The EU and democracy promotion in Central Asia

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The European Union and Democracy Promotion in Central Asia

        The collapse of the Soviet Union fundamentally altered International geopolitics, and opened up Central Asia to powerful elements of change.  The loosely defined region was transformed into a strategic priority arena for a multitude of international states, pursuing a multitude of strategies.  The Central Asian countries of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan were artificially created products of Marxist economic and social development theory.   The five countries that emerged in 1991 exhibited initial enthusiasm and support for democracy, market economy reforms, secularism and a normalization of international relations.   This initial enthusiasm for democratic advancement has however faded.  Almost all elections have had dubious legitimacy and the emergence of independent mass media has been hindered; in short, substantive democracy is either absent or falls short of the mark, states Freedom House.   Central Asia as a region has shown little conformity with respected democratic norms and has fallen short of expected democratic reform.  Why?  This essay will attempt to answer that question, focusing on the role of the European Union as an emerging international actor pursuing concrete foreign policy goals.  The first section will examine the present state of democracy in Central Asia. The second section will describe EU engagement with Central Asia, finding that EU aid and assistance is provided irrespective of EU foreign policy documents which consistently make references to the importance relationships based on common values of respect for human rights, democracy and the rule of law. 

The third section will briefly expand upon the traditional foreign policy actions of the EU member countries and the EU itself.  Given space constraints, it will only be possible to discuss EU and the EU member states approaches to the topic of energy in Central Asia.  It will be argued that the pursuit of a very traditional foreign policy, natural resource acquisition, undermines EU efforts at encouraging democratic governance in Central Asia.  Although not addressed outside of this introduction, additional impediments to the spread of democracy in central Asia include the actions of less democratically inclined foreign powers (Russia, China) pursuing competing foreign policies within the region.  The US led war on Terror has resulted in governments cracking down on any and all domestic opponents, ostensibly to fight terrorism, while ironically stifling democracy.   

1.1 – The state of Democracy in Central Asia

Any essay on democracy, and democracy promotion must delve briefly into the democracy definition discourse.  A summarized version of Robert Dahl’s definition of Democracy will be presented.  Democracy provides opportunities for 1) effective participation, 2) equality in voting, 3) gaining enlightened understanding, 4) the people exercising final control over the agenda, and 5) inclusion of adults. The political institutions that are necessary to pursue these goals are "1) elected officials, 2) free, fair and frequent elections, 3) freedom of expression, 4) alternative sources of information, 5) associational autonomy, and lastly 6) inclusive citizenship.  Using these criteria as a measurement of democratic achievement it is obvious that the countries of Central Asia are not democratic.  There are however important country specific differences as to the nature of the ‘undemocratic’ regimes currently ruling Central Asia.  there are important regional differences in attitudes and approaches.

The methodology used in the essay to determine the extent to which democracy has been achieved in transformation countries will rely on the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) election reports, the Bertelsmann Transformation Index and Freedom House assessments.  

The five countries pursue very different policies towards democracy, good governance, human rights, general liberalization and reform.  Arguably Kazakhstan has progressed farthest along the path toward democracy, helped in no part by surging economic growth fuelled by some $ 34 Billion  in Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) to develop Kazakhstan’s vast oil and natural gas reserves and pragmatic, yet un-democratic policy decisions made by the president Nursultan Nazarbayev.  The president has successfully guided Kazakhstan along the path to a capitalistic country with an acceptable level social development.  The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) reported in 2005 that the Presidential elections of that year did not meet a number of OSCE commitments and other international standards for democratic elections.   Well publicized crackdowns of the independent media, opposition groups and non-governmental organizations critical of the government have clearly demonstrated that democracy is under siege in Kazakhstan.  Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan are described as semi-authoritarian countries while Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan are defined of as authoritarian or even dictatorships.   Well profiled human rights abuses, such as the Andijan massacre in 2005 in Uzbekistan have continued to highlight the lack of convergence on EU values of democracy, principles of international law and human rights.  Freedom House reports that Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan are ‘not free’ while only Kyrgyzstan has the dubious distinction of being ranked as ‘partly free’.   The Bertelsmann Transformation Status Index provides another measurement of progress toward democracy and market based economy within transformation countries.  Although the Status ranking includes progress towards a market based economy it does cast light onto the progress of 119 countries on their paths towards democracy, in an aggregate ranking with economic market reform.  Kazakhstan achieves the highest Central Asian Status ranking of 5.5 (66th), Kyrgyzstan 4.76 (78th), Tajikistan 3.50 (102nd) , Uzbekistan 3.56 (103rd)  and Turkmenistan at 3. 20 (109th).  10 is a perfect score in this ranking, meaning a country has a very high level of market economy coupled with a totally democratic system of governance.  For comparison countries such as the Czech Republic score  9.23, Croatia 8.71, and Ukraine 6.96.  

Progress towards democracy in Central Asia has been hampered in all countries by a multitude of factors which will explored later in this essay. This is the present state of democracy within Central Asia.  

1.2 The European Union’s historical engagement with Central Asia

The region of Central Asia lies on the strategically important intersection of Europe and Asia, and has a rich tradition of being both a barrier and a bridge to greater European interaction with its neighbors.  Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the newly independent Eastern European and Commonwealth of Independent States began to integrate themselves into international affairs as sovereign states with control over their destiny’s and domestic affairs. 

Since the early 90s the EU greatly expanded into the former Soviet space of Central and Eastern Europe guiding and consolidating the newly independent Central and Eastern European countries into democratic and liberal market based economies.  As these countries began to integrate themselves into international affairs as sovereign states with control over their destiny’s and domestic affairs the European Union began to engage with them.  

EU initial assistance was concentrated in technical aid-programs, such as PHARE, (Poland and Hungary: Assistance for Restructuring their Economies) or TACIS (Technical Aid to the Commonwealth of Independent States).  These programs helped Eastern European countries and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in their transitions from command economies to democratic market based economies.  

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EU technical assistance to East Europe and the newly independent Commonwealth of Independent States came at a time when the EU was formulating a Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP).  The CFSP was seen as necessary for the EU, a major economic power, to play a greater role in international affairs, take on a greater role in the trans-Atlantic relationship and to ‘develop externally apace with internal developments (single market, single currency, enlargement).’  A common European foreign policy was also seen as important for EU citizens.  Furthermore it was thought that common foreign policy strategies pursued by all of the member ...

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