, as well as the related history of cooperation with the older EU MSs and the United States. ²⁷ Unlike the CEECs, most of the older MSs cannot boast of their transition experience, because they underwent their transitions a very long time ago and their institutional memory carries no implementation blueprints anymore.

The fact that the CEECs were themselves beneficiaries of the EU Twinning instrument, and thus have an intimate knowledge of the strengths and weaknesses of this instrument as a channel to help induce reforms, adds further weight to the expectation that civil servants from CEECs will be perceived to be particularly well placed to implement such projects in the Eastern neighbourhood. In this regard, the experience of civil servants from CEECs who were themselves involved in the implementation of Twinning projects in the pre-accession period and now operate in Twinning projects on behalf of the “sending partner” might appear especially valuable. As Königová et al. point out based on their assessment of the participation of EU MSs in pre-accession Twinning projects in the Czech Republic, it is critical to “explain the philosophy of any aid programme to the beneficiaries in a comprehensive and clear way, being fully aware of cultural sensitivities and seeking the acceptance and commitment from the recipient country and its institutions first.” ²⁸ This brings us to the comparative advantages of socio-linguistic proximity and common historical legacies.

As highlighted above, Twinning establishes a socialization forum through the long-term secondment of bureaucrats and continuous direct contact between the respective bureaucracies and fosters interpersonal linkages across peer institutions. Under such circumstances, interpersonal communication plays an important role. Therefore, the socio-linguistic proximity and common historical legacies between civil servants from CEECs and their counterparts in the Eastern neighbourhood may help to build a relationship based on trust and mutual understanding and, as a result, familiarize counterpart state officials with EU regulations and practices. Also the fact that civil servants in some of CEECs, and in particular the Baltic countries, are fluent in Russian is expected to offer an added value to their participation in the Twinning exercise in the Eastern neighbourhood. ²⁹

As indicated by Papadimitriou and Phinnemore, in the case of Twinning, “the ability of the dispatched civil servants to develop good working relationships with local staff has a significant bearing on the full realization of objectives.” ³⁰ Existing studies on Twinning projects in the former EU candidate countries from Central and Eastern Europe have shown that the implementation process, at a day-to-day level of cooperation, has often been hampered by communication problems due to the language barrier, as well as by difficulties experienced by MS civil servants in adjusting to the local administrative culture. ³¹ Tulmets, for instance, indicates that “CEEC officials had difficulties to trust their future EU colleagues, who—they considered—had little knowledge of the candidate countries and were not always open to learning on the CEECs’ culture and past.” ³² Therefore, it seems plausible to expect that the socio-linguistic proximity and common historical legacies between the CEECs and the Eastern neighbouring countries should make it easier for civil servants from CEECs to find common ground with their counterparts in the Eastern neighbourhood countries and build a relationship based on trust and mutual understanding.

Indeed, decades of communist rule in the Eastern neighbourhood countries created a “Soviet identity” in those countries alongside their own national identities. It consists of certain habits, practices, social institutions, and socio-linguistic formulas, which linger on in the collective memory of all those who lived in the Soviet Union and, by extension, the Soviet bloc. ³³ Such commonalities may contribute to better mutual understanding and trust between CEECs and post-Soviet countries east of the EU. Related to this, and even more importantly perhaps, a specific public service culture and administrative tradition emerged throughout the former Soviet Union and the former Soviet bloc, which to varying degrees still persists across the region. ³⁴ Indeed, even in the new public administration practices of CEECs, influences from the communist heritage can still be seen. ³⁵ This is not to suggest that all CEECs had the same communist regimes and administrative systems and all followed identical patterns in reforming their public administration. The point is rather that compared to civil servants from other EU MSs, civil servants from CEECs will find it easier to understand the local administrative culture of the post-communist countries in the Eastern neighbourhood. Given the specific goals and context of the Twinning instrument, understanding the local administrative culture may play an important role in facilitating the implementation process at the level of day-to-day cooperation.

Sector-Specific Comparative Advantages

Unlike the country-specific, sector-specific comparative advantages reflect strengths of MS institutions and civil servants in particular sectors of public policy making that are of relevance to the beneficiary. We look at four kinds of sector-specific comparative advantages—institutional experience, sectoral policy fit, prior sectoral cooperation, and Twinning experience, which are hypothesized to be mostly, but not exclusively, a prerogative of the older MSs.

To begin with, institutional experience is understood here as a notable record of administrative or institutional accomplishment gained by an MS in a specific area of public policy or administration. In other words, this concerns a reputational feature, held by MSs that are considered to demonstrate a “good example at home” in terms of their governance of a particular sector. ³⁶ Given that the older MSs have been EU members for a longer time and, in many cases, have a more established administrative system, it is obvious to expect that this comparative advantage will apply more to the older MSs than to CEECs. Indeed, the latter are in some cases still struggling themselves to overcome their communist legacies and consolidate their transition.

Secondly, MSs may be considered as valuable partners when their administrative system at the sectoral level displays a certain degree of sectoral fit or compatibility with the administrative structures of the beneficiary side. ³⁷ As indicated by the Europeanization literature, whereas some amount of misfit is important for policy diffusion to occur in the first place, ³⁸ it is important that the nature or magnitude of such incompatibilities do not clash with the organizational specifics of the beneficiary institution. In the context of Twinning, this comparative advantage implies that for projects in specific sectors (e.g., statistics, land ownership, or education), MSs with a similar size or ministerial capacity as the counterpart organization in the BC may be preferred.

A third comparative advantage is the prior existence of sectoral networks between the MSs and beneficiary administration in a given policy area. Such sectoral networks may be part of established bilateral cooperation between the MSs and the ENP country. In her study of Twinning in Estonia and Hungary, Tulmets notes that these two countries preferred working with the MSs that had been their cooperation partners for several years. ³⁹ In such a way, the financial, administrative, and personal connections emerging from the previous cooperation programmes in specific policy sectors are expected to create a conducive environment for Twinning. ⁴⁰

A final sector-specific comparative advantage is prior Twinning experience. Certain MSs have gained extensive Twinning experience in a particular policy sector by participating in multiple Twinning projects in several countries. This may provide them with a “competitive edge” in EU transgovernmental cooperation in that particular sector, as compared to other MSs with no such experience. Through prior Twinning experience, they may be better equipped to avoid common pitfalls and setbacks in the management and organization of these projects in a given policy sector than the less experienced MSs would. ⁴¹

Recent Transition and Accession Experience

Most interviewees to this study concur that the recent transition and accession experience of MS partners from Central and Eastern Europe contributes to their added value during the implementation of Twinning projects. ⁴⁸ For instance, in discussing the benefits of Poland’s transition experience for Twinning programme in Ukraine, a Polish official noted that “it is their understanding [by Ukrainians] that we [Poland] have gone through a certain period and achieved stability and now we are moving forward.” ⁴⁹

Evidence from several interviews shows that civil servants from CEECs are valued for Twinning in Azerbaijan and Ukraine because they have a recent memory of how their country has undergone certain reforms. ⁵⁰ As illustrated by a Swedish civil servant who operated as RTA in a project in Azerbaijan in which Latvia was the junior partner, the Latvian team members were indispensable as they could “share their experiences, the steps of transformation, mistakes and recommendations on how to avoid them.” ⁵¹ The fact that most CEECs can boast of a recent transition experience has two important implications for their added value in Twinning. First, Twinning officials from CEECs still carry their own professional experience and blueprints of recent reforms that they witnessed or spearheaded in their home administrations about a decade ago. ⁵² As a Danish civil servant who was involved in a statistics project in Ukraine suggested,

Officials from the new member states [CEECs] can relate well to how that decade has passed for them in statistics. The Danes do not remember that situation because there are already different generations. They do not know how it was 50-60 years ago when a certain [statistical] register was being created. It was just too long ago. . . . Initially, we wanted to only cooperate with Germany and France; however, the experience of the new member states is simply invaluable. Their experts are around 50 years old. 10-15 years ago they were implementing new technologies [in their country systems] and they perfectly remember what they did. ⁵³

And second, because a majority of CEECs are still in the process of reforming their administrations and have not yet reached the level of the older MSs, the gap in the institutional development between these CEECs, on the one hand, and Azerbaijan and Ukraine, on the other, is still within reach. As a Ukrainian respondent explained, “something that gets reformed in Germany or France is in fact not reformed, but adjusted. In our Ukrainian case, we need to build from scratch and therefore their experience is generally interesting, but not realistic.” ⁵⁴ For that reason, Azerbaijani and Ukrainian officials simply find it easier to relate with the MSs that have not gone too far off from their common starting point of institutional reform. In this respect, a Polish official noted that CEECs have a better understanding of “what is happening in the civil service system of Ukraine.” ⁵⁵ For example, he added, “the English have a better experience; however, it is so remote [from the Ukrainian conditions] that without a ‘translator’ it is very difficult to implement something.” ⁵⁶

For that reason, while often themselves being role models for CEECs, the older MSs often struggle to get their message across because their administrative systems or best practices in a given policy sector are too advanced and hard to stomach from the point of view of their partners from the Eastern neighbourhood. ⁵⁷ A Dutch civil servant highlighted that this is exactly why the Netherlands always tries to partner with CEECs in EU Twinning projects, because “they sense the counterpart better since they were beneficiaries of Twinning themselves only recently.” ⁵⁸ Similarly, a British civil servant explained that his department wanted to team up specifically with a CEEC for the Twinning project in Azerbaijan on technical barriers to trade, because, like Azerbaijan, they moved from a planned economy system. ⁵⁹

Thereby, the transition experience of the Baltic countries is perceived as offering an even greater added value than the other CEECs from the former Eastern bloc, because the Baltics were a part of the Soviet Union and thus changed from the Soviet system to the EU’s system. ⁶⁰ According to one Ukrainian official, “they [Baltic states] come from the same political system and have similar issues, and the approaches they used are more suited for us as well.” ⁶¹ In this respect, it is also interesting to note that, particularly in Azerbaijan, the Baltic countries tend to be seen as a best practice of de-Sovietization and modernization, at least in the perception of civil servants and technocrats—as opposed to senior government officials. ⁶² However, beyond attesting to the value of transition experience, this appreciation also speaks to the relevance of socio-linguistic proximity and common historical legacies.

Socio-linguistic Proximity and Common Historical Legacies

Historical, cultural, and linguistic affinity of (some of) the CEECs with Azerbaijan and Ukraine are seen as an important factor facilitating the implementation of Twinning projects in those countries. ⁶³ After the collapse of the USSR, former communist societies found themselves in a state of institutional, social, and cultural homogeneity, ⁶⁴ which allowed those societies, despite the different evolutionary paths adopted in the post-Soviet period, to have a more intimate understanding of political and administrative predicaments facing each other and thus enjoy more legitimacy in dealing with each other’s issues, as compared to outsiders, that is, the older MSs. Respondents from both Ukraine and Azerbaijan expressed the view that civil servants from CEECs have a much better understanding of typical political problems and cultural context in the Eastern neighbourhood after having shared part of history together, both under the Soviet Union and before. As a Ukrainian civil servant notes, “countries of the former Soviet bloc are particularly effective, because we have in common some issues, shared history, and understanding of the current processes.” ⁶⁵

Just like with transition experience, this is especially the case for the Baltic states that were formerly part of the USSR and have a unique understanding of the post-Soviet realities. ⁶⁶ The Swedish RTA of a Twinning project in Azerbaijan, which involved Latvia as junior partner, said that she “noticed that dialogues and discussions between the Latvian and Azerbaijani team members sometimes were more constructive [than between the Swedish and Azerbaijani team members]. For instance, when they discussed a new law based on a law from Soviet time, the Latvian and Azerbaijani team members easily understood each other.” ⁶⁷ This also indicates that recent transition experience and shared history are often seen as two sides of the same coin. ⁶⁸

In terms of cultural proximity, respondents implied that affinity with the administrative culture rather than with the national culture of the beneficiary country contributed to the added value of CEECs. ⁶⁹ For example, Dutch civil servants mentioned that the Netherlands prefers to work in a consortium with CEECs like Poland, Lithuania, and Latvia for Twinning projects in the Eastern neighbourhood not only because of their recent transition experience but also because of their closer affinity with the local administrative culture. ⁷⁰

Besides historical and socio-cultural legacies, command of local languages, in casu Russian (and/or Ukrainian in the case of Ukraine), was very often cited as a factor facilitating the Twinning implementation process. ⁷¹ This relates to the importance in Twinning of interpersonal communication between the beneficiary country and the MS officials, whereby direct interaction without interpreters contributes to a better rapport between the sides. The high importance of demonstrating hard, measurable results in the aftermath of each project makes the quality of communication (both in terms of language familiarity and interpersonal relations) between different members of project team a crucial component of Twinning success. For example, the French RTA of the Twinning project on competition policy in Ukraine was recalled and replaced because of the mounting communication difficulties with the beneficiary country’s officials. ⁷² Interestingly, in the case of Twinning in Azerbaijan, a command of Russian only appears to be an asset with older civil servants. Since many of the younger civil servants in the country were educated in the EU or the United States, communication in projects involving younger civil servants tends to be in English.

Institutional Experience

The interview data generally confirm our hypothesis that institutional and administrative experience constitutes mostly—but not exclusively—a comparative advantage for the older MSs owing to their generally well-established governance of particular policy sectors. Several interviews have indicated that the division of objectives and tasks within Twinning consortia during project implementation occurs on the basis of institutional experience of each MS partner in the given policy sector. ⁷³ And that experience is often judged against the quality of reforms undertaken and general reputation of the MSs in that policy sector. ⁷⁴

For example, in the Twinning project in Azerbaijan on standardization and technical regulations, the long established experience of the United Kingdom and France in this area, in combination with the transition experience of Slovenia, was seen as the main strength of the consortium. ⁷⁵ In a project on metrology and consumer policy in Ukraine, the French and German systems were considered the most competitive in Europe, partly because of their strong role in such EU-wide standardization institutes as AENOR. ⁷⁶ Also, our interviewee added, “they [France and Germany] are powerful and reputable players in the sphere of standardization and lead many technical committees in Europe, in addition to a well-functioning system at home.” ⁷⁷ Similarly, France and Germany’s long and relevant experience in the field of disability care and social services was considered an important asset in Twining projects in these areas in both Azerbaijan and Ukraine. ⁷⁸

In a project on land sales and land cadastre in Ukraine, the Netherlands was valued for its long-time expertise in this field. ⁷⁹ Germany, a junior partner to that project, brought a more recent reform experience in that policy area, because Germans “experienced unification between Eastern and Western Germany and they are still in the process of selling state-owned land. And after thirty-five years the land market of Eastern Germany is still not complete. So they bring this tremendous value of how it is to sell public land and how you set up the cadastre of that area and what difficulties you encounter.” ⁸⁰ In a related Twinning project in Azerbaijan, both Sweden and Latvia were considered to have great experience in the field of land evaluation and cadastre. ⁸¹

In projects in Ukraine’s transport sector, France, Spain, Germany, and Poland were viewed to have strong administrative and institutional experience in multimodal, rail, road, and aviation transport, respectively. ⁸² Estonia and Finland were perceived to have a good reputation in the field of higher education, and therefore the Azerbaijanis wanted to learn from their administrative and institutional experience in this field. ⁸³ During Twinning cooperation on police forces in Ukraine, the French gendarmes were viewed to carry a valuable home-based experience in that policy area. ⁸⁴ In the sector of budgetary forecasting in Ukraine, Sweden was perceived by Ukrainians to have a sophisticated, well-staffed debt management system. ⁸⁵ The German Federal Bank (Deutsche Bundesbank), a senior project partner to a Twinning project with the Central Bank of Ukraine, was viewed as “one of the most respectable central banks all over the earth.” ⁸⁶ The Netherlands, in turn, presents a role model in civil service reform and public personnel management, ⁸⁷ while Poland’s financial and banking sector serves as a model thanks to Poland’s successes in building a stable currency and liberalizing capital flows. ⁸⁸

Sectoral Fit

Besides institutional experience, it is also important that the MS administrative system and practices fit with those of the beneficiary’s during Twinning implementation. In the abovementioned project on standardization in Azerbaijan, an additional advantage of the consortium was that Slovenia (unlike France or the United Kingdom) was a small country with a limited administrative capacity, like Azerbaijan. In the field of technical barriers to trade, the size of the country and especially the administrative capacity of the ministerial organization matters. The Azeri side saw strong parallels with Slovenia in this regard. ⁸⁹ The participation of Austria in a project on tourism in Azerbaijan was also considered beneficial not only because Austria has a very good reputation in terms of managing and promoting tourism (cf. administrative and institutional experience) but also because it is comparable in terms of size and, like Azerbaijan, it has mountains with a significant touristic potential. ⁹⁰

In a project on phytosanitary issues in Ukraine, Germany’s involvement was considered very relevant because of the similar size of the countries and their comparable regional division (Germany has Länder and Ukraine, Oblasts). ⁹¹ A Danish official involved in a project in the field of statistics confirmed this point by suggesting that France enjoyed a comparative advantage working with Ukraine because of the comparable regional structure of the statistical systems in both countries, whereby data are collected from below, processed locally, and then passed on to the centre. ⁹² In a follow-up interview, our respondent emphasized a great importance of general sectoral fit between MSs and beneficiaries’ system from the Danish point of view:

Ukrainian statisticians think that the French system is very similar. For us, Northern member states, Denmark and Finland, we find this strange because we think that the French system is very old-fashioned and 20 years behind from ours. However, it turns out to be closer to the Ukrainian system. ⁹³

In that respect, our interviewee also mentioned Poland as having the similar comparative advantage to France’s, as “it is a large country with regions,” which works very well for Ukraine in this and other policy fields. ⁹⁴

Existing Sectoral Networks with the Beneficiary

Only in a couple of projects, sectoral networks involving the MSs and their counterparts from the beneficiary institution in Azerbaijan and Ukraine existed prior to the Twinning project. For example, the Estonian and Azerbaijani team leaders of the Twinning project on higher education in Azerbaijan already knew each other because they were the respective leaders of the Quality Assurance Agency of their countries. ⁹⁵ Ukraine hosted France with two Twinning projects in the field of law enforcement owing to an existing bilateral collaboration between the Ukrainian Ministry of Interior and French gendarmerie. ⁹⁶ There was a considerable density of such bilateral networks with the French in the early stages of Twinning in Ukraine (between 2007 and 2010), which was likely the reason why the French were selected for every second project during that period. ⁹⁷ While the existence of such sectoral networks contributes to building thrust and creates a conducive environment for Twinning, ⁹⁸ overall, we did not find enough evidence based on our sample to make robust claims about sectoral networks as a comparative advantage.

Prior Twinning Experience

We found more evidence in support of prior Twinning experience as a sector-specific comparative advantage. Given that CEECs generally participate less in EU Twinning projects than the older MSs, it is not surprising that it is mostly the older MSs that were mentioned to have this comparative advantage. For example, in the Twinning project in the Ministry of Taxes of Azerbaijan, Spanish and French participant organizations were valued for their extensive experience with previous Twining projects dealing with human resources. ⁹⁹ It was also considered an asset that most of the French and German experts involved in the implementation of a project on disability care in Azerbaijan had international experience in post-communist countries, including in EU Twinning projects. ¹⁰⁰ Similarly, for a project on standardization, the Azeri Twinning partners found it valuable that the French experts had previous experience with Twinning in the Balkans in the area of standardization and technical regulations. ¹⁰¹

In the case of projects in Ukrainian statistics, Denmark had a comparative advantage because of its multiple involvement in similar Twinning projects in places as diverse as Turkey, Israel, and Armenia. ¹⁰² Ahead of the EU’s Eastern enlargement, Denmark was also a great advocate of the CEECs and organized many PHARE projects in the region. As a result, this MS participates in almost every EU Twinning project in statistics, with 80 percent of cases as a leading partner. ¹⁰³ Our Danish interviewee also noted that “even if another country wins a project (like Germany did in Macedonia), it still invites Statistics Denmark as a junior partner.” ¹⁰⁴ An EU official involved with several projects at the National Electricity Regulatory Commission of Ukraine suggested that Italy, the lead partner in the project, has always been at the forefront of EU Twinning cooperation in this field in Turkey, Lithuania, and other counties. ¹⁰⁵