Reforming regional governance in East Central Europe: Europeanization or domestic politics as usual?

East European Politics and Societies

Volumn 20, Issue 2, 2006, Pages 219-253

  O'Dwyer, Conor ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

Decentralization; EU enlargement; Europeanization; Political parties; Post Communism

Indexed keywords

EID: 33646172957     PISSN: 08883254     EISSN: 15338371     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/0888325404271286     Document Type: Review

References (121)

1. See Zyta Gilowska, "Reforma samarza̧dowa a reforma finansów publicznych" [The Reform of Self-Governments and Public Finances], in Lena Kolarska-Bobińska, ed., Cztery reformy: od koncepcji do realizacji [The Four Reforms: From Conception to Realization] (Warsaw, Poland: Instytut Spraw Publicznych, 2000);
2. Jolanta Koral, "Sukcesy i porażki wdrażanej reformy" [Successes and Failures of an Imposed Reform], in Kolarska-Bobińska, Cztery reformy;
3. Grzegorz Gorzelak and Bogdan Jałowiecki, "Reforma terytorialnej organizacji kraju" [The Reform of the Territorial Organization of the Country], in Lena Kolarska-Bobińska, ed., Druga fala polskich reform [Second Wave of the Polish Reforms] (Warsaw, Poland: Instytut Spraw Publicznych, 1999);
4. Chancellery of the Prime Minister of the Republic of Poland, Government Plenipotentiary for the Systemic Reform of the State, Effectiveness, Openness, Subsidiarity: A New Poland for New Challenges, 3rd ed. (Warsaw, Poland, December 1998);
5. Plenipotentiary for the Reform of the Public Administration, Strategy of Public Administration Reform in the Slovak Republic, http://www.mesa10.sk/vs/ (accessed 19 June 2001);
6. and Michal Illner, "Territorial Government in the Czech Republic," in Emil Kirchner, ed., Decentralization and Transition in the Visegrad: Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia (New York: St. Martin's, 1999).
7. By "regional governance reform," I am referring to the restructuring of the division of powers and tasks between subnational elected governments (at the local, regional, and district levels) and the branch offices of the central state administration (at the local, regional, and district levels). Of course, genuine reform is in the eye of the beholder: some of the "reforms" that I will be describing fully deserve their quotation marks.
8. Heather Grabbe, "Europeanisation Goes East: Power and Uncertainty in the EU Accession Process," in K. Featherstone and C. Radaelli, eds., The Politics of Europeanisation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003);
9. and Wade Jacoby, "Priest and Penitent: The European Union as a Force in the Domestic Politics of Eastern Europe," East European Constitutional Review 8 (Winter/Spring 1999): 62-67.
10. For a broader view of EU influence in East Central Europe (ECE), see also Andrew Janos, "From Eastern Empire to Western Hegemony: East Central Europe Under Two International Regimes, "East European Politics and Societies 15:2(2001): 221-49.
11. Grabbe, "Europeanisation Goes East."
12. For a description of the cognitive-socializing element of EU integration, see Brigid Laffan, "The European Union Polity: A Union of Regulative, Normative, and Cognitive Pillars,"Journal of European Public Policy 8 (October 2001): 709-27.
13. Jan Zahradil, foreign affairs spokesman of the conservative Civic Democratic Party (ODS)
14. quoted in Peter Green, "On Eve of Vote, Czechs Seem to Lean toward Joining Europe," New York Times, 13 June 2003.
15. Grabbe, "Europeanisation Goes East," 4-6.
16. James Hughes, Gwendolyn Sasse, and Claire Gordon, "EU Enlargement and Power Assymetries: Conditionality and the Commission's Role in Regionalisation in Central and Eastern Europe," in Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), "One Europe or Several?" Programme Working Paper no. 49 (Brighton, UK: University of Sussex, 2003);
17. Dan Marek and Michael Baun, "The EU as a Regional Actor: The Case of the Czech Republic,"Journal of Common Market Studies 40:5(2002): 895-919;
18. and Jennifer Yoder, "Decentralisation and Regionalisation after Communism: Administrative and Territorial Reform in Poland and the Czech Republic,"Europe-Asia Studies 55:2(2003): 263-86.
19. I distinguish here between deconcentration, which "entails the transfer of limited responsibility to lower levels of administration," and devolution, which "in contrast, is the transfer of authority to relatively autonomous bodies outside the direct control of central authorities"; see Yoder, "Decentralisation and Regionalisation," 264.
20. As Jonah Levy notes, deconcentration differs fundamentally from devolution in that it offers a singular advantage to the government, "the preservation of central state control"; see "Territorial Politics after Decentralization," in Alain Guyomarch, Peter Hall, Jack Hayward, and Howard Machin, eds., Developments in French Politics 2 (London: Macmillan, 2001), 106.
21. Grabbe, "Europeanisation Goes East," 4.
22. See also Huges, Sasse, and Gordon, "EU Enlargement," 11-15.
23. See Grabbe, "Europeanisation Goes East," 4-5.
24. Earlier enlargements had allowed new members to adjust policies after accession.
25. Grabbe, "Europeanisation Goes East," 5.
26. Yoder, "Decentralisation and Regionalisation," 268;
27. Hughes, Sasse, and Gordon, "EU Enlargement," 26.
28. Before 1989, the Communist Party had colonized the whole of public authority, from the highest levels of state to the lowest organs of local administration. Formally speaking, decentralized regional structures existed, but what really mattered was the Communist Party, which was extremely centralized. The territorial administration of the state was essentially the same in Poland and the then Czechoslovakia. In both, the provincial state apparatus consisted of four levels (the government, the region, the district, and the municipality or commune), each of which was subordinated to the Communist Party Elections to these subnational institutions amounted to a pro forma ratification of the candidates nominated by the appropriate party-level committee. Within this system, the role of subnational institutions was to implement directives from above.
29. For a description of the initial, unsuccessful attempts to reform Poland's regional level, see Gorzelak and Jałowiecki, "Reforma terytorialnej."
30. Katařina Šafaříková, "Co přinese sobota 14. června?" [What Will the 14th of June Bring?], Respekt 24:3(2003), http://respekt.inway.cz/.
31. The Structural Funds target Objective 1 regions whose per capita GDP is less than 75 percent of the EU average, Objective 2 regions facing economic restructuring, and Objective 3 regions to combat unemployment. See Jeremy Faro, "Europeanization as Regionalisation: Forecasting the Impact of EU Regional-Policy Export upon the Governance Structure of Slovenia" (Manuscript, Centre of International Studies, Cambridge University, September 2004), 2;
32. Marek and Braun "EU as Regional Actor," 897;
33. and Hughes, Sasse, and Gordon, "Eastern Enlargement," 4-5.
34. Emil Kirchner, "The Role of the EU in Local and Regional Government," in E. Kirchner, ed., Decentralization and Transition in the Visegrad: Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia (New York: St. Martin's, 1999), 211-12.
35. Decentralization and Transition in the Visegrad: Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, Emil Kirchner, Ibid., 211.
36. Hughes, Sasse, and Gordon, "EU Enlargement," 7.
37. Quoted in Marek and Braun, "EU as Regional Actor," 899.
38. Quoted in Kirchner, "Role of the EU," 212. The Commission's progress reports are available at http://europa.eu.int/comm/enlargement/docs/ index.htm.
39. La Nomenclature des Unités Territoriales Statistiques (NUTS).
40. Marek and Braun, "EU as Regional Actor," 898.
41. For a complete list of the regional policy requirements, see European Commission, Enlargement of the European Union: Guide to the Negotiations Chapter by Chapter, http://www.europa.eu.int/comm/enlargement/negotiations/chapters/ negotiationsguide. pdf (accessed 18 September 2004).
42. Marek and Braun, "EU as Regional Actor," 898.
43. Martin Brusis, "Re-Creating the Regional Level in Central and Eastern Europe: An Analysis of Administrative Reforms in Six Countries," in Eric von Breska and Martin Brusis, eds., Central and Eastern Europe on the Way into the European Union (Munich, Germany: Center for Applied Research, May 1999), 1-2;
44. Yoder, "Decentralisation and Regionalisation," 268;
45. Hughes, Sasse, and Gordon, "EU Enlargement";
46. Marek and Braun, "EU as Regional Actor," 898.
47. Hughes, Sasse, and Gordon, "EU Enlargement," 28.
48. Marek and Braun, "EU as Regional Actor," 898;
49. Hughes, Sasse, and Gordon, "EU Enlargement," 9-10. As one example of such variation, in its version of regional reform, the Czech Republic chose to create elected regional governments whose boundaries did not qualify as NUTS 2 regions; instead, it created NUTS 2 regions as separate, purely statistical entities for the purposes of implementing structural funds projects. In Poland's regional reform, on the other hand, the boundaries of regional self-governments and NUTS 2 regions were coterminous.
50. Hughes, Sasse, and Gordon, "EU Enlargement," 10.
51. Hughes, Sasse, and Gordon, "EU Enlargement," Ibid.
52. Yoder, "Decentralisation and Regionalisation." As Yoder admits, however, the effect of these two influences may not be decisive. Regarding the institutional legacies of regional institutions, there are at least two at play in ECE, the pre-Communist and the Communist. Second, regional sentiments do not appear to be highly developed in ECE countries.
53. On the second point, see also Bogdan Jałowiecki, "Ruchy regionalne czy bunt elit? Obserwacja protestów społecznych" [Regional Movements or Elite Revolts? An Observation on the Social Protests], in Grzegorz Gorzelak, ed., Decentralizacja terytorialnej organizacji kraju: założoenia, przygotawanie, ustawodawstwo [The Decentralization of the Territorial Organization of the Country: Basic Principles, Planning, Legislation], Center for Social and Economic Research (CASE) Reports no. 21 (Warsaw, Poland: CASE, 1999).
54. Hughes, Sasse, and Gordon, "EU Enlargement," 27.
55. Among extant analyses of ECE regional reform, Yoder pursues domestic politics the furthest, arguing that, where the transition from Communism was negotiated (as in Poland), post-Communists were better able to constrain reforms; see "Decentralisation and Regionalisation," 267. She also notes, however, that the beliefs of non-Communist parties did not neatly align in favor of regional devolution. While sympathetic to these points, my argument will take a different tack, focusing on regional reform as a political tool by which governing coalitions seek to secure institutional advantages in the process of party building. In this conception, the relative balance between the government and opposition becomes the crucial factor.
56. These differing coalitional logics expressed deeper differences in party system formation, which are beyond the scope of this article to account for. Based on Kitschelt et al.'s analysis, it is the author's view that the emergence of bipolar competition in the Czech Republic, but not in Poland or Slovakia, is the result of the greater resonance of nationalist and religious social cleavages in the latter two countries. These cleavages intersected with socioeconomic ones so that, for example, the Polish right wing contained nationalist parties of both neoclassical and left-of-center economic orientations. In the Czech case, right and left were defined primarily in socioeconomic terms. See Herbert Kitschelt, Zdenka Mansfeldova, Radoslaw Markowski, and Gábor Tóka, Post-Communist Party Systems: Competition, Representation, and Inter-Party Cooperation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999).
57. According to opinion polls conducted in Poland from 1990 to 1998, the percentage of the public who considered decentralizing the public administration an urgent priority never exceeded 9 percent. Moreover, the same polls showed that was never a time when a majority of respondents did not consider such reform something that should be postponed for later or that was unnecessary altogether; see Macieja Falkowska, "Społeczen̊stwo wobec reform" [Society's View of the Reforms], in Kolars ka.-Bobiňskw, Druga fala, 282. Though not as extensive, public opinion research on regional decentralization in the Czech Republic indicates a similar lack of public interest. A survey conducted in June 2000 found that only 37 percent of the public claimed to have a clear idea of what the reform meant, and only 45 percent considered regional decentralization a step in the right direction;
58. see "Většina lidízatím ne ví, co Jim přinese vznik nového kraje" [Most People Still Do Not Know What the Creation of the New Region Will Bring Them], Právo, 30 June 2000.
59. Hughes, Sasse, and Gordon also note the close connection between regional reform and political advantage, finding, for example, that interview respondents felt that "regionalization in Hungary was corruptly manipulated by the Fidesz government of prime minister Orban to secure its patrimony and political position"; see "EU Enlargement," 23.
60. Chancellery, Openness, Effectiveness, Subsidiarity, 5-11.
61. James Toole, "Government Formation and Party System Stabilization in East Central Europe," Party Politics 6:4(2000): 441.
62. Volatility measures the net change in the vote shares of all parties from one election to the next. More particularly, "The [volatility] index is derived by adding the net change in percentage of seats (or votes) gained or lost by each party from one election to the next, then dividing by two"; see Scott Mainwaring and Timothy Sculley, "Introduction," in Scott Mainwaring and Timothy Sculley, eds., Building Democratic Institutions: Party Systems in Latin America (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1995), 6. In calculating volatility, I count party splits and mergers as fully new parties, which maximizes volatility but is consistent and avoids difficult judgment calls about party continuity
63. It is not uncommon for government coalitions in ECE to include nonparty groups such as trade unions, social movements, and interest-based groups.
64. See Frances Millard, Polish Politics and Society (London: Routledge 1999), 441-61;
65. Toole, "Government Formation"; and
66. Włodzimierz Wesołowski, Partie: Nieustanne Kłopoty [Parties: Ceaseless Troubles] (Warsaw, Poland: IFiS PAN, 2000).
67. Aleks Szczerbiak, "Interests and Values: Polish Parties and Their Electorates," Europe-Asia Studies 58 (1999): 1432.
68. Aleks Szczerbiak, Europe-Asia Studies Ibid., 1431.
69. See Kevin Deegan Krause, "Slovakia's Second Transition," Journal of Democracy 14 (2003). 65-79;
70. and Martin Bútora, Grigorij, Mesežnikov, Zora Bútorová, and Sharon Fisher, The 1998 Parliamentary Elections and Democratic Rebirth in Slovakia (Bratislava, Slovakia: Institute for Public Affairs, 1999).
71. Tim Haughton, "HZDS: The Ideology, Organisation and Support Base of Slovakia's Most Successful Party," Europe-Asia Studies 53 (2001): 745-09;
72. and M. Steven Fish, "The End of Mečiarism," East European Constitutional Review 8 (Winter/Spring 1999): 47-55.
73. The new government was composed of the Party of the Democratic Left (SDL'); the Party of Civic Understanding (SOP); the Hungarian party (SMK); and the Party of the Democratic Coalition (SDK), which was itself a hastily put together amalgam of the Christian Democrats (KDH), the Democratic Party (DS), the Democratic Union (DU), the Social Democratic Party (SDSS), and the Greens (ZS).
74. See Plenipotentiary, Strategy.
75. Lubomír Brokl and Zdenka Mansfeldová, "How the Voters Respond in the Czech Republic," in Kay Lawson, Andrea Römmele, and Georgi Karasimeonov, eds., Cleavages, Parties, and Voters: Studies from Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Romania (Wesport, CT: Praeger, 1999);
76. Kitschelt et al., Post-Communist Party Systems;
77. and Toole, "Government Formation."
78. The ODS's junior coalition partners in these governments consisted of two right-of-center parties, the Civic Democratic Alliance (ODA) and the Christian Democrats (KDU-CSL).
79. Some Czech political commentators have argued that the ČSSD minority government was actually a kind of grand coalition since it was formed with the support of the ODS. As Andrew Roberts has convincingly demonstrated, however, it was a typical minority government such as is commonly found in European parliamentary systems; see "Demythologising the Czech Opposition Agreement," Europe-Asia Studies 55 (2003): 1273-1303.
80. The first HZDS government (1992) lost a parliamentary vote of confidence in 1994. It won in the next elections, held a few months later. After these elections, HZDS governed with two junior coalition partners, the Slovak National Party (SNS) and the Slovak Workers' Party (ZRS). HZDS was the unquestioned leader of this coalition, though SNS and ZRS benefited considerably from patronage as a result of being in the government.
81. Lubomír Falt'an and Vladimír Krivý, "Slovakia: Changes in Public Administration," in Emil Kirchner, ed., Decentralization and Transition in the Visegrad: Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia (New York: St. Martin's. 1999), 107.
82. Before 1989, there had been regional offices in Slovakia (as well as in the Czech Republic). These offices were abolished in both republics in the spring of 1990; see Lubomír Falt'an and Vladimír Krivý, Decentralization and Transition in the Visegrad: Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia ibid., 105. The Czechs did not follow the Slovaks in recreating them a few years later.
83. Data requested from the Slovak Statistical Office's Infoservis, July 2001, Bratislava.
84. Falt'an and Krivý, "Slovakia," 110.
85. Vladimír Krivý, "Slovakia and Its Regions," in Martin Bútora and Thomas Skladony, eds., Slovakia 1996-1997: A Global Report on the State of Society (Bratislava, Slovakia: Inštitút pre verejné otázky, 1998), 59.
86. Quoted in Kevin Krause, "Accountability and Party Competition in Slovakia and the Czech Republic" (Ph.D. diss., University of Notre Dame, South Bend, IN, 2000), 38.
87. Faltan and Krivý, "Slovakia," 115.
88. Peter Kunder, "Vyhrali politici: porazili reformu" [The Politicians Won: They Defeated the Reform], Sme, 6 July 2001.
89. Marek Vagovič, "Reformné K.O.: Skutočnú reformu verejenej správy parlament odmietol" [Reform Knockout: The Parliament Rejects the Real Sense of Public Administration Reform], Domino-Forum, 12-18 July 2001.
90. See Vagovič, "Reformné K.O.";
91. and Kunder, "Vyhrali politici."
92. Stefan Hríb, "Čo sme to za reformátorov?" [What Kind of Reformers Are We?], Domino-Forum, 12-18 July 2001.
93. Koral, "Sukcesyi porażki," 51.
94. Janusz Sepioł, "Reforma samorza̧dowa w działaniu" [The Self-Government Reform in Actual Practice], in Kolarska-Bobińska, Cztery reformy. To give one example, the reform charged each regional self-government with formulating regional policy but entrusted the centrally appointed regional prefect with monitoring that policy and with negotiating regional policy contracts with the central government ministries. In the words of one wice-wojewoda (vice regional governor), this led to "competency battles" and, in many cases, a struggle to determine who is more important, the prefect or the self-government (Author's interview with anonymous official, Krakow, Poland, 1 August 2001).
95. These administrative units were subordinate to the central government and headed by its appointees.
96. Sixty-five of the new districts were larger cities that took on the powers of district governments in addition to those of local governments.
97. Rocznik Statystyczny Rzeczpospolitej Polskiej [Statistical Yearbook of Poland] (Warsaw, Poland: GUS 1999).
98. Author's calculations using the 1999 and 2000 Polish statistical yearbooks; see Rocznik Statystyczny Rzeczpospolitej Polskiej [Statistical Yearbook of Poland] ibid.
99. The exceptions to this rule were the post-Communist SLD and PSL, which had kept many of the organizational resources of their predecessors in the old regime.
100. Janelle Kerlin, "The Politics of Decentralization in Poland: Influences and Outcomes" (Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, San Francisco, 31 August 2001), 16.
101. Author's interview with Michał Kulesza, "Warsaw, Poland, 5 October 1999.
102. Kerlin, "Politics of Decentralization," 14.
103. Mirosław Sekula, Chair Polish Parliamentary Committee on Administration and Internal Affairs,
104. quoted in Kerlin, "Politics of Decentralization," 14-15.
105. Mirosław Sekula, quoted in "Politics of Decentralization, " ibid., 15.
106. Sepioł, "Reforma samorza,dowa";
107. Koral, "Sukcesy i porażki";
108. and Witold Kieżun, "Czterej jeźdźcy apokalipsy polskiej biurokracji" [The Four Horsemen of the Polish Bureaucratic Apocalypse], Kultura (March 2000): 3-12.
109. Władysłw Tyrański, "Bez hipokryzji proszȩ: rozmowa 2 Markiem Nawara̧ marszalkiem województwa małopolskiego" [Please, No Hypocrisy; An Interview with Marek Nawara, Speaker of the Małopolska Regional Parliament], Wspólnota Małopolska, 27 March 1999.
110. Janelle Kerlin, "The Political Means and Social Service Ends of Decentralization in Poland: The Story of Poland's Mid-Level Public Administration Reform and Its Effect on Social Service Delivery" (Ph.D. diss., Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY, 2002).
111. Gilowska, "Reforma samarza̧dowa," 37.
112. Miroslav Korecký, "Osm let se bojovalo hlavně o počet krajů" [For Eight Years They Fought Mainly over the Number of Regions], Lidové noviny, 10 March 2000;
113. Vladimír Mlynář, "Jen pro otrlé: koalice se opět přela o správní reformu" [Only for the Cynical: The Coalition Again Skims over Administrative Reform], Respekt, 4-10 July 1994;
114. "Nové kraje mají přiblízit úřady k občanům" [The New Regions Should Bring Offices Closer to Citizens], Hospodářské noviny, 18 April 2000;
115. and Marek and Braun, "EU as Regional Actor," 899.
116. Quoted in Andreas Beckman, "The Big Yawn: Decentralization in the Czech Republic," Central Europe Review, 20 September 1999.
117. KDU-ČSL and ODA were more supportive of regional decentralization, yet ODS was able to consistently override its coalition partners on this issue (see Korecký, "Osm let"), highlighting the essentially bipolar character of Czech party competition.
118. Korecký, "Osm let."
119. Interestingly, ČSSD tried in 1999 to amend the number of regions once again, from the fourteen enacted in 1997 to the nine that regional policy specialists argued would be optimal. Illustrating again the power of the political opposition in the Czech system, this attempt failed; see Korecký, "Osm let." ibid.
120. To highlight the importance of this accomplishment, recall Slovakia's second round of regional reform, where the government was unable to win support for abolishing the district-level state administration to compensate for the new regional governments.
121. There are eight NUTS 2 regions in the Czech republic, which do not have elected institutions. They are purelyadministrative entities for the implementation of Structural Funds programs.