Giving a stronger voice to civil society in the EU neighbourhood

Development of civil dialogue and partnership relations between civil society, national governments and EU institutions

International conference to be held in Brdo pri Kranju (Ljubljana), Slovenia 02 April 2008

Conference framework

In a climate of some political uncertainty with regards to the enlargement process and the ambiguities of European Neighbourhood Policy, there is a need for NGOs to come together and make a clear statement about the role that civil society in the EU neighbouring countries should play in shaping the EU external policies and assistance. Connecting the event to the Slovenian Presidency provides an excellent opportunity to send a political message on behalf of civil society calling on the EU to develop a coherent and coordinated strategy for the sustainable civil society development in the EU neighbourhood.

To respond to the radical changes in the EU neighbourhood and to help EU neighbouring countries to face the further challenges of the ongoing reforms, the sustainable civil society development should become one of the main objectives of the EU strategy for the Western Balkans and Eastern Europe. The EU policies towards neighbouring countries, such as European Neighbourhood Policy and Stabilisation and Association Process, both underline the importance of the civil society stressing the increasing role that it should play in the process of further integration with the EU. The crucial role of the civil society organisations in the social service delivery is unquestionable and fully recognised by the EU and national authorities. But have CSOs been recognised as fully-fledged partners at the level of the policy dialogue? While civil society organisations in the EU neighbourhood are mostly involved in the operational/project partnership, their contribution in the policy-making is still quite weak. There is still very low recognition of the value of the public advocacy at national level and lack of effective mechanisms of neighbourhood civil society consultation at EU level.

Despite being at different stages of development, NGOs from the EU Neighbourhood face common lack of clarity about the European venture and ambiguities inherent in the EU strategies. The EU approach and that of the other donors to the civil society development in the EU neighbourhood appears to be scattered and lacks a coherent and coordinated strategy. DECIM – the Donor exchange, coordination, and information mechanism initiated by the European Commission and the World Bank has potential in this respect aiming to bring a civil society as a key actor in the development process and making CSOs contribute to the “aid effectiveness agenda”.

The aim of the conference

The conference is the second event in the framework of the Information, Training and Scholarship programme. The first event on the “New external financial instruments new opportunities for civil society in the EU neighbourhood” was held on 10 October in Brussels. During this conference, particular emphasis was put on the partnership principle referred to in the regulations and its potential impact for stronger civil society inclusion in shaping, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of EU external policies and ENPI and IPA programmes . Following-up to this event, the Ljubljana conference intends to provide a common space for brainstorming about how to create sustainable partnership relations between civil society actors, EU and national authorities putting civil society as a key player not only at the level of external assistance implementation but also at the level of policy dialogue. A special focus of the conference will be put on the following questions, which are crucial for sustainable civil society development in the EU neighbourhood:

• Could the EU develop a long-term coherent and coordinated strategy for the civil society empowerment in the EU neighbouring countries? How civil society could contribute in this respect?

• How to encourage development of partnership relations between civil society, EU institutions and public authorities and what could be the mechanisms of this cooperation? How to promote civil society involvement not only in the EU project implementation but also in shaping the EU programmes and policies?

• How civil society organisations could contribute for shaping aid effectiveness agenda? What are the perspectives under DECIM mechanism in this respect?

The conference will result in a declaration on building civil dialogue and partnership relations between civil society, national governments and EU institutions as well as on enhancing the role of CSOs as development actors by engaging them in the dialogue on aid effectiveness. The declaration will be open to the signatures of participants. The results of the conference will be followed up at EU and national levels in order to measure its impact.

Who is organising the event?

The conference is organised jointly by ECAS (in the context of ITS programme funded by MOTT) and CNVOS and is supported by the Slovenian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Government Communication office, the Representation of European Commission in Slovenia and DECIM (Donor Exchange, Coordination and Information Mechanism).

Who should attend?

The conference is expected to attract 100 participants from the EU, particularly the Western Balkans, Turkey and Eastern Europe. Participants will include partners and beneficiaries of the ITS programme, other NGO representatives, public and private donors active in the region, and officials from EU governments and EU institutions.

What are the practical arrangements?

1. There will be no fee charged for participants, but they will be expected to cover their own travel and subsistence costs ;

2. Detailed information and background documentation will be available on the ECAS website and Slovenian NGOs portal for the period of EU presidency;

3. The availability of interpretation services will be confirmed at a later stage

Informal NGO round table 01 April 2008 (to be held the day before the opening of the conference)

17.00-20.00 p.m.

The Advisory Committee and NGO leaders responsible for the analysis of the Questionnaire in their country (see below) will be invited for an informal round table, which will be held in the morning of the day of the event. It will be an opportunity to bring the NGO community from different countries and different sectors to debate in an informal atmosphere on the issues relevant for all of them, notably to assess the role and the efficiency of the EU strategy regarding civil society development in the EU neighbouring countries, to debate on the partnership building principle and CSO involvement in shaping, implementing, monitoring and evaluating the EU policies and programmes. The questions raised during the NGO round table will help the organisers to guide the conference debate and will give the possibility to finalise a list of recommendations to be included into the Ljubljana declaration.

A questionnaire was elaborated on the basis of the Brussels conference report. The report and the questionnaire were sent to ECAS and CNVOS partner organisations in Western Balkans and Eastern Europe, which are widely disseminating them, enabling the civil society community to contribute to the formulation and development of Ljubljana declaration. During the NGO round table each country would have to come up with drafted recommendations regarding the role that CSOs in their country should play within EU external assistance and the mechanisms that would enable them to get involved in shaping, implementing, monitoring and evaluating of EU policies and EU programmes.

Programme of the roundtable:

17.00-17.15       Welcome speech Tony Venables and Jose Gornik

17.15-18.30       Short Presentations of the country reports: Albania, BiH, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, Turkey, Moldova, Belarus, Ukraine, Russia 

18.30-20.00       Open discussion on the content of the “Ljubljana Declaration”

Conference draft programme

02 April 2008 08.45 – Registration of the participants

SESSION I:

The role of the EU in promoting civil society development and civil space beyond the EU borders

09.15 – 10.00    Opening session:   Welcome speeches Joze Gornik, Director CNVOS;   Tony Venables, Director of ECAS

Keynote speaker : Senior member of cabinet of Olli Rehn, Commissioner for Enlargement Senior member of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, Slovenia

10.00-11.30     Discussion Panel  Issues for debate: What is the place of the civil society in EU external policies towards its neighbours? Could the EU develop a long-term strategy for the civil society empowerment in the EU neighbouring countries? How far the EU external instruments respond to the political and legal environment of the civil society development in the EU neighborhood? What are the relative responsibilities of the EU in establishing this enabling environment?

Jelko Kacin, MEP Wenceslas de Lobkowicz, DG Enlargement, Adviser on civil society dialogue

Andreas Herdina, European Neighbourhood Policy, Head of Unit, DG Relex Nilda Bullain, European Centre for Not-for Profit

Stevo Muk, Centre for development of NGOs

Discussion, Q&A

11.30-12.00   Coffee break

12.00-13.30  

SESSION II:

Creating sustainable partnership relations between civil society, EU institutions and national authorities

Issues for debate:

How to cooperate with public authorities in the process of European integration and how to get involved in the shaping of the EU policies and programmes?

What would be the mechanism of cooperation between the EU institutions, national authorities and the third sector?

How supportive are the EU and national authorities to include the civil society on the agenda of political dialogue and in the preparation and implementation of the action plans?

How do current EU – government aid relationships affect the possibilities for CSOs to get engaged in policy dialogue?

What models of partnerships can be identified, and what is their relative importance?

What effective tools could be envisaged in order to encourage the governments and EU Institutions to cooperate with the non-state actors?

Participants split in 2 Working groups:

Working group I: Western Balkans and Turkey

Chair: Cvjetana Plavsa-Matic, Director of NFCSD

Panel: Sasho Klekovski, Macedonian Centre for International co-operation Igor Vidacak, Head of Government Office for Cooperation with NGOs Miljenko Dereta, Civic Initiatives, Serbia Dorian Filote, EC Delegation, Turkey Filiz Bickmen, Third Sector Foundation of Turkey (TUSEV)

Discussion, Q&A

Working group II: Eastern Europe (Moldova, Belarus, Ukraine, Russia)

Chair: TBC

Panel: David Stulik, EC Delegation to Ukraine Tatyana Poshevalova, Chairperson of the Public association ”Centre for Social Innovations”, Belarus Konstantin Baranov, Youth Network against racism and Intolerence, Russia Arina Kraijdan, Association for European Training and Information, Moldova

Discussion, Q&A

13.30-14.30   Lunch break

14.30-16.00

SESSION III:

Involving civil society into “aid effectiveness” agenda

Discussion panel  Issues for debate:

How do donors contribute to the sustainable civil society development? What could be the mechanisms of the civil society involvement into the programming of donors’ priority? What are the perspectives under DECIM framework? What are the first DECIM outcomes – developed donor’s synergies? Do the donors’ programmes fully reflect the needs of CSOs at regional and local levels? How CSOs can get involved in monitoring of the process of the donors and government performance against aid effectiveness commitments?

Chair: TBC

Panel: Jan Pakulski, Senior Social Development and Civil society specialist, World Bank Rayana Gavrilova, Executive Director of Trust for Civil society in Central and Eastern Europe Irma Meznaric, Ministry of Public Administration, Slovenia Joanne Caddy, OECD Mr Gerry Salole, Chief Executive of EFC headquarters in Brussels

Discussion, Q&A

16.00-16.30      Coffee break

16.30 – 17.30   Closing session: Presentation of the “Ljubljana Declaration” and Concluding remarks