(Challenges To Democracy in The 21st Century Series) Timm Beichelt, Irene Hahn-Fuhr, Frank Schimmelfennig, Susann Worschech (Eds.) - Civil Society and Democracy Promotion-Palgrave Mac

Challenges to Democracy in the 21st Century series
The series “Challenges to Democracy in the 21st Century” was initiated by the
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Democracy faces substantial challenges as we move into the 21st Century.
The West faces malaise; multi-level governance structures pose democratic
challenges; and the path of democratization rarely runs smoothly. This series
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publishes innovative research on established democracies, democratizing polities
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Gianpietro Mazzoleni, University of Milano, Italy
Wolfgang Merkel, WZB-Berlin, Germany
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Timm Beichelt, Irene Hahn, Frank Schimmelfennig and
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CIVIL SOCIETY AND DEMOCRACY PROMOTION
Laurent Bernhard
CAMPAIGN STRATEGY IN DIRECT DEMOCRACY
Hanspeter Kriesi, Daniel Bochsler, Jörg Matthes, Sandra Lavenex,
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DEMOCRACY IN THE AGE OF GLOBALIZATION AND MEDIATIZATION
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POLITICAL COMMUNICATION IN DIRECT DEMOCRATIC CAMPAIGNS
Enlightening or Manipulating?
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CITIZEN’S INITIATIVES IN EUROPE
Procedures and Consequences of Agenda-Setting by Citizens
Challenges to Democracy in the 21st Century

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Civil Society and
Democracy Promotion
Edited by
Timm Beichelt
European University Viadrina, Germany
Irene Hahn-Fuhr
Frank Schimmelfennig
Center for Comparative and International Studies, Switzerland
and
Susann Worschech
Selection, introduction and editorial matter © Timm Beichelt, Irene Hahn-Fuhr,
Frank Schimmelfennig and Susann Worschech 2014
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Contents
List of Figures and Tables vii

Acknowledgments ix
List of Contributors x
1 Introduction 1
Irene Hahn-Fuhr and Susann Worschech
Part I Democracy Promotion and Civil Society:
Conceptualizing the Link
2 External Democracy Promotion and Divided
Civil Society – The Missing Link 11
3 Democracy Promotion and Civil Society:
Regime Types, Transitions Modes and Effects 42
Timm Beichelt and Wolfgang Merkel
Part II Democracy Promoters: Actors, Objectives,
and Approaches
4 From the Unity of Goodness to Conflicting Objectives:
The Inherent Tensions in the External Promotion of
Democracy and Civil Society 67
Jonas Wolff
5 The Changing Nature of EU Support to Civil Society 86
Natalia Shapovalova and Richard Youngs
6 Making Transnational Democracy and Human Rights
Activism Work? On the Trade-Offs of Eastern EU Support
for Civil Society Development Abroad 110
Tsveta Petrova
Part III Civil Society: Developments and Consequences
7 Democratization from Below: Civil Society versus Social
Movements? 137
Donatella della Porta
v
vi Contents
8 Engineered Civil Society: The Impact of 20 Years of

Democracy Promotion on Civil Society Development in
Former Soviet Countries 150
Armine Ishkanian
9 Who Is Supported by Western Civil Society Promotion?
The Russian Case 171
Štěpánka Busuleanu
10 Participation in Civil Society Organizations
and Political Parties in Post-Communist Europe:
The Impact of Political Divides 191
Franziska Blomberg and Edina Szöcsik
Part IV Concluding Remarks
11 Democracy Promotion and Civil Society in Eastern Europe:
Conclusions 217
Index 234
List of Figures and Tables
Figures
2.1 Classification of civil society theories 16

2.2 Democracy promotion via civil society 28
2.3 Democracy promotion and the divided civil society 32
10.1 The development of individual participation rates
in civil society organizations and political parties in
post-communist Europe 203
Tables
2.1 Functions of civil society in actor-oriented theories 19

2.2 The divided civil society 30
3.1 Relevance of civil society in different stages
of democratization 49
3.2 Patterns of civil society oriented democracy promotion 59
5.1 Non-state actors and local authorities in development,
2007–12 (EUR) 90
5.2 EIDHR allocations to country-based support
schemes in the Eastern Partnership countries in
2007–12 (in EUR) 91
5.3 Neighbourhood Civil Society Facility allocations for the
Eastern Partnership countries in 2011–13 (in EUR) 97
A5.1 EU aid tools supporting civil society actors in the Eastern
neighborhood 104
6.1 Activities of Polish and Slovak civic democracy
promoters: percentage of NGOs using a particular
instrument out of all democracy promoters 117
6.2 Geographical democracy promotion priorities of the Polish
and Slovak civic democracy promotion
movement: percentage of NGOs providing
democracy assistance to recipient country 124
vii
viii List of Figures and Tables
6.3 Democracy sectors targeted by Polish and Slovak civic

democracy promoters: percentage of NGOs targeting a
particular sector 127
10.1 The determinants of the likelihood of being involved in
a civil society organization or a political party 204
A10.1 Operationalization of the variables and data sources 207
A10.2 Summary statistics of the independent variables 209
11.1 Models of democracy promotion and civil society 219
Acknowledgments
This volume would not have been realized without the support of
many people and organizations. First and foremost, we thank the
Heinrich Böll Foundation for establishing the Graduate Studies group
(Promotionskolleg) on “Democracy Promotion and Civil Society in
Post-Socialist Europe”, which funded the Ph. D. research of Franziska
Blomberg, Stepanka Busuleanu, Irene Hahn-Fuhr, Edina Szöcsik, and
Susann Worschech, and which was directed by Timm Beichelt and
Frank Schimmelfennig. We further thank the Europa-Universität
Viadrina at Frankfurt/Oder for hosting the lecture series from which
this book originated.
Our understanding of democratization processes and the ambiva-
lence of civil society support would have remained incomplete with-
out the inside knowledge of the representatives of the Heinrich Böll
Foundation’s regional offices in Moscow, Kyiv, Tbilisi, Belgrade and
Sarajevo, who organized and accompanied our field trips. We are grateful
for their commitment.
Furthermore, we would like to thank several colleagues who com-
mented on our ideas; among them Jürgen Neyer, Anna Schwarz, Jan
Wielgohs, Klaus Eder, Reinhard Heinisch, and the anonymous reviewers
for Palgrave Macmillan. Also, we would like to thank Linne Selle and Lisa
Düsing for their support in preparing the manuscript and assembling the
index. Special thanks go to the team at Palgrave Macmillan, in particular
Andrew Baird, who steered us through the publication process.
Finally, we thank Christoph Breit for the photograph, which we
used for the cover of our book and which speaks directly to its
major theme: international assistance for democracy and civil society.
Taken in Warsaw in late 2004, it demonstrates direct Polish support
to the protesters in the first weeks of Ukraine’s Orange Revolution.
“Pomarańczowa alternatywa” (“Orange Alternative”) was a creative
Polish opposition group performing public happenings in the 1980s.
After Poland’s development into a democracy, the “Pomarańczowa
alternatywa” movement surfaced again: This time it sought to contri-
bute to democratic change in neighboring Ukraine. Their website www.
wolnaukraina.pl (“wolna Ukraina” means “a free Ukraine”) was used
as a platform to inform about the events in Kyiv and elsewhere and to
coordinate Polish support.
ix
List of Contributors
Timm Beichelt, European University Viadrina, Germany

Franziska Blomberg, European University Viadrina, Germany
Štěpánka Busuleanu, European University Viadrina, Germany
Donatella della Porta, Department of Political and Social Sciences,
European University Institute, Italy
Irene Hahn-Fuhr, European University Viadrina, Germany
Armine Ishkanian, Department of Social Policy, London School of
Economics and Political Science, UK
Wolfgang Merkel, WZB Rule of Law Center, Wissenschaftszentrum
Berlin (WZB), Germany
Tsveta Petrova, Harriman Institute, Columbia University, USA
Frank Schimmelfennig, Center for Comparative and International
Studies, Switzerland
Natalia Shapovalova, FRIDE, Spain and University of Warwick, UK
Edina Szöcsik, Center for International Studies, Swiss Federal Institute
of Technology, Zurich, Switzerland
Jonas Wolff, Peace Research Institute Frankfurt, Germany
Susann Worschech, European University Viadrina, Germany
Richard Youngs, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
x
1
Introduction
When the bulldozers and tractors were heading to the Serbian capital in
October 2000, bringing aggrieved farmers and citizens from the Serbian
provinces to Belgrade in order to ‘bring down a dictator’,1 one could get
an idea of what the political power of civil society could look like. The
same image has been repeated several times since then, from the Rose
Revolution in Georgia in 2003, the tent camps at Maidan Nezalezhnosti
(Independence Square) in Kiev, Ukraine in November 2004, the Tulip
Revolution in Kyrgyzstan in 2005, and the Cedar Revolution in Lebanon
in 2005, to the 2011 ‘Arabellions’: large protest campaigns, organized by
civil society activists and supported by international actors. If we follow
these examples, well-elaborated strategies to bring the people to the
streets and to convince them to struggle for democracy have become a
serious threat for authoritarian regimes worldwide. In the given exam-
ples, it is no secret that the successful challenges to autocratic power
have been strongly supported by external actors.
However, while civil society fostered by international support has
experienced several overwhelming success stories, democracy has stag-
nated or even declined in most of the countries involved. This puzzle
forms the starting point of this volume: Is civil society able to contribute
substantially to democratization of post-socialist authoritarian systems?
Can external civil society oriented democracy promotion contribute
substantially to democratization in target countries? Scholars as well
as practitioners have made ambitious attempts to define and perceive
democracy promotion and civil society in different ways. However, the
mismatch between the input and outcome of democracy promotion –
in particular via civil society – remains little understood. The aim of
this volume is to elucidate this relationship by offering theoretical
approaches as well as empirical case studies from different perspectives.
1
2 Civil Society and Democracy Promotion
1.1 External support for civil society:

ambitious aims, ambivalent results
Since the days of the political and economic transition in Central and
Eastern Europe after 1989–91, civil society has become the focus of active
political promotion of democracy by the international community. As
a consequence, civil society in these states has seen dramatic and rapid
developments in the last two decades. Civil society is presumed to be
a general factor that facilitates democratic transitions in two ways and
in two different phases: either ‘by helping to generate a transition from
authoritarian rule to (at least) electoral democracy’ or ‘by deepening and
consolidating democracy once it is established’ (Diamond, 1999, 233).
Thus, it is a common assumption that stable and functioning democracies
depend to a large extent on vibrant civil societies. However, that vision
is challenged by many post-socialist transitions which display a broad
variety of transition paths. They prove that democratization should not be
understood in teleological terms: While some of the former socialist socie-
ties have today become consolidated democracies and EU members, many
post-Soviet countries may be characterized as hybrid regimes (Diamond,
2002). After first steps toward democracy, their political direction now
alternates between democratization and re-autocratization.
At the same time, variation in the effect of external political assis-
tance is obvious. Whereas EU enlargement has turned out to be a pow-
erful and successful democratization tool of EU foreign policy in the
(potential) candidate countries for EU membership (Schimmelfennig
& Sedelmeier, 2005; Vachudova, 2005), EU democracy promotion
has been much less successful in the rest of the EU neighborhood
(Schimmelfennig & Scholtz, 2008).2 The most important mechanism
has proven to be conditionality, whereas institutional learning, sociali-
zation, and international norm adoption have been of minor relevance.
The role that civil society has played within these different contexts
of democracy promotion varies to a great extent (Kutter & Trappmann,
2010). Research on civil society and democratization has focused on dif-
ferent groups of cases. The first phase of research was linked to transition
countries in general – Huntington referred to them as the Third Wave of
Democratization (Huntington, 1993) – and was marked by conceptual
transfer. The democratizing functions of civil society were primarily
developed and discussed with reference to existing democracies. When
strong civic associations and movements such as the Polish Solidarność
and other opposition groups drove the socialist systems in Central
Europe to their knees, it seemed obvious to apply the knowledge about
Introduction 3
established democracies to processes of regime change. Consequently,

democracy promotion programs of the first phase were designed with
this knowledge in mind and aimed at the support of civil society groups
that would aggregate citizens’ interests, advocate them against the state,
provide broader access to political decision-making, and establish a
democratic culture (Carothers, 1999a; 1999b).
The empirical results of this first phase in Central (and Eastern)
Europe fed into theoretical expectations that were not met in Eastern
and Southeastern Europe. Consequently, a second research phase started
in which scholars explored less successful and more difficult cases. This
phase was marked by empirical perspectives which gave cause for a more
pessimistic view. After the first decade of democracy promotion efforts in
Central and Eastern Europe had passed, practitioners and scholars stated
that – despite undeniable efforts – very little civil society existed. Even
where it did, it was described as ‘weak’ (Howard, 2002). Many civil soci-
ety organizations had been built from scratch by Western aid agencies
and transnational non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and were
characterized as ‘artificial’ (Mandel, 2002). Case studies showed that
externally supported civil society did not perform the expected func-
tions, whether because of a lack of constituency or a limited influence
on elites and decision-makers (Mendelson & Glenn, 2002). Henderson
argued that Western support to NGOs in post-socialist countries had
created a distinct civic elite, which lacked horizontal ties to other
groups and society, and that assistance programs led to ‘the business
of aid’ (Henderson, 2002). Thus, after a decade of experience of inten-
sive democracy assistance, civil society was rather seen as ‘engineered’
(Ishkanian, 2007) and unlikely to perform the ascribed functions.
Hence, democracy promotion via civil society displays an ambivalent
picture. Although most theories suggest that civil society is a necessary
feature of vibrant democracies, supporting civil society does not neces-
sarily lead to democratization. Today, in post-socialist Europe there are
huge numbers of civic organizations working on democracy issues and
campaigns.3 However, while external promotion of civil society as a
purpose in itself appears to be successful in quantitative terms, it does
not seem to translate into effective democratization.
1.2 About this book
We inquire into the interplay of external democratization and civil

society in three parts: a theory part, a part that focuses on democracy
promoting actors, and a part that concentrates on civil society itself.
In the first part, we present two different overviews, which offer two
contrasting perspectives of approaching and connecting the research
fields. In the first contribution, Irene Hahn-Fuhr and Susann Worschech
offer a framework that links democracy donors, civil society, and ‘target
groups’ of democratization such as administrative bodies and inter-
mediary organizations including the media and citizens. They argue
that donor strategies based on different conceptions of civil society’s
democratizing functions require specific types of civil society actors as
their ‘counterparts’. Furthermore, they indicate that external financial
aid produces a division between externally funded and non-funded
civic actors, and that this division and the stagnating democratiza-
tion process are interdependent. In this view, civil society is not only
represented as the recipient of democracy assistance, but also serves
as a hinge between democracy donor intentions and the domestic
actors which are in the end decisive for the further development of
democratization.
The second overview is written by Timm Beichelt and Wolfgang
Merkel. Their contribution aims at analyzing the interplay between
external democracy promotion and civil society but offers a different
focus. Like Hahn-Fuhr and Worschech, they start from the functions
that civil society exerts on democratization, but classify them diffe-
rently and continue by discussing them with regard to the compatibility
of donor and democracy recipient action. Out of a considerable variety
of options for both external and domestic actors, Beichelt and Merkel
single out a few potential paths for civil society oriented democracy
promotion. One of their findings consists in the fact that most of those
feasible paths include foreign cooperation not only with civil society
organizations but also with regime elites.
With these two different theoretical concepts, we start the volume by
presenting a contrasting juxtaposition of perspectives to link civil soci-
ety and external democracy promotion. While the first concept deploys
a more process-oriented approach to explain ambivalent results such as
the divided civil society, the second concept assigns civil society’s func-
tions to stages of democratization, regime characteristics, and modes of
democracy promotion. The tensions that emerge from this conceptual
juxtaposition cannot be reduced to the antagonism of ‘top-down’
versus ‘bottom-up’ democratization mechanisms, although this also
constitutes an important aspect. In the following contributions to this
volume, both perspectives are in use in the quest to develop a deeper
understanding of the complex interplay of civil society and external
democracy promotion.
Introduction 5
The second part of this volume contains three texts which center on
the actors who try to promote democracy. Our three authors contribute
to a growing literature on potential obstacles to active external democ-
ratization. Jonas Wolff looks for them on the meso level by identifying
several inherent tensions in the external promotion of democracy and
civil society. Wolff argues that three dilemmas that are well known
from democratization theory also apply if civil society is included as
the primary focus of democracy promotion: democracy versus stability,
democracy versus governability, democracy versus majority. He demon-
strates that external democracy promotion is systematically confronted
with conflicting objectives concerning both the overall business of
democracy promotion and the specific field of civil society support.
In the next chapter, Richard Youngs and Natalia Shapovalova focus
on one of the major actors supporting civil society in Eastern Europe:
the European Union. Their chapter demonstrates the improvements
and shortcomings of European efforts to bolster civil society across the
countries of the Eastern Partnership. Youngs and Shapovalova present a
history of EU originated civil society support and discuss the strategies
behind the many turns in EU democracy promotion as well as contextual
factors influencing the choices of the European Commission. While the
authors detect a growing goal orientation in the EU’s overall program
of democracy promotion, they also identify a series of weaknesses.
In particular, they find that the impact of the EU’s quite generously
funded civil society programs remains disappointing.
Tsveta Petrova turns to a specific group of external democracy promoters,
namely transnational civil society organizations based in the former
transition countries of Poland and Slovakia. In her chapter, Petrova
analyzes the motivation of transnational democracy and human rights
activists and tries to resolve the dispute if this happens for normative or
opportunistic reasons. She finds that democracy promoters from former
socialist countries are much closer to the experiences of actors in recipient
countries. Among other consequences, this leads Central European
actors to focus on technical assistance which is helpful on the ground.
Part III of the book then turns to the ‘recipient side’ – to civil society
and its groups in democratizing countries, to the consequences of civil
society oriented democracy assistance and to the developments of post-
socialist democracy in relation to domestic civil society action. Four
contributions elucidate these aspects. Donatella della Porta addresses
the role of social movements in democratization processes. She starts
from the observation that social movement studies have often stressed
conflicts whereas the transition literature tends to regard political
conflicts as an impediment to further democratization. The chapter

then discusses some potential implications for democracy promotion.
Armine Ishkanian’s chapter examines the impact of 20 years of
external democracy promotion policies that have focused on build-
ing and strengthening civil society in the former socialist countries in
Eastern Europe and the former Soviet states. She critically examines the
achievements and missed opportunities of externally funded democracy
promotion which led to the exponential growth of formal and profes-
sionalized NGOs. Her chapter then examines the recent emergence of
new civic initiatives and other non-institutionalized, volunteer-based
forms of collective action throughout the former post-Soviet countries.
While many observers regard these grassroots organizations as margin-
alized and non-political, Ishkanian shows with many examples that
the new civic initiatives indeed perform politically and, moreover, offer
alternative forms of civic participation.
In her contribution, Štěpánka Busuleanu looks at externally promoted
actors by analyzing the biographies of a selection of activists promoted
by a Western donor organization. Her chapter therefore takes a strictly
individualistic perspective on democracy recipients. She asks what
biographical conditions enable ‘the ordinary citizen’ in becoming an
activist. Are there underlying patterns of action and interpretations that
can be found? How does Western promotion affect the activists’ biogra-
phies? Busuleanu argues that such actors’ potential for civic engagement
is determined not only by the socio-political framework, but mainly by
opportunity structures and the legacies of previous regimes in their
respective pattern of action. In other words, the perceived impact of
Western democracy promoters is judged as more or less marginal.
In the last chapter of Part III, Franziska Blomberg and Edina Szöcsik
look at civic and political involvement of individuals by inquiring into
participation rates in civic organizations and political parties. They
demonstrate that civic and political engagement follows different
trajectories in Central Europe. They establish an explanatory model
which singles out certain individual factors, partisan linkages, and the
levels of economic and democratic development as decisive for the
likelihood of individual participation. With these last contributions, it
becomes clear that the success of civil society in democratization – and
thus the potential effectiveness of external assistance – depends to a large
extent on contextual factors that are beyond the reach of international
promoters of democracy.
In the final chapter, Frank Schimmelfennig summarizes the various
findings of the book. He reviews the processes, instruments, and merits
Introduction 7
of civil society support from the viewpoint of three models of democracy

promotion: leverage, governance, and linkage. The chapter argues that
the effectiveness of political conditionality in Eastern Europe is inhibi-
ted by the weakness of the West’s incentives and bargaining power
and the high political adoption costs for the authoritarian regimes in
the region. Democracy promotion according to the governance model
suffers from the weak implementation of democratic governance provi-
sions and the dominance of clientelistic networks.
With regard to the linkage model of direct civil society support, the con-
tributions to the volume provide a critical assessment of past democracy
promotion practices in Eastern Europe and point to alternative strategies
of support and civil society actors. Many of the contributions remain
skeptical about the potential for a positive impact on democracy that
such alternatives can have under conditions of public mutual mistrust
and state repression of civil society. However, most authors also recognize
the intrinsic value of civil society for the autonomy of groups from the
state; both as a means of protecting and as a barrier to further democratic
decline.
In combination, the contributions to this volume represent a broad
variety of disciplines, approaches, and methods to study democratiza-
tion, civil society, and external support in post-socialist Europe. The
region’s ambivalent development of democracy – at some points showing
clear tendencies of re-autocratization – and the negative consequences
for civil society in the short term make a continued discussion neces-
sary. Large parts of our volume deal with the empirical aspects of this
stagnation. In theoretical terms, however, the assembled texts spread
hopes that civil society still bears the potential to contribute to the
flourishing of democracy. It seems certain by now that the hopes that
were linked to civil society in the early phase of transition were overly
optimistic. New forms of civic engagement and a more symmetrical
interaction between democracy promoters and civil society groups
in democratizing countries can be identified as models for a growing
self-confidence of society vis-à-vis the state and its elites.
Notes
1. ‘Bringing Down a Dictator’ is a documentary by Steve York and Miriam
Zimmerman. It portrays the spectacular defeat of Slobodan Milošević by
non-violent protest strategies and massive civil disobedience in October 2000.
The film and more information are available at http://www.aforcemorepower
ful.org/films/bdd/.
2. We define ‘EU Neighborhood’ here according to the EU’s definition of the

European Neighborhood Policy (ENP) as a bilateral policy between the EU
and each partner country of the ENP. The ENP framework includes 16 of the
EU’s closest neighbors – Algeria, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Egypt, Georgia,
Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Moldova, Morocco, Occupied Palestinian
Territory, Syria, Tunisia, and Ukraine; see also http://ec.europa.eu/world/enp/
policy_en.htm.
3. In Ukraine, for example, there are more than 7000 active NGOs (Palyvoda &
Golota, 2010).
References
T. Carothers (1999a), Aiding Democracy Abroad: The Learning Curve, Washington,
D.C.: Brookings Institution.
T. Carothers (1999b), ‘Western Civil-Society Aid to Eastern Europe and the
Former Soviet Union’, East European Constitutional Review, 8:4.
L.J. Diamond (1999), Developing Democracy: Toward Consolidation, Washington,
D.C.: Johns Hopkins University Press.
L.J. Diamond (2002), ‘Thinking about Hybrid Regimes’, Journal of Democracy,
13:2, 21–34.
S.L. Henderson (2002), ‘Selling Civil Society’, Comparative Political Studies, 35:2,
139–67.
M.M. Howard (2002), ‘The Weakness of Postcommunist Civil Society’, Journal of
Democracy, 13:1, 157–69.
S.P. Huntington (1993), The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late 20th Century,
Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press.
A. Ishkanian (2007), ‘Democracy Promotion and Civil Society’, in: H. Anheier,
M. Glasius & M. Kaldor (eds), Global Civil Society: Communicative Power and
Democracy, London: Sage Publications, 58–85.
A. Kutter & V. Trappmann (2010), ‘Civil Society in Central and Eastern Europe:
The Ambivalent Legacy of Accession’, Acta Politica, 45:1–2, 41–69.
R. Mandel (2002), ‘Seeding Civil Society’, in: C.M. Hann (ed.), Postsocialism:
Ideals, Ideologies, and Practices in Eurasia, London, New York: Routledge.
S.E. Mendelson & J. K. Glenn (eds) (2002), The Power and Limits of Ngos: A Critical
Look at Building Democracy in Eastern Europe and Eurasia, New York: Columbia
University Press.
L. Palyvoda & S. Golota (2010), Civil Society Organizations in Ukraine: The State and
Dynamics 2002–2010, Kyiv: Publishing house «Kupol».
F. Schimmelfennig & H. Scholtz (2008), ‘EU Democracy Promotion in the
European Neighbourhood Political Conditionality, Economic Development
and Transnational Exchange’, European Union Politics, 9:2, 187–215.
F. Schimmelfennig & U. Sedelmeier (2005), The Europeanization of Central and
Eastern Europe, Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
M.A. Vachudova (2005), Europe Undivided: Democracy, Leverage, and Integration
After Communism, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Part I
Democracy Promotion and
Civil Society: Conceptualizing
the Link
2
External Democracy Promotion
and Divided Civil Society – The
Missing Link
2.1 Introduction
Democratization in post-socialist Europe followed two general paths

after the collapse of the Soviet Union: one way led more or less straight
to European Union (EU) membership, whereas a second way oscillated
between democratic awakening and autocratization. While the Central
European countries1 and Slovenia as well as the Baltic States were the
first to take the way to EU membership, the majority of the Soviet
Union’s successor states followed the second path.
In the first decade of the twenty-first century, tens of thousands of cit-
izens raised their voices in democratic uproar during the so-called color
revolutions in Serbia (2000), Georgia (2003), and Ukraine (2004). This
seemed to open a new era of democratic participation in post-socialist
Europe. In particular, youth movements, which appeared to be the
driving force behind the protests (White, 2009, 407), were said to pave
the way for finally demanding democratic reforms. The domestic youth
organizations received support from non-domestic (external) democ-
racy promoting actors2 in the form of material resources and trainings.
Hence, the external democracy promoters also claimed the revolu-
tions to be part of their own success story of supporting civil society
to democratize post-socialist Europe. There was no reason to doubt the
power of the people on the streets and the concomitant power of civil
society.
In retrospect, about one decade later, the democratic movements rather
appear to have been democratic moments (Onuch & Onuch, 2011).
Democratization has in most cases converted into re-autocratization.
Nevertheless, the ideal of a powerful civil society calling for democratic
reforms and campaigning for participation remains to date virtually
11
12 Irene Hahn-Fuhr and Susann Worschech
unchanged among external democracy supporters and scientific civil

society researchers alike. External democracy supporters still feel
encouraged to promote democracy via civil society. Thus they empha-
size the idea of a positive correlation between a vibrant civil society
and democratization of that society and subsequently, its respective
state structures (see for example the Communication of the European
Commission, 2012 ‘The roots of democracy and sustainable develop-
ment: Europe’s engagement with Civil Society in external relations’).
However, reality tells a different story about the alleged success of
externally supported democratization: In most post-socialist countries
outside the EU, organized civil society to date displays an image of
an elitist sphere of Western-funded Non-Governmental Organizations
(NGOs) (Lutsevych, 2013). The objectives, functioning, and structures
of these NGOs seem blurred. Moreover, such NGOs are perceived by the
well-educated locals as providing ‘one of the very few non-corrupt job
market segments and thus an interesting career option for ambitious
young people’.3 Most of the externally supported NGOs in post-socialist
Europe nowadays have little to do with the grassroots movements
that were enthusiastically welcomed by external observers during the
‘colored’ uprisings. In the words of a Georgian NGO official, external
support for civil society seemed more ‘like an internship for democracy,
but soon after 2003 [the Rose Revolution in Georgia], any democratic
culture disappeared’.4 Another NGO representative from Serbia stated
that NGOs ‘work as service providers for the state, albeit the state is not
interested in democracy education’.5
These difficulties were pointed out by a number of scientific empiri-
cal studies conducted in the last decade on post-socialist civil society.
These studies can be summarized as arguing that civil society in post-
socialist countries has developed somewhat differently from what
Western donors and political observers had expected. In the first decade
of the twenty-first century, scientific skepticism towards civil society’s
democratic power manifested itself when scholars characterized civil
society in post-socialist countries as ‘weak’ (Howard, 2002) or ‘artificial’
(Mandel, 2002; see also the introductory chapter to this book). Western
support of domestic NGOs in post-socialist countries was criticized for
having created a distinct civic elite that lacks horizontal ties to other
groups and society (Mendelson & Glenn, 2002). Instead of having
forged a critical mass of citizens committed to participating actively
in democracy development in their respective countries, assistance
programs are shown to have led to a ‘business of aid’ (Henderson,
2002) and an ‘engineered civil society’ (Ishkanian, 2007). Thus, current
External Democracy Promotion and Divided Civil Society 13
empirical research is questioning core theoretical assumptions on the

role of externally funded civil society in and for local democratization
(see, inter alia, Pishchikova, 2007, 2010; Lutsevych, 2013). At the same
time, however, researchers are reporting on a still increasing number of
new and apparently dynamic NGOs (Palyvoda & Golota, 2010).6
While a growing political NGO scene in the post-socialist countries
can be noticed, these NGOs do not appear to perform their implied
core functions of representing the people’s interest and advocating
democratic reform. Such inconsistency between the number of domestic
political NGOs and their political and societal relevance can be
observed in most post-socialist countries. How can this phenomenon,
the inconsistency between qualitative and quantitative performance of
civil society, be explained? Paths of political, economic, cultural, social,
and religious development differ significantly among the post-socialist
countries. Therefore, these aspects do not explain the cross-border
resemblance of characteristics of civil societies and their structures.
Thus, external support of civil society as a shared experience can be
considered a main causal factor for the described phenomenon of civil
society in post-socialist countries. Is there a pattern of externally sup-
ported civil society, and how might intended and unintended effects
of external democracy promotion contribute to the emergence of this
pattern? Furthermore, how can related processes be conceptualized
theoretically?
The starting point of this book is the puzzle of the incoherent deve-
lopment of democracy and civil society in post-socialist countries,
whereby the latter is supposed to be an instrument to achieve the
former. In this chapter, we will focus on the characteristics of interna-
tionally supported domestic civil society and on the role that external
funding plays in their emergence. We will propose a detailed theoreti-
cal approach and present a research strategy that can be deployed to
deconstruct the different processes and aspects of external democracy
promotion in civil society.
Research on external promotion of democracy has not yet substantially
reflected the interrelationship of external support and the development
of domestic civil society. This is due to most scholars’ focus on empirical
case studies featuring specific donors and their respective strategies.7
Conceptual approaches towards post-socialist Europe evolved within the
debate on Europeanization as a related (but not similar) concept. However,
EU membership as the most effective incentive for democratization does
not play a crucial role in states lacking the membership perspective.
External democracy promotion or external democratization are general
terms for the same process and thus are being used interchangeably
by different scholars (Merkel, 2009). Basically, these terms characterize
‘a set of actions of non-domestic actors who intentionally try to over-
come authoritarian power by supporting domestic actors who share
the same objective’ (Beichelt, 2012, 2). The objective is to encourage a
transition to democracy or to enhance the quality of democratic gov-
ernment. This set of actions is being differentiated into distinguishable
modes of external influence as models of providing incentives, social
learning, or lesson-drawing (Schimmelfennig & Sedelmeier, 2005).
A related approach distinguishes rationalist modes of coercion and
conditionality from constructivist perspectives of persuasion and social-
ization (Börzel & Risse, 2009), to name just a few.
However, while those modes are suitable to classify external actors’
approaches and the related output dimensions, they are lacking the
ability to capture a deeper understanding of the link between external
support and the development and role of domestic (civil) society in
democratization. Because of this missing link between the two research
strands – theories on the evolution of civil society on the one hand,
and on the mechanisms of external promotion on the other – the very
effects of external democracy promotion via civil society remain under-
exposed in a black box.
In this chapter, we will open this black box and provide tools for
analyzing the process and for generating hypotheses on the effects
of democracy promotion via civil society. We will disentangle exter-
nal democracy promotion by discussing assumptions, concepts, and
interactions on which the external support of civil society is based. We
will explore the links between theories on civil society and democracy
promotion and outline a theoretical approach to the study of civil society
as a target of democracy promotion.
We do so by dissecting the process of civil society support and exter-
nal democracy promotion along the lines of the three relevant actor
groups – external democracy promotion actors, domestic civil society,
and the targeted (democratizing) society – along with their interrelations.
Accordingly, we distinguish three analytical steps: The first step refers to
the role that civic actors are supposed to play in society and, in particular,
in democratization. This sheds light on the underlying assumptions about
the civil society’s democratizing functions which guide a certain donor,
and, thus, on the input dimension of external civil society support. The
second step focuses on interaction processes between donors and civil
society and within civil society. It focuses on mechanisms of external
democracy promotion that shape the structure and development of
civil society. The third step points at the output dimension of external civil
society support and asks how externally promoted civic actors establish
ties to their target group. These three steps will be discussed in turn by
linking them to respective theoretical strands. Thus, the deconstruction
of this process will display external democracy promotion through civil
society as a combination of different social logics. We will argue that
external democracy promotion produces a division between externally
funded and non-funded civic actors, and that this division and the stag-
nating democratization process are interdependent.
2.2 Logics of external civil society support
2.2.1 Civic actors in society: donors’ underlying assumptions

Strategies of external democracy promotion are based on external
actors’ ideas about what civil society is and how it may contribute to
democratization. However, both applied and theoretical concepts of
civil society present a broad variety of definitions. In this section, we
systematize relevant approaches in order to clarify implicit roles of civil
society in democratization. By categorizing existing concepts of civil
society and civic action, we do not seek to add another definition. The
purpose is rather to classify the existing external donors’ underlying
assumptions of an ideal type of civil society and civic actors in society
in order to understand the process and outcomes of external support.
The concept of civil society has its roots in multiple theoretical and
empirical contexts and is seen by some authors as an ‘umbrella concept’
(Salmenniemi, 2008) characterized by ‘acute definitional fuzziness’
(Edwards & Foley, 1996, 3). Until today, there is still no single theory of
civil society, but rather competing approaches to describe civil society
from different perspectives. While the term itself goes back to ancient
Greek philosophical discussions on the constitution of state and polity,8
a more precise evolution of the concept in relation to other aspects
of politics and society became contoured only during the period of
Enlightenment. Within the polity architecture proposed in the seven-
teenth century by Thomas Hobbes, civil society had been understood
as a sphere outside the state and thus as one of the (non-political) parts
of society (Adloff, 2005, 21). Enlightenment philosophers rejected the
absolutist view of a sovereign decoupled from the societas civilis and
reintegrated civil society into the political process. Hegel located civil
society within a public sphere distinct from the state, and therefore
within the realm of public politics (Powell, 2010, 354). Hence, civil soci-
ety became linked to evolving parliamentarism and increasing political
participation of the bourgeois class. Eighteenth century philosopher Tom

Paine, who contributed essentially to the progress of the debate, intro-
duced civil society as a ‘natural and potentially self-regulating form of
association, counterpoised to “government”’ and acknowledged it ‘as the
basis for the realization of equal rights for all citizens’ (Powell, 2010, 355).
Here, we find a basic distinction of all modern concepts of (politically
relevant) civil society: On the one hand, civil society is seen as an inter-
mediate sphere. This perspective follows the question where civil society
is located within society. On the other hand, civil society is recognized
as an actor on its own, following the question what civil society is
supposed to do in society. Figure 2.1 illustrates this analytical distinction
as a basis for different approaches to conceptualize civil society:
Civil Society
Civil Society as a Sphere Civil Society as an Actor
Empirical–Analytical Systemic Pro State: Contra State:

Approach Approach Republican Idea Liberal Idea
Figure 2.1 Classification of civil society theories
Following this analytical distinction, civil society can be conceptua-

lized and further defined within two ideal-typical forms. The first group
of civil society theories defines ‘civil society as a sphere that is analyti-
cally independent of – and, to varying degrees, empirically differentiated
from – not only the state and the market but other social spheres as well’
(Alexander, 1998, 6). Civil society is seen as an ‘arena in society, distinct
from the state, market, and usually the family, where collective action
in associations and through other forms of engagement takes place’
(Heinrich, 2005, 213). Within this logic of spheres, Heinrich stresses
empirical-analytical approaches, in contrast to normative-theoretical
approaches, as an umbrella category for all non-empirical concepts.
These conceptualize civil society as a sector composed of voluntary
non-profit organizations. Empirical-analytical approaches of civil society
have become exceedingly influential in the second phase of empirical
civil society studies. They have been deployed in seminal studies that
focus on organizational aspects of civil society such as amount, size, and
density in comparative perspectives (for example Heinrich & Fioramonti,
2008 on the CIVICUS project). Non-governmental organizations and

grassroots initiatives are referred to as the main agents and manifesta-
tions of democratization, although their ‘actorness’ is not considered
relevant in that respect. These studies are mainly based on the idea
that quantitative aspects of civil society organizations reflect the status
of democratization in a given entity.9 Within the perception of these
studies, the emerging chain ‘NGOs civil society democracy’ was
called the ‘civil society orthodoxy’ (Salmenniemi, 2008, 5). However, as
illustrated before, the assumed causality between quantitative aspects of
civil society organizations and a qualitative development of democracy
has proven to be too simplistic. Empirical-analytical approaches fail to
explain civil society’s contribution to democratization, as they do not
provide the possibility of a systematic verification or falsification of the
‘civil society orthodoxy’ theorem.
Moreover, systemic approaches offer ideas on the ‘location’ of civil
society in a political or social system from a macro level. In a systems-
theoretical perspective, civil society is still seen as a sphere or part of a
(sub)system, but it is also attributed certain functions within the system:
Civil society is a part of the community component of the social
system and fosters integration in modern societies.10 Mutual agree-
ments, communication, and solidarity are supposed to form dominant
interaction logics of civil society. Following the systemic approach,
Gosewinkel and Rucht (2003) define civil society as its own subsystem
of societal integration. Assuming that civil society is based on resources
such as values and norms, abstract appreciation and solidarity constitute
the central media of interaction. With this innate systematic interac-
tion logic, civil society becomes a fourth subsystem besides community,
state, and economy (Rucht, 2005). Furthermore, this logic of interaction
links the macroscopic frame of systemic approaches to civil society to
somewhat microscopic functions of civil society in democratization,
though without spelling them out in more detail.
The second group of theories exposes civil society’s actorness and
concentrates on its political and social functions. These functionalist
approaches seek to examine the potential contributions of civil society to
specific political settings, which mainly means democracy or democrati-
zation as a process. At the end of the twentieth century, democracy ‘has
come to mean a special type of political system and way of life in which
civil society and government tend to function as two necessary moments,
separate but contiguous, distinct but interdependent’ (Keane, 2010, 461)
and is seen as a system in which ‘the exercise of power (…) is subject to
public monitoring, compromise, and agreement’ (ibid.). The functionalist
approach conceptualizes civil society either as an integrative power which

serves a democratic system by enhancing democratic skills and norms or
as a counterpart to state and government, defending democratic rights
and values against political power.
The first view refers to republican concepts of civil society as complemen-
tary to the state and to the political system, providing basic socialization
functions. This concept goes back to Alexis de Tocqueville’s idea of asso-
ciations as ‘schools for democracy’ and was further developed by Robert
Putnam in his theory on social capital (de Tocqueville, 1956; Putnam
et al., 1993; Putnam, 1995; Lin, 2001, 19). Civil society is based on ‘private
and public associations and organizations, all forms of cooperative social
relationships that created bonds of trust, public opinion, legal rights and
institutions, and political parties’ (Alexander, 1998, 3). The second view
of civil society as a state counterpart takes up liberal arguments. Here, civil
society acts as a bulwark against state power and defends the free civic
sphere. This perspective is mainly rooted in John Locke’s juxtaposition
of state control with civic rights and freedoms that have to be defended
against the state. The liberal view became specifically prominent at the
end of the twentieth century, when opposition groups and dissidents
fought for civil rights in socialist dictatorships and thus brought the
authoritarian political systems in Eastern Europe to their knees.
Based on this differentiation, we can distinguish the functions of civil
society in democratization and categorize them first by their relation to
the state and second by their temporal scope and leverage.11 Table 2.1
outlines this categorization by presenting the republican and liberal
perspective on the horizontal axis and the scope from short-term and
direct to long-term and indirect leverage on the vertical axis.
Table 2.1 clusters the different functions of civil society in democ-
ratization and allocates them to four groups of aggregated functions.
Three of the four groups follow the republican logic of a complement to
the state, while the fourth group of functions corresponds to the liberal
logic of controlling state power. Each will be discussed in turn.
Civil society as a complement to a (democratic) state (Table 2.1,
groups of functions ‘School of Democracy’, ‘Social Capital’, and
‘Modernization’) follows the idea that democracy is not an elitist or
institution-based concept, but needs active citizens who have inter-
nalized democratic values and habits. Thus, these concepts focus on
democratic socialization, participation, and social capital to establish
a democratic culture in which institutional arrangements are rooted.
Functions of group 1 refer to the School of Democracy. This probably
most prominent grouping of functions can be subsumed as ‘learning
Table 2.1 Functions of civil society in actor-oriented theories
Republican Perspective Liberal

Complementary to the State Perspective State
Counterpart
Direct and Participation Conflict Checking and

Short-Term Mediation/ Limiting State
Civilization Power
Recruitment and Defending Civic
Training of New Rights, Advocacy
Political Leaders
↓
Education for Multiple Channels
Democracy for Representation
of Interests Beyond
Political Parties
↓ Interrelations to Support for Election

Political Parties and Structural Monitoring
Institutions Economic Reforms
Transition from
Clientelism to
Citizenship
↓ Socialization and
Internalization of
Democratic Values
Community
Development
Indirect Information and
and Communication
Long- Term Accountability, Pluralistic Society
Responsiveness
Function Group 1: Function Group 2: Function Group 3: Function Group 4:
School of Democracy Social Capital Modernization Watchdog
democracy through civil society’. The single functions of this group

all refer to Tocqueville’s observation that associations as parts of civil
society work as ‘large free schools of democracy’, in which citizens learn
democratic negotiation, mutual trust, and thus internalize democratic
norms and values. Among the functions of this group, we can distin-
guish broad education and specific training in the short range. First,
civil society may contribute to democracy or democratization through
supplementing the role of political parties in stimulating political par-
ticipation, increasing the political efficacy and skill of democratic citi-
zens, and promoting an appreciation of the obligations as well as rights
of democratic citizenship. A second short-term function is recruitment
and training of new political leaders. Through trainings and coopera-
tions with political parties, youth organizations and so on, civil society
organizations may directly teach potential future leaders in technical

and social aspects of democratic governance. One caveat especially of
the short-term recruitment function can be that democratic habits of
young leaders may be corrupted when they enter institutions which
are not yet overwhelmingly democratic. The absorption of demo-
cratic leaders by an autocratic political system can undermine people’s
respect towards democracy and politics and render new political figures
untrustworthy. More medium-term oriented and general is the function
‘education for democracy’. Civil society may elaborate and provide tech-
niques, strategies, and curricula for democratic civic education and thus
teach in particular young people democratic habits and values as well as
stimulate their active participation in community affairs. Civil society
may also contribute more indirectly and in a medium-term oriented
fashion to the recruitment of potential political candidates when civil
society activists start to engage and build cross ties to political parties and
institutions. In the long run, this democratic socialization function is said
to establish profound cultural changes in the transition towards a more
critical, democratic society. Furthermore, one long-term effect of civil
society’s democratizing power can be the improvement of the state’s abi-
lity to govern: Since democracy education through civil society increases
citizens’ respect for the state and enhances their positive engagement, it
is argued that also the state’s accountability, responsiveness, effectiveness,
and thus the legitimacy of the whole political system might grow.
Functions of group 2 comprise Social Capital and the building of trust
networks and draw on inspiring confidence at all levels of society. This
civilizing aspect of civil society has been noticed and described exten-
sively in Robert Putnam’s work on social capital and its implications for
democracy in the USA and in Italy (Putnam, 1995; Putnam et al., 1993).
Theories and assumptions about how civil society generates social
capital focus on abstract as well as concrete mechanisms. Short-term
civilizing functions of civil society include direct conflict mediation
between different interest groups in society and/or politics. Civil society
provides multiple channels for the representation of interests beyond
classical political party structures. In doing so, civil society offers a
platform for the transformation of bonding social capital to bridging
social capital: Interest groups are given possibilities to negotiate their
diverging interests, build coalitions, and seek influence via different
channels and media. On the other hand, political parties may build
their specific networks upon these interest groups, and thus include
ideas and preferences (from outside) in the political process. From the
medium-term perspective, bridging social capital and the provision of
multiple networks minimize the dependency on monopolistic networks

or clientelism and foster citizenship. By enhancing the building of
social capital in particular within community development in the long
term, civil society furthers the development of a pluralistic society that
includes liberal citizenship and cooperation through horizontal ties.
Function 3, Modernization, stems from the socioeconomic perspective
in transformation studies. Macro-economic stabilization is seen as crucial
and respective measures should be implemented immediately by the
executive (as in Poland 1990–91). However, more structural economic
reforms, as for instance liberalization, deregulation, and privatiza-
tion, are still highly controversial (Pickel & Wiesenthal, 1997). Hence,
they require acceptance by a larger part of society. Civil society can
contribute to creating a minimal consensus and enhance democratic
legitimization of reforms that mostly imply short- to medium-term
costs for certain parts of society. Therefore this function is also short- to
medium-term-oriented.
The liberal view of civil society (Table 2.1, group of functions 4:
Watchdog) emphasizes civil society’s ability to control state institu-
tions and thus forms a ‘counterpart’ to the state administration. In the
short term, it checks and limits state power by raising public criticism
on decisions that ignore democratic standards and the rule of law.
In order to execute this function, civil society needs at least the possibility
of initiating a public debate, so there must be a responsive audience
in or outside the state which is sensitive to civil society actors’ signals
and reports. Also in the short term, civil society ‘against’ the state seeks
to defend citizens’ rights by providing legal assistance, raising public
awareness, or publishing abuses of power. A function that spans from
short- to medium-term is election monitoring and campaigning against
election fraud. A long-term oriented function of group 4 is the wide
dissemination of information which ‘empowers citizens in the collective
pursuit and defense of their interests and values’ (Diamond, 1999, 247).
This function provides citizens with alternative information on govern-
ment activities that often contradicts the official version of a story. Based
on investigation, civil society organizations, together with independent
media, provide the public with information and alternative perspec-
tives, which may form the basis for citizens’ activities in contesting
government policies and defending their own interests. These activities
are also referred to in the literature on social movements, where it
is noted that not only the distribution of information, but also the
provision of alternative frames of interpretation is a central accomplish-
ment of social movements (for example Benford & Snow, 2000; Della
Porta & Tarrow, 2004). In a process of framing and counter-framing,

several alternative interpretations and perspectives on political issues
are offered, which minimizes the danger of an information monopoly
in favor of the government, and which gives citizens the possibility to
react to power abuses.
In light of this categorization of the roles that civic actors can play,
it becomes obvious that civil society support in democracy promotion
rests on a functionalist approach. It is not an aim per se but implies an
assumption on the part of the donor about the way a civic organization
should contribute to democratization. In supporting civil society in a
certain manner, donors support particular functions of civil society.
We assume that functions are related to organizational aspects of civil
society in the way that the implementation of a function requires cer-
tain organizational preconditions. If donors foster democratization via
civil society support, they imply some ideas about the relation of civil
society to the state, and they will have to decide whether to promote
short-term effects or long-term changes. Consequently, donor strategies
differ and lead to interrelations and path dependencies in support of
functions and organizational issues. Thus, the input process of democ-
racy promotion can be characterized as a set of different strategies of
enabling civil society to fulfill certain functions.
2.2.2 Civic actors and external donors: interaction processes

Donor strategies can be conceptualized in terms of political aims, tech-
nical and financial aspects, and project cycles, inter alia. In supporting
certain functions, donors deploy an idea about their implementation,
which leads to particular organizational manifestations of civic actors.
Thus, ideas on functions and organizational settings of civil society
actors seem to be linked.
In democracy promotion theories, instruments designated by donors
to impact their immediate target groups, in this case civic actors, gene-
rally follow the paradigm of encouraging and demanding. Mechanisms
of interaction processes range between socialization and conditionality
(Kelley, 2004).12 A transmission of organizational ideas is to be expected
due to the inherent hierarchy between donor and beneficiary within
both mechanisms. Organization theory provides for assumptions
concerning the emergence of different organizational structures and
influences. Theories on world society or world polity underline that
there is a rapid global diffusion of culture and norms which leads to
a worldwide adoption of institutional models of organization (Meyer
et al., 1997; Meyer, 2010). Rationalization and professionalization have
been emphasized as central processes that influence the character of

non-profit organizations both on the national and on the international
level (Hwang & Powell, 2009; Boli & Thomas, 1997). Therefore, external
democracy promotion can be seen as a process of homogenization via
institutionalization of certain organizational models and practices,
based on norms and cultures of the donor community.
Institutional isomorphism is one of the most prominent perspec-
tives and describes three different modes of organizational alignment:
coercive isomorphism, mimetic processes, and normative pressure
(DiMaggio & Powell, 1991, 67). All three modes may occur in democracy
promotion interaction between donors and beneficiaries, as well as
within the group of the latter.
Coercive isomorphism indicates an alignment strategy of civil society
actors to meet the formal requirements for support such as bureaucratic
aspects, reference lists, etc. The criteria set by a donor reflect the donor’s
functional script and thus imply the donor’s ideas, values, and norms.
To receive a grant, a civic organization has to comply with ideas and
standards set by the donor. Thus, financial support is a medium for the
transfer of ideas. This means that elaborated criteria for cooperation
correspond to the promotion of a certain ‘Western’ role model of civil
society. This mechanism implies a hierarchy or a bias in power and is
characteristic of the donor-beneficiary relation. The beneficiaries have
to shape their organizations corresponding to these ‘Western’ models,
regardless of the specific context they are working in. One example of
this logic is the democracy promotion strategy of the European Union:
Via programs of the European Instrument for Democracy and Human
Rights (EIDHR), for example, the EU launches calls for applications in
certain fields of activities, and civic organizations that apply for these
grants have to prove their compliance to sophisticated standards,
professional characteristics, and good references. The application process
is perceived as extremely bureaucratic and difficult by most civic organi-
zations, so that there are even civil society organizations providing con-
sultancy services for other NGOs on how to get an EU grant.13 However,
receiving a grant ultimately requires designing the organization according
to the EU’s professional standards for democracy promotion.
As a second process of organizational alignment, mimetic processes
occur without direct pressure and often via diffusion. Organizations
try to ‘copy’ others who appear to be more successful, legitimate, etc.
Role models may thus be other grantees or beneficiaries of foreign aid,
but also independent actors. Positive role models (possibly adapting
to certain donor strategies) encourage other actors to change their
organizational characteristics, strategies, and action repertoires. As a

‘peer alignment’, mimetic processes may lead to an equalization of
specific aspects of civil society and thus to the clustering around certain
subtypes.
Normative pressure is the mechanism that comes into play with increas-
ing professionalization. Organizations change their structure either
because of higher education levels that are required in the field or because
of the growth and elaboration of professional networks across which new
models diffuse rapidly (DiMaggio and Powell, 1991, 71). With regard to
democracy promotion, this mechanism occurs when civil society actors
enter into a ‘competition’ of being more professional. Typically, profes-
sionalized civil society actors are engaged in delivering policy services
rather than in working at the grassroots level. Accordingly, we assume
normative pressure to contribute to the establishment and stabilization
of certain subtypes of supported civil society.
We expect the first process (coercive isomorphism) to come into play
between the donor and the beneficiary; thus, this interaction process
describes the input dimension. The second and third processes, how-
ever, mostly occur between the different beneficiaries of democracy
promotion. We assume that the cleavage of the civil society field is
enhanced by the influences of civil society actors on their peers. In
particular, imitation and professionalization are regarded as important
mechanisms in that area. While donor strategies based on functional
logics are one independent variable, isomorphic processes can be seen
as the second independent variable fostering the formation of civic
actors’ organizational profiles and, consequently, the establishment of
different types of civil society.
2.2.3 Civic actors in democratization: relations to the

target group
Because civil society is conceptualized in democracy promotion as a
representative of certain societal groups and interests, it seems necessary
to analyze in whose name civil society acts and which other actors are
addressed. Hence, regarding the output dimension of democracy promo-
tion via civil society, the question is in which way externally promoted
civic actors establish ties to their targeted addressee(s). We assume that
depending on the democratizing function supported by external donors,
various civic actors address respective target groups in different ways.
Consequently, we explore ‘where’ civil society’s functions may be located
in the democratization process and in which way this output logic
corresponds to the target groups of externally supported civil society.
Democratization is described and defined in a plurality of theories.

In the aftermath of revolutions and democratic transitions in Latin
America and Southern Europe, a group of scholars around Laurence
Whitehead and Guillermo O’Donnell developed a seminal series of
analysis and transition theories (O’Donnell et al., 1986). After the ‘Third
Wave of Democratization’, their actor and phase oriented approach was
further developed. Putting a focus on elite constellations, civil society
was seen here as a factor for the regime breakdown and the consolida-
tion of democracy, but not as a necessary condition for democratization.
Thus, the contribution of citizens’ activities to obtaining and sustaining
democracy is better reflected in processual concepts.
In his influential theory on democratic rule, Robert Dahl described
democracy – which he calls ‘polyarchy’ – more in terms of certain
rights that citizens are given in a polyarchic system (Dahl, 1972; 1997):
Essential criteria for a democratic system are effective participation
and inclusion, equal voting rights, free formation of opinions, free-
dom of expression, and the final control of all eligible voters over the
political agenda and the political process. All these criteria focus on
the relationship between citizens and state. But although Dahl stresses
process-oriented criteria for democracy, the bottom-up approach of civil
society’s contribution to democratization is not reflected. As Charles
Tilly wrote, ‘Dahl’s criteria for polyarchial democracy describe a working
process, a series of regularized interactions among citizens and officials’
(Tilly, 2007, 10). Therefore, Tilly claims to ‘improve Dahl’s criteria while
remaining faithful to their process-oriented spirit’ (ibid.).
Starting from Dahl’s polyarchy, Tilly develops a procedural
and relational theory of democratization. Since in Tilly’s concept
‘Democratization means movement toward broader, more equal, more
protected, and more binding consultation’ (ibid., 13f.), interactions
between citizens and institutions are central processes. Democratization
can be conceptualized as the occurrence of changes in three central
areas (ibid., 51ff.): First, networks of trust have to integrate in regimes,
‘and thus motivate their members to engage in mutually binding con-
sultation – the contingent consent of citizens to programs proposed or
enacted by the state’ (ibid., 74). Second, Tilly emphasizes inequalities in
society which could hinder democracy if they translate into categorical
differences in political rights and obligations. Thus, the insulation of
public politics from categorical inequalities is central to democratiza-
tion. Third, continued existence of autonomous power centers which
remain detached from public politics can inhibit democracy. With this
processual as well as relational view on democratization, Tilly proposes
an integrative model of democratization in which ties and relations of

different qualities and functions are increased.
The relational concept of democratization outlined above leads to
some hypotheses of how an externally supported civil society may
contribute to democratization. If functional expectations form the
basis of a donor’s strategy, we may assume that this functional expec-
tation towards a supported civil society group also includes an idea
of who should be the target group of civic action. The logic of the
‘civil society as a complement to the state’ consists mainly of foster-
ing ‘Schools of Democracy’, ‘Social Capital’, and ‘Modernization’ (see
Table 2.1). Therefore, the citizens themselves are the target group in
focus. Democratic change is expected to occur on the individual level.
Institutions such as administrative bodies, parties, or media enter the
picture only as indirect target groups since it is the individual citizen
who builds them up. Related to Tilly’s concept of democratization, the
task of the ‘complement’ civil society is to establish networks of trust
and integrate them into the regime. For example, a donor who supports
the function ‘conflict mediation and civilization’ will support an organ-
ization that works as a mediator. The target group of this civic actor
might be young people from post-conflict regions supposed to partici-
pate in exchange programs or Bosnian and Serbian war veteran groups.
Within the logic of the ‘civil society as a counterpart to state power’,
civic actions by ‘Watchdogs’ (Table 2.1) target the state regime and its
institutions. Democratic change is expected to occur on an aggregated
systemic level. In Tilly’s concept of democratization, we find this func-
tional logic embedded in the areas of decreasing categorical inequality
and autonomous power centers. For example, a donor who supports the
function ‘election monitoring’ will cooperate with a civil society group
that works as a watchdog. The targeted audience of this group’s civic
action (training of election observers directly observing in the polling
station) will be administrative bodies.
The relations between civil society and its respective target group
demand preconditions within the functional logic with regard to
democratization. Civic action within the ‘complement’ logic requires
a certain level of interconnectedness between civil society actors who
promote democratic values and citizens. Since cultural changes are often
based on role models and a certain level of persuasion, being socially
embedded and the prestige of democratic trendsetters are important
aspects. Hence, trust would be the precondition for, and not the effect
of cooperation. In that respect, the logic of Putnam’s statement on
the origin of social capital as a community effect – ‘people who join
are people who trust’ (Putnam, 1995, 666) – might be reversed into
‘people who trust are people who join’ (Kern, 2004, 125; also Newton,
2001). If basic trust and linkage are lacking, it is in question whether
horizontal ties spanning different groups and parts of society can be
established through civil society. Civic action within the ‘counterpart’
logic needs at least a responsive audience, be it a domestic one or the
international community. As Levitsky and Way (2005) point out, the
quality and degree of international linkage is a key factor to the success
of democratic pressure. The audience shall respond through different
levels of linkage (economic, political, and societal cooperation) and
may exert a certain degree of leverage in cases of power abuse. If neither
the political system itself nor the domestic audience is responsive, and
if international linkage and leverage capacities are low, the watchdogs
and advocates remain solitary and ineffective actors.
Apparently, a supported civil society group addresses its specific
actions to specific target groups according to its respective function.
Returning to the external democracy promotion agenda, the question
remains whether the promotion of democratizing functions reaches the
respective target groups. In other words: Are the input and the output
dimensions of democracy promotion via civil society congruent?
2.3 Democracy promotion via civil society:

a research model
As stated in the beginning, the aim of this chapter is to define hith-

erto missing theoretical links between theories on civil society and
democracy promotion. The question of input and output dimensions
of democracy promotion underlines our argument that results of this
complex process cannot be analyzed substantially if democracy promo-
tion is tackled as a black box. Therefore, we asked for components of
the democracy promotion process and the guiding principles within
possible sub-processes. We deconstructed ‘democracy promotion’ into
the relevant actor groups – external donors, civil society, and the tar-
geted democratizing society – and their interrelations. On this basis,
we distinguished three analytical steps: The first step refers to the role
that civic actors are supposed to play in society and, in particular, in
democratization. It sheds light on the underlying assumptions guid-
ing a certain donor, and, thus, on the input dimension of external
civil society support. The second step focuses on interaction processes
between donors and civil society and between civil society actors. It asks
for the mechanisms of external democracy promotion determining the
structure and development of civil society. The third step points at the
output dimension of external civil society support and asks how exter-
nally promoted civic actors establish ties to their target groups.
In sum, we propose to conceive democracy promotion through civil
society as a combination of different logics that are described within dif-
ferent strands of theory: We argue that democracy promotion processes
are based on and thus can be analyzed according to the following three
aspects: first, underlying assumptions of democracy promotion via civil
society; second, interactive formation of civil society; and third, rela-
tions of civil society to the respective target groups. In linking the single
parts of the process to theories on civil society, interaction processes,
and democratization, we aim at systematizing the missing links and
open questions of external democratization at different levels. Upon
this systematization, we put the outlined segments in an analytical
framework and introduce the following model of external democracy
promotion via civil society (Figure 2.2):
Donors A. Underlying
Assumptions
of Donor
Strategies
Promote
democratizing
functions
B. Interaction
Processes
Civil Society
Implement
democratizing
functions
C. Relations
to the
Target Groups Target
Group
Intermediate Actors
Administrative
(Parties, Media Citizens
Bodies
Unions...)
Figure 2.2 Democracy promotion via civil society
Analytical step A concerns the donors’ underlying concepts of civil

society’s contribution to democratization. The main question of this part
of the process is which democratizing function a donor promotes, and,

in correspondence with organizational requirements of this function,
to which type of civil society the logic of support leads. Step B touches
on the aspect of interaction processes and organizational alignment. We
hypothesize that the relation between donors and civil society is mainly
characterized by coercive mechanisms of standard setting. Furthermore,
it seems likely that different groups of civil society influence each other
through normative pressure and mimetic processes. Step C refers to the
relation of civil society to target groups of democratization. Civil society
actors are connected to specific target groups according to the functional
logic of civic action and aim at inducing changes in specific areas of
society. Thus, external democracy promotion via civil society follows
a path dependency that links different actors, functions, mechanisms,
and areas of democratization.
2.4 The divided civil society
The starting point of this volume is a major puzzle of democracy promo-

tion in post-socialist countries: Whereas a strong and vibrant civil society
fostered by international support seems to have developed, democracy
has stagnated or even declined. Empirical research has put core theoreti-
cal assumptions on the role of civil society in and for democratization
in question. Following our analytical model to disaggregate the process
of external promotion, we proceed on the assumption that external
financial aid yields a division of domestic civil society into externally
funded and non-funded civic actors. We argue that this division and the
stagnating democratization process correlate.
Obviously, domestic civil society is as heterogeneous, pluralistic,
and complex as the respective society itself. Within the framework of
democratization, civil society usually deploys a ‘division of respon-
sibilities’ related to political or social functions. However, external
funding seems not solely to comply with that internal functional diffe-
rentiation of civil society. In the context of external funding, a certain
division between voluntary and professional14 groups of civil society
has emerged. The phenomenon of a ‘Divided Civil Society’ appears in
most post-socialist countries alike. This is puzzling, considering that
paths of economic, cultural, social, religious, and political development
differ significantly between those countries. This means that there is
a high variance in terms of local conditions, contrasted by a strikingly
low variance in the characteristics of the respective domestic civil
societies.
With regard to the differentiation into social and political functions in

democratization processes on the one hand, and to the division between
voluntary and professional structures of organization on the other, we
may distinguish four subtypes of civil society. Table 2.2 outlines the
resulting typology:
Table 2.2 The divided civil society
Organizational Structure
Voluntary Professional
Function in Direct (1) (3)

Democratization (Political) Opposition Externally Funded
(e.g. Dissidents, ‘Political Service
Small Initiatives) Providers’
Indirect (2) (4)
(Social-, Welfare- Social Initiatives Externally Funded
Oriented) ‘Social Service Providers’
or ‘State Substitutes’
Section (1) of the typology in Table 2.2 outlines voluntary initiatives and
groups that are part of a wider societal opposition. They consist of – inter
alia – former political dissidents, once agents of democratic change who
had attained influential positions during the transformation process. Those
groups and activists operate in a somewhat spontaneous fashion and are
little formalized. Anecdotal rather than empirical observations suggest that
certain actors within this category remain stuck in the mode of ‘societal
opposition’ without regaining political relevance. Constantly staying critical
and weary of democratic backlashes, those former dissidents seem to have
become marginalized. This group also includes political grassroots initia-
tives and small movements – the ‘ideal type’ of a political civil actor, in a way.
The second section (2) illustrates voluntary initiatives operating
within the social sector, often run by those who are themselves directly
affected. These social initiatives include, for example, war veteran organi-
zations advocating for welfare provisions and pensions as well as child
care and education networks. Although there may be an overlap with
political work, the groups’ focus is on welfare.
On the other side of the table, section (3) features highly profession-
alized political organizations. Those professional structures are often
shaped by young and well-educated (full-time) employees from the
academic sector. These organizations seem to operate as agencies, thus
representing a part of an (externally fostered) modern employment
sector which was hitherto underdeveloped or nonexistent in many

post-socialist countries. Organizations of section 3 appear compliant with
the aims and principles of external democracy promotion. They perform
as implementation organizations and, thus, as ‘political service providers’
for external donors. At the same time, there is a lack of volunteer activists
and of financially contributing members.
Section (4) encompasses highly professionalized civil society actors
working within the social sector. They often operate within the context
of weak statehood and take on public tasks or social services, such as
the organization of health clinics. The release of state actors from their
responsibilities within the education, health, and welfare sectors15 has
already been recognized (and discredited) within the field of traditional
development aid. External democracy promotion considers those ‘social
service providers’ as cooperation partners as well; however, their role
within democratization remains questionable.
The professionalized social and political organizations (3 and 4) seem
to be the key partners of foreign assistance. We hypothesize that the
emergence of these professionalized groups is one specific result of
external funding: Foreign assistance creates its own type of cooperation
partners and thus contributes to the division of domestic civil society
induced by material support. This corresponds to the findings on the
‘engineered civil society’ (Ishkanian, 2007). Among these two subtypes,
we find the professionalized political service providers (3) – analog to
the traditional social service providers (4) – are a new phenomenon.
We assume that the emergence of the political service providers as a
distinctive subtype marks the division of civil society. In the view of
many donors, actors in group (3) are described as successful civic organi-
zations, while the consequences of providing political services appear
to be underexplored: Democracy promotion via civil society seems to
consist of intended actions which often evoke unintended results. This
points to an inherent problem of democracy promotion: Whether the
promotion of civil society is a means to an end (democratization) or an
end in itself remains undecided. Still, this differentiation of the complex
‘civil society’ provides an improvement to our model (Figure 2.3).
2.5 Democracy promotion via civil society:

unintended effects
External donors usually frame their support of civil society as democ-

racy promotion. However, the support of ‘political service providers’
points to unintended effects of external democracy promotion and
Donors A. Underlying
Assumptions
of Donor
Strategies
Promote
democratizing
functions
Civil Society
B. Interaction
Professionalized Processes
Opposition, Social
Political Organizations,
Initiatives
Initiatives
‘Service Providers’
Implement
democratizing
functions
C. Relations
to the
Target
Group
Target Groups
Intermediate Actors
Administrative
(Parties, Media, Citizens
Bodies
Unions, ...)
Figure 2.3 Democracy promotion and the divided civil society
thus evokes conflicts. With the help of our model, we can allocate these
unintended effects to single parts of the process and thereby propose
three hypotheses on unintended effects of democracy promotion via
civil society:
Hypothesis 1: Criss-Cross Support – External civil society promotion leads
to political service providers.
The first hypothesis concerns a problem that emerges within part A
of the model (Figure 2.3) and is based on the underlying assumptions
of donor strategies. We argue that the promotion of functions related to
the ‘watchdog’ (Table 2.1, group 4) produces ‘political service providers’.
The analysis of donors’ aims shows that democracy promotion orients
its targets, contents, and ideas towards the voluntary-political subtype

of civil society which we called ‘opposition’ (section 1 in Table 2.2).
Groups and movements like Solidarność are still seen as the embodi-
ment of the role model for democratizing authoritarian systems through
civil society. However, the way external actors try to advance civil
society in this direction generates effects on the organizational side
that pushes civil society more and more towards the subtype of the
‘political service providers’. We call this phenomenon the ‘criss-cross
support’ of functional and organizational logics. It seems to lead to
professional actors who implement democratizing functions as agencies.
Simultaneously, the genuine but less standardized subtype of civil society
remains disconnected from support because of organizational short-
comings. The problematic aspect of this phenomenon is that external
assistance to ‘political service providers’ fosters material dependencies.
Limited by donors’ finances, civic groups have to act according to
economic rationales. By filling out applications and employing staff,
civic groups become agencies, and political civic action becomes profes-
sionalized. The resulting professional business structure of ‘civic action’
obviously does not comply with a common ideal of a voluntary-political
civil society. Instead, external democracy promotion via civil society
has created a new business sector, and so could thus be considered an
‘external labor market policy’.
Hypothesis 2: External civil society promotion counteracts social capital.
The second hypothesis touches upon the interaction processes
between the different subtypes of civil society (part B in the model): We
argue that the division implies a conflicting situation within civil soci-
ety. Through its contribution to the division into professionalized and
voluntary civil society actors, external assistance generates processes
of disintegration: By strengthening only actors working according to
certain democracy promotion criteria, external democracy promotion
intervenes in and may even distort the political competition of groups,
interests, and methods. Hence, externally supported civil society actors
are often seen as ‘agents’ of Western states. The promotion of func-
tions related to ‘social capital’ (Table 2.1, group 2) as a central means to
democratization is thereby counteracted. Instead, external democracy
promotion causes distrust within the ‘Divided Civil Society’.
Hypothesis 3: External civil society promotion alienates civic groups from
their constituencies.
Third, the relation of democracy promotion to its constituency (part C)
is ambiguous. If civil society is seen by donors as a means to target
society, respective interconnections ought to be defined. Obviously,
the subtypes of civil society point to different target groups and aim at
different levels of society. It remains uncertain whether and how external
support can strengthen these ties and provide opportunity structures to
unfold civil society’s democratizing potential. Particularly, the relations
of the ‘political service providers’ with the state and its institutions are
questionable. We assume that, just as ‘social service providers’ run social
institutions, ‘political service providers’ might tend to ‘run’ alternative
state institutions – for example, they could design shadow reforms,
establish shadow cabinets, and the like. From a democratic perspective,
the respective legitimacy is highly controversial. The role of ‘political
service providers’ is ambivalent with respect to participative opinion-
making, political parties, and to state institutions who are often them-
selves partners of external democracy promotion actors. The more civic
actors have to comply with externally set economic rationales and
agendas, the more they get alienated from concerns within their domestic
society. If linkage between civil society and the domestic audience as
well as the political system is low, civic actors seem to act within a
vacuum. Thus, we expect that the inherent logic of external democracy
promotion renders it difficult for supported civil society actors to imple-
ment democratizing functions.
2.6 Conclusion: theories need to be linked,

and promotion has counterproductive effects
On the basis of our theoretical discussion and model of external

democracy promotion, we can conclude that the internal functional
differentiation of civil society is not only a structure on which external
democracy promotion operates. Rather, external democracy promotion
itself produces a specific pattern of civil society that implies a specific
division between externally funded and non-funded civic actors. We
call this pattern the ‘Divided Civil Society’.
The divided civil society as a theoretical typology of civil society in
post-socialist states has two relevant implications. The first implica-
tion affects the practical-political and normative dimension of external
democracy promotion: With the divided civil society in mind, external
democracy promoters could reflect on the question which subtype of civil
society they actually promote on the basis of their respective strategy.
Unintended effects such as the evolution of political service providers,
the decline of social capital within civil society, or an alienation of civic
groups from society itself could be extracted and appropriately addressed
with the help of our model. However, highlighting critical moments of
external civil society promotion and subjecting them to debate should

not neglect the other side of the coin – the significant positive effects
that external democracy promotion can have. For example, Western
donors in many cases create a protective sphere for civil society activities
in a legal vacuum in authoritarian state systems. In such countries,
Western donors thereby serve as a kind of ‘patron saint’ because strong
ties between civic actors and representatives of Western donors render
it more difficult for authoritarian regimes to persecute active citizens
campaigning for alternative and pluralistic political views. Furthermore,
the establishment of an externally supported political employment sector
in states suffering from high unemployment due to difficult transforma-
tion need not be questioned in principle. Nevertheless, it should at least
be honestly disclosed if external democracy promotion’s primary effect
is providing a successful business model for well-educated, ambitious
(young) people. After all, the related professionalization of civil society
may appear to be a preferable outcome of civil society support per se.
Overall, a resulting improvement of external democracy promotion
towards civil society might be a shift of its focus from supporting single
‘change agents’ towards creating political opportunity structures for
civic action. Democracy promoters could be well advised to concentrate
on fostering human and social capital and strive to provide the discur-
sive, and, if possible, legal framework to enhance social action.
The second implication affects the theoretical dimension of external
democracy promotion. Our starting point was the missing link between
theories on the development and role of domestic (civil) society in
democratization on the one hand, and on mechanisms of external pro-
motion on the other. We linked theories by discussing implicit donor
strategies and interactions which cause the emergence of the divided
civil society. The presented triple-layered model is intended to serve
as an analytical grid for theoretical as well as for applied reflection
and evaluation of the process of external democracy promotion via
civil society. The model splits the complex issue of external democracy
promotion into single mechanisms, processes, and phases, thereby offering
a functional chain that can be operationalized following the three ana-
lytical steps of input (donors’ assumptions), throughput (interaction),
and output (target groups). The model combines the insights of different
theories on civil society, organizational development, and democratiza-
tion. It proposes a system of hypotheses and research questions that is
compatible with main interdisciplinary research strands. Furthermore,
the typology of the divided civil society reveals certain analytical gaps
in democracy promotion research. The different subtypes of the divided
civil society – social and political actors, volunteer and professionalized

organizations – are handled differently by external donors of money,
knowledge, and ideas. With the help of the model and the typology,
it becomes apparent that different forms and strategies of external
democracy promotion yield different forms and roles of civil society
with respect to its democratizing potential.
In this text, the key objective was to disentangle the process of
external democracy promotion via civil society in order to open the
black box and thereby reveal the missing links for a comprehensive
understanding of the democracy promotion issue. In bringing all
these elements together, we propose an integrative approach to the
dispersed attempts at theorizing and systematizing external democracy
promotion and civil society in post-socialist countries. On the basis of
our model, the specific objectives of support, the potentials and con-
straints of the supported subtype of civil society, and the coherence
of the input and output dimensions of democracy promotion can be
studied distinctively. Precise analyses of single elements of the models
and/or one of our related hypotheses are likely to result in important
normative and practical consequences for external democracy promo-
tion. Further research could, for example, investigate the development
of democratic culture by looking at social capital within and across
different subtypes of (civil) society. In summary, the hypothesis on the
civil society division through external democracy promotion might be
either falsified or supported. We hope that our model will provide a
feasible interdisciplinary tool to operationalize the empirical research
on civil society in post-socialist countries. We further hope that it
will encourage scholars to search for generalizable insights into the
causal links between external promotion, civil society, and democratic
development.
Notes
1. Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Slovakia.
2. The terms ‘democracy supporters’, ‘Western donors’, ‘Western support’,
‘external democracy promoters’ are usually used interchangeably for non-
domestic actors who support domestic actors in order to strengthen democ-
racy in the domestic actors’ home country.
3. Interview with Ghia Nodia, Caucasus Institute of Peace, Democracy and
Development (CIPDD), Tbilisi, June 2010.
4. ibid.
5. Interview with Miljenko Dereta, Civic Initiatives, Belgrade, March 2010.
6. For example, in Ukraine, more than 7,000 NGOs were registered in the year
2010 (Palyvoda and Golota 2010).
7. Research has focused democracy promotion strategies of the USA (inter
alia Pishchikova 2010; Magen, Risse and McFaul 2009), the EU (Knodt and
Jünemann 2007; Vachudova 2005; Schimmelfennig and Sedelmeier 2005;
Youngs 2008), or International Organizations (as for the OSCE: Richter
2009).
8. In his seminal Politeia, Aristotle described the societas civilis (Greek: politike
koinonia) as the association of free citizens engaging in self-governing their
community. Although conditions and meanings of citizenship and, hence,
of civil society have obviously changed since, the basic idea of voluntary
engagement in self-government is inherent in all modern definitions of and
discourses on civil society. See also Adloff (2005: 17f.).
9. For example, data on the density of organizations in a given entity (a state,
a city, etc.) is used to analyze, for example, Social Capital (cf. Franzen
and Freitag 2007). In this context the concept of Social Capital forms the
theoretical approach to a study, while the conceptualizations of civil society
remain solely operational.
10. Within Parson’s structural functionalist approach, each system and subsys-
tem runs four central functions: (A) Adaptation to changing environmental
conditions; (G) Goal attainment – that is, the ability of a system to define
and pursue certain goals; (I) Integration as the ability of a system to provide
cohesion and inclusion of the system itself; and (L) Latent pattern main-
tenance, which means the sustainment of basic structures and norms. The
social system can in turn be subdivided into basic functional components
which are related to these four functional aspects. These components are
the economy (A), the political system (G), the community (I), and the
cultural system (L). Since the community component contributes integra-
tion to the overall social subsystem, civil society has to be located here
(cf. Parsons, 1965).
11. This classification is based on a detailed listing of civil society’s functions
mainly proposed by Diamond (1999).
12. Further concepts that distinguish between ‘political conditionality’,
‘political dialogue’, and ‘financial incentives and capacity building’
(Börzel, Pamuk and Stahn 2009) or ‘democracy assistance’ and ‘political
conditionality’ (Youngs 2001) or further differentiate between ‘externaliza-
tion’, ‘imitation’, and ‘learning’ (Schimmelfennig 2008; Schimmelfennig
and Scholtz 2010) could be assigned to this classification (Hahn 2012:
287ff.).
13. This information is based on authors’ yet unpublished own empirical data
on Ukraine.
14. The term ‘professional’ is used in this context not in the meaning of good,
qualified and competent work, but literally in relation to entrepreneurship.
15. It is often criticized that if social matters are concerned, many civil society
organizations take over the implementation of tasks that in Western democ-
racies are considered responsibilities of the state administration. Since wel-
fare systems differ significantly among Western states, the ‘problem’ of the
state’s lack of responsibility may be interpreted differently.
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3
Democracy Promotion and Civil
Society: Regime Types, Transitions
Modes and Effects
Timm Beichelt and Wolfgang Merkel
3.1 Introduction
The literature on external democratization or democracy promotion1

has gone through different phases. During the heyday of Huntington’s
famous ‘third wave of democratization’ (Huntington, 1991), external
influence on regime transformation was not dealt with as a major factor.
There were a few exceptions (see, for example, Whitehead, 1986), but in
general regime transition was conceptualized predominantly as a domes-
tic affair. By the mid 1990s, when the European Union (EU) and other
international organizations made it clear that they would link the mem-
bership ambitions of new democracies to the real existence of certain
democratic institutions, the perspective changed. The external dimension
of democratization and democratic consolidation, and in particular the
influence by Western dominated organizations, attracted more attention
from political actors and scholars. Governments and, for example, the
European Commission started to design programs to enhance the capa-
city of transition regimes for democratic governance and implemented
tools to export institutions and values thought compatible with sustain-
able democratization (Carothers, 1999; Burnell, 2000).
In the years that followed, the international dimension was regarded
as the most important sphere for a successful transition. One reason
for this was the neo-liberal zeitgeist of the time. The Washington con-
sensus heavily impeded on post-socialist transition (Aslund, 2001), and
many of the countries that had opted for a radical reform course did
comparatively well a decade after the start of their economic transitions
(EBRD, 1999). The successful cases clustered around Central Europe,
which shifted the focus to another explanatory variable – the potential
of the EU and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) to induce
42
Democracy Promotion and Civil Society 43
democratic change in contested transitions. Particularly the EU did so by

providing incentives or putting pressure on neighboring countries and
governments, which took courses disliked by West European leaders.
Pertinent examples of successful Western interference seem to be
Slovakia (1998), Serbia (2000), Georgia (2003), and Ukraine (2004).
A few years later, we still find ourselves in a new phase. Both politi-
cal actors and scholars have become much more skeptical of democracy
promotion. Georgia and Ukraine cannot be considered as examples of
sustainable democratization anymore. Even the EU member states Bulgaria
and Romania have not yet developed beyond the stage of defective
democracies. It seems as if the chances for effective external democratiza-
tion action have diminished greatly. The once euphoric enthusiasm about
promotion of democracy has given way to a more sober analytical view
(Merkel, 2010, 488). It is obvious today that the potential of external
players to influence domestic regime outcomes is limited – especially if
relevant domestic leaders do not intend to transform their regimes into
full democracies. The farther east we look in Europe, the more this is the
rule than the exception. The state of the political regimes that remained
after EU enlargement does not provide realistic hope for rapid democrati-
zation. Most of the countries – in Eastern Europe, the Southern Caucasus
or the Western Balkans – have long historic traditions of autocratic rule,
bear strong socioeconomic disruptions or are divided in ethnic, religious,
or cultural terms. That makes most non-consolidated regimes of the post-
socialist space unlikely candidates for rapid democratization.
The research on external democratization can thus roughly be divided
into three phases: indifference, enthusiasm, and realism. The pace may
sometimes have been set by some few important international actors
like the United States (Cox et al., 2000), the United Nations (Newman &
Rich, 2004), and the European Union (Pridham, 2005). However, these
are not the only ‘promoters’ of democracy, and even they have to direct
their efforts to different global areas with different contexts. Moreover,
democracy promotion ‘recipients’ usually follow their respective agen-
das in various settings. As a result, a plethora of different constellations
between international democratizers, domestic elites, and local societies
can be observed.
How can we assess civil society involvement in democracy promotion
within these multiple opportunity structures? At least three sets of vari-
ables matter.
• First, the character of civil society itself needs to be determined.

Different types of civil society organizations (CSOs) can be
44 Timm Beichelt and Wolfgang Merkel
observed: domestic CSOs in democracy promoting states, domestic

CSOs in recipient countries, and transnational CSOs with pillars in
both Western countries and countries undergoing democratization.
• Second, we have to take into account the transition phase in which
a country is situated. Talk of a ‘third wave’ already suggested a
cohesiveness among democratizing countries that only existed in a
temporal, but certainly not in cultural, economic, or political terms.
Twenty years later, the pathways of democratization have forked
off into even more multifaceted directions: while some countries
have taken a clear path towards either democratic consolidation or
re-autocratization, others have oscillated between different regime
types and settled in a relative equilibrium as hybrid regimes. In this
chapter, we suggest considering the phase of stagnating or regressive
democratization, a process linked to the numerous hybrid regimes
between democracy and autocracy (see below).
• Third, democracy promotion with civil society involvement can take
place within different modes of external democratization, depending
on the mode of promoter-recipient relations and the degree of asym-
metry between the two sets of actors.
These three dimensions structure our text. We first discuss the relevance
of civil society for external democracy promotion at a general level, start-
ing with different conceptions of civil society contributions to democracy
and democratization (section 3.2). Then, we move on to an assessment
of civil society in different political regimes (section 3.3). After that we
link civil society related democracy promotion to various modes of demo-
cratic aid (section 3.4). In conclusion (section 3.5), we identify different
constellations between regimes and civil society which have evolved in
the complex configuration of civil society oriented democracy promotion.
3.2 Civil society functions and transition
In what constellations, and under what circumstances, is civil society

capable of playing a decisive role in the transition to democracy? More
than a decade ago, Hans-Joachim Lauth and Wolfgang Merkel mapped out
an ‘optimal’ sequence of types of civil societies for a successful transition
to democracy (Lauth & Merkel, 1997). Lauth and Merkel argued that
civil society’s impact needs to be distinguished by phases of democra-
tization. First, civil society may play a critical role in the liberalization
phase of an autocratic regime. In this phase, civil society often rein-
forces challenges to the ancien régime and forms a counter-hegemony
to autocratic incumbents by taking the form of a social movement (see

della Porta in this volume). This can be the time where civil society is
best mobilized, because the institutions and actors of the old regime are
weakened and new institutional actors are not yet established.
Second, the opportunity structure for civil society changes when the
new rules and structures of the emerging democracy become institu-
tionalized. Since democratic institutions are by definition weak during
the phase of their installation, new political parties are not established
and civil society groups find a large playing field for civic and political
action. At the same time, this phase marks a peak in political involvement
by civil society in transition politics.
Once democratic elections have been introduced and – thirdly –
democratic consolidation begins, democratic institutions are strengthened
by their constitutional prerogatives and public finances. Civic move-
ments are and should be complemented or even replaced by political
parties, which take over the function of aggregating citizens’ values and
preferences into proper political programs. For the pivotal actors in civil
society, this means the choice to either act within democratic politics or
to mobilize against elected governments (see also the systematization
of functions proposed by Hahn-Fuhr and Worschech in this volume).
Therefore, civil society’s loss of dominance can almost be seen as a
necessary condition for the institutionalization of representative democ-
racy during consolidation (for an illustration with regard to Bolivia, see
Wolff, 2012).
While we still think that such an ideal typical sequence of civil society’s
changing roles is written into the very logic of representative democracy,
we find it necessary to adapt Lauth and Merkel’s model to the huge
variety of post-socialist regime transitions. In particular, we have to take
into account the many cases of halted, reversed, and re-reversed regime
transformations that characterize the Western Balkans, the Southern
Caucasus and other Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries.
We define transition regimes in stagnation/reversion as regimes that
have (or have been) stopped on their way to democracy or have suffered
reversals without regressing to open autocracies.2 This includes halted
transition as well as re-autocratization within certain partial regimes
of the polity. Typically, stagnation is associated with regimes that are
neither fully consolidated as democracies nor have fully fallen back into
pure authoritarianism: they can be categorized as defective democracies
or hybrid regimes (Beichelt, 2011; Diamond, 2002; Karl, 1995).
In order to rethink the democratizing functions of civil society in
stagnating regimes, we should instead take another perspective and
approach civil society from its impact on articulation and aggregation

of interests as well as its impact on decision making. Irene Hahn-Fuhr
and Susann Worschech (in this volume) elaborated on a systematization
of different functions, following four strands of theoretical conceptuali-
zation of civil society and combining them with the time horizon
of their respective impact on democracy. They aggregate the single
functions as operating either in a ‘pro-state’ perspective, that means
supporting democratic culture from below as a general political attitude
of society, or in a ‘contra-state’ perspective, that means challenging anti-
democratic performance of state representatives and misuse of power
structures. We follow Hahn-Fuhr and Worschech’s idea, but leave out
the aspect of the time horizon here, and we further distinguish between
a total of five democratizing functions of civil society (Merkel, 2002)
which can be derived from the classic literature on civil society: protection
from state arbitrariness (Locke), balance between state and civil society
(Montesquieu), school of democracy (Tocqueville), production of social
capital (Putnam), public sphere and critique (Habermas).3
Protection from State Arbitrariness (Locke): In the liberal tradition,
emphasis is placed on the aspect of an independent social sphere
vis-à-vis the state. Locke, and later to a greater extent Adam Smith,
perceived society as the genuine social sphere beyond the state. Armed
with natural rights, people create a community in which societal life
freely evolves. In the best-case scenario, this pre- or non-political arena
can exist under the protection of the state but under no circumstances
under its authority. From this perspective, the protection of individuals’
autonomy, the development of their rights, as well as the securing of
their property are seen as central tasks of civil society. The function
assigned to civil society is therefore one of negative liberty; for example
citizens’ freedom from state interference. The spheres of civil society
and the state are strictly separated; their reconciliation does not appear
in the Lockeian perspective.
Balance Between State and Civil Society (Montesquieu): Montesquieu
blurs the sharp contrast between state and society. In his complex
model of the separation and interdependency of constitutional powers,
he identifies the balance between a central political authority and a
social network of corps intermédiares as a crucial theme. The strong central
(monarchic) government must be limited and embedded by both the
rule of law and checks and balances. However, the law loses its autho-
rity if it is not supported and invigorated by independent, yet legally
protected, bodies. These corps intermédiares are ‘amphibious’ bodies that
possess a life both within and outside the state, thereby connecting
the social and state spheres (Taylor, 1994, p. 142). This is because
the powerful central authority must be embedded by the rule of law
and interconnected with, limited and controlled by, a large number
of civic associations if freedom is to be secured. Montesquieu backs
institutions and organizations and does not place his trust primarily
in personal ‘virtue’ as did the philosophers of the ancient polis or of
communitarianism.
School of democracy (Tocqueville): Tocqueville builds on Montesquieu
and strengthens the concepts of the ‘free associations’ being the most
important guarantors of a free community. To him, organizations in
civil society are schools of democracy in which democratic thinking and
civil behavior are learned and included in day-to-day practice. While
citizens’ associations do actually function as places of self-government,
they may not be disproportionately large, but there must be many of
them. Moreover, they should establish themselves at all levels of the
political system, because if they wither away at the local level, freedom
and democracy at the national level are also endangered. Civil society
organizations serve to create and entrench civic virtues such as tole-
rance, mutual acceptance, honesty, integrity, trust and the courage to
stand up for one’s beliefs. They thereby accumulate social capital, with-
out which democracies are unable to emerge or consolidate in the long
term (Putnam, 1993). From the Tocquevillian perspective, civil society
arms democracy with a normative and participatory potential that both
serves to immunize against authoritarianism on the part of the state and
places internal limits on the tyrannical ambitions of social or political
majorities. In the Tocqueville tradition, the positive functions of civil
society for the entire democratic community are underlined and linked
by Ralf Dahrendorf to a distinctive participatory component of self-
government: civil society is ‘a world which offers individuals life chances,
without the state having to play a role’ (Dahrendorf, 1992, p. 80).
In this sense civil society is not only a school for democracy, but also
an integral sphere of it.
Production of Social Capital (Putnam): Robert Putnam (2000) has even
further developed the Tocquevillian idea of civil society as a school for
democracy. According to him, civic associations bring citizens together
to meet, communicate, deliberate, negotiate, and compromise. The
more people communicate and compromise, the more they learn to
trust each other. Mutual trust is the core of social capital. The higher the
accumulation of social capital, the lower the repressive functions and
the administrative transaction costs of the state: There can be no democ-
racy without social capital. Social capital that bridges different ethnic,
religious, cultural, and socioeconomic groups is particularly important,

as it leads to tolerant and fair democracies.
Public Sphere and Critique (Habermas): The concepts of civil society
shaped by critical theory go beyond Tocqueville, Dahrendorf, and Putnam.
They argue that civil society broadens the arena for interest articu-
lation and aggregation through the establishment of pre-institutional
pluralist interest mediation (Habermas, 1992; Keane, 1988; Cohen
& Arato, 1992). In their perspective, interests that are disadvantaged
and difficult to organize need to have access to public space. In order
to have an influence on the political agenda, the democratic process
is ‘dependent on the supply of informal public opinions’ that only
develop outside of ‘the structures of a non-empowered political public’
(Habermas, 1992, p. 374). Jürgen Habermas’ concept of civil society
is extraordinarily demanding. It excludes not only state institutions
and political parties, but also economic interest groups. Making up the
core of civil society in his concept are above all spontaneously created
groups, organizations, and movements which ‘find, take up and distill’
(Habermas, 1992, p. 433) the social problems of the private sphere and
then carry them into the political sphere as a kind of social amplifier.
Such a civil society may be sensitive to problems, but as a rule it is weak
in politics.
Given the different functions (see Table 3.1), we are now able to be more
specific about the potential democratic contributions of civil society
during the individual phases of democratization. First of all, Table 3.1
shows us that the peak hypothesis of Lauth and Merkel – a decline of
civil society’s relevance during the consolidation phase – can in particu-
lar be applied to the functions of state-society balance (Montesquieu)
and school of democracy (Tocqueville). Here, we have to be aware
of the potential legitimacy conflict between non-elected civil society
associations and democratically elected parties, parliaments, and
governments.
In contrast, liberal and communication theory – the theoretical
backbones of the Locke function and the Habermas function – contain
arguments that raise doubt about the alleged dangers of party politics.
Political parties can under certain circumstances become so entangled
with political power that they lose the function of an intermediary
locator between the state and society and degenerate into cartel parties
(Katz & Mair, 1995; Pateman, 1970). Therefore, civil society’s role as
a counterweight to institutional politics can grow with the maturing
of democracy. Its role to protect from state arbitrariness becomes more
relevant in the consolidation phase than in the institutionalization
phase. A similar argument holds for Putnam’s social capital function: the
Table 3.1 Relevance of civil society in different stages of democratization
Liberalization Institutionalization Consolidation Stagnation/

Regression
Protection from Low Intermediate High Intermediate

the State
Limited Growing relevance Civil society Declining space
potential for of state watch as emerging for state watch
state watch groups counterweight groups
groups to state
institutions
State-Society Intermediate High Intermediate Low
Balance
Mass Civil society Weak Decreasing
movements as recruitment counterweight counterweight
with limited reservoir for to democratic to semi-
organizational thoughts and state autocratic state
capacity, CSOs political personnel
still weak
School of High High Intermediate Low
Democracy
Strong Many opportunities More opportuni- Declining
mobilization for political ties for political opportunities
through civic participation and participation for for political
associations polity design for CSOs, but often participation
against the old CSOs disenchantment
regime with outcomes
Social Capital High Intermediate High Low
Strong The previously Long-term Disenchantment

mobilization more homogeneous opportunities and declining
leads to fast oppositional CSOs for producing space for CSOs
production of begin to pluralize social capital
social capital and fragment in a friendly
context
Communication High Intermediate High Intermediate
CSOs conquer Growing potential Secure space for Repression

public space for linking political pre-institutional of mass
as counter- institutions pluralist interest communication
hegemonic and mass mediation limits CSO
cultural and communication potential
political forces
higher the density of bridging associations, the better for the development
of democracy.
Table 3.1 also shows the precarious contribution of civil society to
democracy in the phase of stagnation (or within the hybrid regime
type). With regard to most functions, the impact of civil society on
the transitional regime decreases in comparison with the other phases.
Consolidation does not constitute a veritable point of reference because
those post-socialist countries that have developed into hybridity (for

example Armenia, Georgia, Moldova, Ukraine) have been stopped on
their way to democracy before reaching that phase. However, civil society
in stagnating regimes faces a diminished impact on democratization
also in comparison to the institutionalization or liberalization phases.
The main reason for this is the regained strength of authoritarian or
semi-authoritarian elites. During the liberalization phase, civil society
actors are in a morally superior position to forces of the ancien régime.
Even during the phase of institutionalization, CSOs can often count
on anti-party or anti-establishment sentiments in parts of the popula-
tion. With regard to several functions (state-society balance, school of
democracy, social capital), this advantage turns into a disadvantage in
the power relations between civil society and political elites in the case
of stagnation. The promises of democratization have not held, and in
this case it is much easier for political elites to insist on the illegitimacy
of civil society and its organizations. Therefore, civil society is less
capable of fulfilling all of its theoretically derived function – to serve
as a protecting shield against the state (Locke), to guarantee horizon-
tal control and thus provide a potential counterweight to the state
(Montesquieu), to participate in political life (Tocqueville), to exert its
bridging potential (Putnam), and to filter political decisions within the
institutions necessary for deliberation and communication (Habermas).
Almost 25 years after the fall of the Iron Curtain, post-socialist regimes
that have developed into hybrid regimes are therefore only to a limi-
ted extent likely to further profit from civil society’s democratizing
potential.
What does regime stagnation or reversion imply for civil society
and its capacity to strengthen democracy? With the reinforcement of
authoritarian governance and re-autocratization strategies, autono-
mous interest aggregation and civic self-organization are often not
appreciated by semi-autocratic elites. Within the sphere of political
institutions, civil society organizations can more easily be discriminated
against and banned than oppositional political parties. The dealings of
regime elites with CSOs in Russia and Ukraine may serve as primary
examples (Evans, 2012; Stewart, 2009).
On the other hand, there are limits to repressive discrimination
which the rulers of hybrid regimes have to respect. Only a handful of
openly repressive regimes – Belarus is the prime example – have been
ready to isolate themselves internationally, closing almost all indepen-
dent media and international non-governmental organizations (NGOs).
Many other regimes, which have not yet transgressed the borderline
to open authoritarianism refrain from such a step and tolerate some

societal autonomy including the spread of selected international or
national oppositional media. Also, most European post-socialist coun-
tries have so far opted to keep digital communication channels open.
In Egypt, the internet, Facebook, and Twitter were major tools of civil
society mobilization during the final throes of the Mubarak regime
(Howard & Hussain, 2011; Schraeder & Redissi, 2011). Despite the
limited democratizing potential of civil society during the stagnation
phase, we are nonetheless able to recognize a few areas where external
democratizers may successfully support civil society.
3.3 Civil society and political regimes: a blurred target

for external democratizers
In which areas are actors in the field of democracy promotion able to

help civil society in stagnating regimes? In order to get an analytical
grip on democratic stagnation, we can use a distinction of regimes into
sub-regimes that has been suggested by Wolfgang Merkel in a different
context (Merkel, 2004). Political regimes can be analytically subdivided
into five partial regimes: ‘the electoral regime, political rights of partici-
pation, civil rights, horizontal accountability, and the guarantee that
the effective power to govern lies in the hands of the democratically
elected representatives’ (ibid., 36). The functioning of these five partial
regimes secures the normative and functional existence of the whole
democratic regime. However, the concept has also been used with
reference to autocratic regimes (Møller & Skaaning, 2009, p. 257). In our
context, we now apply the concept to hybrid regimes.
The five partial regimes may be linked to the democratizing functions
of civil society. With regard to the Lockeian function, civil society ought
to protect society from illegitimate state interference by strengthening
the autonomous organizational capacity of society. This refers mainly
to the claim of political rights, civic rights, and horizontal account-
ability within the democratic regime. The Montesquieuan function
is relevant for the electoral regime since especially the ‘amphibian’
organizations of political parties link society and state. In addition it is
also sensitive for citizens’ and group rights. With regard to the school of
democracy function, external assistance concentrates on the activation
and strengthening of political participation and the partial regime of
political rights. The communication function is the most difficult to
target. In order to increase the public sphere, it has to be a major focus
of external and internal democratizers to guarantee the freedom of

information and the plurality of the media system.
What conclusions can be drawn about the opportunities of external
democratization? In general, the division by partial regimes shows that
there is hardly one dominant strategy of external democratization.
Stagnating regimes offer an overly complicated mix of democratic,
semi-democratic, semi-authoritarian, and sometimes purely authorita-
rian regime practices. Bureaucracies can be simultaneously rational and
patrimonial (this concerns the sub-regimes’ ‘horizontal control’ and
‘effective power to govern’). Often, the population consists of citizens
that demand political participation and of subjects that are apathetic
and belong to Almond and Verba’s subject or parochial cultures
(Howard, 2003). Both political theory and empirical evidence imply
that such diversity in the populace creates political elites that respond
to short-term challenges rather than invest in the hardships of build-
ing stable administrative, judicial, and political institutions (Higley &
Gunther, 1992; Gill, 1998; Kullberg & Zimmerman, 1999).
All this creates problems on two levels of action. First, actors within
domestic civil society have to be able to recognize opportunities for
their own drive for a more democratic regime. At least by instinct,
they have to distinguish between the different functions and partial
regimes in order to identify areas of action that have a positive effect on
democracy. For example, they have to be aware of the fact that political
participation (Tocquevilleian function) requires some degree of coope-
ration with the state and its institutions. In other words, CSOs have to
invest in a mutual and trustful relationship with political actors in the
partial regime of political rights. The same strategy, however, is not very
promising if civil society actors aim at establishing a strong counter-
weight to a state which already shows strong traits of authoritarian rule
(Montesquieu function). In this case, CSOs should keep a critical position
vis-à-vis state actors.
Second, things become even more complicated if we take the posi-
tion of external democratizers into account. They also have to be aware
of the various constellations between democratizing functions and
regimes. In addition, their actions need to be linked to the strategies
of domestic actors who have to make choices that are not at all clearly
arranged. Consequently, thinking about the existence of partial regimes
sheds light on an agency problem in the field of democracy promotion.
Constellations and contexts in transitions are uncertain to a high degree
which typically leads to asymmetrical information favoring agents over
principals (Williamson, 1985). Generally therefore, any external action
in regimes where democracy stagnates or regresses takes place in an

insecure environment where the outcome of external promotion is
highly contingent. The functional requirements of the different partial
regimes, as well as the overall political instability, render a general and
coherent course of democracy assistance almost impossible.
One observable strategy to escape uncertainty has been to concen-
trate external democratization on a small reservoir of civic groups that
is experienced enough to deal with internal contingency and external
donors (Carothers & Ottaway, 2000). Promoters of democracy prefer to
invest their aid in groups that are stable, unambiguously committed to
democracy, relevant, and know how to deal with directives of the donor
organizations (Lutsevych, 2013). Such domestic civic associations are
sometimes hard to find. In consequence, external actors tend to coope-
rate with a limited group of ‘professionalized’ NGOs that have learned
how to meet the bureaucratic demands of their grant givers (Ishkanian,
2008). One result of this strategy is the emergence of a ‘Divided Civil
Society’ in recipient countries (see Hahn-Fuhr and Worschech in this
volume) and the formation of supranational NGO patronage networks.
Therefore Western democracy assistance often constitutes an inter-
national ‘aid industry’ (van Rooy, 1998) thereby widening and deepening
‘a gap between a few well-established [transnational civil society] groups
and active citizens’ (Lutsevych, 2013, p. 1).
Despite these critical remarks, there may be few alternatives to sup-
porting those transnational, professionalized NGOs. Political elites and
established political organizations rarely constitute normatively attrac-
tive partners for democracy assistance in stagnating regimes. They are
often responsible for regression in the electoral sphere, they account for
reversals in the partial regimes of political or civic rights, and they are
involved in clientelism, corruption, and the circumvention of horizontal
accountability. If the West does not want to lose its influence on the
continued democratization of Eastern Europe or the Southern Caucasus
as a whole, it cannot refrain from sustainable cooperation with profes-
sionalized NGOs.
The focus of democracy promoters on professionalized NGOs is not
only due to a lack of alternative relevant CSOs. To this day many observers
are skeptical about the genuine potential of post-socialist societies
to develop a stable and self-sustained autonomy. The post-socialist
legacy of societal mistrust and a historic aversion to organizations were
seen as central impediments to a prospering civil society (Howard,
2003; Mendelson & Glenn, 2002). Despite elements of civic ‘recreation’,
post-socialist societies are often described as ‘formless’ (Alexander, 2000).
In more recent years, we can recognize a few societal sectors that have
developed a certain degree of communicative activism. For exam-
ple, the Russian blogosphere is identified as extraordinarily vigorous
(Konradova & Kalužskij, 2010). In various works, Armine Ishkanian
(see article in this volume) discovered a blossoming field of grassroots
organizations in several post-Soviet countries beyond Russia. However,
these myriad domestic civic associations emerge and persist beyond the
political. Many of them do not aim to democratize the core procedures
of democracy, such as political participation, protection of civil rights,
representation of neglected social interests, and controlling the execu-
tives. Therefore, international promoters of democracy cannot abstain
from supporting the more political transnational NGOs if they want to
see democratic progress in the short run.
Concluding on civil society oriented external democratization and
regime characteristics, most evidence tells us that the conventional
categories in transition studies barely cover the existing range of regime
constellations. The various functions of civil society crystallize in dif-
ferent partial regimes, but at the same time the stagnation of democ-
ratization turns all partial regimes into inherently unstable power
structures. External democratization is therefore characterized by great
uncertainty. Against this background, the support of professionalized
NGOs has become a dominant strategy, albeit one with the unintended
consequence of inner-societal alienation. Grassroots civil society may
be developing in some countries and sectors, but it seems to be too early
to declare these findings as an overall confirmed trend.
3.4 Civil society and democratization modes: multiple

options for donors and recipients
Our previous sections presented two areas that aggravate coherent

democracy promotion via civil society: the variety of democratizing
functions of civil society and the complexity of transition in different
sub-regimes of democracy and/or autocracy. Unfortunately, these two
areas are not the only ones that complicate the activities of external
democratizers. The ‘selection problem’ of democracy promotion (Merkel,
2010, p. 447) additionally poses the question of how domestic actors
should be approached and supported.
From the more recently developed modes of external influence on
domestic democratic development, we basically see three different
modes: conditionality, persuasion, and socialization (Beichelt, 2012;
Börzel & Risse, 2009; Magen & Morlino, 2009). If we cross-table them
with the functions of civil society explained in section 3.2, we find

general traits and typical affinities. On the general line, socialization
and persuasion seem to be the most important modes of interaction
among CSOs and their donors. Conditionality is not feasible due the
limited financial resources directly allocated to CSOs by Western donors
(some figures can be found in Beichelt, 2012, p. 2). However, that also
depends on the size of the country – EU funds in Bosnia-Herzegovina
and US aid to Georgia certainly have a greater impact on democratic
development than all the international democratic aid for big countries
such as Indonesia or Nigeria.
It is true that most grant givers operate with soft conditionalities in
their contracts. However, the implementation and supervision of the con-
ditionalities is extremely difficult or even impossible. Non-accomplished
tasks in promoted projects can usually not be followed by sanctions. In
contrast, the professional NGOs have the option of strategically choosing
between various grant-giving organizations. This is especially true in
countries that have been declared a priority by Western governments or
international organizations; Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo, Georgia, and
Ukraine are the most important examples. The intense communication –
both by socialization and persuasion – between Western donors and
domestic civil society bears all the characteristics of a transnational advo-
cacy network (Keck & Sikkink, 1999) rather than a conditional top-down
structure.
However, conditionality is not completely absent from civil society
oriented democracy promotion. When we turn to the functions of civil
society in detail, we find that civil society’s relevance for democratiza-
tion depends on the state’s readiness to grant at least some degree of
societal autonomy. For example, the Lockeian function of civil society is
closely linked to the willingness of state officials to refrain from arbitrary
action against civil society and its associations. External democratizers
aiming to strengthen this function not only have to invest in pressure-
resistant groups but may also try to convince domestic governments of
hybrid regimes to respect an autonomous civic sphere.
This aspect deserves special emphasis. Even if democracy promoters
focus on the support of civil society, they also have to take into account
the interests of domestic political elites as well as administrative and
judicial actors. As we have outlined in sections 3.2 and 3.3, this is not
true for all possible constellations in the interplay of democratizing
functions and sub-regimes. However, there are enough fields of civil
society oriented democracy promotion that do not yield effective
results if assistance is directed towards civil society alone. Therefore
the support of CSOs often has to be accompanied and backed by some

cooperation between external donors and state institutions. This is
especially the case when authoritarian regressions are already manifest
in the transitional regime. With the multiple programs of capacity-
building and the will of many post-socialist governments to become
better integrated into the sphere of the European Union, conditionality
towards the state and its elites may indirectly help strengthen civil
society. The field of action for intermediary bodies grows and decreases
with the state’s will to recognize societal autonomy and to cooperate
with civic organizations.
Tocqueville emphasized the importance of civic socialization. His
idea was that both the internal organization of civic groups and their
contribution to institutional politics enhance citizens’ understanding
of democratic norms, rules, and procedures. It is active civic coopera-
tion where the school of democracy provides practical lectures on civic
virtues such as tolerance, mutual acceptance, honesty, integrity, trust,
and the courage to stand up for one’s beliefs. External supporters have
the greatest impact on domestic NGOs by interacting on equal terms as
equal partners or even leaving the ‘driver’s seat’ to the domestic NGOs.
The function of communication is also marked by the mode of
persuasion. Persuasion by external democratizers is directed towards
domestic non-democratic or semi-democratic elites, who have to be
persuaded to accept democratic rules in the transition process (Linz,
1990). Empirical evidence tells us that even close communicative links
between the West and stagnating regimes barely lead domestic elites to
accept civil society’s needs. For example, Regina Heller finds that the
implementation of human rights norms in Russia is halted wherever
they become incompatible with the power interests of the Russian
elite (Heller, 2008, 306). As a consequence of these findings, external
supporters might choose to strengthen the internal public sphere, for
example by investing in exchange and training programs for journalists.
Again, such a strategy is much more promising if hybrid regime elites
are persuaded on a complementary basis to better respect the autonomy
of ‘speakers’ (Habermas) in the public sphere.
Advocacy networks evolving around CSOs develop their own
communicative channels and structures. The exchange of ideas and
knowledge between organized societal actors is one of the major com-
ponents of the development of transnational civil society (White, 1994;
Keane, 2003). Under certain conditions arguing can create ‘islands of
persuasion’ (Deitelhoff, 2006, p. 280). Within international advocacy
coalitions, norm entrepreneurs of democratization can thus transform
non-democratic norms and behavior into democratic ones. But such

a success depends heavily on the existence of certain preconditions.
A study by Manal Jamal on civil society oriented democracy promotion
in Palestine and El Salvador has shown that external democracy promo-
tion is not only dependent on communicative processes among all actor
groups but also on the inclusivity of political settlements in general.
Where certain groups are excluded from the settlement, external
democratization efforts may even weaken the quality of civil society as
the main carrier of democratic institutionalization and consolidation
( Jamal, 2012).
In sum, civil society oriented democracy assistance can work through
different modes, but there is no golden rule to which democracy pro-
moters can adhere. There is empirical evidence that promoting CSOs via
socialization and resource rendering may have a positive effect on short-
term protest mobilization such as in the color revolution (Bunce &
Wolchik, 2009; 2010; Finkel et al., 2007). However, instances of external
‘flash support’ – as in the cases of Ukraine, Georgia, and Kirgizstan –
particularly failed to have a lasting effect on democratization. All the
aforementioned regimes can at best be described as stagnating or hybrid
regimes on a slippery slope to increasing authoritarian governance. The
EU stands as a counter example [or alternative] to external flash support if
it is able to offer EU membership. Indeed, EU conditionality works well in
connection with the substantial incentive of prospective EU membership
(Schimmelfennig, 2005). This instrument is not available for various rea-
sons in the post-Soviet space. Simple conditionality may arguably have
some democratizing effects, but quite frequently these effects may also
stabilize semi- or fully authoritarian regimes (Ademmer, 2013).
All this does not mean that the success of foreign assistance to civil
society is completely dependent on domestic leaders. The autonomy
of civil society is a value in itself and so is civil society’s potential to
feed societal preferences in the political process. Instruments within
the modes of socialization and persuasion help strengthen both. It is
uncertain, however, to what extent such civil society assistance can be
transformed into progress in the field of democratization.
3.5 Conclusion: paths of civil society oriented democracy

promotion
When external democratizers invest in domestic civil society, they

have different objectives in mind. We have argued that these aims can
be ordered by various functions of civil society in democracy. The five
functions identified – labeled by the theorists who perceived them:

Locke, Montesquieu, Tocqueville, Putnam, Habermas – are not isolated
from each other. On the contrary: despite their belonging to different
schools of political thought (Adloff, 2005), the functions complement
one another. For example, the school of democracy impact is stronger
if accompanied by a vibrant sphere of public discourse, and social capi-
tal can be more intensively accumulated if the autonomous sphere of
civil society is guaranteed. When trying to strengthen civil society, it is
therefore not likely that foreign actors aim at only one of the discussed
functions. Both theoretically and empirically, we should expect them to
assist civil society in a broad manner (Burnell, 2000; Finkel et al., 2007).
Altogether, we are able to classify four patterns of civil society oriented
democracy promotion (see Table 3.2). The table evolves from both
theoretical and empirical considerations. The theoretical component
consists of the orientation toward different democratizing functions
of democracy and their combination with other relevant categories of
transition research (regime constellations, external democratization
modes). In contrast, the last column offers observable paths of civil
society oriented democracy promotion which we have found in the
pertinent literature.
In detail, actors who try to strengthen the Lockeian function to protect
an autonomous individual and civil sphere against state interferences
need to concentrate on the partial regimes of civic rights and horizontal
accountability. Section 3.4 has shown that this is likely to happen in
the mode of conditionality; hence political actors and administrative
elites beyond civil society have to be addressed by external democracy
promoters. Direct support of CSOs can only play a complementary role
here; a primary example consists in the failed consolidations of the
color revolutions in Georgia and Ukraine (again, see Bunce & Wolchik,
2010). In our view, civil society oriented democracy promotion bears
some potential for effectiveness. However, the success of the strategy
sometimes also depends on the scope of incentives offered to officials
and on the amount of resources provided to CSOs.
Within the frame of the Montesquieuian function, external pro-
moters often try to secure free and at least somewhat fair elections by
putting pressure on domestic political elites. By advocating the voice
of society as an electorate, they hope to empower civil society as an
instance of horizontal control and thus as a potential counterweight
to the main actors of the semi-authoritarian state. This ‘electoral
strategy’ has often proven not to be sustainable unless domestic elites
have a vested interest in opening the political regime and therefore to
Table 3.2 Patterns of civil society oriented democracy promotion
Function of Most relevant Prevailing Path of civil society

civil society regime mode of oriented democracy
with regard to constellation external promotion
democratization democratic aid
Protection from Civic and Conditionality Focus on political

state interference political rights, and administrative
horizontal elites, accompanied by
control specific support for CS
watchdog organizations
State-society Electoral Conditionality Focus on political elites,
balance regime, rhetorical support of
civic rights, societal interests
horizontal
accountability
School of Civic and Socialization Focus on (professional-
democracy political rights ized) CSOs, rhetorical
pleas to political elites
Social capital Civic and Socialization Focus on a broad set of
political rights domestic CSOs
Communication Political rights, Persuasion Focus on political elites
effective and CSOs (including
government media)
proceed with democratization. In the post-Soviet sphere outside the

realm of the EU, this seems to be rather unlikely because of the West’s
limited political will and capacity to change the hybrid character of
the political regimes (for empirical evidence, see Schimmelfennig et al.,
2006; Schimmelfennig & Scholtz, 2008). Moreover, it has to compete
with Russia’s support of authoritarian modes of governance in the region.
Gas, other natural resources, and geographical proximity guarantee that
Russia’s aid to autocratic regimes has a greater impact than the promo-
tion of democracy from the major Western powers and organizations.
The constellation changes significantly if international democratizers
try to strengthen the Tocquevillean function. Here, they follow a sociali-
zation strategy, supporting civic networks as schools of democracy, and
have the considerable advantage of following a normatively impeccable
strategy. Cooperation with semi-autocratic political elites rests on a low
profile, and resources are provided to groups that pursue democratic aims.
Empirical evidence has shown that this strategy does not seem to be very
effective in the post-Soviet cases where stagnation and outright autocratic
reversals dominate (Henderson, 2003). Because of the traditionally

and politically weakened societal autonomy (Howard, 2003), the CSOs
that have survived are not embedded within a flourishing domestic civil
society. They are often alien organizations that represent transnational
ideas and networks rather than the needs and traditions of the domestic
society (Lutsevych, 2013). As such, they may give examples of internally
inclusive structures. However, they are neither embedded nor appropri-
ate as role models for a sustainable participatory democracy.
The production of social capital is intricately linked to Tocqueville’s
school of democracy and, to a lesser degree, to Habermas’ public sphere.
The idea is to accumulate social capital through the cooperation of
people in common associations, networks, and civil society activities. The
core of social capital is mutual interpersonal trust. But there is also a clear
difference from Tocqueville. Putnam (2000) distinguishes between two
sorts of social capital: bonding and bridging social capital. In bonding
social capital, for example, mutual trust is accumulated within socially,
culturally, religiously, and ethnically homogenous circles, subcultures,
and associations. Its contribution to successful democratization is meager
if not outright harmful, since the subcultural segmentation of a society
sometimes leads to wide and even hostile cleavages vis-à-vis other reli-
gious and ethnic subcultures. That could and can be seen in the post-
Yugoslav societies, Russia, Malaysia, and in many countries undergoing
democratization in Africa. On the contrary, bridging social capital is only
positive for democracy. ‘Bridging’ means that civic associations assemble
people from different classes, religions, ethnicities, and cultures in one
organization (for example trade unions, sport clubs, neighborhood meet-
ings) and stimulate contact, communication, and trust, thereby bridging
subcultural divisions in society.
The Habermas function to strengthen the democratic public sphere
mainly works through the mode of persuasion. In certain cases, this can
offer the prospects of success for external democratizers. Domestic actors
must be convinced that an autonomous society with open channels of
deliberation is linked to the aims of individual freedoms and political
decisions that are in line with the needs and preferences of the popu-
lation (Habermas, 1992: chapters 7 & 8). The developments in Serbia
since the year 2000 may serve as an example of successful persuasive
politics (Binnendijk & Marovic, 2006).
However, the Serbian case also shows us that persuasion alone does
not win the game. In addition to convincing CSOs to deliberate across
all parts of society, the focus also needs to be put on political elites, who
are needed to guarantee the legal frame for mass media communication.
Foreign governments and international organizations using the mode of

persuasion are much less likely to find themselves accused of hypocrisy
than those who employ the mode of conditionality. However, such low
profile democratic aid will only have a sustainable impact on democra-
tization if the external support endures and produces multiplier effects
among domestic actors of the public sphere. Continuity, durability, and
reliability of democratic aid are necessary conditions for each sustainable
effect on democratization.
Altogether, there seems to be one major conclusion. Despite its con-
vincing normative potential, civil society oriented external assistance to
democracy building in stagnating regimes only offers limited prospects
of success. Its effectiveness heavily depends on the willingness of domestic
political elites to allow for autonomous societal organization, which
has a direct impact on how core democratic institutions and procedures
function. If the semi-authoritarian rulers deny those guarantees, civil
society oriented democracy promotion may be helpful for the develop-
ment of civil society but hardly brings a short or mid-term contribution
to the further institutionalization or consolidation of democracy.
Notes
1. The two terms ‘external democratization’ and ‘democracy promotion’ will be
used interchangeably in this chapter.
2. We insist that this does not constitute a teleological statement. The develop-
ment of authoritarian regimes into an unknown something else is always a
contingent process. Within the transition paradigm, we see different paths
of development – stagnation is the descriptive term for one; consolidation the
term for another possible path.
3. The following passages are largely taken over from Merkel 2002.
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the Analytical Ground,’ Democratization, 1, 375–90.
L. Whitehead (1986), ‘International Aspects of Democratization,’ in G.A.
O’donnell, P.C. Schmitter & L. Whitehead (eds) Transitions from Authoritarian
Rule. Comparative Perspectives, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
O. Williamson (1985), The Economic Institutions of Capitalism, New York: Free
Press.
J. Wolff (2012), ‘Democracy Promotion, Empowerment, and Self-Determination:
Conflicting objectives in US and German policies towards Bolivia,’
Democratization, 19, 415–37.
Part II
Democracy Promoters: Actors,
Objectives, and Approaches
4
From the Unity of Goodness to
Conflicting Objectives: The Inherent
Tensions in the External Promotion
of Democracy and Civil Society
Jonas Wolff
Since 1990, democracy promotion has become a prominent aim and

strategy of the foreign and development policies of the established
democracies in the global North-West. This political rise was premised
on the assumption that in supporting the global spread of democratic
regimes, finally, ‘values and interests reinforce each other’ (Talbott,
1996, 49).1 In fact, the ‘third wave of democratization’ (Huntington,
1991) and the end of the Cold War, in combination with paradigmatic
shifts in academic and political debates, suggested that promoting
democracy would contribute to a host of other goods, such as peace
and stability, economic development, and poverty reduction. With
democracy promotion, then, came a revival of the old liberal belief in
the ‘unity of goodness’: the idea ‘that all good things go together and
that the achievement of one desirable social goal aids the achievement
of others’ (Huntington, 1970, 5; see Packenham, 1973, 123–9).
Recent experiences with coercive regime change and, in particular,
the cases of Afghanistan and Iraq certainly had a sobering effect on
this debate and provoked a revival of critical analyses of the norma-
tive and conceptual premises underlying democracy promotion (see
Goldsmith, 2008; Hobson & Kurki, 2012; Ish-Shalom, 2006; Smith,
2007; Whitehead, 2009). Specifically, scholars have taken issue with
the notion of ‘all good things go together’ by arguing that the promo-
tion of democracy is frequently confronted with conflicting, not com-
plementary objectives, including outright dilemmas (Leininger et al.,
2012; Spanger & Wolff, 2007; Wolff et al., 2013). This argument relates
to debates about the dilemmas of peace and state building (Grimm,
2008; Jarstad & Sisk, 2008; Paris & Sisk, 2009), but emphasizes that we
are dealing here with a more general problématique that reaches beyond
67
68 Jonas Wolff
the prominent and particularly difficult cases of democratization after

military intervention and/or civil war. Conflicting objectives also have
to be seen as part and parcel of the day-to-day business of promoting
democracy in the broad range of countries that have already established
basic democratic institutions and are not challenged by violent conflict
(Wolff, 2012). This, inter alia, includes most of the Central and Eastern
European countries dealt with in this volume. In this chapter, I will
argue that the well-known dilemmas inherent to democratization imply
that external democracy promotion is systematically confronted with
conflicting objectives – conflicting objectives that concern both the
overall business of democracy promotion and the specific field of civil
society support.
The chapter proceeds as follows. It begins by sketching the rise of
democracy promotion and the related idea of harmony associated with
it. Then, I outline three general dilemmas of democratization, which
are in fact basic dilemmas of democracy intensified by democratization.
Third, the conflicting objectives on the part of external democracy pro-
moters that result from these dilemmas are summarized. I conclude by
discussing specific conflicts of objectives that concern external support
for civil society as a means for democracy promotion.
4.1 The rise of democracy promotion and

the idea of harmony
When trying to identify the starting point of the rise of ‘modern’ democ-
racy promotion as we know it today, a plausible candidate is the US
government led by Ronald Reagan. Of course, the idea that established
democracies in their foreign policy should aim at globally spreading
democracy has a long history, particularly in the United States (Smith,
1994). More specifically, Reagan’s democracy promotion agenda had
direct precursors such as Jimmy Carter’s human rights policy (Guilhot,
2005, chapter 2) and the international work of the German political
foundations (Mair, 2000). But still it is Reagan that best represents the
new way of politicizing (US) foreign aid that culminated, in the 1990s,
in establishing democracy promotion as a new paradigm of North-
Western foreign and development policy as well as in ‘the emergence
of a virtual democracy promotion industry’ (Schraeder, 2003, 25; see
Burnell, 2000; Carothers, 1999).
In the Reagan years, specialized agencies explicitly in charge of pro-
moting democracy around the world such as the National Endowment
for Democracy (NED) were created, and existing agencies like the US
From the Unity of Goodness to Conflicting Objectives 69
Agency for International Development (USAID) developed an increasingly

‘political’ approach to foreign aid. Even if Reagan’s democracy promo-
tion agenda was clearly conceptualized as a strategy in the framework of
the Cold War, it united four core features that characterize contempo-
rary democracy promotion. First, the declared aim to support the spread
of democracy around the world enabled an ideological convergence of
(neo-)liberal and (neo-)conservative thought. This convergence, second,
facilitated a broad political alliance ranging from ‘Cold Warriors’ to
human rights activists. Third, a broad range of policy tools became
instruments for the promotion of democracy: from diplomacy (‘war
of ideas’) and development assistance (USAID, NED) to (para)military
means (CIA, army). Fourth, politicization went hand in hand with
conceptual narrowing down: Human rights were understood as civil and
political liberties, democracy defined as a procedurally limited version
of polyarchy, and democracy promotion conceptualized as support for
capitalist market democracy.2
This ‘politicization’ of foreign aid was also supported by changes in
the international development discourse and, namely, by the emergence
of the concept of ‘good governance’. During the 1980s, the World Bank
discovered that political institutions were crucial for development and,
in a report on Sub-Saharan Africa in 1989, introduced the term ‘good
governance’ (World Bank, 1989, xii). The concept rapidly spread among
bi- and multilateral ‘donors’ and, since the early 1990s, can be regarded
a leitmotif in the development discourse. Although the rather techno-
cratic notion of good governance and the explicitly political concept
of democracy promotion are, at first sight, quite different in nature, in
actual practice they are almost indistinguishable. From the very begin-
ning, good governance included public accountability and pluralistic
political institutions, freedom of press, and human rights (World Bank,
1989, xii & 61); in the contemporary development discourse, ‘good
governance has become interchangeable with “democratic governance”’
(Engel & Olsen, 2005, 4). Conversely, classic topics of the good govern-
ance agenda such as anti-corruption and rule of law are core elements
of usual democracy promotion strategies. Contemporary democracy
promotion, in this sense, merges rather technocratic notions of good
governance and explicitly political notions of democracy and human
rights into a relatively uniform agenda. In conceptualizing democracy
promotion as liberal democracy promotion, this agenda focuses on
‘certain key liberal democratic procedures – encompassing electoral
processes and institutionalization of rule of law, freedoms of expression,
press and association’ (Kurki, 2010, 363).3
70 Jonas Wolff
With the end of the Cold War, more and more states and international
organizations adopted democracy promotion as a declared aim and
strategy of their foreign and/or development policies. In the mid 1990s,
US President Bill Clinton proclaimed his strategy of democratic enlarge-
ment. As the 1995 National Security Strategy declared: ‘All of America’s
strategic interests – from promoting prosperity at home to checking
global threats abroad before they threaten our territory – are served
by enlarging the community of democratic and free market nations.’
(The White House, 1995, 22; see Talbott, 1996) Responding to 9/11, the
National Security Strategies released under President George W. Bush
merely sharpened this rhetoric: Now, the US committed herself ‘to seek
and support democratic movements and institutions in every nation
and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world. […]
This is the best way to provide enduring security for the American
people’ (The White House, 2006, 1; see The White House, 2002). The
increasing relevance of democracy promotion also shows up in the
rather silent work of development aid. Since 1990, the budget of USAID
devoted to democracy assistance has been rising almost continuously.
Since 2001, it is the third most important aid category (after ‘Agriculture
and Growth’ and ‘Health’). At the same, US aid in the ‘democracy
and governance‘ sector, which had been very much focused on Latin
America until 1990, became globalized to cover all regions of the world
(Azpuru et al., 2008, 152–7).
Germany also followed this trend (see Rüland & Werz, 2002; Youngs,
2006, 109–32; Wolff et al., 2013). Since 1991, German development
aid has officially been conditional on political criteria that include
human rights, rule of law, and political participation. German govern-
ments usually commit themselves to promote ‘democracy and human
rights worldwide’ (CDU et al., 2005, 13). In 2005, the Federal Ministry
for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) for the first time
released a position paper on the ‘promotion of democracy in German
development policy’ (BMZ, 2005). In terms of financial resources, the
share of the German aid budget devoted to the core area ‘democracy,
civil society and public administration’ increased from €280 million
or 6.2 percent in 2000 to €410 million or 9 percent in 2006. Data for
most North-Western donors – such as the UK, the Netherlands, Sweden,
Denmark, and the European Union (EU) – show corresponding trends
(Youngs, 2008, 160–9).
Existing research agrees that this overall rise in the importance of
democracy promotion in foreign and development policies is only
very partially – and inconsistently – translated into actual political
practice (see Schraeder, 2003; Spanger & Wolff, 2007; Wolff et al., 2013;
Youngs, 2004, 183–4). ‘Classic’ types of development assistance aiming
at socioeconomic and humanitarian purposes still dominate inter-
national development aid; political conditionalities are applied only
hesitantly and selectively; and the usual range of perceived national
interests (mainly security and economic interests) continues to prevent
democratic norms from coherently guiding foreign and development
policies.4
These qualifications notwithstanding, the rise of democracy promo-
tion as an official paradigm of democratic foreign and development
policies is still remarkable. In trying to explain this rise, existing
research suggests five factors (see Burnell, 2000, 39–44; Spanger & Wolff,
2007, 263–6).5 First, in democracies, both citizens and governments
are assumed to share a general normative preference for those (liberal)
democratic norms that prevail in their own societies. This preference
implies a certain moral impetus to externalize those norms by promoting
the spread of democracy, especially because democratic norms are based
on a universalist conception of (liberal) human rights. Second, the end of
the Cold War reduced the (perceived) risk associated with democratiza-
tion, namely, the ‘threat’ that the breakdown of ‘reliable’ authoritarian
regimes might lead not to pro-Western liberal democracy but facilitate
some kind of communist regime. North-Western preferences for liberal
democracy, thus, no longer took a back seat to the perceived necessity of
building strategic alliances against the Soviet Union.6 Third, the ongoing
wave of democratization increased both demand and opportunities for
international democracy promotion. The noble aim to support democ-
racy, fourth, proved also suitable – in the arena of domestic politics and
internationally – to (re-)legitimize foreign and development policies in
a new era in need of new paradigms.
The fifth factor directly leads to the overall topic of this chapter
and concerns changing academic paradigms which made democracy
promotion seem feasible and useful. In the area of development studies,
as indicated earlier, classic modernization theory was replaced by
the good governance discourse. While the former regarded political
democratization as the final stage of complex processes of moderni-
zation, the latter sees the shape of political institutions as crucial for
enabling (socioeconomic) development. As Amartya Sen (1999, 4) nicely
summarized this paradigm change, the problem now was no longer
to make developing countries become ‘fit for democracy’ but rather to
help them ‘become fit through democracy’. In a related development,
democratization studies analyzing democratic transitions in Southern
72 Jonas Wolff
Europe and Latin America also came to abandon modernization theory

and structuralist approaches. Instead, scholars emphasized the role of
actors (especially elites) and their specific choices in delimited periods
of time (see O’Donnell & Schmitter, 1986).7 Finally, in the discipline of
International Relations, the Liberal Democratic Peace paradigm became
increasingly prominent. By positing – contra (neo-)realism – that
democracies are generally, or at least vis-à-vis other democratic states,
more peaceful than non-democratic regimes, the Democratic Peace
meant that democratization directly contributed to peace and security
(see Cox et al., 2000; Ish-Shalom, 2006; Smith, 2007).
As a result, democracy promotion could be seen as a strategy in
which, finally, ‘realist’ interests and ‘liberal’ norms became one.8 The
Democratic Peace, in particular, became a general theme running
through official remarks about democracy promotion – most notably,
but not exclusively in the US discourse (see Poppe, 2010). In 1992, then
presidential candidate Bill Clinton argued that US strategic interests and
moral values were both rooted in the goal to promote ‘the powerful
global movement toward democracy and market economies’: ‘As we help
democracy expand, we make ourselves and our allies safer. Democracies
rarely go to war with each other or traffic in terrorism. They make more
reliable partners in trade and diplomacy.’ (Clinton, 1992) This is not
too different from the neo-conservative reading of a ‘strategic value of
democracy’ reflected ‘in a truth of international politics: Democracies
rarely, if ever, wage war against one another’ (Kaplan & Kristol 2003,
104, quoted in Ish-Shalom, 2006, 586). This directly leads to the ‘clear
premise’ behind President George W. Bush’s national security strategy,
namely, that US national security ‘depends on the advance of liberty in
other nations’ (Bush, 2006). Correspondingly, a USAID strategy paper
on democracy promotion regards democracy as ‘central to our national
security’ (USAID, 2005, 5). Even if US rhetoric is generally much more
explicit and simplistic in this regard, the general motif can be also seen
in European discourses. According to the German Federal Ministry for
Economic Cooperation and Development, for instance, the promotion
of democracy supports, at the same time, ‘stability, mitigates crises and
strengthens a democratic culture’: ‘Furthermore, democracies do behave
more peacefully in their foreign relations: They more rarely wage war
against each other.’ (BMZ, 2005, 7)
This role of the academic paradigm of the Democratic Peace in the
political rise of democracy promotion was also noted by scholars.
Summarizing the 1990s discourse about US democracy promotion,
Michael Cox and colleagues concluded that ‘if democracies did not go
to war with each other – as many now seemed to believe – then the US
clearly had a vested interest in making the world safe for democracy’
(Cox et al., 2000, 6). This (implicit) reference to Woodrow Wilson shows
that ‘the belief that the nation’s security is best protected by the expan-
sion of democracy worldwide’ (Smith, 1994, 9) can be traced back to
the early twentieth century. However, in comparison with the previous,
rather diffuse belief in the intrinsic value and peace-proneness of
democracy, the academically proven ‘truth’ of the Democratic Peace –
in combination with the notion that transitions to democracy were
possible irrespective of structural ‘preconditions’ and promised benefits
also in terms of development – offered a much more concise conceptual
foundation for a policy of active democracy promotion (see Ish-Shalom,
2006; Smith, 2007).9
4.2 Dilemmas of democratization and conflicting

objectives in democracy promotion
The notion that democratic regimes should be actively spread around

the world because democracy has not only an ‘intrinsic’, but also a
multiple ‘instrumental value’ (Sen, 1999, 10; emphasis in the original) has
always been contested. Yet, in the brief period of ‘liberal triumphalism’
after 1990, such contestation was relatively marginal both academi-
cally and politically. Since the turn of the millennium, it has clearly
resurfaced. In this sense, Laurence Whitehead has speculated that the
dramatic failure of the regime change imposed by military force in Iraq
might become a historical turning point for the international promo-
tion of democracy: Just as the successful transitions in Spain, Poland,
and South Africa represented key events in the rise of democracy
promotion, Iraq could become the symbol of the beginning of a new
historical era in which democratization and democracy promotion,
again, reveals its ‘dark side’ (Whitehead, 2009, 215). The revival of
normative and conceptual critiques of democracy promotion discussed
in the introduction to this chapter supports this idea, as does the
increased political resistance (‘backlash’) against democracy promotion
on the part of those countries at the receiving ends (Carothers, 2010).
As a result, in the contemporary debate, the expectation that democ-
racy promotion could be regarded as promoting ‘all good things’ at
the same time, is seriously questioned. This, first, concerns the above-
mentioned observation that democratization does not always bring peace
to (post-)conflict countries and, in part, can even fuel political violence.
Second, some autocratic regimes have proven remarkably successful in
74 Jonas Wolff
terms of economic growth and poverty reduction. Especially China’s

economic success story has revived the old argument that (economic)
governability – at least, in developing countries – might be served best
by some kind of authoritarian developmental state (see Fukuyama,
2012). Third, democratic procedures have enabled the emergence and
election of political movements in Latin America (‘radical populists’)
and the Arab world (‘Islamists’) that are perceived, in the North-West, as
threats to liberal democracy (see Castañeda, 2006; Burnell, 2011). These
observations point to three general dilemmas of democracy: democracy
vs. stability, democracy vs. governability, and democracy vs. majority
(Spanger & Wolff, 2007, 266–70). While these dilemmas are inherent
to democracy as ‘a system of ruled open-endedness, or organized uncer-
tainty’ (Przeworski, 1991, 13), they become specifically problematic in
processes of democratization.
Democracy versus stability: Democratic regimes – and, in particular,
political regimes in a process of democratization – can be threatened
by escalating conflict that overburdens and, therefore, destabilizes the
existing democratic institutions. As a result, repressive and/or authori-
tarian strategies might promise to stabilize the political order at the
expense of democracy. Sticking to democratic principles, by contrast,
can lead to further destabilization and conflict escalation and, thus,
undermine the very basis of any democratic order. This dilemma is, of
course, far from new. Challenging harmonious conceptions of moderni-
zation, Samuel Huntington in 1970 explained ‘violence and instability’
in the Third World as ‘the product of rapid social change and the rapid
mobilization of new groups into politics coupled with the slow deve-
lopment of political institutions’ (Huntington, 1970, 5). In developing
countries, he argued, too much democratic participation and competi-
tion might overstretch the capacities of (fragile) political institutions.
The consequence is a plea for sequencing that has, once again, entered
the discussion: effective state institutions first, democratic participation
and competition later (Mansfield & Snyder, 2007).
However, the problem is not only about fragile institutions. The
central paradox of democracy, Larry Diamond has argued, is between
conflict and consensus: Democracy is based on conflict and competition;
yet, this implies ‘the risk of its becoming too intense, producing a society
so conflict-ridden that civil peace and political stability are jeopardized’
(Diamond, 1990, 49). To avoid this, a democratic regime has to rely
on ‘universally accepted boundaries’ to competition and a basic soci-
etal consensus that tempers social cleavages (Diamond, 1990, 49).
Now, in countries that undergo processes of political change both
political institutions and societal consensus tend to be particularly

fragile. Quantitative studies on the onset of civil war confirm these
considerations: A ‘semi-democratic’ regime type and, especially, a process
of regime change significantly increase the statistical risk of large-scale
violence (Hegre et al., 2001; Cederman et al., 2010).
Democracy versus governability: A plethora of contradicting societal
demands may render effective and democratic governance impossible.
Here it is a government’s capacity to decide on and implement coher-
ent (economic) policies that can be made impossible under conditions
of democratic pluralism. This critique of mass democracy has a long
history that can be traced back to the ancient Greek’s caution against the
irrationality of the unqualified ‘plebs’ (Buchstein & Jörke, 2003, 475).
In the 1970s, it experienced a revival in the conservative critique of the
‘ungovernability’ of modern democracies (Offe, 1979). Less democratic
participation was, then, the supposed response to ensure ‘rational’
political decision-making (especially in the area of economic policies) –
a recipe also found later in the shock therapy offered to developing
countries in order to facilitate the implementation of painful, but alleg-
edly necessary structural adjustment programs (Klein, 2007). In more
general terms, this problem refers to two further paradoxes of democ-
racy outlined by Diamond: On the hand, ‘representativeness’ and
‘governability’ are in tension because governments and political parties
in democracies have to respond to the conflicting interests articulated
by interest-group demands; but at the same time they have to ‘resist
them’ and ‘have sufficient autonomy to rise above them’ in order to
govern (Diamond, 1990, 49). On the other hand, ‘consent’ collides
with ‘effectiveness’ when it causes elected leaders ‘to be reluctant to
pursue unpopular policies, no matter how wise or necessary they may
be’ (Diamond, 1990, 50).
Democracy versus majority: Democratic majority decisions can violate
basic principles of democracy. In contemporary liberal democracies,
‘constitutionalism’ and the ‘rule of law’ normally provide effective
‘counterweights to the supremacy of the people’, specifically through
‘enforceable human rights, constitutional courts, the territorial and
functional division of powers, and the autonomy of the central banks’
(Mény & Surel, 2002, 9). In addition, again, a certain basic societal
consensus – a ‘belief in a “thick” collective identity’ – is necessary
for majority rule to ‘lose its threatening character’ (Scharpf, 1999, 8).
Systematically, however, the ‘uneasy marriage of two components’
remains: ‘a liberal element that limits the scope and reach of government
in the name of preserving individual freedom, and an element based on
76 Jonas Wolff
popular sovereignty that calls for majority rule, as expressed at the ballot
box’ (Plattner, 2002, 59; see Zakaria, 2003). ‘Germany 1933’ is, historically,
the most dramatic example for a certainly not really democratic, but
still majoritarian decision to abolish democracy. More recently, the
2006 victory of Hamas in Palestine was read by many, especially in the
North-West, as a contemporary version of this problématique (Turner,
2006). The general point here is the fear that Islamist movements in the
Arab world might use democratic procedures to enforce substantially
undemocratic policies (Zakaria, 2003, chapter 4).
4.3 Extrinsic and intrinsic conflicts
The three dilemmas discussed above refer to political developments

within countries that may be ‘recipients’ of democracy promotion.
From the perspective of external actors, they clearly undermine the har-
monious conception of democracy promotion outlined in the first part
of the chapter. To the extent that democratic procedures or processes of
democratization in a given country produce one or some of the dyna-
mics sketched above, democracy promoters will be confronted with
serious conflicts of objectives. Analytically, it is useful to distinguish
between two kinds of conflicts: In extrinsic conflicts of objectives, the
aim to promote democracy clashes with other ‘donor’ interests, while,
in intrinsic ones, different dimensions and subgoals of democracy pro-
motion collide (Spanger & Wolff, 2007, 267; see Leininger et al., 2012;
Wolff et al., 2013).
When democracy in a given situation is perceived as threatening
stability and peace, the intrinsic conflict of objectives is straightforward:
Should a democracy promoter try everything to prevent breaches of the
democratic order even if this might threaten the very basis of democracy?
Or does promoting democracy, under such circumstances, require tole-
rating or even supporting temporary violations of democratic principles
in order to guarantee stability and peace and, thus, set the basis for
a democratic development over the long haul? At the same time,
an extrinsic conflict of objectives emerges to the extent that ‘donor’
interests are also threatened. Destabilization and conflict escalation
in a ‘recipient’ country can, of course, affect democracy promoters’
economic interests related to trade or foreign investment as well as
security interests of various kinds.
When the tension between democracy and governability comes to
a head, two main dimensions of democracy promotion collide. Just as
democracy relies on input and output legitimization (Scharpf, 1999,
chapter 1), democracy promotion aims at supporting both: democratic
institutions in order to improve the extent and quality of participation,

representation, and accountability (input dimension); and the capacity
and performance of the democratic state, most notably in the area of
economic and social policies (output dimension). An intrinsic conflict
of objectives arises when demoting democracy is perceived as neces-
sary to improve governability. Typical examples of such a deliberate
(if partial) demotion of democracy include establishing constraints on
democratic participation and competition (for example through high
thresholds in parliamentary elections that reduce the number of political
parties), or increasing the relative autonomy of supposedly ‘technical’
state entities (such as the Central Bank) in order to reduce their account-
ability vis-à-vis the democratically elected powers of the state. Problems
of ‘ungovernability’ can, again, also harm ‘donor’ interests of a given
democracy promoter and, thus, provoke extrinsic conflicts of objectives.
While destabilization and violent conflict directly threaten economic
and/or security interests, such interests, in the case of ‘ungovernability’,
are rather harmed by omission: To the extent that a ‘recipient’ govern-
ment is incapable of pursuing ‘sound’ policies, political decisions that
would render benefits to the ‘donor’ are not taken or not (coherently)
implemented. As the above-mentioned example of structural adjustment
programs highlights, what ‘sound’ policies would look like remains in
the eye of the beholder. It is therefore well possible that external democ-
racy promoters perceive conflicting objectives due to a situation of
‘ungovernability’, when – from the ‘recipient’ perspective – the ‘failure’
to implement a coherent package of neo-liberal economic reforms is not
seen as the problem but rather as part of the solution.
The most clear-cut cases of intrinsic conflicts of objectives are pro-
voked by manifestations of the third dilemma. Here, it is really core
principles of democracy that clash, which leads to additional collisions
of principles of democracy promotion. As far as democracy in the
‘recipient’ country is concerned, the question for democracy promoters
is whether to accept or reject political decisions that procedurally rely
on democratic legitimization but are seen by the ‘donors’ as substan-
tially undemocratic. On the level of democracy promotion, this leads to
the further (intrinsic) clash between the external actor’s aims to support
democratic self-determination and to protect specific democratic princi-
ples (Wolff, 2012, 417–19). Extrinsic conflicts of objectives emerge when
sovereign, democratic decisions in a ‘recipient’ country are perceived as
negatively affecting ‘donor’ interests.10 The above-mentioned case of
the Hamas victory in 2006 shows how intrinsic and extrinsic conflicts
may coalesce: The election of a political movement that is regarded as
fundamentally undemocratic, at the same time, was seen as threatening
78 Jonas Wolff
crucial security interests, especially related to Israel (see Turner, 2006). To

be sure, ‘recipient’ policies do not have to violate democratic principles
in order to harm ‘donor’ interests. For instance, ‘recipient’ governments’
decisions to reject a trade agreement with the EU, to reduce coope-
ration in the US ‘wars’ on terror or drugs, or to intensify South-South
cooperation affect North-Western interests. But such decisions do not
immediately provoke any kind of intrinsic conflict of objectives. Still,
empirically, we find that ‘donors’ tend to perceive ‘recipient’ policies
that threaten their security or economic interests as also harmful to
democracy in the ‘recipient’ country – or at least as indicating a limited
liberal democratic orientation in the government in question. This is
because, from the ‘donor’ perspective, reliable foreign, economic, and
security policies, growing economic and security cooperation as well as
protection of investors’ rights are all supposed to support democracy in
the ‘recipient’ country (see Wolff et al., 2013).11
It is well known in the literature that democracy promotion policies
are, at times, confronted with extrinsic conflicts of objectives. Usually
scholars argue that, when the two collide, foreign policy interests prevail
over the normative goal of democracy (Carothers, 1999, 16; Schraeder,
2003, 41). When also taking the intrinsic dimension of conflicting objec-
tives into account, the picture becomes much more complicated. First,
even an idealized, entirely disinterested democracy promotion policy will
have to deal with contradictory principles and make difficult normative
choices. As the ways in which intrinsic conflicts of objectives are dealt
with depends on the specific concept of democracy held by the particular
democracy promoter, particular ‘donor’ preferences necessarily re-enter
the process – if not in terms of ‘material’ interests but as ideological,
normative, or cultural predispositions (see Hobson & Kurki, 2012). Any
strategy of democracy promotion is, thus, necessarily incoherent and par-
ticularistic (Poppe & Wolff, 2013). This leads to the second implication.
In any particular ‘recipient’ context, there is normally no clear-cut, quasi
objective guideline as to what ‘genuine’ democracy promotion might
require. Therefore, real-world democracy promoters, even when pursu-
ing purely interest-driven policies, have quite some leeway to frame and
justify what they do as also normatively appropriate (Wolff et al., 2013).
4.4 Conclusion
This chapter has not specifically discussed the role and relevance of civil
society for democratization and democracy promotion. Still, the issues
discussed do have immediate implications in this regard. During the
1990s, civil society was largely conceptualized in line with the harmonious
notion of democratization and democracy promotion outlined above.
As Carothers and Ottaway observed at the end of that decade, among
policy-makers and many democratic theorists, the idea prevailed that
civil society was ‘always a positive force for democracy, indeed even
the most important one’: As a vibrant civil society was seen as ‘both
the force that can hold governments accountable and the base upon
which a truly democratic political culture can be built’, promoting civil
society development became ‘key to democracy-building’ (Carothers &
Ottaway, 2000, 4). Carothers had already criticized many of the prob-
lematic assumptions behind this conception of civil society (support)
in 1999.12 In their contribution to this volume, Irene Hahn-Fuhr and
Susann Worschech show that democracy promotion that focuses on
supporting civil society can have counterproductive effects – if it helps
produce a divided and, in part, externally dependent civil society. The
general dilemmas and conflicting objectives discussed in this chapter
further add to this, if on a more basic level.
Civil society plays an ambivalent role in all three dilemmas of
democratization – with corresponding implications for external civil
society support. In the Huntingtonian version of the democracy versus
stability dilemma, a civil society that is too vibrant (to use contemporary
parlance) is at the heart of the problem: too much societal mobilization
producing too much societal demands on fragile political institutions.
The same logic applies to the democracy versus governability dilemma.
Here, again, the plural and contradictory claims that emerge from (civil)
society constitute the problem. Third, the dilemma of democracy versus
majority points to the much-discussed fact that civil society actors can
also represent values that deviate from liberal democratic ideals. In this
sense, the focus on elite-run NGOs in North-Western democracy pro-
motion (Carothers, 1999–2000, 19–20)13 can be read as a strategic way
to (preventively) deal with the conflicting objectives discussed here:
Civil society support, then, would deliberately privilege those societal
organizations that best fit – and least challenge – the relatively narrow
form of liberal democracy or ‘polyarchy’ which mainstream democracy
promoters aim at (see Ayers, 2006; Crawford & Abdulai, 2012; Gills,
2000; Robinson, 1996).
Once again, the experience of the ‘third wave of democratization’
is telling. When pro-democracy movements toppled authoritarian
regimes in Southern Europe, Latin America, and Central and Eastern
Europe, efforts to support these transitions clearly contributed (even if
to a limited extent) to the political emancipation of oppressed societies.
80 Jonas Wolff
At the same time, however, North-Western democracy promotion has

not meant unambiguous support for an emancipatory project, but also
aimed at containing the corresponding processes of democratic change
in terms of liberalism and capitalism while incorporating the respec-
tive countries into a world order dominated politically, economically,
and ideologically by the North-West (Robinson, 1996). But civil society
support, just as democracy promotion in general, cannot guarantee the
success of such a policy.14 It remains fundamentally inconsistent. As
discussed in the introduction to this volume, a narrow focus on some
‘like-minded’ organizations in civil society can delegitimize precisely
those groups that one aimed to strengthen. Democracy promotion
policies that are too openly driven by particular ‘donor’ preferences will
undermine the credibility – and, thus, the effectiveness – of democracy
promotion while helping to mobilize opponents to both North-Western
interference and liberal (market) democracy. In the end, both the demo-
cratic political regime and the arena of civil society in which this regime
is embedded constitute opportunity structures that only serve to shape,
but can never determine the dynamics of political struggle.
Notes
1. This contribution is based on research conducted within the framework of the
project ‘Determinants of democratic states’ handling of conflicting objectives
in democracy promotion’ jointly conducted by the Peace Research Institute
Frankfurt (PRIF) and Goethe University Frankfurt, and supported by the
German Research Foundation (DFG). The chapter, specifically, draws on a paper
co-authored with Hans-Joachim Spanger (Spanger & Wolff, 2007). The overall
results of the research project are published in Wolff et al. (2013). The author
thanks Caroline Fricke and the editors of this volume for helpful comments.
2. On Reagan’s democracy promotion agenda, see Carothers (1991), Guilhot
(1995, chapters 1-2), and Robinson (1996, chapters 1–2).
3. At the core of international democracy promotion is, thus, a procedural
concept of democracy as proposed by Robert Dahl that is expanded with
a view to explicitly emphasizing the rule of law, an effective, efficient, and
transparent administration, an independent and plural civil society, and
political and civil rights (see Ayers, 2006, 323–32; Carothers, 1999, 85–8).
Generally, liberal democracy is also thought to encompass a capitalist (free
market) economy, as made explicit by Bill Clinton’s emphasis on ‘market
democracy’ (Gills, 2000, 329).
4. Furthermore, despite all international declarations and pronouncements,
there is (still) no agreement on the precise content of the very aim of democ-
racy promotion, that is, about the concept of democracy (see Hobson &
Kurki, 2012; Kurki, 2010).
5. For a systematic attempt to identify competing theoretical approaches to
democracy promotion, see Wolff and Wurm (2011).
6. The Cold War reasoning is best exemplified by John F. Kennedy’s outline

of US preferences for a future political regime in the Dominican Republic
after the death of long-term dictator Trujillo: ‘There are three possibilities in
descending order of preference: a decent democratic regime, a continuation
of the Trujillo regime, or a Castro regime. We ought to aim at the first, but we
really can’t denounce the second until we are sure we can avoid the third.’
(quoted in Smith, 1994, 226)
7. As Carothers (2002, 8) summarizes one of the core assumptions of the
so-called transition paradigm, ‘the underlying conditions in transitional
countries – their economic level, political history, institutional legacies, ethnic
make-up, sociocultural traditions, or other “structural” features – will not be
major factors in either the onset or the outcome of the transition process’.
To be sure, many studies on democratization such as the famous one by
O’Donnell and colleagues were decidedly aware of the complexities of transi-
tions (‘from authoritarian rule’, not ‘towards democracy’). Yet, at least in the
discourse on democracy promotion, transition studies were very much per-
ceived along the simplistic lines characterized and criticized by Carothers.
8. Notably, also critical scholars tended to agree with the expectation that
democracy promotion – as actually exercised by the ‘North-West’ (and the
US in particular) – indeed directly served strategic interests: ‘Polyarchy has
been promoted by the transnational elite as the political counterpart to
neo-liberalism. [...] The demands, grievances, and aspirations of the popu-
lar classes tend to become neutralized less through direct repression than
through ideological mechanisms, political co-optation and disorganization,
and the limits imposed by the global economy. While mediating inter-class
relations, polyarchy is also a more propitious institutional arrangement for
the resolution of conflicts among dominant groups. With its mechanisms
for intra-elite compromise and accommodation and for hegemonic incorpo-
ration of popular majorities, polyarchy is better equipped in the new global
environment to legitimize the political authority of dominant groups and
to achieve enough of a minimally stable political environment, under the
conflict-ridden and fluid conditions of emergent global society, for global
capitalism to operate.’ (Robinson, 2003, 54; see also , 2000; Robinson, 1996)
9. Ultimately, this can lead to ‘democratic wars’, that is, wars fought by
democracies for democratic purposes (Geis et al., 2006): As an antinomy of
Democratic Peace, the belief in democracies’ peacefulness – and in the very
norms that are thought to constitute this peacefulness – can motivate (and/
or justify) the use of military force to bring democracy and peace to people
living in non-democratic regimes (Müller & Wolff, 2006).
10. In contrast to the first two dilemmas, it is, thus, intentional political action on
the ‘recipient’ side which triggers the conflict of objectives in this third case.
11. Accordingly, ‘donors’ conceive of their interests – for instance in security or
economic cooperation – normally not as expressing egoistic ‘national inter-
ests’ but as common interests of both ‘donor’ and ‘recipient’.
12. Among the assumptions Carothers (1999–2000) took issue with are: that
NGOs are the heart of civil society; that civil society is warm and fuzzy; that
a strong civil society ensures democracy (and vice versa).
13. See also Ayers (2006); Crawford and Abdulai (2012); Hearn and Robinson
(2000); Ottaway and Carothers (2000); Sundstrom (2006).
82 Jonas Wolff
14. It is important to add that this policy cannot be analyzed as the result of
intentional collective action orchestrated by some transnational class, as
Robinson (1996) seems to suggest. Of course, the diverse North-Western
democracy promoters follow multiple – and, at times, contradictory – policies
and are driven by quite different and complex motives.
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5
The Changing Nature of EU
Support to Civil Society
Natalia Shapovalova and Richard Youngs
Until the creation of the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP), the

European Union (EU) was neither a visible player in the external
democracy promotion arena, nor a known supporter of civil society
groups in post-Soviet countries. The European Commission focused
primarily on technical assistance to economic transformation and social
and humanitarian projects rather than political reform. The US and
some EU member states had a much higher profile and greater clout
when it came to promoting democracy in the former Soviet republics.
With the development of the ENP – and especially since the creation of
the Eastern Partnership – the EU has gradually become a more proac-
tive, unified actor in democracy promotion in the Eastern neighbor-
hood. Several external events (including Ukraine’s Orange Revolution,
in which the EU got involved) played a role in this transformation. But
there was also a greater push within the EU, coming mainly from new
member states, for more genuine support of democratic agents in the
Eastern neighborhood.
Echoing the experience of Eastern enlargement, the ENP originally
put most emphasis on top-down Europeanization. This approach
struggled to gain traction. With little or no previous experience of
democratic rule, East European and South Caucasus post-Soviet states
were less advanced in democratic transformation than most of the EU’s
post-socialist new entrants. In the absence of an accession carrot, EU
promises of a stake in the internal market and visa facilitation were
weak incentives for undemocratic rulers to reform.
Since 2009, the EU’s Eastern Partnership (EaP) has tried to address
these drawbacks, introducing new tools to enhance the involvement of
non-governmental actors. The motif has been one of more bottom-up
and locally driven democracy support. One of the main novelties of the
86
The Changing Nature of EU Support to Civil Society 87
EaP was the EU’s attempt to reach out beyond state institutions and
tighten modes of engagement with non-state actors. In 2011 the EU
unveiled a new concept of ‘partnership with society’, offering enhanced
assistance to non-state actors in the neighborhood. Under the EaP, the
EU has gradually become a more engaged and unified actor in democ-
racy promotion in the Eastern neighborhood.
Existing academic studies have tended to pay less attention to
overtly political European civil society support than the export of – and
compliance with – EU governance rules (Forsberg, 2011; Lavenex &
Schimmelfennig, 2009, 2011; Schimmelfennig, 2011; Schimmelfenning
& Sedelmaier, 2004; Smith & Weber, 2011). Attention has also been
paid to the extensive array of formal instruments of democracy pro-
motion (Kotzian et al., 2011). There is a slight risk that such academic
concerns underplay the weakness of the more political dimensions of
EU democracy support (Youngs, 2009, 2010). With an aim to comple-
ment and correct these biases in recent academic concerns, this chapter
examines EU support to civil society in the Eastern neighborhood from
a long-term perspective, outlining the main stages of its evolution.
It concludes that the EU has genuinely turned over a new leaf in its
support to democracy through civil society development. However, it
argues that the EU still needs more fundamentally to review the way it
implements civil society support in the Eastern neighborhood if its new
initiatives are to contribute effectively to demand-driven, bottom-up
reform. Our aim here is to offer a rich empirical canvas as foundation
for the conceptual points drawn elsewhere in this volume.
5.1 The EU’s record in the Eastern neighborhood
In the 1990s and early 2000s, the EU was the largest multilateral
donor to Eastern European and South Caucasus post-Soviet countries.
At the time, it paid greatest attention to stability and market reforms.
Partnership and Cooperation Agreements (PCA) signed with the post-
Soviet countries during the 1990s were concerned primarily with trade
and economic cooperation. The main instrument for financial assis-
tance to post-Soviet states (Technical Assistance to the Commonwealth
of Independent States – TACIS), was not tailored to democratization but
focused on trade and investment promotion and government capacity
building. In Ukraine only a small amount of TACIS funds went to civil
society development, independent media, and democracy: only €10
million out of a total €212 million Commission aid allocation for 2004
to 2006 (European Commission, 2003).
88 Natalia Shapovalova and Richard Youngs
Human rights and democracy promotion in post-Soviet countries was

accorded some substance by the European Instrument for Democracy
and Human Rights (EIDHR). This support was channeled through both
a micro-projects grant scheme and large projects run by local civic
bodies, international non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and
intergovernmental organizations such as the Council of Europe. Eastern
European countries were not funded equally. Commission delegations
were first established in Ukraine (in 1993) and Georgia (in 1995), and
ran micro-project grant schemes in these countries from 2002. These
were followed by Belarus (from Kyiv) and Armenia (from Tbilisi) in
2005–6. By contrast, micro-project schemes were not established in
Moldova and Azerbaijan owing to the lack of EU diplomatic presence.
Between 2000 and 2006, only two large-scale projects were conducted
in Azerbaijan (one of which was implemented by the UN Children’s
Fund), and three in Moldova (one of which was run by the Council of
Europe).1
However, EIDHR did not prioritize direct civil society strengthening
for democratic reform. The largest grants were often awarded to the
Council of Europe, UN agencies, or big international NGOs to imple-
ment projects on human rights, media freedom, and peace-building in
post-Soviet countries. Given the limited size of the Commission’s grants
and the requirement that recipients match up to 20 percent of a grant
with their own funding, only well-established, highly professionalized,
and mainly capital-based organizations emerged as regular beneficiar-
ies (EuropeAid, 2007). The projects financed by EIDHR in the Eastern
neighborhood countries chiefly focused on social rights protection and
to a lesser extent on voter education and election monitoring.
A major exception to this pattern was in Belarus, where political
conditions under the Lukashenka regime did not allow the EU to
sign the PCA or freely implement TACIS projects. As a result, EU aid
moved to finance humanitarian and social projects. Since 2004, the
EU has increased its assistance to non-state actors in Belarus, support-
ing the establishment of independent radio broadcasting, funding the
European Humanities University (which was expelled from Minsk to
Vilnius), and assisting civil society activists and organizations ( Jarabik
& Silitski, 2008).
A change in EU democracy promotion strategy towards Eastern
European and South Caucasus post-Soviet countries began to occur after
2005 as a result of EU enlargement and the introduction of the ENP.
Events such as Georgia’s Rose Revolution of 2003 and Ukraine’s Orange
Revolution of 2004 led to the EU becoming one of the key democracy
promotion actors in the Eastern neighborhood. This gave hope to many

Europeans working in the field of democracy and civil society promo-
tion that the transitions in Georgia and Ukraine would have a significant
impact on other post-Soviet authoritarian regimes. As a Ukrainian think
tank wrote in 2004, ‘[f]rom a cautious and primarily economic partner
who was wary of aggravating Russia unnecessarily, the EU suddenly
became a proactive, lively defender of the democratic movement in
Ukraine’ (ICPS, 2004, 8).
The EU introduced elements of positive conditionality through ENP
Action Plans signed with Moldova and Ukraine in 2005 and with the
South Caucasus countries in 2006. The Commission enhanced channels
for political dialogue and people-to-people contacts, while also strength-
ening its assistance to neighbor countries in the East by introducing new
instruments and increasing the volume of aid.
The European Neighbourhood and Partnership Instrument (ENPI)
replaced TACIS in 2007, and made support for democratic development
and good governance a priority. This aim received around 30 percent of
the total ENPI budget in the Eastern neighborhood countries. In sup-
port of this priority Ukraine was allocated €148 million for 2007–10;
Moldova received €73.4 million; Armenia, €29.5 million; Azerbaijan,
€30 million; and Georgia, €31.5 million (European Commission, 2007).
However, these funds were primarily channeled to governments, as over
70 percent of aid was granted in the form of sector budget support. Only
ENPI cross-border and regional cooperation mechanisms involved local
authorities and civil society. Some EU democracy funds were imple-
mented through an EU–Council of Europe Joint Programme, but in
most cases public authorities were the main partners in projects falling
under this program. In the case of Belarus, 70 percent of ENPI fund-
ing was used to support the population’s economic and social needs;
democracy and civil society received only €13.8 million for 2007–11
(ENPI, 2007).
ENP Action Plans with Moldova, Ukraine, Armenia, and Azerbaijan
aimed to foster and facilitate civil society development. This fell under
the priority area of strengthening human rights and fundamental
freedoms. The EU-Azerbaijan Action Plan explicitly envisaged simplifying
the cumbersome procedures that NGOs must complete in order to
register. Dialogue with civil society was also promised in the context
of educational reform, environmental governance, the fight against
corruption, and resolution of frozen conflicts. In addition, Actions
Plans with Moldova and Ukraine contained brief chapters on civil
society cooperation under the priority area ‘People-to-people contacts’.
However, in the ENP’s implementation, scarce attention was paid to

improving the general political environment for civil society in neigh-
bor countries, or to involving civil society actors in the monitoring and
assessment of EU aid to the region (European Commission, n.d.).
In 2007, the Commission introduced the thematic program Non-State
Actors and Local Authorities in Development (NSA-LA) funded under
the Development Cooperation Instrument (Table 5.1). This provides
grants to civil society organizations (CSOs) and local authorities in
order to strengthen their capacities in poverty reduction and sustain-
able development, ensure participatory and inclusive development,
and citizens’ involvement in development issues. Such funding focused
initially on the South Caucasus countries and Belarus; since 2010 it
has focused more on Moldova and since 2011 on Ukraine. Grants
under this program can go up to €1 million, as determined by the EU
Delegations managing calls for projects. The program only tangentially
supports democracy by empowering non-state actors; its primary focus
is on the facilitation of social and economic development.
Since 2007, the EU has enhanced its direct support to CSOs in the
Eastern neighborhood under the reformed EIDHR. The country-based
support schemes were launched in the ENP Eastern countries in 2007,
except in Belarus where it was launched one year later (Table 5.2).2
In addition to the country-based schemes, the EIDHR envisaged the
possibility of ad hoc small grants to human rights defenders to meet
their urgent needs and support to non-registered organizations in duly
justified cases (Belarus and Azerbaijan reportedly benefited from this
scheme, though the Commission did not report on these measures
ostensibly for the sake of grantees’ safety).
Table 5.1 Non-state actors and local authorities in development, 2007–12 (EUR)
Country/Year 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012
Armenia 1,500,000 800,000 800,000 750,000 650,000 600,000

Azerbaijan 1,000,000 1,000,000 1,000,000 700,000 – 700,000
Belarus 1,000,000 1,000,000 1,000,000 1,000,000 2,400,000 200,000
Georgia 2,000,000 650,000 650,000 650,000 400,000 550,000
Moldova – – – 500,000 450,000 450,000
Ukraine – – – – 950,000 950,000
Total ENP-East 5,500,000 3,450,000 3,450,000 3,600,000 4,850,000 3,450,000
Source: European Commission, Thematic program ‘Non-State Actors and Local Authorities
in Development’, Annual Action Programs, 2007–12.
The amount of EIDHR aid available to civil societies through the

country-based schemes did not reach the levels of funding allocated by
the United States. In 2007–8 the European Commission allocated €6.9
million to all the six countries, whereas just one US-funded project on
strengthening civil society’s capacity in the fight against corruption in
Ukraine from 2007–9 amounted to $9.8 million.3 USAID has also paid
more attention to NGOs’ organizational capacity, providing financing
for training and resource centers.
Furthermore, the Instrument for Stability aimed among other objectives
at conflict prevention and peace-building since 2007 has supported civil
society involvement in confidence building in the zones of separatist
conflicts in Moldova and the South Caucasus.
Despite all these improvements and commitments, the ENP did not
become an effective or especially focused democracy promotion tool.
ENP strategic documents – such as the ‘Wider Europe – Neighbourhood’
Communication of 2003 and the ENP Strategy Paper of 2004 – considered
the main objective to lie ‘in strengthening the stability, security and
well-being’ of the neighboring countries, rather than explicitly aim-
ing to promote democracy. Most of the objectives of the ENP Action
Plans remained unfulfilled, especially those referring to democracy, rule
of law, and human rights. The quality of democracy indicators in the
Eastern neighbors during the period 2005–8 deteriorated (Boonstra &
Shapovalova, 2010, 2).
As the EU’s attention began to drift from the Eastern to the Southern
neighborhood, Sweden and Poland advocated enhancing EU policy
towards the Eastern neighborhood by launching the Eastern Partnership
Table 5.2 EIDHR allocations to country-based support schemes in the Eastern

Partnership countries in 2007–12 (in EUR)
Country/Year 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012
Armenia 600,000 600,000 600,000 600,000 900,000 900,000

Azerbaijan 900,000 900,000 – 1,200,000 – 900,000
Belarus – 300,000 300,000 450,000 500,000 500,000
Georgia 900,000 900,000 1,200,000 1,200,000 1,200,000 1,200,000
Moldova 300,000 300,000 600,000 600,000 1,200,000 1,000,000
Ukraine 600,000 600,000 600,000 600,000 1,200,000 1,200,000
Total ENP-East 3,300,000 3,600,000 3,300,000 4,650,000 5,000,000 5,700,000
Source: European Commission, EIDHR, Annual Action Programs, 2007–12.

initiative in May 2008. Security concerns aggravated by the Russia-Georgia

war in August 2008 ensured EU-wide support of the new initiative. The
EaP is essentially a strengthened version of the ENP. It is based on the
principle of conditionality and offers Eastern neighborhood countries
closer political cooperation and economic integration with the EU.
Association Agreements being negotiated with all EaP countries except
Belarus will contain articles on developing democracy, human rights,
and rule of law. Deep and comprehensive free trade agreements link
neighbor countries more closely to the EU common market by lowering
trade barriers and transferring EU norms to neighbors’ legal systems.
Finally, the EU has shown readiness to abolish its visa regime, given
that partner countries have met all the technical and security criteria
asked of them.
One of the most important EaP innovations has been a greater
involvement of non-governmental actors in the EU’s cooperation with
neighboring countries. The European Commission proposed supporting
the further development of CSOs and establishing an EaP Civil Society
Forum ‘to promote contacts among CSOs and facilitate their dialogue
with public authorities’ (European Commission, 2008). The promise
to increase civil society participation was also made in the context of
reforming democratic institutions. In addition, the Commission sug-
gested increasing contact between parliamentarians, local and regional
authorities, and business circles by establishing fora for multilateral
cooperation.
EU democracy assistance channeled through civil society actors
represents only a small share of EU aid to Eastern neighbor countries.
Although funding to CSOs in EaP countries provided through EIDHR
has gradually increased from €3.3 million in 2007 to €5.7 million in
2012, it still focuses on a limited number of issues. Grants mainly go to
well-established and highly professionalized NGOs; civil society actors
such as labor unions, business associations, and informal civic initia-
tives and social movements remain outside the scope of EU support.
Only in Belarus – where the EU has limited dialogue with the country’s
authorities – has aid covered a broader range of actors, including politi-
cal dissidents.
A major shortcoming of EU aid to civil society remains the means
of provision. Civil society actors have complained that receiving EU
funds is complicated and time-consuming; long-standing and familiar
gripes are still heard regarding the bureaucratic reporting process. There
is still often a year-long wait between submitting an application and
funding being granted, which means that the project concept may
become outdated and be overtaken by events. The application process is

managed only in English,4 providing another obstacle for many NGOs
based outside country capitals and key regional centers or those smaller
organizations lacking well-established links with partners abroad.5 Re-
granting, which can partially solve the problem of accessibility to funds,
has been limited.6
5.2 New developments
Increasingly and more recently, the lack of significant reform in most

Eastern neighborhood countries has enticed the EU into taking steps to
increase its direct assistance to civil society and involve the latter more
systematically in its relations with EaP governments. For these purposes,
new regional and bilateral mechanisms have been established and there
have been moves to institutionalize EU consultations with local NGOs
on a growing number of issues.
The first EaP Civil Society Forum was organized in Brussels in
November 2009 by the European Commission and was attended by
200 organizations, including 140 from partner countries. Since then,
the Forum has been convened annually; in Berlin in 2010, in Poznań
in 2011, and in Stockholm in 2012. A Steering Committee has ensured
the continued work of the Forum by representing it externally in EU
institutions and both EU and EaP states, developing its strategy, and
overseeing communication within the Forum itself. The Forum is
divided into five working groups dealing with democracy; economic
integration; climate change and energy security; contacts between peo-
ple; and social dialogue (the fifth working group was created during the
2012 meeting in Stockholm). Sub-groups have been established to deal
with issues such as corruption, public administration reform, and visa
liberalization. Since 2012, the Forum has permanent participant status
in all intergovernmental multilateral platforms of the EaP. The Forum
has gradually raised more funding for its work. Initially, the European
Commission funded only the annual Forum meetings, as well as meet-
ings of the Steering Committee and working groups. In 2012, the
Commission decided to provide €1.2 million to fund the ongoing work
of the Forum, including its communication, monitoring, and advocacy
activities, its Secretariat (now registered as an international non-profit
organization in Belgium), and the work of the six national platforms.7
The Czech government also granted €100,000 for projects by working
groups one and four (Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum Steering
Committee, 2012).
The post-Arab Spring goal set by the European Commission and the
European External Action Service (EEAS) of establishing partnerships
with society partly took the form of making EU aid ‘more accessible’
to CSOs through a Civil Society Facility. These institutions have also
worked towards creating a European Endowment for Democracy (EED).
As the EED begins work in 2013 it promises to provide quick and flexi-
ble support to a broader range of actors, including political movements
and non-registered NGOs that are not financed under other EU aid
instruments. The High Representative and the European Commission
have also talked of reinforcing human rights dialogues and promoting
media freedom by supporting CSOs’ internet access and use of informa-
tion communications technologies (European Commission and High
Representative of the EU for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, 2011).
The Commission allocated €26.4 million to the Neighbourhood Civil
Society Facility (NCSF) for 2011, to cover the Eastern and the Southern
regions. For 2012–13, the Commission pledged €23.3 million for the
Eastern neighborhood (€13.3 million for 2012 and €10 million for
2013) (European Commission, 2012). According to the Commission,
the Facility aims ‘to encompass and reinforce in a comprehensive way
existing initiatives of support to non-state actors in the Neighbourhood,
complemented with new elements’ as well as to ‘move beyond simply
providing financial support to non-state actors, towards enhancing
engagement with civil society and increasing its involvement in the pol-
icy dialogue at the partner country level’ (European Commission, 2011).
The EU has defined non-state actors extremely broadly to include
NGOs; organizations representing national and/or ethnic minorities;
local citizens’ groups and traders’ associations; cooperatives, trade
unions, organizations representing economic and social interests; local
organizations (including networks) involved in decentralized regional
cooperation and integration; consumer organizations, women’s and
youth organizations, teaching, cultural research, and scientific organiza-
tions; universities; churches and religious associations and communities;
the media; cross-border associations, non-governmental associations and
independent foundations.8 This broad definition seeks to rebut previous
criticisms that the EU was wedded to an unduly restrictive notion of
civil society.
The three main objectives of the Facility are to strengthen non-state
actors and contribute to promoting an enabling environment for their
work; to increase non-state actors’ involvement in programming,
implementation, and monitoring of EU assistance and policies in the
region; and to promote the involvement of non-state actors in policy
dialogue and increase interaction between non-state actors and authorities

at the national level (European Commission, 2011).
The division of labor between the NCSF and the NSA-LA is that the
former aims for CSOs’ capacity enhancement including support for the
setting up of new organizations, advocacy, monitoring efforts, and legal
drafting skills; the latter funds projects in which CSOs together with
local authorities seek to improve the delivery of administrative services.
The Facility consists of three components. The first component assists
in capacity building for non-state actors. The second component funds
regional and country projects by non-state actors, thus supplement-
ing the funding under already available tools such as EIDHR, NSA-LA
and ENPI. The third component aims to increase the involvement
of non-state actors in policy dialogues and in the implementation of
bilateral programs between the EU and selected neighboring countries
(European Commission, 2011).
To implement the first component, the Commission has provided
technical assistance in building the capacities of non-state actors in the
Eastern neighborhood region. From the 2011 NCSF budget, it allocated
€3.5 million for assistance that would include mapping the needs and
capacities of the non-state actors in EaP countries and capacity build-
ing activities. As a result of this call, eight consortia were shortlisted
by the Commission in October 2012, of which six represent European
consultancy firms (EuropeAid, 2012). The Commission set a require-
ment that the consortium must have partners in all six EaP countries;
the eligibility criteria relating to the economic and financial capacity of
the bidders and the complexity of the process make it difficult for all
but large and rich non-profit organizations (such as the German party
foundations) to compete for such initiatives.
In 2012, the first country-based calls for proposals under the Civil
Society Facility were made by the EU Delegations in all six countries.
The modalities of aid delivery are largely unchanged. The size of grants
varies between €50,000 and €350,000 per project with a duration of
between 18 and 36 months. Both European and partner countries’
organizations may be funded. The co-funding criterion has been kept
with the Commission financing a maximum 90 percent of a project
budget. The application process is managed in English only. On a
positive side, the Commission has envisaged the possibility of sub-
granting (except in Azerbaijan [European Commission, 2011a]). The
first projects have been selected in Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, and
Moldova. In Azerbaijan, for instance, two projects were supported from
the 2011 budget, both receiving over €200,000 from the Facility; one
is to be implemented by UK’s Oxfam and another by the Baku-based

Entrepreneurship Development Foundation (European Commission,
2012a).9 In Belarus, in addition to projects selected through an open
call, direct awards to human rights groups were made.
The choice of sector priorities largely reflects the logic of EU coope-
ration with the government in the EaP countries rather than being
driven by local democratic actors. The priorities of the country calls
vary, with attention paid to local self-governance in Armenia, public
financial management in Azerbaijan, and public administration reform
and services in Ukraine.
In addition, ten regional projects were supported in the Eastern
neighborhood with funding of over €7 million, and some money came
from the 2012 NCSF budget (Mikos, 2012). The projects’ focus is on
involving CSOs in environmental governance, media reform, anti-
corruption policies, peace-building, participation of vulnerable groups
in policy making, support to CSOs networks and monitoring activities,
as well as support to the EaP CSF national platforms (Mikos, 2012). The
regional call for proposals also demonstrated that EU funding is in high
demand: the success rate was no more than 10 percent (Mikos, 2012).
In the coming two years, the NCSF is to focus on greater engagement
of CSOs in implementing bilateral cooperation programs. This is set
to include CSOs’ involvement in policy dialogues and sector budget
support, support to CSO twinning programs to build capacities of
civic organizations in EaP countries, and activities of the EaP CSF. The
Commission has responded to variation in civil society needs in the
respective EaP countries by providing the largest amount of support to
two difficult environments – Azerbaijan and Belarus (Table 5.3). In addi-
tion to the 2012–13 NCSF allocations, Belarus will also receive aid to
civil society through an ENPI-funded special measure ‘Support to civil
society in Belarus’ with indicative budgets of €2.3 million in 2012 and
€1.2 million in 2013 (European Commission, 2012).
The idea of establishing the European Endowment for Democracy was
advocated by Poland during its EU presidency in 2011. In December
2011, the Council agreed upon the main principles for the creation of
the EED. At the end of 2012, the EED was established as an international
non-profit organization with its seat in Brussels. To launch the EED,
the Commission allocated €6 million from the ENPI; Poland pledged
€5 million; the Netherlands and Sweden €1 each (though the latter
initially promised €5 million), and several other member states pledged
smaller contributions (Brudzińska, 2012). The initial budget for EED has
reached approximately €14 million (European Commission, 2013). It is
supervised by representatives of all member states and EU institutions,

along with representatives of civil society who sit on the EED Board
(Kostanyan & Nasieniak, 2012). The Polish diplomat Jerzy Pomianowski
was appointed as the EED executive director.
The EED is expected to be able to provide flexible and rapid democ-
racy support, with an initial geographical focus on the EU’s immediate
neighbors. The EED will purportedly work as a private grant-making
foundation providing support to actors that are currently excluded from
EU support, such as ‘journalists, bloggers, non-registered NGOs, political
movements (including those in exile or from the diaspora)’ (European
Commission, 2012b). It will primarily target countries not yet undergoing
or still at a very early stage of transition to democracy. Differences exist
on how overtly political the EED should be (Richter & Leininger, 2012).
The EED would contribute added value to European democracy pro-
motion if it were able to provide a rapid response to political situations
in third countries, intervening where other EU tools are unable to. The
EED should also be able to take risks and provide support to emerging
political parties, non-registered initiatives, and small local groups. From
its position on the ground and first-hand knowledge of evolving local
contexts, the EED will be able to work closely with local beneficiaries
and experts. It will need to demonstrate that it is a Europe-wide instru-
ment, showing the solidarity and commitment of EU member states to
democracy support. For the EED to function successfully, new sources
of funding should be mobilized as opposed to redirecting Commission
funds currently targeted elsewhere (Youngs & Brudzińska, 2012).
Table 5.3 Neighbourhood Civil Society Facility allocations for the Eastern
Partnership countries in 2011–13 (in EUR)10
Component 2011 2012 2013
Regional projects 5,000,000 3,400,000 3,700,000

Technical assistance to 3,500,000 – –
capacity building (regional)
Country-based projects (total) 5,800,000 9,980,434 6,300,000
Armenia 350,000 850,000 850,000
Azerbaijan 500,000 3,630,434 1,500,000
Belarus 2,300,000 2,000,000 1,000,000
Georgia 500,000 1,500,000 950,000
Moldova 150,000 – –
Ukraine 2,000,000 2,000,000 2,000,000
Total ENP-East 14,300,000 13,380,434 10,000,000
Source: European Commission.

At the bilateral level, the EU has further institutionalized consultations

run by delegations in EaP countries on EU assistance priorities and
implementation of the ENP. Human rights dialogues now exist with
Georgia, Armenia, Moldova, and Belarus (although the dialogue with
Belarus has been held only once, in 2009). In the case of Ukraine and
Azerbaijan, human rights are discussed at the Sub-Committees on
Justice, Freedom and Security within the PCA framework; these now
last a full two days. In line with EU human rights guidelines, EU repre-
sentatives meet with local and international NGOs prior to human
rights dialogues. The EU also holds civil society seminars convening
local and EU human rights groups prior to dialogue meetings, as well as
inviting civil society representatives to attend the dialogue as observers
where possible (given the consent needed from an EaP state). In addi-
tion, the EU Commissioner for the ENP and Enlargement, Štefan Füle,
regularly meets with civil society representatives during his visits to EaP
countries.
In the case of Belarus, EU institutions have well-established rela-
tions with the opposition and increasingly try to consult with civil
society groups. In March 2012, the European Commission launched
the European Dialogue on Modernization at a meeting in Brussels with
representatives of Belarusian civil society and political opposition.
Issues of political and judiciary reform, people-to-people contacts,
economic and social policy, and trade are to be discussed through this
Dialogue. The Dialogue looks ineffective so far, with only a few think
tanks involved, the opposition lacking capacity to be fully involved
and continuing disagreement about the participation of government
officials (Martynov, 2012, KorovenKova, 2012).
It is also expected that the Association Agreements between the EU
and the EaP countries will contain provisions on civil society, in which
commitments will be made to push for a more favorable environment for
civil society protection. The EU-Ukraine Association Agreement – already
initialed but not signed due to the political situation in Ukraine – contains
a chapter on cooperation for the development of civil society (Sushko
et al., 2012, 22).11 The text also envisages the establishment of a bilateral
civil society platform to monitor the implementation of the agreement.
This will be a site for the exchange of ideas and will interact with insti-
tutions created by the agreement: the EU–Ukraine Association Council,
Association Committee and Parliamentary Association Committee.
The European Economic and Social Committee will be responsible for
EU representation in this platform.12 Given that these provisions are
replicated in the Association Agreements with other EaP countries, civil
societies in the Eastern neighborhood will receive an institutionalized

mechanism of influence over the implementation of the Agreements.
In September 2012, the European Commission published a communi-
cation outlining its vision of Europe’s engagement with civil society in
external relations which was endorsed by the EU Council a month later
(European Commission, 2012c; Council of the European Union, 2012).
The document offers the first systematic overview of the EU’s goals
and priorities for cooperation with CSOs in relations with third coun-
tries. The Commission sees civil society as ‘a crucial component of any
democratic system and […] an asset in itself’ (European Commission,
2012c, 3). The document defines civil society organizations as: ‘all non-
State, not-for-profit structures, non-partisan and non-violent, through
which people organize to pursue shared objectives and ideals, whether
political, cultural, social or economic’ (European Commission, 2012c, 3).
It also recognizes agents of change in ‘new and more fluid forms of
citizens and youth actions’ such as the Arab Spring and the Occupy
movements.
In short, the Commission has set three priorities for EU support to
civil society: to enable a favorable climate for civil society actors; to pro-
mote civil society participation in policy making both in-country and
at the international level; and to enhance the role of civil society actors
in development (European Commission, 2012c, 4). The Commission
envisages a wide range of tools to promote these priorities starting
from political dialogue with third countries, assistance to CSOs, and
concerted international action to promote civil society. At the country
level, the EU is to develop EU roadmaps for engagement with CSOs that
should help coordination and best practice exchange with EU member
states and other donors.
For the future financial perspective period of 2014–20, the EU plans
to increase its aid to democracy promotion. The reformed European
Neighbourhood Instrument is set to reach €18 billion, compared to €11
billion in the current financial perspective period. The Commission
plans to extend the ‘more for more’ principle and increase flexibility.
For example, an ad hoc review of programming is envisaged in the
event of crises or threats to democracy. In persistent cases of breaches
of democratic principles, aid may be suspended (European Commission,
2011b). The EIDHR budget is planned to reach €1.6 billion for seven
years, compared to €1.4 billion for the current period. The Commission
proposes to boost the flexibility of EIDHR funding and develop a
stronger focus on the most difficult countries and urgent situations.
This implies funding to informal initiatives, more flexible re-granting,
and the possibility to award funds without calls for proposals in difficult
countries such as Belarus (European Commission, 2011c, 2012d).
The failure of top-down Europeanization and democratization in EaP
countries combined with the events in the Southern neighborhood
have led to a reassessment of the EU’s democracy promotion policy. The
EU realized that it also needs to build partnerships with societies, not
just governments, and that support to non-state actors should receive
more attention in EU strategies for promoting political reform in the
neighborhood. In terms of policy, the first steps were the EU’s vision of
an enhanced role for non-state actors, which led to the creation of the
EaP Civil Society Forum; raising the budget of existing aid instruments;
and increasingly consulting local CSOs. In reaction to the Arab Spring,
the EU has developed new instruments of democracy promotion that
aim to involve a wide range of actors and help them to develop the
capacity to influence reforms and policies in their countries.
5.3 Challenges
This overview of EU policy on democracy promotion in the Eastern

neighborhood and engagement with civil society shows that until
very recently EU support to civil society groups in the region was
mainly directed towards the promotion of narrowly delineated rights
and sustainable development. The development of civil societies in
the neighboring countries as an asset itself or as a powerful means of
democratization has become an EU policy objective more recently,
prompted both by changes in the Southern neighborhood and the fail-
ure of top-down reforms.
It is difficult to gauge the impact of the EU’s efforts on civil society
in general. The EU has empowered certain types of civil society actors,
mainly NGOs that are either social services providers or political
watchdogs. The modalities of EU aid delivery ensure that mainly well-
established, resourceful, and highly professional NGOs are those that
have directly benefited from EU funding. Additionally, well-resourced
NGOs and think tanks usually play the most active role in consultation
practices led by the EU as they are better prepared to provide informa-
tion and expertise on different issues connected to the state of reform
in EaP countries.
Until recently, EU tools largely focused on the promotion of vul-
nerable groups’ rights and sustainable development rather than the
strengthening of CSOs’ capacities to represent societal interests and
participate in policy-making channels. Capacity building of civil society
actors was more explicitly prioritized as an objective of EU aid for

non-state actors only in 2011, when the NCSF was established. In the
future, the EED is tasked to provide more flexible and timely support to
a broader range of actors in the whole neighborhood and especially in
the difficult political contexts.
Apart from aid provision, the EU’s engagement with civil society in
the Eastern neighborhood also increasingly takes the form of consulting
NGOs as partners in the dialogue between the EU and partner countries.
In this regard, the growing role of the EU Delegations from Minsk to
Yerevan in managing grant-making processes, facilitating consultations
with local civil society about funding opportunities and priorities, and
evaluating the success of aid on the ground is a positive trend. With the
establishment of the EEAS, EU statements made both from Brussels and
EU Delegations in response to concrete cases of violations against civic
society representatives have become more frequent and timely.
In order to fulfill the priorities outlined in the September 2012
Commission’s communication on engagement with civil society in
external relations, the EU should build on its successes and continue
reshaping its democracy promotion policy through stronger civil society
support. It can further improve its policies in a number of ways.
First, the EU needs to streamline its aid modalities far more than it has in
recent years. The granting system is too burdensome and complicated for
local but also for many European NGOs. The introduction of sub-granting
is very positive news and the focus on capacity building is widely appreci-
ated. But the EU still seems to rely mostly on for-profit consultancies in
providing technical assistance to local actors in the region. This militates
against links between EU and Eastern European CSOs.
Second, the EU must pay greater heed to the ways in which the
legal and political climate for civil society remains unfavorable in the
Eastern neighborhood. Despite the commitments undertaken in ENP
Action Plans, little has been achieved with regard to promoting a better
environment for civil society in the most problematic countries. For
example, while the EU-Azerbaijan ENP Action Plan explicitly commits
to improving the procedures of CSO registration, the parliament in
Baku has adopted a restrictive NGO law that has reduced the number
of CSO registrations (USAID, 2011, 30). NGOs have few or no tax ben-
efits and confront unfriendly regulation of their economic activities.
Post-Soviet countries have one of the lowest levels of corporate and
individual philanthropy. Government funding to NGOs, mainly those
providing social services, is on the rise in some countries; the GONGO
(a government-organized NGO) phenomenon is now much more
prevalent in the region. Meanwhile, foreign-funded NGOs are occasionally

tarred by politicians and some media as foreign agents and traitors of
the national interest.
Following the pattern of the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement, the
EU should include provisions on civil society development as well as
bilateral civil society platforms in the texts of the similar agreements
which are under negotiation with other EaP countries. The EU should
also put more emphasis on civil society laws in its bilateral and multi-
lateral political dialogue with the EaP states. The EU Delegations should
prioritize this issue in the future country roadmaps on engagement
with CSOs, and the EaP Multilateral Platform on Democracy, Good
Governance and Stability should include this issue on its agenda.
Third, it is also necessary to involve civil society in the consultations
related to the Association Agreement negotiation process and to encour-
age more discussion on the future content and provisions of the agree-
ments. NGOs can help to inform a wider public about the benefits of
the future agreement, cultivating public demand for further integration
with the EU.
Fourth, the EU must rectify the dearth of dialogue and cooperation
between NGOs and government bodies. Recent years have witnessed
virulent mistrust and in some cases the systematic persecution of civil
society representatives. NGOs at the provincial level are particularly
weak, beset by pressure from local authorities. The situation varies by
country. Azerbaijan and Belarus exhibit the most difficult relations
between the state and NGO sector; Moldova, Georgia, and Ukraine have
registered some improvements. The EU should support such dialogue
much more. Every aid project to government should contain an element
of public consultation with stakeholders and involve expertise from
civil society. Public participation in the policy process should be one of
the criteria for awarding increased sector-based assistance.
Fifth, low public trust in NGOs and low citizen engagement in associa-
tional life still blight democratic quality in post-Soviet countries. NGOs
heavily dependent on foreign funding often lack strong incentives to
engage with a broader public, incentivize volunteering, or raise indi-
vidual donations. Funding should be transparent. Community-based
approaches to development can be made to enhance local democratic
governance. Groups that work with volunteers or raise funds among
populations should be targeted. European donors should also cooper-
ate with local philanthropists where possible. The EED must show
itself free of government interference so as to fulfill these tasks with
success.
Sixth, the EU and member states still need to find ways to react to more
fluid forms of activism in the region, beyond a few generic rhetorical
promises to do so. A whole plethora of local-level campaigns, such as
those recently in Ukraine over construction plans at historical or green
sites, have failed to elicit European support – despite these being the
region’s most vibrant arena of politics. Donors can retain neutrality
without ignoring such expressions of locally-driven demands for more
influence over policy making. European donors should design their
programs in a way that encourages the cooperation of local professional
NGOs with such unregistered initiatives or movements. They can do
so by providing them with the advice they need for their operations.
The goal must be to build bridges between Western-funded professional
‘civil society’ and grass roots pro-democracy initiatives driven by endog-
enous factors.
Seventh, in such resilient cases as Belarus, the EU should aim to reach
out to broader layers of society, going beyond political groups and
pro-European NGOs. The inception of the Dialogue for Modernization
promoting discussions about Belarus’s future among civil society, oppo-
sition and government officials is a step in right direction. Opinion
polls show that popular support amongst Belarusians for European
integration has begun to rise again since the Dialogue was launched in
March 2012.13 But the EU still needs to make this new initiative fully
effective. Even more projects aimed at youth mobility such as the EU
Language Courses for Young Belarusians scheme launched in 2012,
exchanges and cooperation in the fields of education, culture, sports,
and research are needed. The EU should also back up its support to
people-to-people contacts by abolishing or at least halving visa fees to
ordinary Belarusians.
Finally, the EU needs to devise its own monitoring and evaluation
tools to assess the state of civil society in those countries where its aid
is destined. So far, EU assessments of changes to civil society are at best
limited to one or two paragraphs in the ENP Action Plans’ progress
reports. Europe has nothing similar to the regular assessments of civil
society provided by the USAID-led CSO Sustainability Index14 or civil
society scores for nations in transit made by independent US NGOs.15
This is not to say that the EU should copy those tools, but there is a
need for more systemic knowledge about civil society developments in
neighboring countries as a precursor to more effective support schemes
and evaluation procedures. This knowledge would provide a more solid
base for the country roadmaps on engagement with CSOs envisaged by
the Commission.
5.4 Conclusions
In recent years the EU has boosted the level of support to civil society
actors in democracy promotion and modestly improved the modali-
ties of its funding. However, the EU still faces a number of challenges:
it must further improve the balance between aid going to state and
non-state actors; it must continue reforming funding procedures and
broaden its role beyond that of a provider of grants to a limited number
of NGOs; it should develop modes of support to more fluid and spon-
taneous civil society initiatives, such as issue-based grassroots move-
ments; it should increasingly involve civil society actors in designing
and implementing its policies and aid programs to governments in the
region; it should build bridges between civil society, political society,
and state authorities; it must use diplomatic tools and international
arrangements to promote a conducive environment for civil society
organizations, especially in the most difficult political contexts; and,
for that, it needs more systematic and participatory evaluations of civil
society developments and the impact of its own aid. The EU should find
ways to reach out to societies in the Eastern neighborhood, including
those groups that do not embrace European values.
The EU deserves much credit for moving its democracy policies in
the right direction; but much more needs to be done for such tentative
steps to make a tangible difference to those desirous of better quality
democracy in the Eastern neighborhood.
Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank Giovanni Grevi, Balázs Jarábik, Tika

Tsertsvadze, and Viorel Ursu for their helpful comments on earlier ver-
sions of this chapter.
Table A5.1 EU aid tools supporting civil society actors in the Eastern neighborhood
Tool Main focus Countries covered
European Instrument for Enhancing respect All EaP countries

Democracy and Human for human rights and
Rights (EIDHR) fundamental freedoms
and the role of civil
society in promoting
human rights and
democratic reform
(continued)
Table A5.1 Continued
Non-State Actor and Participatory and All EaP countries

Local Authorities inclusive development;
(of Development citizens’ engagement in
Cooperation Instrument) development processes;
capacity development
Neighbourhood Strengthening and All EaP countries
Civil Society Facility promoting civil society’s
(ENPI-East) role in reforms and
democratic changes in the
Eastern neighborhood
countries, through
increased participation
in the fulfillment of ENP
objectives
Instrument for Stability Global security and Moldova, South
development; conflict Caucasus (Abkhazia,
prevention, post-conflict Nagorno-Karabakh
political stabilization, areas)
pre- and post-crisis
preparedness capacity
building
Notes
1. Projects funded under EIDHR 2000–6: Compendium by Location, http://
ec.europa.eu/europeaid/what/human-rights/documents/updated_report_
by_location_en.pdf, accessed 30 September 2012.
2. Apart from the country-based support scheme, since 2008 EIDHR has granted
€1million annually to the European Humanities University Trust Fund.
3. See Component 1 ‘Strengthening civil society monitoring and exposure
of corruption’ in Millennium Challenge Corporation, ‘Ukraine Threshold
Program Agreement’, http://www.mcc.gov/documents/agreements/soag-
ukraine.pdf, accessed 1 October 2012.
4. In 2008–10, the EU Delegation in Moldovan (Romanian), the official lan-
guage of the Republic of Moldova, or Russian. However, this practice has
been discontinued.
5. See relevant country reports of La Fundación para las Relaciones Internacio-
nales y el Diálogo Exterior (FRIDE)’s study on assessing democracy assistance
worldwide: J. Boonstra, ‘Assessing Democracy Assistance: Georgia’, FRIDE
Project Report, June 2009; B. Jarabik and A. Rabagliati, ‘Assessing Democracy
Assistance: Belarus’, FRIDE Project Report, June 2009; and N. Shapovalova,
‘Assessing Democracy Assistance: Ukraine’, FRIDE Project Report, June 2009.
See also a more recent report by I. Bekeshkina and P. Kaz嘔mierkiewicz, Making
Ukrainian Civil Society Matter: Enabling Ukrainian NGOs to Absorb International
Assistance. A Review of Capacity Gaps and Needs for Institutional Support,

Warsaw: Institute of Public Affairs, 2012, pp. 40–1.
6. Re-granting should be a part of a bigger operational project and cannot
exceed more than 50 percent of the grant and more than €10,000 per organi-
zation, and not more than €100,000 per total budget. See V. Řiháčková,
‘EU Democracy Assistance through Civil Society - Reformed? The design
of the Community Financial Instruments for the first half of the Financial
Perspective 2007–2013’, Research study for The Evaluation of Visegrad
Countries’ Democracy Assistance (Prague: PASOS, 2008), http://pasos.
org/157/eu-democracy-assistance-through-civil-society-reformed/, accessed
30 September 2012.
7. €915,000 for the activities of the national platforms are provided from the
2011 Neighbourhood Civil Society Facility (NCSF) budget and €250,000 for
the EaP Civil Society Forum (CSF) Secretariat’s work are provided from the
2012 NCSF budget.
8. See Article 14. ‘Regulation (EC) No 1638/2006 of the European Parliament
and of the Council of 24 October 2006 laying down general provisions estab-
lishing a European Neighbourhood and Partnership Instrument’, Official
Journal of the European Union, 9 November 2006, L 310/1.
9. Additionally, later a third project was supported, also to be carried out by a
Baku-based think tank.
10. 2011 figures are extracted from the calls for proposals registered on the
European Commission’s DG Devco webgate. 2012–2013 figures are indica-
tive allocations. See European Commission, Commission Implementing
Decision on the Special Measure: Eastern Neighbourhood Civil Society Facility
2012–2013 to be financed of the general budget of the European Union, Brussels,
27 November 2012, C(2012) 8526 final and Commission, Action Fiche 2012
and 2013.
11. See also Chapter 26. Association Agreement between the European Union
and its Member States, of the one part, and Ukraine, of the other part, http://
glavcom.ua/pub/2012_11_19_EU_Ukraine_Association_Agreement_English.
pdf, accessed 6 December 2012.
12. For details see articles 469–470, Title VII. Institutional, General and Final
Provisions, Association Agreement. Civil society institutions will also be
involved in implementation of provisions of chapter 13 on Trade and
Sustainable Development (Article 299. Civil society institutions, Title IV.
Trade and trade-related matters).
13. Belarusian Institute for Strategic Studies (BISS), ‘The Return to Europe’,
Polling Memo, October 2012, http://www.belinstitute.eu/images/doc-pdf/
biss_pm04_2012en.pdf, accessed 21 November 2012. If asked to vote in a
referendum for a union with Russia or for joining the EU, 44.1% of respon-
dents voted for the EU and 36.2% for Russia in October 2012. It was the
first time since early 2011 that pro-EU choices gained ground. The prior
downward trend was linked to EU sanctions towards Belarus, according
to BISS experts. Belarusian analysts attribute the current shift to the EU’s
Dialogue for Modernization for Belarus launched in March 2012, on the one
hand, and the absence of Russia’s economic support to Belarus and tangible
benefits from Belarus membership in the Common Economic Space.
14. USAID’s CSO Sustainability Index for Central and Eastern Europe and
Eurasia analyzes and assigns scores to seven dimensions of CSOs’ sustainabil-
ity: legal environment, organizational capacity, financial viability, advocacy,
service provision, infrastructure, and public image. See USAID, ‘The 2011
CSO Sustainability Index for Central and Eastern Europe and Eurasia’, http://
transition.usaid.gov/locations/europe_eurasia/dem_gov/ngoindex/, accessed
20 October 2012.
15. Freedom House’s ‘Nations in Transit’ annual reports analyze the degree of
political change in the post-communist world based on seven categories:
national and local democratic governance, elections, media, civil society,
judiciary, and corruption. The civil society score reflects the growth of
NGOs, their organizational capacity and financial sustainability, and the
legal and political environment for NGOs, the growth of free trade unions
and participation of interest groups in the policy process. See Freedom
House, ‘Nations in Transit’, http://www.freedomhouse.org/report-types/
nations-transit, accessed 20 October 2012.
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6
Making Transnational Democracy
and Human Rights Activism Work?
On the Trade-Offs of Eastern
EU Support for Civil Society
Development Abroad
Tsveta Petrova
Supporting the diffusion of democracy and human rights has become

an important element of the work of many state and non-state actors
in international affairs (Diamond, 1995; Burnell, 2000). This trend has
been reflected in the growing body of works on democracy promotion
(Hassan & Ralph, 2011; Cardwell, 2011) and in the increasing attention
the literature on comparative democratization has paid to the role played
by external actors in regime change and consolidation (Whitehead, 1996;
Zielonka, 2001). Most of these studies, however, have focused on the acti-
vities of a few Western countries. Yet, some of the newest democracies and
former recipients of Western democracy and human rights assistance – the
Eastern European members of the European Union (EU) – have become
increasingly involved in supporting democratization abroad ( Jonavicius,
2008; Kucharczyk & Lovitt, 2008). Moreover, some of these Eastern EU
countries have not only become key promoters in their neighborhood but
have also already made some difference there by helping secure certain
democratization gains in the post-communist space (Bunce & Wolchik,
2011; Pifer, 2010; CES, 2008). Therefore, this chapter asks: How have
the Eastern EU countries been supporting democracy and human rights
abroad? How is their activism different from Western efforts?
Western democracy and human rights support has been criticized both
by recipients, including post-communist ones, and by the Western policy
communities (Carothers, 1999; Burnell, 2000; Crawford, 2003). Thus, the
activism of and the potential demonstrated by the Eastern EU promoters
beg an investigation into their efforts. Although previously overlooked,
these countries are an important category of democracy promoters to
study. As former recipients of such support and now democracy promoters
110
On the Trade-offs of Assisting Civil Society Development from Abroad 111
themselves, these countries have experience with both sides of the donor
process (Kucharczyk & Lovitt, 2008). They also have had the opportunity
to potentially learn from the successes and mistakes of a number of
Western donors offering very different types of democracy support.
The first key finding in this chapter is that the Eastern EU actors have
provided primarily technical assistance and worked with both elites and
the general citizenry in recipient countries. They have thus tended not
to create a big division between their beneficiaries and the rest of the
civil society in the recipient countries. The second key finding is that
because of their recent democratization experience and because they
have worked primarily in their own region, there has often been a better
fit between recipient realities and the practices exported by the Eastern
EU civic democracy promoters than the fit with the practices promoted
by some Western democracy promoters. The third key finding is that
because of their limited capacity, their impact on the organizational
survival of civil society abroad has been overall rather limited.
While most existing studies on the external factors in the process of
democratization have focused on the Western global players, this study
sheds light on the activities of little-studied, non-Western, regional
actors. Similarly, there has been much work on the diffusion of Western
and especially EU liberal norms and practices into Eastern Europe
(Vachudova, 2005; Pridham, 2005; Schimmelfennig & Sedelmeier, 2005)
but little attention has been paid to these countries as transmitters of
liberal ideas. Yet, understanding their democracy promotion approaches
and how they compare to Western ones is crucial for understanding the
new Eastern EU role within the Euro-Atlantic space and the future and
the form of the liberal international order, now reinforced and propa-
gated through the Eastern EU efforts as well.
Democracy promotion is defined here as purposeful actions meant to
encourage a transition to democracy or to prevent the regression and to
enhance the quality of regimes that have already moved towards demo-
cratic government.1 Such promotion also includes support for human
rights abroad.
6.1 From recipients of democracy assistance to democracy

promoters: research agenda and design
With the third wave of democratization and especially after the end
of the Cold War, democracy promotion became an explicit goal of
many governmental and non-governmental actors in international
affairs, even if this objective has been pursued through inconsistent,
112 Tsveta Petrova
ad hoc, and sometimes low-priority policies (Schraeder, 2000; Glenn &

Mendelson, 2002; Youngs, 2001). The third wave of democratization
unfolded in part because a number of new democracies sought not only
to ‘observe the principles of democracy and human rights at home but
also to propagate them elsewhere’ (Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz, former
Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Poland, describing his
country’s commitment to democracy (Cimoszewicz, 2003)). Much like
Western support for democracy abroad, the democracy promotion com-
mitments of such new democracies have often been wavering.2 Still,
despite these limitations of their efforts, these new democracies have
already played, and will most likely continue to play, an important role
in the diffusion of democracy around the globe.
The Eastern European members of the EU feature some of the most
active new democracy promoters born after the third wave of democratiza-
tion. This study focuses on the activities of these countries’ civic organi-
zations that have developed international democracy and human rights
aid efforts, the so-called civic democracy promoters. They have often been
key drivers behind their states’ efforts to support democracy and human
rights abroad. The Eastern EU states have also frequently built on the work
of, cooperated with, and delegated responsibilities to, various such civic
democracy promoters. In fact, many post-communist diplomats see these
civic democracy promoters as strategic partners with a lot of expertise and
potential for influence on the ground. As a result, they have had the ear
of policy-makers at the domestic and the EU levels concerning relations
with democracy-promotion priority countries. These Eastern EU civic
democracy promoters have also played an important role in shaping the
Eastern EU development assistance laws, strategies, and annual programs.
The Eastern EU civic democracy promoters include some of the largest
and most influential civic groups doing democracy and human rights
work in the Eastern EU countries but also a few organizations that spe-
cialize in international work.3 A number of these groups have received
international recognition for their democracy work at home as well as
abroad. Most Eastern EU civic democracy promotion grew out of the
efforts of some of the activists who prepared the democratic break-
throughs in their own countries. The initiatives of the Eastern EU civic
democracy promoters generally reflect solidarity with and an impulse
to respond to demands from activists in neighboring countries and
beyond. Such solidarity has moved a number of Eastern EU civic organi-
zations to search for funding opportunities and follow available ones
to help sister groups abroad. Additionally, as they started withdrawing
from Central and Eastern Europe, many Western donors invited some
of their major recipients to become re-granters of aid and to serve as

consultants or subcontractors in Western-funded projects to the east
and south-east. Much of the work of the Eastern EU civic democracy
promoters is funded by Western donors – as a result of US founda-
tions’ support for some of these civic groups and also their capacity
to win support from the EU and other Western European donors. As
Eastern EU development aid systems have been set up, funds for this
civic democracy aid work have started becoming available from within
Eastern EU countries themselves as well. These new aid systems have
further increased the number and diversity of the Eastern EU civic
groups involved in supporting democracy and human rights abroad (by
funding groups beyond those that regularly win Western grants). Still,
Eastern EU & Western assistance for democracy and human rights is
often intertwined.
How have the activities of these Eastern EU civic democracy promo-
ters shaped their ability to contribute to the development of democ-
racy abroad? Also, how do the merits and limitations of the Eastern
EU civic groups compare to those of their Western counterparts and
partners?
To answer these questions, this study follows the consensus in the
field on the importance of detailed scrutiny of individual cases (Hook,
1998) and focuses on two donor countries – Poland and Slovakia.
Poland and Slovakia are not only among the most active democracy
promoters in the Eastern EU group but they are also representative of
the two sub-groups of Eastern EU democracy promoters. There have
been two waves of democratization among the Eastern EU states. In the
first wave (1989–91), a number of countries overthrew communism; in
the second wave (1996–8) – pro-democratic forces in countries residing
in the gray zone between dictatorship and democracy triumphed over
their illiberal post-communist rulers (Bunce, McFaul & Stoner-Weiss,
2010). Poland is representative of the first wave of democratization in
Eastern Europe and Slovakia is representative of the second democrati-
zation wave in the post-communist space. Not only did each wave rely
on particular democratization innovations, but it was also embedded in
the ‘business of democracy promotion’ at a different stage of its devel-
opment. In brief, Poland and Slovakia are representative but diverse
cases, which thus reveal the most about this previously understudied
phenomenon (Gerring, 2003).
The Polish and the Slovak case studies are based on the organiza-
tional archives and interviews with representatives of the civic groups
that make up each country’s movement supporting democracy and
114 Tsveta Petrova
human rights abroad. Almost all Polish and Slovak groups with strong
and sustained international democracy and human rights programs
This chapter examines the activities of 29 Polish groups and 15 Slovak
organizations in the first two decades after the collapse of communism
in Eastern Europe (1989–2009). To provide some context for the work
of each country’s civic democracy promoters, eight additional interna-
tional development NGOs and domestic democracy NGOs were also
interviewed. All interviews were conducted with the lead activist(s)
managing the international programs of the civic organization.
6.2 Lessons learned from Western assistance for civil

society development abroad
Some of the documented benefits of Western support for the development

of civil societies in Eastern Europe include: facilitating the survival,
invigoration, and growth of the ‘third sector’ of professional non-profit
organizations; the establishment of new democratic channels between
them and political elites for input and the articulation of interests; help-
ing civil society organizations achieve some of their objectives through
grant-assisted projects and activities; a growth in official and societal
acceptance of NGOs as legitimate social actors; democratizing civil society
organizations and encouraging groups in the capitals to reach out to the
periphery; and the incorporation of local elites into transnational civil
society networks of support (Glenn & Mendelson, 2002; Klose, 2000).
Many studies, however, also draw attention to the unintended
negative consequences of Western support.4 International donors have
played a large role in helping local actors build institutions commonly
associated with liberal democracies, but have done less to help make
these new institutions function well (Glenn & Mendelson, 2002). Aid
providers ‘have gone from favoring NGOs as recipients of aid to equat-
ing NGOs with civil society itself and assuming that the growth curve
of NGO proliferation is a good measure of civil society development’
(Carothers, 2000b). International assistance has created ‘haves’ and
‘have-nots’, thus splintering civil society movements, accentuating the
new–old hierarchies and privileges, and forcing groups, which might
otherwise work together, into a competitive relationship (Henderson,
2003). Foreign aid has encouraged civil society groups to focus on the
acquisition of donor funding, frequently to the exclusion of pursuing
local causes, generating support locally, or engaging the local popula-
tion (Richter, 2002; Narozhna, 2004).
Western assistance has also created incentives for the creation and
high turnover of single-issue organizations, established to apply for
a specific grant or to obtain some tax advantages (Narozhna, 2004).

Foreign donors have often maladministered assistance away from
genuine groups with an established campaigning agenda and a capacity
to engage the wider population, as Western, rather than local, thinking
and agendas have frequently dominated the type, style, and direction of
funded activities. Oftentimes emulating their donors, civic associations
have become more institutionalized and professionalized, more hierar-
chical and centralized corporate entities that value their own survival
over their social mission (Glenn & Mendelson, 2002). Lastly, abundant
external aid has removed the need for civil society organizations to
develop a viable financial base, thus giving rise to their dependence on
donors’ generosity (USAID, 1999).
In sum, the existing literature highlights that: (1) Western assistance
has contributed to the survival and growth of recipient civil societies
while also creating divisions within them; (2) Western aid has developed
the relationship between recipient civil societies and their policy-makers
while sometimes also holding back the efforts of these recipient civil
societies to reach out to the general population; (3) Western assistance
has at times supported recipient civil societies in achieving some of their
stated goals while also imposing Western organizational objectives and
models onto these recipients.
This chapter proceeds by examining the activities of the Eastern EU
democracy promoters while paying attention to these trade-offs docu-
mented in the literature on the merits and limitations of Western aid. To
study the Eastern EU contributions to the development and cohesiveness
of recipient civil societies, this chapter analyzes the place of financial
assistance in the overall activities of the Eastern EU civic democracy
promoters. To investigate their impact on the place of recipient civil
societies in their polities, this chapter investigates who the targets of the
Eastern EU assistance projects are – civil elites or civil and political society
in general. Lastly, to inspect the support the Eastern EU civic democracy
promoters have provided for recipient civil societies’ objectives, this
chapter considers the nature of/models behind the Eastern EU assistance.
6.3 Insights from Poland and Slovakia
6.3.1 What assistance do the Eastern EU civic democracy

promoters provide? Survival and development of recipient
civil societies
A majority of the Polish and Slovak civic democracy promoters usually
employ a combination of three strategies. There have been some initiatives,
designed to transfer technical knowledge, including conferences or forums,
116 Tsveta Petrova
trainings or seminars, the publication of different manuals or of research

summarizing the donor’s transition experience as well as some more experi-
ential forms of technical assistance such as inviting recipients to observe or
participate in ongoing Polish or Slovak projects at home or to visit Poland
or Slovakia to study the working of different democratic institutions (civil
society, local government, independent media, parliament, etc). The Slovak
and Polish civic democracy promoters have also been engaging in a variety
of more political activities such as educating, lobbying, and monitoring their
own diplomats, the EU, and recipient governments as well as raising aware-
ness at home and abroad. The third group of initiatives includes a transfer
of financial assistance in the form of grants or scholarships to recipients.
For the time period studies for this chapter (1989–2009), the Eastern
EU civic democracy promoters have preferred to provide primarily
technical assistance. This strategy has not only allowed them to work
around their limited financial resources but also to build on their per-
ceived strengths, such as their own recent democratization experience.
As a result, the Eastern EU assistance programs are not very likely to
have created donor-dependent recipients or divisions between recipi-
ents and the rest of civil society in the assisted countries. At the same
time, however, unlike their Western counterparts, the Eastern EU civic
democracy promoters are also unlikely to have contributed significantly
to the growth of civil society abroad, except indirectly by imparting
some lessons about civil society survival in new democracies.
Poland: The preferred activities of the Polish civic democracy promot-
ers have been trainings, study tours, and conferences (see Table 6.1). 78
percent of the Polish civic democracy promoters provide some instruction
for their international partners and 37 percent produce manuals/guides
in the native language of their partners. 74 percent also organize study
visits or exchanges to show their partners how democracy is practiced in
Poland. A majority of Polish democracy promoters ‘export’ their domestic
programs abroad by coupling trainings with study visits. Additionally, 63
percent of Polish democracy promoters further hold regional conventions
or meetings as forums for transferring the democratization experiences of
a variety of Polish civic and political activists.
For example, the School for Leaders Association was set up (with foreign
assistance) in 1994 to support the development of local communities in
Poland by educating young people, civic elites, and local government
officials about democracy and local development.5 As early as 1996, the
Association opened a similar ‘school for leaders’ in Ukraine and soon
thereafter another one in Belarus, which disbanded after a few years
as the political situation in Belarus worsened. Smaller similar programs
Table 6.1 Activities of Polish and Slovak civic democracy promoters: percentage
of NGOs using a particular instrument out of all NGOs in movement
Instruments Country
Poland Slovakia
Financial/Material Re-granting 19 23
Own resources 18 8
Technical Training 78 69
Study visits 74 46
Manuals 37 31
Send volunteers 19 15
Conferences 63 15
Political Advise/Monitor Recipient Govt 26 62
Educate/Lobby/Monitor Donor Govt 30 54
Educate/Lobby/Monitor EU 19 31
Consult/Evaluate/Monitor 19 38
Recipient NGOs
Public Awareness Raising/Debates in 7 54
Recipient Country
Public Awareness Raising/Debates in 22 31
Donor Country
Source: Petrova, forthcoming.
were later also launched (but did not endure) in Moldova and Serbia. The
Association couples training on how to start a civic group, how to apply
for funding, how to involve businesses and NGOs in local government
work, etc. with study visits to Poland, so that recipient civic and political
leaders can see in practice how democratic local communities function
in a cultural setting very similar to their own.6 Finally, the association
also organizes regional conferences where domestic and foreign gradu-
ates of its programs can learn from each other and maintain and develop
their contacts. A further example: the Institute for Strategic Studies
(previously, International Center for Development of Democracy)
builds on its research about Poland’s transition and foreign affairs by
publishing a variety of materials on and organizing conferences and
seminars for Eastern European politicians, scholars, journalists, civic
activists, and businesspeople; the topics range from ‘Key Rules of Civil
Society and Self-Government in Contemporary Democratic States’ to
‘EU and NATO in the World Security System’.
While most Polish civic democracy promoters participate in the
formulation of Polish foreign policy – if not directly, then at least
118 Tsveta Petrova
through their participation in the Polish platform of NGOs working

abroad – a third of them prioritize educating, lobbying, and/or monitor-
ing Warsaw’s efforts to support democracy abroad. Also, a fifth of the
Polish civic democracy promoters further seek to influence the broader
democracy-promotion debate in Poland.7 A fourth of the Polish democ-
racy promoters consult, monitor, and publish research for the benefit of
foreign states and a fifth – for foreign non-state actors. The Polish civic
democracy promoters that employ such political instruments are mostly
research centers such as the College of Eastern Europe and think tanks,
such as the Center for International Relations, the Institute for Strategic
Studies, the Institute for Public Affairs, and the Batory Foundation.
However, there are others too – for instance, the One World Association
organizes annual public events (movies with discussions) on the state of
freedom, human rights, and tolerance in Eastern Europe and beyond;
the Polish Robert Schuman Foundation sponsors a yearly ‘Europe
Day’ celebrations meant to provide information about European inte-
gration to the Polish public and other Eastern European guests; the
Foundation in Support of Local Democracy has advised the government
of Kazakhstan on the development of local government; the Foundation
for Civil Society Development evaluated the work of 13 NGO centers
in Ukraine and the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights monitored
the presidential elections held in Belarus.8 While some of these political
activities engage the Polish and EU policy-makers and public, others
target the recipient civic groups, policy-makers, and citizenry. As a
result, these programs not only socialize the recipient country into
accepting civil society as legitimate social actors but to the extent that
recipient civic activists are also involved in these projects (as is often the
case), new channels for input and interest articulation between recipient
civil society and political elites and/or citizens are created as well.
In addition to technical and political assistance, intended to develop
the capacity and standing of recipient civil societies, 37 percent of the
Polish civic democracy promoters also provide some financial support
towards democratization abroad. Some Polish activists send money to
enable weak civic actors/groups abroad to continue working or provide
them with equipment such as fax machines, computers, and printers.
For example, the East European Democratic Center (EEDC) awards grants
to independent newspapers in Belarus and the Nowy Staw Foundation
has equipped the ‘offices’ of a few Belarusian activists.9 Additionally,
a few Polish civic democracy promoters award scholarships or small
grants: for instance, the Education Society of Malopolska funds civic
education projects and the Center for International Relations awards
scholarships to ‘young management staff from countries of Central

and Eastern Europe’.10 Lastly, there is a group of Polish organizations that
have been administering the programs of major foreign donors under
which grants are allocated. For instance, the Education for Democracy
Foundation administers the Region in Transition (RITA) program of
the Polish-American Freedom Foundation and the Polish-Ukrainian
Cooperation Foundation (PAUCI) re-grants funding to Ukraine on behalf
of the ‘US’ National Endowment for Democracy (NED).11
Not only is it a minority of Polish NGOs that provide such financial
assistance but for the most part, it is rather modest and represents a small
element of their work; thus, its impact – both positive and negative –
tends to be limited. Consider that in the mid 2000s, one of the more
ambitious Polish financial aid programs, the EEDC’s program for inde-
pendent newspapers in Belarus, provided grants that averaged $3,500.
In the group of Polish organizations that ‘re-grant’ Western assistance,
PAUCI’s whole grants program in the late 2000s, for instance, was about
$13,000 while its technical and political assistance budget was close to
$500,000. Some of the largest grants provided by Polish NGOs are the
RITA grants, which in the late 2000s were up to $13,000 and which
still pale in comparison to some of the funding that Western NGOs
provide.12 The grants provided by the C. S. Mott Foundation for the
same period in the same recipient region for civil society development
alone, for example, were on average of up to $135,000.13
Slovakia: The preferred activities of the Slovak civic democracy
promoters have been technical and political – trainings as well as moni-
toring the work of regimes in transition combined with public debates
about the state of democracy in these countries and with advocacy for
keeping democracy promotion in these neighbors on Bratislava’s agenda
(see Table 6.1). Sixty-nine percent of Slovak democracy promoters have
provided some instruction for their international partners and 46 percent
coupled the trainings with study visits. Moreover, 62 percent of Slovak
democracy promoters monitor the democratization track records of
states in the neighborhood; 54 percent help organize public discussion in
such countries about their regime’s performance; and another 54 percent
lobby the Slovak government to take steps to support democratization
abroad. And much like their Polish colleagues, a majority of the Slovak
democracy promoters often ‘export’ their domestic programs abroad.
For instance, the Pontis Foundation is perhaps Slovakia’s leading
democracy promoter. The Foundation was set up in 1997 with US assis-
tance to contribute to the ‘building of civil society and democracy in
Slovakia and abroad.’14 Pontis, which had organized an impressive youth
120 Tsveta Petrova
voter mobilization campaign for the Slovak 1998 electoral breakthrough,

in 2000 began training several Belarusian youth organizations in various
techniques for popular mobilization in time for the 2001 Belarusian
presidential elections. Pontis soon realized that (unlike in Slovakia
before 1998) the civil society and political opposition in Belarus are
disconnected and that neither was prepared for the reforms Belarus
would need after a democratic breakthrough. So Pontis brought inde-
pendent Belarusian experts to Bratislava to learn about the reforms that
Slovakia implemented after 1998. Pontis continued providing technical
campaign assistance for the Belarusian civil and political opposition
and focused on training them to apply opinion polls and focus groups
to prepare an effective pre-election communication strategy (much like
Slovak opposition before 1998 had done with assistance from the US
International Republican Institute).
Also, Pontis not only helped the Belarusian opposition begin a
public debate about the meaning of the 2006 election but also helped
them package their agenda. The result of this consultation was the
slogan ‘For Freedom’ that replaced ‘For Democracy’ (which implied
regime change and was thus deemed more divisive and controversial by
the Belarusian citizenry). Finally, Pontis has actively cooperated with the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Slovak Representation at the EU in an
attempt to shape their policy towards Minsk. Pontis monitors the current
situation in Belarus, regularly briefs both the Slovak Foreign Ministry
and the European Council and European Parliament on it, and arranges
meetings for representatives of the Belarusian opposition in Bratislava
and Brussels. Pontis has also pressured Bratislava to come up with a policy
on Belarus that goes beyond adhering to the common Euro-Atlantic
sanctions and towards demanding specific reforms such as media and
economic liberalization both bilaterally and through the EU.15
Not only have Slovak democracy promoters sought to influence
the policies of the Slovak government and the EU but the Slovak acti-
vists have also worked to keep democracy promotion on the agenda
of the Slovak public. A good example comes from the People in Peril
Association, which is the leading Slovak civic advocate for humani-
tarian and human rights issues abroad.16 In addition to financially,
technically, and morally assisting human rights activists abroad, the
Association seeks to educate the Slovak public and government about
the violations of human rights and democratic practices in countries
such as Belarus, Moldova, Chechnya, Cuba, Burma, China, and North
Korea. The Association’s activities range from organizing human rights
conferences and school debates to visits by dissidents to Slovakia to
sponsoring human rights film festivals and marches in solidarity with

victims of human rights abuse.
Moreover, in addition to monitoring the democracy track record of
a number of regimes in the region, quite a few Slovak civic democracy
promoters have also been evaluating and consulting for non-state
actors in the region and generally helping them expose and deal with
undemocratic practices in their countries. In this group of Slovak NGOs
there are strong think tanks, such as MESA 10, the Slovak Foreign Policy
Association, and the Institute for Public Affairs as well as groups, such as
Civic Eye and Memo 98, that have earned an international reputation
for conducting and training others to conduct election observation and
media monitoring.17
Finally, only about a third of the Slovak civic democracy promoters
provide some financial or material assistance to their international
partners. Again, however, such grants tend to be relatively small and
represent a minor element of the international work of the Slovak civic
democracy promoters. For instance, the People in Peril Association
sends small sums of money to the families of Cuban political prisoners.
About $40,000 was distributed among the families of seven political
prisoners over the course of five years in the mid and late 2000s. When
the program ended in 2008, the grant-awarding projects represented
about 20 percent of the democracy assistance programs implemented by
the Association that year. Another example comes from the US German
Marshall Fund in Bratislava, which awards grants ‘supporting the deve-
lopment of civil societies and democracy.’18 The German Marshall Fund
has since 2005 awarded about $5,000,000 in grants to civil society in
Belarus but the Fund’s Bratislava branch has awarded about less than
one percent of that sum. In general, as in the Polish case, a majority of
the Slovak civic democracy promoters have done technical and political
work, and therefore aimed at developing the capacity and standing of
recipient civil societies.
6.3.2 What are the models behind Eastern EU assistance?

Assistance usefulness and fit
If the technical and, to a lesser degree, the political assistance provided
by the Eastern EU civic democracy promoters is central to their interna-
tional work, an important next question is: To what extent is this work
grounded in the donor’s organizational and operational models and
to what extent is it grounded in the recipients’ needs? In general, how
helpful is it to recipients? Both the Polish and the Slovak civic democ-
racy promoters borrow from their country’s own transition experience
122 Tsveta Petrova
the practices they understand to fit the needs of their recipients. Thus,
recipient needs are only a second-order factor guiding Eastern EU prac-
tices. Still, while they are ‘recycling’ and ‘importing’ democracy and
civil society models, because the Eastern EU NGOs tend to work in
their own region and to have first-hand democratization expertise, their
assistance has a relatively good fit and therefore usefulness for their
recipients. In fact, this fit is understood by both recipients and other
donors to be one of the comparative advantages of the Eastern EU civic
democracy promoters.
Both the Polish and the Slovak civic democracy promoters have been
organizing a variety of activities in order to ‘exchange experiences and
knowledge about [their own] political, economic and societal transfor-
mations’.19 Many Polish and Slovak civic democracy promoters base
‘their programs abroad on the success of programs at home.’20 The
examples of the Polish School for Leaders Association and of the Slovak
Pontis Foundation, presented above, illustrate this point well. As one
activist succinctly described the approach shared by his Polish and
Slovak colleagues – the emphasis in their various democracy promotion
initiatives is on ‘demonstrating the progression from conceptualization
to execution, the way solutions are developed – by way of example’
(Czubek, 2003, 32).
Both Polish and Slovak civic democracy promoters emphasize that
they share with other activists abroad ‘what worked at home and what
did not’ and help them think how best to ‘adapt’ such lessons.21 As one
recipient reported, what especially impressed him about the Eastern
activists he worked with, was that they had found ways to ‘get things
done’ in the ‘dysfunctional’ post-communist region.22 Not only are the
Eastern EU civic democracy promoters working to adapt their experi-
ence to the recipient realities but they also often seek to tailor the
experiences they share with recipients. Because they are considering
the recipient democratization needs, the Eastern EU civic democracy
promoters have different approaches to recipients at different stages of
democratization (as will be documented within the next section).
Finally, it should be noted that in sharing their experience, the Polish
and the Slovak civic democracy promoters have sometimes exported
best practices that were initially imported into the work of these civic
groups by their Western partners. Again, the case studies of the Polish
School for Leaders Association and of the Slovak Pontis Foundation,
presented above, document this point. Still, what the Eastern EU civic
democracy promoters in these cases export further east and south-west
are Western imports that have already been sufficiently adapted to the
post-communist context to have proven successful in the Eastern EU

countries. In addition, their personal experience as the architects and
construction workers of their countries’ own transitions to democracy
gives the Polish and Slovak democracy promoters not just democratiza-
tion expertise that other/Western donors do not have but credibility
to leverage this expertise. Such credibility and expertise can be very
important in democracy promotion work since the authority of trans-
national advocates has consistently been found to be ‘the key sources of
influence’ of norm promoters (Price, 2003, 589; see Evangelista, 1999;
Florini, 1999; Higgott, Underhill & Bieler, 2000).
Not only have both the Polish and the Slovak civic democracy pro-
moters relied on their own democratization experience, but both groups
of activists have also tended to work in their own neighborhood (for
the geographical priorities of the Polish and the Slovak civic democracy
promoters, see Table 6.2). The Polish civic democracy promoters have
focused mostly on their undemocratic neighbors to the east. For exam-
ple, 93 percent of the Polish civic democracy promoters have worked
in Ukraine, 78 percent have had programs in Belarus, and 70 percent
have been involved in Russia. Similarly, the Slovak civic democracy
promoters have been most engaged with their neighbors to the east
and south-west. Such civic democracy promoters have been most active
in Serbia, where 86 percent of the Slovak NGOs have had or currently
have significant involvement. Additionally, 71 percent and 57 percent
of Slovak groups doing democracy work abroad have or currently work
in Ukraine and in Belarus respectively.
As a result of this shared geography and history, the Eastern EU
democracy promoters usually have a good knowledge of their recipi-
ents’ cultural traditions, authoritarian practices or legacies, and local
power relations. Both recipients and Western donors point to such local
knowledge and personal relationships as an important advantage of the
Eastern EU democracy promoters.23 At the same time, the lack of such
knowledge and relationships is one of the most consistent criticisms of
Western civil society assistance (Schmitter & Brower, 1999; Carothers,
1999). Also, because of their good understanding of the situation on
the ground the Eastern EU organisations have not been ‘afraid’ to fund
and partner with ‘small and sometimes unknown’ civic groups and civic
groups ‘outside the capital city’ (Shapovalova & Shumylo, 2008).
Similarly, because of their pre-existing ‘trust-based dialogue’ with recip-
ients, the Eastern EU activists have been able to broach ‘areas that can be
tricky for post-Soviet societies, such as combating corruption or engag-
ing civil society in the policy-making process’ (Shapovalova & Shumylo,
124 Tsveta Petrova
Table 6.2 Geographical priorities of the Polish and Slovak movements:

percentage of NGOs providing assistance to recipient country out of all NGOs
in movement
Donor Country Poland Slovakia

International Partner Country
Ukraine 93 71
Belarus 78 57
Russia 70 21
Moldova 56 36
Georgia 48 21
Azerbaijan 41 21
Armenia 26 14
Kyrgyzstan 29 14
Kazakhstan 22 22
Tajikistan 22 14
Uzbekistan 18 22
Turkmenistan 11 0
Mongolia 0 0
Serbia 26 86
Croatia 22 15
Bosnia-Herzegovina 19 36
Macedonia 30 35
Kosovo 15 43
Albania 25 7
Asia 22 14
Africa 22 0
Middle East 19 36
Central America 11 22
Latin America 7 0
2008). What is more, criticism coming from the Eastern EU actors has
been felt more like peer pressure and has thus been accepted ‘much more
patiently’ in hybrid regimes in the neighborhood than criticism coming
from the West.24 And especially at the civic level, many recipient civic
groups report feeling ‘ownership’ as they were able to help shape the
‘objectives, activities, target audience’ of projects as equals to their Eastern
European partners thus also ensuring that assistance reflects better the
needs of beneficiaries (Shapovalova & Shumylo, 2008; on lack of sense
of ownership of practices promoted by Western donors, see Schmitter &
Brower, 1999). In sum, by sharing their recent democratization experience
with other countries in the same region, the Eastern EU civic democracy
promoters have achieved a reasonable fit between recipient realities
and promoted practices. A good fit between recipient and promoted
practices is consistently found to be one of the most important fac-
tors for the success of the norm adoption by recipients (Checkel, 1999;
Acharya, 2004; Cortell & Davis, 1996; Clark, 2001; Price, 1998).
6.3.3 With whom do the Eastern EU civic democracy

promoters work? Civic elites, policy-makers, and citizens
The last question to be considered in this chapter is: who has benefited
from the assistance of the Eastern EU countries? Both the Polish and
the Slovak civic democracy promoters have worked predominantly with
other civic actors abroad. However, which segments of the recipient civil
societies have these Eastern EU civic democracy promoters engaged?
Have they preferred to work primarily with professionalized, centralized,
bureaucratized groups, as many Western democracy promoters have
been criticized for doing? A majority of the Eastern EU civic democracy
promoters work with a combination of (1) formal civic groups, such
as interest and grassroots groups and think tanks; (2) individuals with
important civic functions, the so-called civic ‘multipliers’ or ‘alternative
leaders’, such as journalists, researchers, teachers, and young leaders, who
embrace and in turn spread democratic norms in their home countries;
and (3) political elites from the national and local governing institutions.
In sum, both the Polish and the Slovak civic democracy promoters have
worked with an array of different civic (and political) actors with many of
their programs bridging different civic spaces as well as the civic-political
divide.
Poland: The Polish civic democracy promoters working in ‘countries
in transition’, such as Ukraine, Georgia, Moldova, and the Western
Balkans, have most actively supported the development of civil soci-
ety as a platform for spreading democratic practices and values in
these countries. Polish civic democracy promoters have invested in
increasing the capacity of various interest groups and grassroots initia-
tives, which would allow the citizens to ‘take responsibility for their
community and its problems’.25 The Polish civic democracy promoters
have further supported these countries’ transformations by working with
a number of national and local political elites to prepare them for imple-
menting reforms and for working in a democratic system. A common
intersection of the Polish assistance to civic and to political elites has
been support for ‘civic and local self-government as a basic form of
democracy’.26 Additionally, a number of the Polish civic democracy
126 Tsveta Petrova
promoters reported that as the capacity of their international counterparts

improved, many of them were transformed from recipients into part-
ners in new joint projects especially around EU integration/cooperation
themes.27
The approach of the Polish civic democracy promoters working in
autocracies, such as Belarus, Russia, and the countries in Central Asia
and the South Caucuses, has been somewhat different – it has centered
on investing in civic groups and in grassroots initiatives in order to
generate public demand and support for democratization. A number
of Polish civic democracy promoters have supported the development
of civil society as a bulwark against the control autocrats have of their
societies. Just as importantly, many Polish civic democracy promoters
have also invested in working with civic multipliers such as journalists
and young leaders as important agents of democratization. In general,
the Polish activists have sought to engage the oppressed citizens abroad
in an effort to develop ‘a culture of freedom’ in their countries, so that
their citizens can then demand democratization.28
In general, the Polish civic democracy promoters consider their strengths
to include ‘supporting the development of local communities’ (Czubek,
2003; see Table 6.3). Indeed, the Polish activists have prioritized working
both with civic organizations and with individuals with important civil
roles as well as with some local government authorities.29 This is reflected
in the relatively high proportion of Polish civic democracy promoters
who work with youth – 74 percent, with educators – 41 percent, with
community grassroots groups – 52 percent, and with local governments
37 percent, in addition to working with various interest groups – 78
percent. The activities of the School for Leaders Association, presented
above, is a good example of Polish work with local communities abroad –
work that bridges different civic spaces as well as the civic-political divide.
Consider also the example of the European Meeting Centre, Nowy Staw
Foundation, which is a youth center in Poland, set up with German assis-
tance. By the mid 1990s Nowy Staw began working with young Belarusian
leaders. Nowy Staw opened a youth center in Belarus, which worked with
other youth groups, state schools, and the Church to help strengthen
values such as democracy, self-governance, tolerance, and solidarity within
and between nations.30 In brief, the Polish civic democracy promoters
work as much with the general citizenry as they do with civic elites abroad.
Just as importantly, many Polish civic democracy promoters encourage
their organizations-partners abroad to work with relevant policy-makers
and to engage their fellow citizens in various forms of civic and political
activism.
Table 6.3 Beneficiaries of the Polish and Slovak civic democracy promoters:
percentage of NGOs targeting particular beneficiary out of all NGOs in movement
Sectors Country
Poland Slovakia
Political Elections – 15
Process Parties 4 38
Governing Executive & 33 46
Institutions Legislature
Judiciary – –
Local Government 37 15
Civil Society Organized Interest Groups 78 77
Grassroots Groups 52 46
Think Tanks 11 38
Unorganized Media 30 15
Youth 74 31
Educators 41 15
General Public 15 46
Slovakia: Borrowing from their own experience with organizing an

electoral breakthrough in their country in 1998, the Slovak civic democracy
promoters have assisted several neighboring post-communist opposi-
tions in organizing ‘electoral revolutions’ in their countries through
helping with voter mobilization (voter registration, get-out-the-vote
campaigns, youth mobilization, and pre- and post-election debates) and
media- and election-monitoring.31 After the democratic breakthrough in
some of these recipient countries, such as Croatia, Serbia, and Ukraine,
the Slovak civic democracy promoters have focused on building the
capacity of these recipient civil societies to serve as ‘the government’s
partners in shaping public policy and accelerating their country’s EU
integration’ (Kucharczyk & Lovitt, 2008). Slovak activists working in
these countries have focused primarily on cooperating with various pub-
lic interest groups and further on organizing a number of public debates
about the reform process in these countries and about their relationship
with the EU and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).
In autocracies, such as Belarus, the Slovak civic democracy promoters
have worked with interest groups, the political opposition, and think
tanks producing alternative campaign and reform ideas to ready the
128 Tsveta Petrova
opposition to take and assume office.32 The Slovak civic democracy

promoters have also invested in strengthening a number of grassroots
and youth groups in order to increase ‘democratic political competi-
tion through the promotion of a democratic alternative’ – a new and
young political elite.33 The Slovak activists have further sought to use
economic development as a non-contentious issue around which com-
munity development and citizen participation could be strengthened
(Kucharczyk & Lovitt, 2008).
In general, the Slovak civic democracy promoters consider their
strengths to include ‘supporting the development of civil society and
citizen participation in policy-making’34 (see Table 6.3). Indeed, the Slovak
activists have prioritized working with a variety of civic organizations
abroad – from interest groups, to community organizations, to think
tanks. Seventy-seven percent of Slovak civic democracy promoters partner
with interest groups abroad, 46 percent of Slovak activists work with com-
munity organizations in the neighborhood and beyond, and 38 percent of
Slovak activists cooperate with think tanks abroad. For example, Partners
for Democratic Change – Slovakia assists ‘various citizen [grassroots]
groups but also […] non-profit organizations’.35 Similarly, Pontis cooper-
ates with both youth grassroots groups and think tanks in Belarus.
Additionally, many Slovak civic democracy promoters also emphasize
cooperation between civic actors and the citizenry on the one hand
and on the other – cooperation between civic actors and political elites.
Accordingly, in addition to partnering with non-state actors abroad,
38 percent of Slovak non-governmental groups have targeted political-
process institutions and 46 percent have worked with foreign political
elites at the national level. The international activities of organizations
such as Civic Eye in election monitoring and corruption monitoring,
for instance, are a good example here. Another example is People in
Peril’s work with political dissidents in countries such as Cuba, Burma,
and Belarus. At the same time, 69 percent of all Slovak civic democracy
promoters have also worked with the general public or with civic multi-
pliers in a range of dictatorships and countries in transition. For exam-
ple, 46 percent of Slovak activists target the citizenry directly through
organizing public discussion about various democracy-related topics
such as the several rounds of debates in Ukraine about the country’s
relations with the EU and NATO organized by the Slovak Foreign Policy
Association. In other words, as with the Polish civic democracy promoters,
their Slovak counterparts have worked with an array of different civic
and political actors, thereby bridging different civic spaces as well as the
civic-political divide.
In sum, the beneficiaries of both Polish and Slovak civic democracy

promotion have been primarily various civic actors abroad. Those civic
partners have included formal NGOs as well as the general citizenry
and individuals with important civic functions. The Polish and Slovak
efforts have thus contributed to the strengthening of diverse forms of
formal and informal civic activism abroad. Moreover, the Polish and
Slovak activists have further worked to bridge the divides between
civil society, political elites, and populations abroad by implementing
projects that simultaneously target all three beneficiary groups, thereby
also creating precedents for their future cooperation.
The emphasis the Eastern EU democracy promoters have placed
on supporting civil society abroad very much mirrors the crucial role
played by Polish and Slovak civil societies in both the breakthrough
and consolidation phases of the democratization of their countries. At
the same time, there are some more minor but still noteworthy diffe-
rences between the beneficiaries of both Polish and Slovak civic democ-
racy promotion – differences that mirror the distinctive features of the
Polish ‘negotiated transition’ and the Slovak ‘electoral breakthrough’
transition. Poland has emphasized the development of civil society as
de-concentration of power away from the political center while Slovakia
has focused primarily on supporting politically oriented civil society as
a bridge between the public and political elites. In other words, much
like Western democracy promotion, Eastern EU democracy promotion
has certain national characteristics as it is based on the domestic models
of democracy/democratization.
6.4 Conclusion: What is the Comparative Advantage of the

Eastern EU Civic Democracy Promoters?
This chapter examined how the Eastern EU civic democracy promot-

ers have dealt with some of the trade-offs of providing international
democracy and human rights support and therefore, their ability to
contribute to the development of civil society abroad. The analysis
showed that Eastern EU NGOs have several merits, such as working
with a broad array of civic actors abroad as well as providing them with
relevant and somewhat tailored technical, and to a lesser extent politi-
cal, assistance based on the Eastern EU transition successes. Still, most
of these civic democracy promoters also tend to work with recipient
organizations from their own region with which they already have ties,
which further restricts their geographical reach. And instead of striving
to innovate, many civic democracy promoters frequently export their
130 Tsveta Petrova
most successful domestic programs. In addition to such limitations of

scope and repertoire, most of the Eastern EU civic democracy promo-
ters have few independent sources of funding. As a result, they remain
dependent on external funding for their international work and still
allocate most of their project funding for project implementation rather
than for the institutional development of their recipients. In sum, while
the Eastern EU civic democracy promoters have much to offer, their
potential impact has been rather limited.
Notes
1. In recent years, the term ‘democracy promotion’ has acquired a somewhat
negative connotation. However, I use the term ‘democracy promotion’ with
the acknowledgment that ‘the primary force for democratization is and must
be internal to the country in question’. (Burnell, 2000, 12) Such promotion
also includes support for human rights obsevance abroad and with democ-
racy import/export. The latter terms have also been criticized as implying
a mechanistic transplantation of a set of political institutions. However,
I use them to indicate the adoption/transmission of a diffusion item without
loading these terms with any information about the degree of adaptation of
such diffusion items. Lastly, I use the concept of donor interchangeably with
democracy promoter.
2. See for example, Carothers and Youngs (2011) and Petrova (2011).
3. The civic democracy promoters discussed in this text are civic groups – both
grassroots and professionalized/third-sector organizations.
4. It should be noted that not all Western actors have made these mistakes and
that many of those who made such mistakes learned from them. Still, these
mistakes are an important reminder of the possible pitfalls of international
democracy support.
5. This case study is based on an interview with L. S., 16 October 2008.
6. Similarly, in addition to or in lieu of the exchanges, other Polish NGOs such
as the Nowy Staw Foundation invite their foreign partners to observe or par-
ticipate in the ongoing activities of the Polish organizations. Interview with
A. M., 7 October 2008.
7. The NGOs that monitor the EU’s support for democratization in the
neighborhood (19 percent) and that actually seek to influence the EU
Common Foreign and Security Policy (7 percent) are even fewer.
8. Interview with K. S., 9 October 2008; and interview with K. M., 7 October
2008.
9. Interview with A. M., 8 October 2008.
10. Interview with U. P., 31 October 2008.
11. Interview with A. K., 15 October 2008.
12. www.pauci.org/en/news-584-Polish-Ukrainian%20Cooperation%20
Foundation%20PAUCI%20-%202009%20Annual%20Report/
13. www.mott.org/news/PublicationsArchive/AnnualReports
14. Pontis is the successor to the Foundation for a Civil Society – the New York
chapter of the Czechoslovak dissident initiative Charter 77. This case study
is based on an interview with M. S., 13 November 2008; an interview with

J. K., 27 November 2008; and an interview with M. S., 25 July 2007.
15. Another good example of a Slovak civic democracy promoter that has sought
to shape Bratislava’s and the EU’s policy on Ukraine is the work of the Slovak
Foreign Policy Association which worked to elevate Ukraine to the status of
Slovakia’s strategic partner and then argued for immediate sectoral economic
integration between the EU and Ukraine (including free-trade and visa-free
travel) as a stepping stone towards future accession. Interview with A. D.,
21 November 2008.
16. This case study is based on an interview with M. O. and G. S., 6 November 2008.
17. Interview with Z. K., 15 July 2007.
18. Interview with P. D., 26 November 2008.
19. Ibid., 31.
20. Interview with J. K., 26 November 2008.
21. First quote from interview with V. H., 30 October 2008; second quote from
interview with B. S., 28 November 2008; interview with K. M., 5 November
2008; and interview with T. I., 28 November 2008.
22. Interview with O. S., 18 March 2010.
23. Interview with L. M., 1 April 2010; interview with R. P., 19 October 2008; inter-
view with L. S., 19 February 2009; and interview with R. S., 19 March 2009.
24. Interview with S. P., 20 June 2007; interview with U. U., 18 March 2009.
25. Interview with K. S., 9 October 2008.
26. Interview with K. M., 7 October 2008.
28. Interview with A. B., 28 November 2008.
29. It should be noted that about a third of the Polish civic democracy promoters
also target the recipient national-level political elites. The example of the work
of the Institute for Strategic Studies is an illustration of how politicians from
the post-communist region are trained to build democratic politics and join
the Euro-Atlantic community and invited to participate in regional forums
where they can learn from the civic and political actors who implemented or
advised on the Polish transition. Interview with U. P., 31 October 2008.
31. Interview with M. M., 27 July 2007.
34. Interview with K. M., 5 November 2008; and interview with P. D., 26 November
2008.
35. Interview with K. M., 5 November 2008.
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Part III
Civil Society: Developments and
Consequences
7
Democratization from Below: Civil
Society versus Social Movements?
Donatella della Porta
While in part overlapping in empirical focus and theoretical concerns,

social movement studies and civil society studies have grown apart from
each other. Besides conceptualizing objects which are at least in part diffe-
rent, the two fields of studies have also focused on different normative and
theoretical concerns. Both are plural fields, with different and contrast-
ing approaches in each. While social movement studies developed from
attention to conflicts, considered as positive movers of society, civil soci-
ety studies stressed the emergence of an autonomous sphere of activities,
separated from the state and the market. In this, the two fields of studies
tend to present different conceptions of democracy: social movement
studies stress the virtues of conflict, whereas civil society studies focus on
the virtues of an autonomous sphere between the state and the market.
Besides and beyond disciplinary fields, civil society has however also
been framed differently by a variety of social and political actors. Conflicts
and autonomy have been in fact also mentioned by the collective
actors that took part in democratization processes: civil society actors
that carried out processes of democratization from below presented
themselves as supporting another politics, developing participatory and
deliberative visions of democracy. This radical conception of civil society
stood out from the institutional actors in the democracy promotion
policy field, which tended instead to spread a neo-liberal vision of civic
society as subsidiary producers of (cheap) services and a legitimating
frame for a narrow conception of representative democracy. The gap
between what oppositional civil society expects from democracy and
what democracy promoters expect from civil society organizations con-
tributes to explain some failures.
In what follows, I shall first discuss overlappings but also tensions in the
social sciences between the field of study focusing on social movements
137
138 Donatella della Porta
and the one focusing on civil society. Second, I shall reconstruct the
conceptualization of civil society in the paradigmatic case of Eastern
European transition to democracy, singling out horizontal participation
in autonomous public spheres as central main elements.
7.1 Civil society and social movement studies:

a difficult dialogue
Social movement organizations (SMOs) and civil society organizations

(as well as, for instance, non-governmental organizations (NGOs)) are
concepts often used as synonymous. Especially, some specific groups,
issues, or campaigns have been analyzed as typical examples of the
evolution of social movements, civil society, and/or NGOs. Interestingly
for us, this had been the case when the 1989 wave of democratization
spread, representing a turning point in research on transition and
democracy (see inter alia Joppke, 1995; Goodwin, 2001). While that
literature had been in fact permeated by first structuralist, and then
elitist biases (inter alia Collier, 1999; Bermeo, 1997), the 1989 peaceful
revolutions were greeted as examples of democratization from below
and linked to the powerful agency of civil society. Democracy promo-
tion was clearly also influenced by these visions, shifting from party
building to incentive to civil society organizations.
Other examples could be mentioned. In particular, in the early
2000s, the transnational campaigns of the global justice movement
brought together hundreds of charities, trade unions, faith groups,
student unions, grassroots groups – that is, organizations that had
been addressed in political sociology within the large field of social
movement studies (defined as opposed to party and interest groups); in
international relations, with a growing focus on NGOs (as opposed to
nation-states); in social theory, within the ‘revival’ of the civil society
(as opposed to the state and the market). The same is true of many
countersummits, global days of action, and transnational social forums,
joined by representatives of thousands of associations and tens of thou-
sands of activists (della Porta, 2007; della Porta, 2009a, 2009b). Students
of SMOs, NGOs, and the Civil Society have also been fast in extend-
ing their focus on the new global dimension of these mobilizations,
through concepts such as Transnational SMOs, International NGOs, and
Global Civil Society.
When moving from empirics to theory, it is however true that very little
dialogue existed between the fields of studies focusing, respectively, on
social movements, civil society, or NGOs (della Porta & Diani, 2011).
Democratization from Below 139
At least in part, this is due to increasing disciplinary specialization. While

attention to social movements first developed in political sociology,
civil society was conceptualized and debated by normative theorists,
and international relations scholars coining the term ‘NGOs’ in order
to conceptualize actors beyond the states. Although these fields of study
have much to offer to our understanding of these emerging conflicts in
our society, they most often talked past each other.
Focusing on social movements and civil societies, besides the pos-
sibility for growing dialogue, there are however also tensions between
the two fields – both empirically and theoretically. Empirically, civil
society organizations have often been conceptualized as the product of
the ‘taming’ of social movements (Kaldor, 2003). Where social move-
ments privilege protest, civil society organizations are said to use less
disruptive forms. While social movements put forward radical claims,
civil society organizations are presented as moderate and reasonable.
And whereas social movements are based on grassroots organizational
forms, civil society organizations are often well organized and quite rich
in resources.
From the theoretical point of view, social science literature on the
two types of actors stresses quite different contributions to democracy:
social movement studies pointing at the virtues of conflicts, civil society
studies underlining the autonomy of these actors from the state and the
market.
Social movement studies have long stressed conflict as the dynamic
element for our societies. The ‘European tradition’ in social movement
studies has looked at new social movements as potential carriers of a new
central conflict in our post-industrial societies, or at least of an emerg-
ing constellation of conflicts (della Porta & Diani, 2006, chapter 2). In
the ‘American tradition’, the resource mobilization approach reacted to
a, then dominant, conception of conflicts as pathologies. In his influ-
ential book Social Conflicts and Social Movements, Anthony Oberschall
(1973) defined social movements as the main carriers of societal con-
flicts. In Democracy and Disorder, Sidney Tarrow influentially pointed
to the relevant and positive role of unconventional forms of political
participation in the democratic processes. From Michael Lipsky (1965)
to Charles Tilly (1978), the first systematic works on social movements
developed from traditions of research that stressed conflicts of power,
both in the society and in politics. In fact, a widely accepted definition
of social movements introduced conflicts as a central element for their
conceptualization: ‘Social movement actors are engaged in political
and/or cultural conflicts, meant to promote or oppose social change.
By conflict we mean an oppositional relationship between actors who

seek control of the same stake – be it political, economic, or cultural
power – and in the process make negative claims on each other – i.e.,
demands which, if realized, would damage the interests of the other
actors’ (della Porta & Diani, 2006, 21). Conflicts – and in particular
protests – have been in fact considered as positive for different reasons,
ranging from the ‘internal’ effects of creating solidarity and collective
identities as well as organizational networks, increasing incentives for
collective action (della Porta, 2011; della Porta & Mosca, 2005), to the
‘external’ one of improving democratic outputs (della Porta, 2013).
Analysts of civil society have rather stressed the role of non-contentious
forms of collective action, focused on consensual agendas. For example,
della Porta and Diani (2011) listed, ‘campaigns promoting collective
responses to pressing public issues that most recognize as central (e.g.
environmental degradation or the persistence of inequality between
Western and developing areas) are surely akin to coalitions if not to full-
fledged social movements: they involve multiple organizations and may
also generate long term solidarities’. As they noted, instead, ‘the conflict
element is largely missing as civil society often acts in pursuit of goals
defined broadly enough to make them acceptable – if not prioritarian –
to large sectors of the public opinion’.
If the presence of conflicts is certainly not denied in social science
literature addressing civil society, nevertheless, especially since the 1990s,
the conception of politics as an arena for the expression of conflicts has
been challenged (or at least balanced) by an emerging attention to the
development of communicative arenas as spaces for consensus building.
In normative theory, but also in the empirical research, attention to
autonomous spaces of communication developed, especially within
the study of civil society. Dubbed as the ‘most favored export from
sociological theory into politics’ (Mitzal, 2001), but also as ‘flattened
out and emptied of content’ (Chandoke, 2003), the concept of a civil
society has been used as a synonym of associational life and emancipa-
tion from state power. Particularly inspired by new social movements
and the movement for democracy in Eastern Europe (Mitzal, 2001), in
social theory, the ‘revival’ of civil society developed especially in the
1990s with the search for a space that was autonomous from both the
state and the market.
In fact, ‘in the aftermath of the revolution of 1989, the term “civil
society” was taken up in widely different circles and circumstances’,
expressing a ‘concern about personal autonomy, self-organization, pri-
vate space became salient not only in Eastern Europe’ (Kaldor, 2003, 2).
In many reflections on contemporary societies, an autonomous civil

society is referred to as being capable of addressing the tensions between
particularism and universalism, plurality and connectedness, diversity
and solidarity. It is, in this sense, called to be ‘a solidarity sphere in
which a certain kind of universalizing community comes gradually to
be defined and to some degrees enforced’ (Alexander, 1998, 7). Also
some of the proponents of the deliberative vision of democracy have
seen social movements and similar associations as central arenas for the
development of these autonomous public spheres (Mansbridge, 1996;
Cohen, 1989; Dryzek, 2000; Offe, 1997).
Similar reflections could be addressed to forms of action. Social move-
ment tactics are disruptive as, in order to obtain the attention of public
opinion and put pressure on decision-makers powerless actors need to
make their voice more audible through direct actions that challenge
law and order. In fact, protest is defined as a non-conventional form
of action that interrupts daily routine (Lipsky, 1965). Moreover, social
movements express a fundamental critique of representative democ-
racy, contesting institutional assumptions about political participation
as mainly electoral and promoting instead participative democracy. This
vision of social movements as challengers has also been stressed in the
concept of contentious politics, which has been defined as episodic,
public, collective interaction among claims makers and their targets
(McAdam, Tarrow & Tilly, 2001). Research on civil society has instead
stressed civility as respect for others, politeness, and the acceptance
of strangers (Keane, 2003). Linked to this is a view of civil society as
consisting of cooperative and associational ties that foster mutual trust
and shared values, so strengthening social cohesion (Putnam, 1993).
Both elements – conflict and autonomy – are relevant for understand-
ing the characteristics of democratization from below and its outcomes.
In fact, in the theorization of civil society by the actors of the 1989
peaceful revolutions, the two aspects were intertwined. In the policy
implementation of democracy promotion, instead, the rhetoric moved
away from conflicts, and the practices also from autonomy.
7.2 Conceptions of civil society: radical versus neo-liberal
Movements active in mobilization for democracy developed some specific

vision of their role, and identified around them. In particular, references
to civil society (re)emerged in Latin America and Eastern Europe during
struggles for democracy. Civil society was in fact framed as an alternative
to the authoritarian control that was extending its grip on everyday life.
First and foremost, social movements developed grassroots conceptions

of mobilization, contrasting civil society to vertical bureaucracy. In
Brazil, the urban popular movements that developed with the libera-
lization of the 1970s played an important role. Even if they were frag-
mented along class lines (middle class versus popular classes) and at
risk of being co-opted into clientelistic networks, they were particularly
influential in introducing a participatory ethos opposed to the once
dominant one of an enlightened vanguard. As Mainwaring (1987, 149)
noted, ‘The movement has helped redefine the parameters of political
discourse in subtle but significant ways. Perhaps most important has
been the change in discourse, away from the technocratic elitist discourse
that permeated all sides of the political spectrum in the late 1960s and
first half of the 1970s, to a new discourse that emphasized popular
participation.’
The relevance of participatory and even deliberative conceptions of
democracy in the opposition is particularly visible in Eastern Europe,
where it was embodied in a specific conception of civil society.
There, during the struggle for democratization, informal ‘micro-groups’
allowed for the spread of ‘horizontal and oblique voice’, with ‘the deve-
lopment of semantically coded critical communication’. This coded
communication included ‘political jokes, innuendo, emphases and
mannerisms of language, and choice of topics that encode one’s own
political preferences’ (Di Palma, 1991, 71). As Di Palma observed, the
oppositional actors have chosen horizontality to mark their opposition
‘to “vertical voice”, that is, to the communication of petition and com-
mand that dictatorships prefer’. Additionally, the oppositional actors
explicitly rejected the opacity of the system by being themselves public
and transparent. This ‘created an emotional and cognitive bond among
opponents of the regime, who came to recognize that they were not
alone’ (Di Palma 1991, 71). This vision is embodied in the samizdat,
whose characteristics Di Palma links to a specific conception of civil
society:
First, the publications – typically, personal political and parapo-

litical testimonials, were authored, reproduced, and circulated
through self-generated, improvised networks, in which the authors
and the disseminators at each step were often single individuals.
Second, this meant that in certain cases, though the publications
were illegal and alternative, they were not strictly clandestine. Full
clandestinity would have defeated the testimonial function. Third,
the individual nature of samizdat also meant that organizational
infrastructures to sustain publication were, strictly speaking, not

necessary. (1991, 71)
Transparency was in fact a central value, often pointed at in the opposi-

tional conception of ‘a life in truth’. The samizdat reflected, and at the
same time helped spread, a particular organizational culture. First of all,
there was a rejection of underground conspiracies for power, as they
rather ‘sought to build, slowly and by the power of example, a parallel
society’. In fact, in this environment,
members and supporters developed modes of contestation that were

less conspiratorial and power seeking and that were instead more
appropriate to alternative, at times single-issue, movements in plura-
list societies. Examples include challenging the official counterparts
of unofficial organizations; collecting information, reporting and
denouncing government activities and misdeeds; demanding redress
of grievances; holding the authorities accountable; proposing alter-
native policies; negotiating with the authorities, if it came to that. In
turn, this unselfish mode of contestation, contrasting as it did with
the reclusive and offensive opacity of nomenklaturas, gave organized
dissent a popular credibility not dissimilar from that enjoyed by the
more heroic examples of individual dissent. (ibid., 72)
So, dissent transparency was opposed to the conspiracy of the regime.

Transparency was bridged with the development of free spaces. The
organized opposition chose in fact the form of civic forums, which were
conceived as broad in scope and ambition as ‘[t]hey aimed at defining
postcommunism by an alternative (though nonetheless traditional)
set of shared civic values and at consolidating a public sphere, a criti-
cal public opinion (that is, a civil society), as the core of a transparent
democratic order’ (ibid.).
In this sense, the democratic opposition expressed a criticism of
liberal democracy, stressing instead participatory and deliberative
democratic qualities (Olivo, 2001, 2–3). In fact, while not wanting to
conquer the state power, the democratic opposition aimed at building
autonomous spaces in which to develop what they defined as ‘a culture
of dialogue’, ‘a culture of plurality and the free public domain’ (cited in
ibid., 14). In these free spaces (or parallel polis, in Havel’s words), as the
dissident Ulrike Poppe put it, ‘members learned to speak authentically
and to relate to each other … to engage in social matters and to put up
resistance’ (in ibid.). In her words, the groups that formed the citizens’
movement in the German Democratic Republic (GDR) were characterized

by ‘openness and publicity… grassroots democracy rejection of patriar-
chal, hierarchical, and authoritarian structures, non-violence, spirituality,
unity of private and public consciousness’ (ibid., 88). The citizens’
movement (calling for ‘democracy now’) aimed at constituting public
forums for deliberation, open to all citizens, self-organizing with a com-
mitment to participatory democracy (ibid., 92). Local round tables and
citizens’ committees reflected this conception.
Self-government had to develop in this free space. As Ulrich Preuss
noted, the 1989 movements did not try to impose a common will of the
people, but rather promoted a principle of self-government, suggesting
‘the idea of an autonomous civil society and its ability to work on itself
by means of logical reasoning processes and the creation of appropriate
institutions’ (1995, 97). The cultural effects of the mobilization of the
civil society implied in fact ‘the breakthrough in pursuing a new civic
culture – a culture that wishes to deny the historical prophecies that
stem from regional retardation and fragmentation – has been made by
dissident movements’ (Di Palma, 1999, 80).
Autonomous from the state, these spaces were however political. The
‘Antipolitics’ promoted by Charter 77 was indeed a call for another
politics. As Baker (1999) summarized, ‘[f]or the opposition theorists of
the 1970s and 1980s, civil society was an explicitly normative concept
which held up the ideal of societal space, autonomous from the state,
wherein self-management and democracy could be worked out. That is,
the idea of civil society was political and prescriptive’ (Baker, 1999, 2).
In the civil society, a community was to be formed. Civil society
theorists, such as Michnik and Kuron in Poland, Havel and Benda in
Czechoslovakia, and Konrad, Kis, and Bence in Hungary, ‘in addition
to their calls for a more liberal politics of checks and balances, also
saw civil society originally in the more positive, or socialist, terms of
community and solidarity. Indeed, for many such theorists civil society
indicated a movement towards post-statism; for control of power, while
not unimportant, would be insufficient for the fundamental redistribu-
tion, or even negation, of power itself. If this was to be achieved, self-
management in civil society was necessary’ (ibid., 15).
The theorists of the civil society considered in fact self-organized
structures from below as fundamental loci for and of democracy:
‘workplace and local community self-government, based on personal
contact, exercised daily, and always subject to correction, have greater
attraction in our part of the world than multi-party representative
democracy because, if they have their choice, people are not content
with voting once every four years [...] When there is parliamentary
democracy but no self-administration, the political class alone occupies
the stage’ (Konrad, in Baker, 1999, 4–5). Not by chance, in Poland, the
Workers Defense Committees (KORs) renamed themselves Committees
for social self-organization (Ash, 2011). And the Civic Forum in
Czechoslovakia was a loosely coordinated umbrella organization with
local branches which worked independently from each other in organi-
zing debates, strikes, and demonstrations.
If this framing helped mobilization against the regime, it appeared
however also problematic to sustain mobilization after transition to
democracy, when (neo)liberal institutions prevailed.
First, procedural democracy obscured the substantive claims of the
radical conception of civil society, contributing to provoking a reduction
in citizens’ participation. To a certain extent, also given the speed of
the breakdown of the old regimes, the civil society frame became prob-
lematic during the Round Tables period. As Glenn (2001) observed, in
this context, the civil society frame was pivotal in the mass mobilizations
that produced the rapid fall of the regime as very decentralized organi-
zations allowed for rapid diffusion of protest. The horizontal organization
conception was however unfit for institutional negotiation and electoral
competition. The civil society frame had difficulty in producing a winning
alternative also because many in the opposition did not want to form
parties, which they saw as instruments of the past (ibid., 139).
Second, the concept of a civic society as a community had difficulty
in adjusting to emerging conflicts. During the transition in Czechos-
lovakia, for instance, Civic Forum ‘continued to portray itself as the rep-
resentative of the nation by presenting speakers from all parts of society.
Havel declared: “after forty years, citizens are beginning to meet freely.
It has happened after what we all called for – dialogue with the powers
that be!”’ (Wheaton & Kavan, 1992, 89, emphasis added). As Solidarnos嘔c嘔
in Poland, it presented itself as the embodiment of the nation and its
members as ‘self-administering and independent representatives of the
common will throughout the republic’ (Glenn, 2001, 113). In fact, after
the general strike of 27 November 1989, when the Central Committee
resigned and the opposition asked for a government of national under-
standing, the Civic Forum refused to make recommendation for the
government as it did not consider itself as a political party but rather ‘a
spontaneously emerging movement of citizens united in their efforts to
find a way out of the crisis in our society’ (ibid., 181). The attempts to
govern in the name of a united society did not help in revitalizing democracy,
as ‘[i]dentity claims on the basis of the unity of society offered little
guidance for how to resolve conflicts within democratic institutions’

(ibid., 195).
The vision of the civil society proposed from below was also at odds
with the one which was proposed from above. As Baker (1999) rightly
noted, the radical view of the civil society that had developed in the
opposition in Eastern Europe (as in Latin America) was ‘tamed’ after the
transition, when a liberal conception of democracy prevailed.
This happened, indeed, during the consolidation of a model of
democracy which was based on a liberal conception, focusing on
elected elites and excluding instead civil society from the true con-
struction of politics and democracy, which had rather to be mediated
through political parties. Representative democracy thus obscured the
substantive claims of the radical conception of civil society, contribut-
ing to reduce citizens’ participation.
This is even more true as policies of democracy promotion have been
implemented by external actors in that region and beyond. In this case,
in fact, funds and support have gone to those groups that presented
their role as subsidiary to the state, intervening on non-contentious
issues, and organizationally accountable. As the introduction to this
volume convincingly argues, a specific type of organizations has been
promoted, using material incentives, and then spread by imitation.
The specific view of civil society as non-contentious has driven funds
distribution, marginalizing instead those SMOs that could claim social
and political reforms, as well as practicing different conceptions of
democracy.
The mismatch between the oppositional conception of civil society,
developed from below, and that imposed from above by various spon-
sors explains, at least in part, both the failure of democracy promotion
policy initiatives and the disillusion of activists of social movements
that struggle for democracy but then find the results of their struggle
much below their hopes and expectations.
7.3 Conclusion
Social science literature on civil society and on social movements deve-

loped quite separately from each other. This is puzzling, given some
overlapping in empirical coverage, as well as theoretical concerns. There
are however also different emphases, on the positive role of conflicts in
the case of social movement studies and on autonomy from the state
and the market in reflections on the civic society. This has also brought
about a tendency in empirical literature in the two fields to focus
either on rebellious, grassroots, and contentious groups or on tamed,

well-structured, and consensual ones.
When moving from scholarship to the ‘real’ world, the example of
democratization processes in Eastern Europe indicated that during tran-
sitions civil society groups framed themselves as horizontal networks
aiming at building open public spheres. Not only the aim, but also the
forms of action were contentious as well as political. In fact, in most
cases one could speak of a relevant role of social movements of different
types in various stages of democratization from below. A grassroots, self-
organized, and contentious society was however not what institution
building and democracy promotion policies considered as appropriate
to the development of the very specific form of neo-liberal democracy
that was spreading also in the West – what Colin Crouch (2004) defined
as post-democracy. Within a limited conception of the role of the citi-
zens as electors, if not consumers, the civil society has been assigned
the role of (cheap) provider of services and legitimation of procedural,
minimalistic models of democracy.
These profound gaps between the conceptions of civil society defined
from below and the one imposed from above have certainly contributed
to the failure of policies of democracy promotion based on selective con-
tribution to self-appointed ‘civic’ society, in Eastern Europe and elsewhere.
Acknowledgements
Work for this chapter has been conducted thanks to an ERC Advanced
Scholars’ grant for the project Mobilizing for Democracy.
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8
Engineered Civil Society: The
Impact of 20 Years of Democracy
Promotion on Civil Society
Development in Former Soviet
Countries
Armine Ishkanian
8.1 Introduction
The starting point of this edited volume is: How does civil society
develop in the context of transition, and can external democracy
promotion via civil society have any impact on sustained democratic
development? Together with many other scholars studying the deve-
lopment of post-socialist civil society, I have examined the unintended
consequences of top-down democracy promotion and civil society
building strategies and analyzed how external democracy promotion
programs often led to non-governmental organizations (NGOs) being
donor driven, upwardly accountable, and disconnected from their
own communities and constituencies (Abramson, 1999; Adamson,
2002; Hann, 2004; Hann, 2002; Helms, 2003; Howell & Pearce, 2001;
Henderson, 2003; Hemment, 2004; Ishkanian, 2008; Ishkanian, 2007;
Mendelson, 2002; Sampson, 2002; Wedel, 1998).
Promoting a market economy and democracy were the two main aims
of the transition1 agenda, which was implemented following the collapse
of the socialist regimes in Central Eastern Europe and the former Soviet
Union. Within the context of the transition, civil society building was
considered both a means as well as an end to achieving democracy and
the development of a free market economy through the implementation
of neo-liberal reforms which included shrinking the socialist welfare
states, privatization, and the transfer of welfare provision to non-state
actors (including NGOs). During the 1990s, a great deal of financial and
human resources were invested in building and strengthening civil soci-
ety through grants, trainings, as well as capacity building and exchange
150
Engineered Civil Society 151
programs. Within a few years, donors claimed success in having

exponentially grown the number of NGOs from a few hundred to several
thousand in nearly all of the former socialist countries (USAID, 1999).
Indeed, in many former socialist countries, NGOs became a by-word
for civil society as ‘NGOs civil society democracy’. The equation
was named ‘civil society orthodoxy’ (Salmenniemi, 2008).
In this chapter, I discuss the impact of external democracy promotion
efforts in the former Soviet countries since 1991. I briefly discuss the
achievements as well as the missed opportunities and unintended con-
sequences of the first phase of externally funded democracy promotion,
which led to the rapid and indeed exponential growth of formal and
professionalized NGOs. I then examine the recent emergence of new
civic initiatives2 and other non-institutionalized, volunteer-based forms
of collective action that have emerged since 2010 throughout the for-
mer Soviet countries. I ask why, after two decades of ‘transition’, are we
now witnessing the rise of such new civil society actors? How are these
new grassroots civic initiatives different from the formal, professiona-
lized NGOs? What is their relationship with established, professionalized
NGOs and external donors? In answering these questions, I consider the
relationship between external democracy promotion, the development
of civil society, and the democratization of political regimes.
I refer to these as second generation civil society organizations because
they are distinct from formal, professionalized NGOs in a number of
key aspects (for example the issues they address; their organizational
structures; their repertories of action; and their lack of engagement with
foreign donors). I argue that although these grassroots civic initiatives,
which began to emerge in 2010, focus on specific issues such as saving
historical buildings and green spaces, their emergence is informed by
and is an articulation of much broader concerns around corruption, the
absence of rule of law, the lack of democracy, and the failure of formal
political elites (including formal NGOs) to address the concerns of citi-
zens. Thus these grassroots civic initiatives, which are situated within
civil society, represent a critique of politics as usual. Moreover, by reject-
ing traditional NGO forms of organizing and campaigning coupled with
their lack of engagement with external donors, these grassroots civic
initiatives are also a critique of the way external democracy promotion
was practiced for the past two decades.
While providing an overview of the developments in a number of
post-Soviet countries,3 I draw on extensive fieldwork that I have con-
ducted in Armenia beginning in 1996.4 Although Armenia is one of
the smallest countries in the region, it has been one of the highest per
152 Armine Ishkanian
capita recipients of foreign aid since gaining independence in 1991 and

civil society development in the country shares certain similarities, as
I shall discuss, with other former Soviet states. Armenia has been a member
of the Council of Europe since 1996 and is also part of the European
Union’s Eastern Partnership program.
8.2 The effect of the first two decades of democracy

promotion? Genetically engineered civil society
Katherine Verdery contends that since the demise of communism,

Western capitalist societies came to believe that they had a monopoly
on truth and could therefore dispense wisdom about how to build the
‘proper’ forms of democracy and capitalism (Verdery, 1996). This, the
critics charge, led to the promotion of a single (i.e., Western) model
of civil society which ignored other traditions and understandings
(Parekh, 2004). In the former socialist countries, Cold War ideologies
greatly influenced and shaped the design and implementation of poli-
cies and practices aimed at promoting civil society and democracy. In
the early 1990s these Cold War ideologies engendered the notion that
everything created prior to the collapse of communism was either
‘not true civil society’ or that it was polluted and contaminated by
the communist legacy and had to be purged before true civil society
and democracy could flourish (Ishkanian, 2008). This belief that ‘civil
society as usually defined by Western theoretical approaches, did not
exist in the Soviet Union’ (Evans Jr., 2006, 28), meant international
donors engaged in a process of building society from scratch (Mandel,
2012) which was strongly influenced by neo-liberal ideologies and the
Washington Consensus. However, while seeking to build democracy
and civil society, the ‘neo-liberal development designers’ neglected to
draw on the ‘deep reservoir’ of knowledge about the Soviet state, poli-
tics, culture, society, and economics and instead operated as ‘ideology-
informed zealots, bringing their mission of neoliberal enlightenment’
(Mandel, 2012).
These ideologically informed approaches to civil society strengthen-
ing and democracy building subsequently led to the creation of what
I refer to as genetically engineered civil societies. These genetically
engineered civil societies, with the injection of external funding (which
can be likened to growth hormones), experienced spectacularly rapid
growth, which would have not occurred organically. In Armenia for
instance, there were 44 NGOs registered with the Ministry of Justice in
1994. The number of registered NGOs grew to over 1500 in 1996 largely
due to the growing availability of foreign grants as well as the opening

of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) funded NGO
Resource and Training Center in 1995 whose sole purpose was to help
build an NGO sector in Armenia (Ishkanian, 2008). Indeed across the
former socialist countries, immense amounts of aid invested in promot-
ing civil society and democracy led to the ‘explosive growth of local
NGOs’ (USAID, 1999, 3). It is highly unlikely that this rapid growth in
the number of local NGOs would have occurred without the injection
of external funding.
Moreover, like genetically modified crops, these genetically engi-
neered NGOs also began to colonize and squeeze out all indigenous
competitors, becoming the dominant type in their environment. Civil
society in many places lost its diversity and was reduced to profes-
sionalized NGOs that were engaged in advocacy or service delivery and
which supported, in theory if not in practice, liberal Western values.
Some scholars have called this the manifestation of the ‘American’ or
‘neo-liberal’ conceptualization of civil society (Kaldor, 2003; Howell &
Pearce, 2001) which tamed social movements or, more harshly, led to
the ‘abortion of local processes of change’ (Hann, 2004). Others have
argued that the ‘Civil Society Agenda’, through an emphasis on creat-
ing professionalized and upwardly accountable NGOs (for example
accountable to donors), resulted in demobilizing and depoliticizing civil
society movements and organizations (Alvarez, 2008).
Through this approach, which Carothers has called ‘institutional
modelling’ (Carothers, 2000), organizations and actors were rewarded
based on how close they came to imitating that particular model and
its associated discourses. In this volume, Irene Hahn-Fuhr and Susann
Worschech also discuss the impact of donor policies on civil society
development. They examine three different modes of ‘organizational
alignment’ – coercive isomorphism, mimetic processes, and normative
pressure – which emerged between donors and beneficiary NGOs (see
Hahn-Fuhr & Worschech in this volume). Like ‘institutional model-
ling’, ‘organizational alignment’ has also led to the emergence of NGOs
that are developed in accordance to models advanced and supported
by donors. In the case of Russia, for instance, despite their claims to
be ‘grassroots’ and to empower the local, the NGOs that international
agencies sponsored were often ‘narrow, professional, bureaucratic
affairs’ (Hemment, 2012, 241).
During the first two decades of the post-Soviet period, NGOs that
fit the preferred model most closely were rewarded with grants and
external praise; meanwhile civil society groups including nationalist
organizations, veterans groups, and others, which did not replicate the
preferred liberal practices and discourses were ignored or marginalized
by donors and soon came to view themselves as real civil society in
contrast to the donor created and supported NGOs.
Thus while it is clear that professionalized NGOs with strong organi-
zational capacity were the favored type for donors, it is less evident,
as I discuss in the next section, how the legions of professionalized
NGOs contributed to processes of democratization and civil society
development because if we look at the post-Soviet states, apart from the
Baltic countries, few can lay a claim to being on their way to becoming
democracies.
8.2.1 Impact of 20 years of democracy promotion

While acknowledging the successes of Central and Eastern European
countries in establishing democratic institutions and practices, it is
important to recognize that the development of democracy and the
growth of civil societies (for example increased number of organiza-
tions) did not translate into greater citizen engagement or participation
(Celichowski, 2004) or provide greater benefits for various social groups
(Hann, 2004). Although the numbers of NGOs dramatically increased in
these countries, the reality is that many NGOs, even after two decades
of transition, are still almost entirely dependent on foreign support and
they continue to have low levels of public support and trust (Caucasus
Research Resource Center, 2010; EBRD, 2011; Niktin, 2010; Morjé
Howard, 2003; Hann, 2004), negative public image, and low levels of
participation (USAID, 2011).
The 2011 Life in Transition report, published by the European Bank
for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), finds that the existing
low levels of trust in all institutions (including NGOs) has ‘… impeded
many countries’ transition to well-functioning markets, undermined
people’s life satisfaction and challenged their views of the positive
benefits of the transition to market economies and democracy’ (EBRD,
2011). According to the EBRD report, across the former socialist coun-
tries trust in NGOs averages below 40 percent.
According to the Caucasus Barometer survey, only 6 percent of
respondents ‘fully trust’ NGOs in Armenia and an additional 15 percent
‘rather trust’ them. Trust levels toward NGOs are somewhat higher in the
other two Caucasus countries. In Georgia NGOs are ‘fully trusted’ and
‘rather trusted’ by 8 and 22 percent of the respondents respectively, while
in Azerbaijan 6 percent of respondents stated they ‘fully trusted’ NGOs
while 23 percent stated they ‘rather trusted’ NGOs. In all three countries,
over 20 percent of respondents said they did not know enough about
NGOs to provide an answer (Caucasus Research Resource Center, 2010).
NGOs’ lack of strong connections to local grassroots groups and the
wider public meant that they have often been perceived by the public
with skepticism and suspicion of being externally oriented towards and
driven by the interests and concerns of Western donors (EBRD, 2011;
Caucasus Research Resource Center, 2010; Lutsevych, 2013).
Such skepticism has made it relatively easy for governments to justify
crackdowns on NGOs by accusing them of being a fifth column, agents
in the pay of foreign governments, or ‘grant-eaters’ shamelessly chasing
donor funding (Ishkanian, 2008). This tendency particularly intensified
in the aftermath of the so-called color revolutions in the mid 2000s
in Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan. In all of the cases, NGOs played
a key role in helping to overthrow regimes. Consequently, a backlash
emerged against both external democracy promotion and civil society
strengthening programs. The backlash manifested in both direct and
indirect forms of repression of NGOs throughout the former socia-
list countries and indeed, throughout the world (Howell et al., 2008).
Governments in a number of former Soviet states adopted laws restricting
NGO activity and in some cases even engaged in other more insidious
forms of repression (Gershman & Allen, 2006; Howell et al., 2008; Stuart,
2011; Carothers, 2006).
In Russia, this crackdown on NGOs has been renewed and even
intensified with the return of Vladimir Putin to the presidency in 2012.
Shortly after coming to power, Putin supported the passage of the ‘for-
eign agents’ law in July 2012. This controversial bill requires all foreign-
funded NGOs involved in political activity to register as ‘foreign agents’
in Russia (BBC, 2012). Putin has argued that this law only applies to
NGOs that are involved in politics and has justified it by comparing it
to similar policies in the US. He is quoted as saying: ‘if foreigners pay
for political activity, apparently they are expecting to get some result
from that’ (RT, 2012).
In September 2012, Putin intensified the pressure on NGOs by
demanding the immediate withdrawal of USAID from Russia. As of
1 October 2012, USAID was required to leave Russia and halt its funding
of NGOs and projects totaling a $50 million budget for 2012. As Vadim
Niktin writes, ‘[In Russia] people tend to view traditional NGOs with
suspicion because of their ties to foreign organizations. It’s a sentiment
enthusiastically fanned by the government’ (Niktin, 2010).
Two decades after the Soviet Union collapsed, it appears that Western
donors’ investment in civil society strengthening and democracy
building efforts have failed to achieve the desired outcomes. Apart from
the success stories of the new EU member states and despite the millions
spent on programs promoting democratization and civil society, today
we witness rising authoritarianism and ‘regimes buttressed by entrenched
networks and webs of corruption’ (Mandel, 2012, 224).
8.3 Second generation civil society activism?
Beginning in 2010, despite the rising authoritarianism and repression of

civil society, and in some instances directly in response to it, there has
been the emergence of grassroots civic initiatives in a number of former
Soviet countries. In this section, I discuss the rise of these new civic
initiatives by drawing on examples from Armenia, Georgia, Russia, and
Ukraine. In my discussion, I address the following questions: Why are
these groups emerging now and what do they hope to achieve? How do
they differ from professionalized NGOs and what is their relationship
to professionalized NGOs and foreign donors?
Globally, 2011 was the peak year of civil unrest, protest, and
movements for democracy and against austerity. The 2011 CIVICUS
report titled Bridging the Gaps: Citizens, organizations and dissociation
highlighted the dynamic changes occurring in civil society globally,
analyzed civil society strengths and weaknesses, and raised questions
about the disconnect between ‘established civil society organizations’
and ‘many citizens, and particularly from new and informal forms of
participation and activism’ (CIVICUS, 2011a). The report concluded that
[T]he rise of informal activity, such as the people’s movements of the

Arab Spring, offers a new challenge and opportunity to CSOs [civil
society organizations]: they must embrace such movements to con-
nect better with the public and renew themselves in order to survive.
(CIVICUS, 2011b)
In 2011, alongside the global anti-austerity (for example Occupy Wall

Street, the Indignados in Spain, etc.) and pro-democracy movements of
the Arab Spring there was also a rise of civic activism across some former
Soviet countries. The civic initiatives that emerged in the former Soviet
countries in 2011 and 2012 share certain similarities with the anti-
austerity and pro-democracy movements across the globe, in that they
are driven by a ‘collective re-imagining of democracy, of its practices, and
its relation to everyday life’ (Kaldor et al., 2012). Moreover, a number of
these initiatives self-consciously refer to and adopt the slogans, strategies,
and repertoires of the Occupy and Arab Spring protest movements

(for example #Occupymashtots; #OccupyGudiashvili).
Much has been made of the use of social media and mobile commu-
nications by activists in Tahrir Square and elsewhere (Mason, 2013) and
indeed, the grassroots civic initiatives in the former Soviet states also
extensively use social media to organize, mobilize, and raise awareness.
However, in recognition of the possibilities of these new technologies,
we should also be wary of exaggerating their impact when there is
evidence that social media has also been a tool for government sur-
veillance and even provocation (Morozov, 2011; Center for Liberation
Technology, 2010).
While drawing on examples from Armenia, Georgia, Russia, and
Ukraine, the grassroots civic initiatives I discuss in this chapter share a
number of commonalities with one another. First, they are urban-based
groups created by citizens around shared collective concerns; they are
not projects or actions that were initiated, organized, or led by profes-
sionalized, formal NGOs. Second, while grassroots civic initiatives focus
on very local issues, such as protecting historical landmarks and trees
in a particular park, I argue that these civic initiatives are motivated
by and are an articulation of the anger of many ordinary citizens in
the post-Soviet countries towards the prevailing corruption, economic
inequality, and oligarchic capitalism, as well as the lack of the rule of
law and the absence of accountability, transparency, and participation
in decision making.
8.3.1 A break from the NGO mould

Grassroots civic initiatives differ from professionalized NGOs in a
number of key aspects. First, whereas NGOs have clear vertical organi-
zational structures and delineated lines of leadership and decision
making, civic initiatives on the contrary are informal, volunteer based,
horizontally structured, and loosely organized. While leaders exist,
these are not formal leaders and civic initiatives tend to adopt par-
ticipatory and horizontal forms of agenda setting and decision making
often using Facebook as a platform for discussion and debate. Second,
grassroots civic initiatives address issues that are quite specific and are
narrowly focused on local concerns. Unlike NGOs, they are not working
in the context of projects or at the program or sector levels. Third, while
traditional NGOs’ advocacy is structured, organized, technocratic, and
expert-based, civic initiatives utilize repertories of action that rely on
street-based demonstrations, including creative forms of direct action
such as flash mobs, as well as concerts, theatrical performances, and
art or photography exhibitions. Finally, civic initiatives do not seek,

receive, or depend on foreign grants; funds are collected in the form
of individual, private donations from the participants and members of
the public. By rejecting traditional NGO forms of organizing and shun-
ning engagement with external donors, these grassroots civic initiatives
distance themselves from professionalized or ‘traditional’ (avanatagan)
NGOs and represent a critique of the way external democracy promo-
tion was practiced for the past two decades.
However, these distinctions do not mean that there are no connec-
tions with NGOs. On the contrary, individual NGO representatives
often join the initiatives in their personal capacity and in certain
instances NGOs subsequently provide advice and support to help scale
up and widen impact. This was most apparent in the Save Khimki Forest
civic initiative in Russia where the efforts to save the forest were initi-
ated by local people, who were later joined by Greenpeace and other
NGOs, which helped expand the domestic and international focus.
For the above reasons, I consider the emergence of grassroots civic
initiatives to represent a new phase, or the second generation of civil
society development in the post-Soviet context. But I do not wish
to overstate the impact of grassroots civic initiatives on the broader
political and socioeconomic development, particularly given that these
initiatives thus far have been fleeting, fragmented, and temporary in
nature. Still, the new civic initiatives have injected a much-needed
breath of fresh air into the stagnant NGO sectors in many countries.
Further research is required to examine how these groups will develop
in the future.
Below, after presenting several examples of civic initiatives from
across the former Soviet states, I discuss the relationship between
new grassroots groups and movements with professionalized NGOs
and donors. In doing so, I consider the relationship between external
democracy promotion, the development of civil society, and the democ-
ratization of political regimes.
8.3.2 Civic initiatives across the former Soviet countries

I have been conducting research on civil society in Armenia since 1996.
Beginning in 2010, I began to observe the emergence of grassroots civic
initiatives addressing a diverse set of issues including the rights of taxi
drivers; the protection of forests; maternity pay; and the preservation
of historical buildings. The numbers of civic initiatives grew rapidly in
2011, in part influenced by the local success of initiatives (for example
the campaign to protect maternity pay) and also the emergence of the
global anti-austerity and pro-democracy movements. In 2011 alone

there were over two dozen civic initiatives addressing issues as wide
ranging as overcrowding on public transportation to the protection of
the Armenian language.
One of the most prominent civic initiatives that has been orga-
nized in Armenia in recent years was the initiative to save Mashtots
Park in Yerevan from being cemented over for the construction of
luxury boutiques. This initiative began in February 2012 when two
young civic activists walked up to the construction workers and told
them they did not have the right to build the boutiques in a public
park as a public consultation and environmental impact assessment
(EIA) had not be conducted. A row ensued and the activists turned to
Facebook and began calling people to the park. Over the following three
months, from 11 February until 1 May 2012 activists began to occupy
the park on a daily basis. While the initiative’s immediate aim was to
save Mashtots Park from being cemented over for the construction of
boutiques, the larger objective was to critique the policies and decision
making procedures which have consistently put the interests of power-
ful oligarchs and corporations ahead of people and the environment.
This was hardly the first instance in which business interests had taken
over, legally or illegally, public spaces for private use. However, this was
the first instance in which Armenian citizens collectively mobilized to
oppose such actions. For the activists, their protest was as much about
process (for example consultations, EIAs) as about actual policy. Activists
argued that their goal was to advance an agenda which encourages
civic participation, respect of rule of law, and sustainable development
(Wallace, 2012).
While occupying the park, the activists organized concerts, exhibi-
tions, theatrical performances, and even a ‘funeral’ for the fictional
‘Olig Garkhian’ (i.e., Mr Oligarch). In the ‘funeral’, a papier mâché
figure of an oligarch was placed in a cardboard coffin, which was then
paraded around the streets of central Yerevan followed by mourners and
drummers. The activists walked behind the funeral cortege handing out
leaflets about the ‘funeral’ and also their demands. Through this crea-
tive and quite humorous action, the activists expressed the anger many
Armenians feel toward oligarchs who have come to symbolize and
embody all that is wrong within the Armenian political system, includ-
ing the corruption of politics, the manipulation of laws for personal
gain, and the rampant growth of monopolies in the marketplace.
For the most part the protests in Mashtots Park were peaceful and
lighthearted, however on a few occasions police confronted the
protestors and demanded they remove tents and maintain a proscribed

distance from the half-built boutiques. While the Save Mashtots Park
initiative was organized and led by young activists, as the parliamentary
elections in May 2012 drew near, some opposition politicians began to
descend on the park to presumably engage with the young activists,
but also to use it as a photo-op and a platform from which to engage
in their own political struggles with the government. One group of
middle-aged male opposition politicians, the self-proclaimed ‘Brigade
of De-constructors’ (apamontazhoghneri brigad), began to come to the
park carrying tools and dressed as builders in late April. Although their
attempts to dismantle the boutiques failed, they used the opportunity
to make political speeches to the crowd. The presence of the political
activists at the protest led to intense debates among the activists. While
some welcomed the opportunity to build alliances with political par-
ties, other activists argued that this politicization of the protest move-
ment would only hurt their cause and allow the government to label
them as an opposition political movement rather than a broad-based
civic movement, which was not affiliated with any political party or
politician.
The situation in the park came to an abrupt end when on 1 May 2012,
just a few days ahead of the parliamentary elections, President Serzh
Sargsyan, accompanied by the mayor of Yerevan, visited the park. While
touring the park, Sargsyan told the mayor, Taron Margaryan, ‘Taron jan
[dear], they [the boutiques] don’t look pretty’ and ordered Margaryan
to demolish the boutiques ‘as soon as possible’. And just like that, the
construction was halted, the boutiques were dismantled overnight, and
it appeared as though the activists had achieved their aim. (Avagyan,
2012; A1+, 2012).
But had they really achieved their aims and was this a success for the
Save Mashtots Park initiative? Yes and no. While the activists achieved
their stated aim of halting the construction of the boutiques, their
larger aims of addressing the failure of the rule of law and corruption
within the system were not met. Sargsyan’s approach, which led to an
abrupt end to the campaign, is quite similar to the manner in which
Putin, as both President and Prime Minister, has in the past handled
civic protests around environmental issues in Russia. Laura Henry refers
to this practice as being akin to ‘appealing to the tsar’ in imperial Russia
which fails to generate systemic changes (Henry, 2010). In other words,
instead of addressing the problems within the system, the leader passes
judgments to correct the policy decision of his subordinates. The irony
that Sargsyan seized the activists’ victory as his own and presented
himself as the defender of civil society and the rights of citizens, instead
of as the leader under whose administration oligarchic capitalism has
been allowed to persist and expand, was not lost on the activists who
proceeded to conduct a lengthy postmortem on Facebook as they
sought to learn from this experience.
Similar civic initiatives aimed at protecting urban green spaces and
historical landmarks have also emerged in other post-Soviet coun-
tries including Moldova, Ukraine, and Georgia (Lutsevych, 2013). In
Ukraine, following the abysmal failure of Viktor Yushchenko’s govern-
ment to enact reforms, in 2010 Yushchenko’s opponent in the 2004
election, Viktor Yanukovytch, was elected to power. Despite the disil-
lusion felt by many activists who had participated in the 2004 Orange
Revolution, in 2010 and 2011, Ukraine witnessed an awakening of
civil movements addressing a range of issues including censorship, the
environment, and human rights (Ukraine Watch, 2011). Civic initia-
tives that have emerged in the past several years include the 2010 Tax
Maidan-II movement, which drew over 90,000 representatives from
small and medium-sized businesses to protest the new tax and labor
codes, as well as the protest that began in 2012 to save Hostynny Dvir,
a historical landmark building in Kyiv, from being transformed into a
modern trade and office center (Lutsevych, 2013, 13–14). The protests
to save Hostynny Dvir began after it was privatized by President
Yanukovytch in 2012. The group ‘Let’s Protect Ancient Kyiv’ (Zberezhy
Staryi Kyiv) was formed and when the private developers, the Cyprus-
registered company Ukrrestavracia, started moving in on Hostynny
Dvir, the group responded by starting an activist performance and in
the spirit of the ‘Occupy’ movement, they created a Hostynna Respublika
(Friendly Republic) in the courtyard of the building in order to block
the construction (Faryna, 2012). The activists have held their ground
despite attempts by police to evict them; however, as of January 2013,
the fate of Hostynny Dvir continues to hang in the balance with the
Kyiv mayor’s office calling for a public consultation (Dyczok, 2013).
In Georgia, meanwhile, a civic initiative called Stop Destroying
Gudiashvili Square was started by artists and art historians in 2011 to
call on the Georgian government to ‘stop destroying their classic Old
Town with its winding streets and wooden balconies’ (Stop Destroying
Gudiashvili Square, 2011). In this case the Georgian government
granted the contract for redevelopment to the Austrian firm, Zechner &
Zechner. The ‘Stop Destroying Gudiashvili Square’ group used Twitter
and Facebook to mobilize, raise awareness, and organize. The square
became the setting for a series of fairs and artistic performances staged
by peaceful protestors who were demanding that the Mayor’s Office

present its project for the redevelopment of Gudiashvili Square and imme-
diately begin the protection of historic buildings (Kokichaishvili, 2012).
Responding to public dissatisfaction and concerns that the architectural
integrity of Gudiashvili Square would be destroyed, the Mayor’s Office
later published on its official website photos purporting to show how
the renovated Gudiashvili Square will actually look. That still has not
quelled the controversy or dispelled public distrust.
Civic initiatives, which protest the placing of private gain above the
public good, are increasing in frequency because, as a number of activists
I interviewed argued, the public has lost patience with the lack of action
by those who are charged with protecting the environment and preserv-
ing public spaces in carrying out their duties.
In Russia, in addition to the high-profile Pussy Riot feminist punk-
rock collective, since 2010 there has been a general ‘upsurge of civic
activism’ around a number of issues ranging from corruption, the envi-
ronment (for example Khimki Forest), abuses in nursing homes, and
the excessive use by officials and celebrities of blue traffic flashers, etc.
(Pagava, 2012; Niktin, 2010). The Society of Blue Buckets (Obshchestvo
sinikh vederok), which emerged in 2010 focuses on the arbitrary, unau-
thorized, and self-serving use of rotating blue flashers (migalka) by
political and economic elites, including high-ranking civil servants,
businessmen, and celebrities, to circumvent the congested Moscow
traffic. According to the Russian Traffic Code, emergency vehicles are to
be given priority when the blue flashing light is employed. Following
a number of car accidents, the Society of Blue Buckets organized a
motorized flash mob in April 2010 consisting of a motorcade of cars
with affixed blue buckets that paraded through Moscow. The protestors
involved in the motorcade demanded that the use of flashing lights be
restricted only to police, firefighting, ambulance, and security service
vehicles (RT, 2010). While the focus of the protest was the migalka, it
was informed and driven by the underlying concerns about the abuse
of power, corruption, and rule of law. It will be important to examine
how these civic initiatives will be affected by the continuing crackdown
on NGOs as well as public demonstrations in Russia.
8.3.3 Civic initiatives and their relation with

NGOs and external donors
The civic initiatives I discussed above were addressing specific issues
that are of concern to local residents, but as I argued above, these
civic initiatives are an articulation of the anger of many ordinary
citizens in the post-Soviet countries towards the prevailing corruption,

economic inequality, oligarchic capitalism as well as the lack of rule of
law and the absence of accountability, transparency, and participation in
decision making.
In addition to their critique of government policies, the civic ini-
tiatives also criticize the practice of foreign-funded NGOs of ignoring
grassroots issues and concerns. Some of the activists I interviewed from
the Save Mashtots Park civic initiative also questioned the effectiveness
of NGO advocacy efforts. For instance, Maneh,5 a leading activist in the
Mashtots Park protest told me:
We have had enough of NGO conferences, consultations, and trainings.

It is time to act and to take our concerns to the streets so that both the
government and citizens may hear our demands! If they [the NGOs]
want to join us they are welcome to do so. But we find that they are
cowardly and afraid of challenging both the donors and the govern-
ment even when they see wrongs being committed. (9 October 2012)
When I interviewed representatives from environmental NGOs based

in Armenia and asked what they thought about street-based demonstra-
tions and protests, several NGO representatives I interviewed told me
that while they admired the young activists for their enthusiasm and
courage, they believed that the protests were ‘too radical’ and not con-
structive to dialogue. One respondent from an international NGO said,
Street-level protests are for the young who are still idealistic. I too
was idealistic once and in 1988, I was actively involved in the
protests in Liberty Square. But today, I think it’s more effective to
discuss these issues in a more rational and less emotional manner
with the government. (11 October 2012)
In Russia, NGOs are also puzzled as to how best to relate to and engage
with these new actors. For example, in Russia, analysts describe these civic
actors and new initiatives as a ‘crucial and unprecedented force’, but they
also criticize their political ‘amateurism’, lack of organization, and raise
questions about their ability to affect change beyond the issue-specific
level (Pagava, 2012; Democracy Digest, 2012). Inga Pagava, who is a Senior
Consultant at the Moscow office of the Charities Aid Foundation, writes,
Who are these people? What is their prime motivation? Can

their initiatives be adapted further and scaled up? Should they be
institutionalized to bring greater impact? Can we be partners? Where

do our paths cross or are we oceans apart? How broad should the
concept of philanthropy be to contain civic activity? (Pagava, 2012)
In answering some of her own questions, Pagava describes these individ-

uals as belonging to a growing class of young and middle-aged Russians
who ‘might be attributed to the middle class’ or the intelligentsia.
What remains unanswered is how NGOs and indeed donors can or
should relate to these civic initiatives and grassroots groups.
Regarding their relationship with donors, this is one area where for-
mal NGOs and these grassroots civic initiatives, to use Pagava’s phrase,
remain ‘oceans apart’. The civic initiatives I have been discussing in this
chapter have not emerged because of nor do they rely on external fund-
ing. In fact, in the Armenian case especially, I found that the activists
neither actively seek relations or funding from international donors,
and vigorously shun relations with foreign donors so as to avoid being
perceived as motivated by grants, driven by foreign powers, or ‘tainted’
by the foreign funding. For the activists, refusing grants from external
donors is a strategic decision aimed at enhancing their credibility and
legitimacy in the eyes of the public and deflecting claims that they are
‘grant-eaters’ (grantagerner).6 For example, Hovsep, an activist from Save
Mashtots Park told me,
We want this to be a bottom-up movement. This is about Armenians

as self-determined citizens. We don’t want grants and we don’t need
grants. Moreover, we don’t trust the international NGOs and donors.
They have stayed silent far too long in the face of the abuse of the
environment, corruption, and other abuses in Armenia. We don’t
expect them to change now. (Skype interview, 10 January 2013)
Beyond shunning grants, activists in the Save Mashtots Park initiative

also criticized certain international organizations for their silence in
addressing how the authorities were cracking down on protestors in
the park. In a letter addressed to the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) they write, ‘We strongly disagree with
OSCE representatives’ assessment of police actions concerning protests
in the [Mashotots] park’ adding,
We call upon you and other establishments and representatives of

OSCE to revise the evil practice when inadequate and careless state-
ments or decisions of an establishment or representative catalyze
power structures’ violence against the society members [at Mashtots

Park]. (HETQ, 2012, emphasis added)
Such overt and outspoken criticism of international organizations is

unheard of among Armenian NGOs where the maxim, ‘you don’t bite
the hand that feeds you’ stands true. Yet for the activists, the act of
openly and boldly criticizing external donors was another means by
which to once again demonstrate their independence from and lack
of reliance on foreign donors. Some of the international organiza-
tions and external donors I interviewed in Armenia, which are used
to working with NGOs in the donor-grantee relationship, remarked
that in the case of civic initiatives they have been cast in the role of
observers. One representative from an external donor organization
told me, ‘We are watching what happens with great interest. But we
are unsure as to how best support or engage with activists. We fear
that our funding may hurt them more than it would help their efforts’
(12 May 2012).
8.4 Conclusion
The aim of this chapter was to consider the relationship between exter-
nal democracy promotion, the development of civil society, and the
democratization of political regimes. I began by discussing the aims and
the impact of externally funded civil society and democracy promotion
strategies of the early 1990s and argued that while these strategies led to
the exponential growth of professionalized NGOs, they also resulted in
genetically engineered civil societies where democracy and civil society
remained weak and where there are low levels of public trust toward
NGOs which were seen as donor driven and upwardly accountable. This
subsequently hampered their ability to promote democracy and to chal-
lenge the persistent and growing authoritarianism.
The second part of the chapter then discussed the rise of grassroots
civic initiatives beginning in 2010. I described how these grassroots
civic initiatives differ from NGOs and argued that although they focus
on very specific, local issues, their protests are also a reaction to and cri-
tique of politics as usual. I examined their relationship with NGOs and
external donors and found that there is lack of engagement with donors
due to activists’ concerns and anxieties of being portrayed as driven by
grants and driven by foreign interests. Such accusations of grant-eating
became common after the color revolutions and have dogged NGOs in
the former Soviet countries ever since.
I argued that while civic initiatives focus on specific issues such as a

park or building, they are driven by broader concerns and disillusion-
ment with politics as usual, anger at corruption, lack of rule of law,
and the placing of private gain above the public good. I maintained
that these grassroots civic initiatives have introduced a much-needed
breath of fresh air into the NGO sectors in their respective societies and
challenged NGOs to be much bolder in their efforts. Their temporary,
fleeting nature, and lack of institutionalization, has thus far meant that
they have not been able to scale up their efforts in order to broaden their
impact. Of course it is still early days and more research is required to
better understand why these movements emerge, what they hope to
achieve, and indeed what they are able to achieve.7 Therefore, while
some activists in Armenia proclaimed the birth of the self-determined
citizen (inknoroshvats kakhakatsi) at the Mashtots Park, we need to wait
and see how these grassroots civic initiatives will develop, what stances
the respective governments will take, and whether these new move-
ments will advance democratization in different and better ways than
the NGOs created by their elders which emerged in the first two decades
of the post-Soviet period.
Notes
1. The term ‘transition’ has been problematized by various scholars including
Michael Buroway and Katherine Verdery (Burawoy, M. K. V. (ed.) (1999)
Uncertain Transitions: Ethnographies of Change in the Postsocialist World,
Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers Inc. who argue that ‘transition’
implies an evolutionary development that has a single, well-defined objective
and trajectory. While I agree with this assessment, I have chosen to use the
term ‘transition’ for the sake of simplicity and because the term continues to
be applied to the region by a number of international organizations including
the World Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
2. ‘Civic initiative’ (kakhakatsiakan nakhatsernutyun) is the term used by the
Armenian activists. In this chapter I have used the term ‘civic initiative’ as a
shorthand way of referring to the grassroots, non-institutionalised, volunteer-
based forms of collective action that have emerged throughout the former
Soviet countries since 2010.
3. While we continue to take a regional approach in our analysis of the for-
mer Soviet countries, it is important to recognize that the former 15 Soviet
republics have followed very different political trajectories in the past two
decades. Although the countries that I discuss in this chapter indeed shared
a common language (Russian) and the historical experience of Soviet rule,
20 years on, it is becoming increasingly difficult to write about these coun-
tries on the basis of a shared legacy. Of the 15 Soviet republics, only Estonia,
Latvia, and Lithuania, which are now members of the EU, are considered
‘consolidated democracies’ in Freedom House’s 2012 Nations in Transit report.
The same report lists Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine as ‘transitional government
or hybrid regimes’, while Armenia is a ‘semi-consolidated authoritarian
regime’. The remaining eight countries, which include Azerbaijan, Belarus,
Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan, are
categorized as ‘consolidated authoritarian regimes’ (Freedom House (2012)
Nations in Transit). A discussion of the reasons behind these different trajecto-
ries is beyond the scope of this chapter. Instead, here I focus on the question
of how external democracy promotion efforts affected the development of
civil society and democratization. Therefore, while I draw comparisons, I am
also cognizant of the differences existing between and across the countries
that were once part of the Soviet Union.
4. I have been conducting fieldwork in Armenia since 1996. From 1996–2012
I have spent over three-and-a-half years doing field-based research. My
research methods have included ethnography, participant observation, semi-
structured interviews, focus groups, as well as media and discourse analysis.
Most recently, with funding from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation,
I conducted research on the emerging civic initiatives in Armenia in September
2011, May 2012, and October 2012 during which I interviewed 70 individuals
and held 15 focus groups. Previous rounds of field research have been funded
by the British Academy, the US National Research Council, IREX, and the
Academy for Educational Development, the London School of Economics,
and the University of California. I am solely responsible for the content of this
chapter and the views expressed are my own and do not in any way represent
the views or the official position or policy of any of these organisations.
5. Names of interviewees have been changed to protect the identity of
respondents.
6. The term ‘grant-eater’, which was coined in the 1990s and refers to NGOs that
take grants (Ishkanian 2008) is applied in other post-Soviet countries as well
and is based on the bribe-taking (bribe-eating) phrase commonly used in the
Soviet Union.
7. I am currently directing a research project, with generous funding from the
Robert Bosch Foundation, to examine the rise of anti-austerity and pro-
democracy movements around the globe. One component of this research
focuses specifically on the former Soviet countries.
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9
Who Is Supported by Western Civil
Society Promotion? The Russian
Case
Štěpánka Busuleanu
9.1 Introduction
Civil society in Russia has often been characterized as weak and

underdeveloped (Howard, 2003; Zdravomyslova, 2008). However, after
the election fraud in the winter of 2011/12 and the subsequent mass
protests, civil society has been reconsidered as an important player. The
protests were evidence that citizens can become drivers of social change
even under repressive conditions in non-democratic states like Russia.
The discourse about the developing civil society in Russia has been revi-
talized (see for example Lipman, 2011; Lipman & Petrov, 2012).
Most of the studies on civil society in Russia consider only organized
civil society by means of registered non-governmental organizations
(NGOs) (see Hemment, 2004; Henderson, 2003; Howard, 2003; König &
Männel, 2009; Kulmala, 2009; Richter, 2002; Salmenniemi, 2007; Siegert,
2008). In the Western notion of civil society, people can organize them-
selves in associations and groups to stand for their interests in this legally
protected and independent space. By contrast citizens in Russia do not
form organized groups to achieve their goals; rather, they trust more in
private connections and personal networks. The lack of trust in volunteer
organizations deriving from the Soviet past (Howard, 2003) is still observ-
able today (USAID, 2011). In addition the legal environment and financial
viability of NGOs in Russia do not serve to develop this sphere (USAID,
2011). Throughout my text, I therefore use the term ‘civil society’ in a
different way – I understand civil society as ‘a public space to engage in
collective debate and self-expression’ (Lutsevych, 2013, 3). In normative
terms, civil society as a medium for negotiating and reproducing social
contracts between citizens and political and economic power should be
legally protected and independent of the state (see Kaldor, 2003).
171
172 Štěpánka Busuleanu
Weakly organized civil society in Russia provided poor preconditions

for Western democracy assistance. Indeed, democracy promotion that
aimed at supporting post-Soviet civil society via capacity building of
NGOs often failed. Instead of active and empowered citizens partici-
pating in public and political life, a funded NGO sector emerged that
is alienated and disconnected from wider society (see for example
Iskhanian, 2007; Lutsevych, 2013). For this reason new approaches to
study the phenomenon of civil society that do not stress the exclusive
role of NGOs are needed as well as new strategies for foreign donors
interested in a vibrant civil society rather than the patronage of a few
professional NGOs.
In this chapter, I focus on individuals involved in civic engagement
in Russia, irrespective of their organizational background. In current
research, theoretical concepts that stress the role of individuals as the
primary actors of civil society are still rare, and the nexus between
donors and supported individuals is completely missing. Interpretative
social research and especially the biographical approach offer a new
view on the phenomenon of civil society. In this tradition, the person
is understood as an acting individual who creates social reality through
interaction with others (Rosenthal, 2008, 15). Biography is considered as
a social construct of social reality (Fisher & Kohli, 1987) and therefore
links macro and micro levels, the personal and the social aspects. This
approach is advantageous for this study as it tackles a field ‘where we are
dealing with questions of social science that relate to social phenomena
that are tied to people’s experiences and have biographical meaning for
them’ (Rosenthal, 2004, 49). In this case biographical interviews with
protagonists of Western supported civil society in Russia show which
biographical experiences enable ordinary citizens to go into this sphere
of activity and what biographical meaning they ascribe to their experi-
ences. Consequently biographical research allows us ‘to reconstruct
social phenomena in the process of becoming’ (Rosenthal, 2004, 50),
which means the process of their creation, reproduction, and their
transformation. The main goal of this approach is not only concentrated
on understanding individual cases but also on understanding societal
realities and the link between the individual experience and the collec-
tive framework. In this context, I ask in my chapter what biographical
conditions incline ‘the ordinary citizen’ in Russia to become a civic actor.
In addition, I try to carve out the underlying patterns of action and inter-
pretation that can be found in biographies of persons that have profited
from Western aid. By doing this, I hope to draw some conclusions on
how Western support has affected civic actors’ biographies.
Based on case reconstructions of the actors of Western supported civil

society in Russia, I argue that old patterns of behavior and interpretation
of the Soviet era are still functional, whereas new models of life repre-
sented inter alia by Western donors are emerging. Personal networks and
trust within the ‘own’ group play a crucial role while entering the sphere
of Western funding and among the Western supported actors of civil soci-
ety in Russia. Thereby enclaves of Western-oriented actors diverge from
the wider public, which is demonstrated in the atomization of Russian
society. Cooperation with Western partners offers the protagonists an
opportunity for professional work and access to international networks,
which attract young people in particular and increase independence
from state structures. Protagonists socialized primarily during the Soviet
Union and Perestroika periods show more considered opinion about
democratic values. However, paternalism, collective orientation, and
adaptation are still present in their behavior. Their younger colleagues,
socialized during the collapse of the Soviet Union and the following
wild capitalism, are more interested in the professional ways of working
and can flexibly switch their topics of interest. In addition the findings
indicate that family history (especially repressions and exile) and the
way of dealing with it clearly affect the life paths of the protagonists.
To understand the context of Western activity in the sphere of civil
society in Russia, I will present a brief historical review of the funding
of civil society in Russia with the most important milestones that have
had a direct effect on the biographies of civic actors. Afterward I will
discuss two case reconstructions of civic actors’ biographies, who were
supported by Western foundations, in order to illuminate the patterns
of behavior and interpretation of these people as well as the nexus
between donors and supported individuals.
9.2 Western support of civil society in Russia
Since the 1990s several Western donors have been acting in the Russian
field in order to support the development of civil society. The most
important Western sponsors have come from the USA, Germany, the
UK, and Norway. Additionally international organizations (EU, UN, and
World Bank) along with political and private foundations have played
an important role in supporting civil society in Russia. The way they
initially deployed the concept of civil society emphasized the crucial
role of NGOs in the democratization processes. In particular, structures
were created to provide technical support: the funding of NGOs and
NGO resource centers together with training for activities (Henderson,
2003). Consequently most Russian NGOs were founded – not just in the
center, but throughout Russia’s regions – right after the dissolution of
the Soviet Union in the Yeltsin era (1991–9) thanks to massive external
support (Henderson, 2003).
The efforts of external donors who tried to help build up civil society
in Russia in the 1990s were often critically referred to as ‘NGO-ization’
(Iskhanian, 2007). This in part alludes to the professionalization of
the work of NGOs, but also refers to the increasing bureaucratization
and consolidation of the hierarchical structures in NGOs. The increas-
ing alienation of Western-oriented organizations from the needs and
interests of the wider Russian society was often criticized (Richter, 2002;
Hemment, 2004). The NGOs acted like ‘firms’ at times that not only
competed for Western grants, but had also become dependent on them.
The political framework and conditions for NGOs have changed since
Vladimir Putin took office in 2000. This meant the end of the heyday
for civil society organizations, which had been growing rampantly until
this time. Despite Putin’s positive rhetoric regarding civil society, the
government targeted critical organizations. A repressive NGO law was
passed in 2006, and attacks on independent organizations and indi-
vidual activists were reported. At the same time, the state made an effort
to create a ‘quasi civil society’ that could be governed centrally and was
loyal to the government. It was supported by state funds and was to be
coordinated by the so-called Civic Chamber of the Russian Federation.1
This also led to the marginalization of Western donor organizations
that were forced to rethink their strategies or give up their efforts in
Russia (Michaleva, 2011). Consequently some of the important Western
donors simply left the Russian field.2 The initially narrow focus on
NGOs and the promotion of their structures was replaced by a wider
definition of social participation and the direct support of individual
people. In addition programs were created to promote voluntary
engagement outside of an organization and support higher education
along with scholarship programs to aid individuals.3
In the years of Dmitry Medvedev’s presidency (2008–12), civil society
was able to draw a quick breath of relief when modernization and libe-
ralization were announced and small concessions were made to civil
society such as a relaxation of the NGO law and the installation of the
Human Rights Council under the President of the Russian Federation.4
New acts of repression have accrued repeatedly since Putin became
president in 2012 when an anti-protest law emerged as well as a new
law that labels NGOs receiving financial support from abroad as ‘foreign
agents’ (see for example Siegert, 2012).
There is a clear division visible in civil society as it is organized today:

the government organized non-governmental organizations (GONGOs)
loyal to the regime and financed by the state as opposed to independ-
ent, critical civil society structures, mostly financed by Western donors.
The central discourse of the state has hardly changed, as the tone of
propaganda against ‘Western spies’ during the 2011–2012 election
campaign clearly shows. Consequently more restriction of Western sup-
port as well as the Russian partners of Western foundations could be
expected, as shown by the latest decision of the Russian government to
end the programs of USAID in Russia.5
Protagonists of the independent critical civil society in Russia, there-
fore, often find themselves caught between a rock and a hard place,
between principles to which they want to remain true and a survival
strategy. They have to weigh their options: whether to engage with
the machinery of the state and apply for state funds for their work if
Western funds are not sufficient6 or exit the field entirely for existential
reasons.
9.3 Case studies
The focus on the biographies of protagonists of civil society in Russia

has its roots mainly in the tradition of dissident movement groups
and their activities since the 1960s. Many scholars have proven these
protagonists, recruited mostly from the intelligentsia, were situated in
big cities – Moscow and Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) (see for example
Stephan, 2005; Tchouikina, 2003; Voronkov, 1993). My focus lies on
people born between the late 1960s and the 1980s who have been active
since the late 1990s and especially during the Putin and Medvedev
periods until today. The special interest lies in people who are not only
from big cities and originally belong to the Moscow or St. Petersburg
intelligentsia, but are more representative of the Russian provinces.
Although contact with former dissident milieus and access to informa-
tion are worse in the provinces than in the capital, a few studies show
that the activist scene there can also flourish (Salmenniemi, 2009).
Twenty-two narrative biographical interviews following Schütze
(1983) and Rosenthal (1995) were conducted from 2008 to 2011 with
people who were chosen as protagonists of civil society in Russia
and supported by Western programs.7 The German Heinrich Böll
Foundation opened the door to the field. This foundation has offered
an annual scholarship for 30 junior academics in the social sciences
and civil society activists from all regions of Russia since 1994. Young
researchers have contributed to the establishment of a space for critical

thought within society through their social engagement, their critical
stance toward the regime, and their innovative research in the fields of
history, sociology, and human rights. About 250 actors participated in
this program between 1994 and 2011.8
This specific group fits the aim of the study as they represent Western-
funded civil society in Russia (especially in their activities); however
they do not necessarily belong to a registered NGO. Consequently the
concept of civil society is not reduced to NGO structures, and the focus
of the study shows the individuals with their behavior and attitudes as
research subjects.
Among the 22 interviews, basically two different groups in terms of
external support could be identified: those who received temporary
external support through scholarships or grants for a specific topic
without staying for a long time within these externally supported struc-
tures and those whose activity remained mostly connected to Western
funding. Of the protagonists who were interviewed, most were inte-
grated not only in the Heinrich Böll scholarship program but in other
European and American-funded projects as well.
For this chapter two contrasting cases were chosen. Both activists
come from Siberia and their families had suffered repression under the
Russian and the Soviet (Stalinist) systems and dislocations. However the
structures of their biographies as well as their ways into the civil society
milieu differ.
9.3.1 Dmitri ‘I’ve changed the color’

The first case is that of a male activist born in 1968 called Dmitri. His
self-presentation complies with the tradition of Russian and Soviet
memoirs, as he understands himself to be a chronicler of the time (see
Stephan, 2005, 49). Dmitri tells his story against the backdrop of politi-
cal and societal events; he marks the important data from his biography
with the official history, like the year of his birth as ‘the year of the 50th
anniversary of the October Revolution’ or his entry into the Pioneer
organization9 on the day of ‘Lenin’s birthday’. His childhood memories
are imbued with Soviet propaganda; therefore Dmitri’s evaluations from
today’s perspective are full of arguments and explanations of how it was
possible to believe the Soviet ideology.
Dmitri’s activism started early in his childhood in the context of the
Pioneer organization loyal to the Soviet regime. His story illustrates the
Soviet socialization as he had to spend his childhood under the condi-
tions of Brezhnev’s regime, which meant stagnation and ideological
propaganda in the public sphere and ideological indoctrination in the

classroom. Conformity to adult standards such as patriotism and loyalty
to the Soviet state were widespread in the educational system (Aviram
& Milgram, 1977). Dmitri was convinced that the Soviet Union was the
best place to live and to have a happy future. Dmitri’s first narrative
includes an episode that he experienced as a 15-year-old schoolboy. In
his function as a youth leader of the Pioneer organization, he felt obli-
gated to speak to his classmates about the heritage of Leonid Brezhnev’s
work after his death in 1982.
It was the year ’82. It was, I think, the ninth grade, maybe the eighth?
Brezhnev died, in November. I stood up and spoke some, somehow I thought,
important words, that the work of Leonid Ilyich would live on with us.
Well, I really thought so ... Do you understand, all this truth about the
Soviet system I found out later during the years of Perestroika. But in ’82
I thought, of course, that our country is the best and that there are these
poor workers abroad, who are suffering and living under terrible circum-
stances, just as they had taught us, how they showed us in some journals.10
From the narration, Dmitri turns to the argumentation and the position
of the present day with the intention of explaining how it was possible
to be subjected to Soviet propaganda. However his responsibility for the
‘collective’ of classmates and the paternalistic orientation of the ideal-
ized figure of Brezhnev came out clearly.
In fact Dmitri was integrated into the Soviet educational system very
early as a three-month-old child. He was brought up in a collective, in
kindergarten, then at school and at the same time in the Pioneer and
Komsomol11 organizations. He followed a classical Soviet educational
path as a child from the working class. The system supported him,
whereas at home the atmosphere was affected by his father’s alcohol
problem and consequent financial difficulties. Similar domestic situa-
tions in Soviet society are described by different scholars of that time;
the Soviet system strengthened women as working mothers, and on the
other hand it abolished men’s privileged position as the sole breadwin-
ner, so that men often felt weak and drowned their sorrows in alcohol
(Ritter, 1999; Zdravomyslova, 1999). For Dmitri, his mother was the
most important attachment figure and his motivating force in addition
to the state, personalized in the father figure of leaders like Brezhnev.
The youth and formative years of Dmitri’s life were influenced by
the Perestroika period and the subsequent fall of the Soviet Union. As
a student in the Pedagogical School, Dmitri was exposed to more and
more critical information about the Soviet state’s past. Thanks to his
teacher, he was introduced to the meetings of the initiative group of
the Memorial society12 and was exposed to information about Stalin’s
repressions and about the repressive history of his region. In light of the
research question, it should be noted that the individual support by a
Western civil society organization did not play a central role in Dmitri’s
motivation to become more interested in Soviet history. Parallel to
that, in the late 1980s his mother shared her family history, including
Stalin’s repressions, with him, which marks the beginning of his criti-
cal examination of the Soviet system and of his own past. On the one
hand, during Perestroika and especially after the collapse of the Soviet
Union, Dmitri was slowly losing his stability structures (ideologically,
the system and in practice the Komsomol organization). On the other
hand, he gained insight into new aspects of his personal history and
his identity. Dmitri was offended that he did not know about his his-
tory before, but otherwise he was proud of such a family history which
allowed him to report it like other ‘victims of the system’ of that time.
It was a natural consequence for Dmitri to seek new stabilizing struc-
tures (collectives) in the time of instability and to join the Memorial
organization with his new awareness. The international dimension of
Memorial’s activities apparently did not play a major role in his new
openness to historical and political issues.
Another episode illustrates the ambivalence between individuality
and the collective, and between loyalty to or criticism of the Soviet
system.
Well, do you remember, in 1991, when the putsch started, yes? And I had
a quite interesting story in the school. I went to work at a school, you know,
as a teacher at an elementary school. I taught the first grade, and I had a
working room. There were two shifts there: Me with my class and another
colleague with her class. She was new at this school as well. And now the
assistant director came and said: ‘A portrait of Lenin should be hanging
there above the blackboard’. And I had already understood that, well we
should not do it [smiling]. Maybe I would have protested against that, well,
but this other teacher, she said, ‘Well, let’s do it, as it should be’. And we
hung Lenin over there.13
The solidarity with other colleagues and respectively to the teachers’

collective is stronger than individual beliefs. In addition Dmitri cannot
completely condemn the Soviet system as he had benefited from it. On
the other hand, he needs acknowledgment for the injustice that his
family had experienced from the system. He is biased by his own history.
He needs a structure, collective, or an authority person, which can
protect and empower him, before he takes initiative on his own. Other
stringent aspects of his life course are to keep working hard and to take
opportunities as they come.
The way Dmitri came into contact with Western support was his
engagement in the Memorial organization. First he was encouraged by
his colleagues from the organization to apply for a one-year scholarship
from a Western foundation to work on his research into the repressions
of the Stalin regime. After this positive experience and as a leader of the
Memorial department of the city, he made more and more international
contacts. He took advantage of the opportunity to participate in inter-
national projects and programs and started to apply for foreign grants
for his organization’s activities.
And that, the success in the competitions somehow, it led me to, well, I don’t
know, maybe, to the next stage of activity.14
Language plays an interesting role in Dmitri’s presentation of this

part of his biography. He presents his activist attitude (applications
for grants and participation in Western educational programs) as a
sequence of competitions, which he mostly won and which motivated
him to continue. This style of presentation is reminiscent of the Soviet
system with its competitions within the school system, Pioneer or
Komsomol organizations, which Dmitri had internalized.
With the help of a Western scholarship, Dmitri reached his academic
career, got his PhD degree and moved from Siberia to St. Petersburg. In
this phase of life, this scholarship was crucial for Dmitri’s decision to
focus on his career and leave Siberia. Once more he took the chance
offered by a Western foundation to fulfill his plan. Nowadays he is still
working as a schoolteacher and lives with his family in a suburb of
St. Petersburg. He concentrates on his work at school and on his family,
while his contact with the Memorial organization lost its intensity, and
his activism and his research (repressions under the Stalinist system)
seem to be slowly depleted. However his engagement in his current
workplace at school is obvious.
And then, when I moved here, I still worked at Memorial for some time.
And then I completely entered the dissertation process, and Memorial,
I started to appear at Memorial rarely. Well now, as I had already defended
my dissertation, I went to work at school and, the outcome of this is
that I’m at school all the time, and there is indeed no more free time for
volunteer work.15
The dissertation seems to be a turning point for Dmitri – he structures

life before and after the dissertation. Before he was engaged in his volun-
tary work for Memorial, and after that he is absorbed by his occupation
as a teacher. The official status as a PhD is the highest acknowledgment
he gets for his work and is very important to him. On the other hand,
the fact that he reached this goal allowed him to leave his birthplace,
which is strongly bound to his research interest and his civic activity.
Consequently, leaving Siberia represents his effort to release himself
from the yoke of his past and to start a new life.
9.3.2 Olga ‘… your job as a professional is to see and

to describe – that’s all.’
The second case is that of a woman, Olga, about ten years younger,
born in 1980. Despite the similarities of some formal facts in their
biographies (Siberia, Stalin’s repressions, and dislocations in the family
history), Olga’s path into civil society activities differs from Dmitry’s.
In her self-presentation, Olga narrates her biography in the tradition of
women dissidents in Russia. She emphasizes her educated family and
her childhood in the care of her grandmothers, who imparted to her
values and beliefs different from those in the public kindergarten that
she never attended. In addition her father is mostly present in her story
and linked to her positive educational development as well as emotional
support, while her mother stands for the management of everyday life
(see for example Stephan, 2005). She pursues the goal to be noticed as
a well educated person belonging to the tradition of the intelligentsia
and situates her story completely in the context of university and edu-
cational success. She constructs an alternative independent ‘university
world’, which gave her security and space for self-development, whereas
the troubles of the 1980s in the Soviet Union that she had to experience
as a child are absent.
And I, in general, as I was little, I didn’t even know that one can work
somewhere in a place other than at the university. Because it was such a
life-world. I didn’t go to kindergarten; granny sat with me at my mother’s
workplace in the university, drawing things on the blackboard there. So
that’s why, then, when we spoke about education, it was obvious that it is
necessary to go to university. I didn’t even know that there are people who
wouldn’t study at the university, which I appreciated deeply.16
Her support system was not the state; it was her family and also her
parents’ friends, who belonged to academia and lived mostly in the
same residence hall. Consequently her peers were children from these
educated families living in the same building. Olga was raised in
the special, protected conditions of this hall and its residents, and she
noticed this as a schoolgirl when her teacher mentioned: ‘I love to teach
the children from this house, the only thing is, they live poorly. They have
just children and books at home’.17 In addition to the community orienta-
tion, typical for the teachers’ milieu in the Soviet and post-Soviet time
(Lonkila, 1999), Olga absorbed the visions and beliefs of her grandparents,
which were related to different cultural and religious traditions. They
conveyed values to her like passion, tolerance, love of her neighbors,
love of nature, and the special importance of education.
Olga’s childhood was situated mostly in the time after Brezhnev’s
death, after the system had lost its stringency and the early Perestroika
period offered new free spaces. Consequently Olga experienced critical
debates about the Soviet system as a child in her parents’ circles and an
inquisitive atmosphere. Olga’s late childhood and youth was influenced
by the instability of the system during the transformation which she
experienced herself (for example the school reform or material deficit),
so that for her the state never could play a stabilizing function. The
central strategy of the family – which Olga inherited – was to survive in
the system and afterward with the help of a good education and personal
networks. Despite the fact that the family was originally repressed, they
stood above the system because of (Olga’s parents’) good education and
were searching for spaces independent of the official ideology.
The beginning of taking an active position is situated in the ‘university
world’ as well. During her studies Olga encountered problems of the
state in transition such as corruption of university staff, students pur-
chasing university places, or unskilled, alcoholic teachers. However she
followed the family strategy and her own intention to achieve a good
education.
And me, for example, some fellow students simply didn’t like me, because
one teacher, who drank alcohol, repeatedly let us go. Everybody was com-
fortable with that, but after the third time, I went to the dean. How is it
possible? We should have to pass exams, but he just gave us high marks.
What about the value of these marks? It is necessary to study. For them it
was a really stupid action on my part. They thought ‘Well, what more does
she want? Do we get high marks? Yes, we do. Does the time fly? Yes, it does.
But I said: ‘What do you think? What about knowledge?’ Well, it was so.18
In this sequence Olga presents herself as morally superior, elevating

herself above the uninterested students. She confirms her exclusive, special
position inside the ‘university world’ by complaining about the cir-
cumstances directly to the dean. She shows solidarity neither with the
alcoholic teacher nor the students; her attitudes and beliefs relate to her
personal ambitions and her sense of justice. This behavior can be related
to the newly forming post-Soviet society and the requirements of capi-
talism that focus on the ethic of self-reliance (Kharkhordin, 1994).
Olga’s way into the world of NGOs and Western support occurred at
the age of 24 and was guided by personal contacts. Thanks to her parents’
network, she was hired by a professor whom they knew to be her sec-
retary during her PhD studies. This person did not belong to the ‘old
school’ of Soviet professors, but was more liberally oriented and was
involved in Western academic circles and well informed about the
financial possibilities of the Western foundations.
When I came into contact with the sphere of people who practiced sci-
ence interestingly, I saw life plans that drew me in. Back then Tatiana
Vladimirovna and her team got a large grant from a Western foundation,
and she invited me to participate. She founded a non-profit organization
because this new model of scientific work didn’t suit the old forms at all.19
Olga stays under the protection of the ‘academic milieu’ to which her
parents belonged. The opportunity to work on a project in cooperation
with Western partners offered Olga a new view of academic work and
gave her new free spaces independent of the state. It was a different
culture of work with a different quality. In contrast to the out-of-date
university system, they established a new, independent organization
for realizing such science-based projects. Olga changed her dissertation
project after she learned new scientific methods and wrote an ambitious
PhD thesis, which she never could have defended in the old official
structures, and would therefore not have obtained her degree. She also
gained access to qualifications through courses outside of the univer-
sity that were oriented toward Western academic standards, sponsored
mainly by Western foundations and attained very good skills in the
current themes and methodology of the social sciences. She is currently
able to work for research-oriented, independent organizations financed
mostly by Western donors or Russian businesses and to choose topics
of her own interest.
Olga’s involvement and cooperation with Western partners entails
the lifestyle of a freelancer and is by its very nature unpredictable.
Here, it’s the same. These practices of independent work, this is highly
required in such organizations. And so I am working there. And this is the
same field. For example, I have been working there for three months, so,
now they have made a contract with me for the next two months. That
is to say, there is no guarantee. Though, when you get used to it, it seems
normal, I think. Because of this, I count on my husband in some cases, like
when there is a break in my work. I can relax, and he earns money. I`m
sure, if I were alone, I would need to look for other jobs.20
Since her childhood Olga has learned to cope with external insecurity
and unpredictability; she gets the necessary stability and the feeling of
security from her immediate family. It seems to be ‘normal’ to her to
trust just her family and friends and to count on her husband nowadays
without seeking stability in any official structures or the state.
Olga presents herself as a self-confident, independent young profes-
sional, who stands up for her interests even against the state. She partici-
pated in the demonstrations against the falsified elections of 2011/12,
took part in public discussions, and was involved in the observation
of the presidential elections in March 2012. At the same time, she is
strongly bound to her region and dependent on her support networks
(family, private and professional contacts) which she could not leave.
9.4 What do these two cases represent?
In general, the two cases tell us that individuals’ social and/or political
activities are strongly linked to biographical profiles. The motives
of getting involved with and the patterns of being engaged in non-
governmental groups can generally be traced in individual biographies.
Dmitri’s social engagement and activism stem from different sources.
His activism started during his childhood within the context of the
Pioneer organization, where he mostly adopted the forms of being active.
Consequently Dmitri’s patterns of activity are nowadays still biased by
his past. In the late 1980s, new information about the repression under
the Stalin regime was released, and the new motivation for Dmitri’s acti-
vity as related to his family history appeared in this context. For Dmitri
the history of repressions immediately served to process his own family
history. His family history, the example of his hard-working mother and
his sense of responsibility for her were the most important motivational
factors in Dmitri’s activity in this field. The motif of acknowledgment
runs like a thread through the whole story and refers to diverse levels,
such as: seeking acknowledgment for his mother, his family history,
his background, and his academic, professional, and voluntary hard

work. Through processing the family history, his need for order seems
to be fulfilled, his activity loses intensity. His central strategies, partly
inherited from his original family, are to work hard (to achieve goals),
to take opportunities (to use structures), and to adapt (to withstand
conflicts passively).
Olga on the other hand represents another type whose activism is
related to her professional career. Olga started her civic activity as an
adult and developed her professional attitudes within the context of
Western-oriented and international NGOs. However her moral beliefs
had formed since her childhood. Her family plays a crucial role in her
biography as a supporting and stabilizing structure. She assumes the
central strategy of her parents to get free space to act through good
education and the use of personal networks. Olga, similar to her family,
tries to stand above the system and to act independently. She identifies
with the new stratum of creative intellectuals, who can speak out about
their dissatisfaction with the system, because they are not immediately
dependent on it. The substance of her professional activity ranges from
environmental protection to communal politics, gender issues, or civil
rights. Keen on protecting her family and the area where she lives (the
environment, the neighborhood), she stands up for interests especially
if she is personally connected to them.
9.4.1 Role of Western support

The role of Western grants in Dmitri’s biography can be defined as sup-
portive. This support was mostly bound to a specific area of research –
reappraisal of the Soviet past. Dmitri used the grants to achieve his
personal goals in rehabilitating his family and getting a doctoral degree
as well as to support his organization while he was working on his
research, the foundations of which were marked by such interests. He
is no longer involved in any other projects financed by Western money
as he has found a stable job in the school system. The contact with
Western liberal traditions broadened Dmitri’s horizons, whereas his
dominant patterns of behavior have persisted unchanged.
The achievement of the Western support programs is also an impor-
tant point in Olga’s story. The external support allowed Olga to discover
new alternative lifestyles from the old Soviet academic world. She used
the opportunities to professionalize herself, to get interesting jobs on
projects and to live out her liberal worldview. The Western foundations
support Olga by developing an alternative, independent way of life. She
can neither be considered a typical opportunistic career-maker nor a
typical opposition activist. She is keen on getting interesting jobs – carried

out by different NGOs and financed by Western money or private busi-
nesses. Nevertheless this ‘independent’ sphere is very ‘dependent’ on
the personal networks that are related to the patterns of behavior of the
Soviet and post-Soviet society.
9.4.2 Identification with civil society?

Self-identification with the sphere of civil society differs for these
two protagonists. Dmitri identifies himself with civic activism both
as Pioneer leader and later as member of the organization Memorial.
The activity – not the special content – is how he identifies with this
sphere. He stresses his voluntary work in this organization especially
at the beginning of his activity in the NGO in his home town. On
the other hand, he expresses his skepticism about the situation of
civil society in Russia, which in his eyes ‘doesn’t exist’. Interestingly
he does not interpret his current occupation as teacher and his
involvement at school as an expression of active civil society. In his
reflection on civil society, he seems to be influenced by the idea that
vibrant civil society is demonstrated by independent NGOs and their
members’ voluntary work. On the other hand his mission and engage-
ment in the work at school still fulfill the notion of civil society as a
public space where he tries to teach the pupils in a more democratic
way. The necessary protection of his work is provided by the school
structure.
Olga does not identify with civic activists at all while she tries to
locate her activity within the context of professionalism. She under-
stands her role as being a scientist who draws the public’s attention
to the problems of the city or the region, but she does not mount the
barricades to solve these problems. She identifies with the group of
people who try to live independently of the state and discuss their
views critically. She does not interpret the sphere of her activity as
civil society that she is interested in as a professional. However she
can stand up for her interests against the system, especially when the
protest is related to her personal issues or issues pertaining to her family.
Furthermore Olga’s latest activities (participating in the demonstrations
against the election fraud of 2011/12) refer to a new, developing qua-
lity of solidarity and protest against the powers that be which outweigh
the individual interests. Olga’s activities obviously fit into the concept
of civil society as a public space; however legal protection of this space
does not exist. Mistrust toward the state fosters a reliance on private
networks and distance from the wider public.
9.5 Conclusions
‘The history of the individual is never anything other than a certain

specification of the collective history of his group or class’ (Bourdieu,
1977, 86). The presented examples of the life stories of two Russian civic
actors stand for a new, emerging stratum of Russian society called the
middle class, which is crucial for a developing civil society.
On the basis of case reconstructions of the interviews with protago-
nists of the independent civil society in Russia, I argue that while old
patterns of behavior and interpretation are still functional, new models
of life are simultaneously delivered by Western donors. These allow the
actors to be independent from state structures and to professionalize
themselves. Under these conditions, enclaves emerge that are based on
networks of the ‘liberal’ members – well educated, professional, liberal
oriented actors. However, overall voluntary civic engagement does not
play a crucial role in it. The following conclusions can be drawn:
1. The importance of personal networks as an inheritance of the Soviet

and post-Soviet times seems to be crucial in the sphere of civil society
nowadays as well. The way people come into the world of Western
funding and projects with Western partners is led exclusively through
personal contacts. In addition paternalistic patterns can be found in
these networks as well. Older colleagues, teachers, or relatives invite
their appropriate younger colleagues for cooperation on projects;
professors nominate their appropriate students for Western scholar-
ships. Consequently the initiative for the first step into this sphere
never lies at the source of these young protagonists. This refers to the
fact that personal networks play an important role in the Western
supported groups as well as the trust that develops within the group.
2. The protagonists of the Western-oriented civil society are aware of
the exclusiveness of their group which not everybody can be part of.
An often-used phrase about ‘their own people’ confirms this. They
identify themselves with the ‘intelligentsia’ and position themselves in
general as ‘like-minded people’. There is a gap arising between this
group and the ‘simple people’. In addition these emerging enclaves
of the ‘like-minded people’ do not succeed in attracting the wider
public. The often proclaimed atomization of Russian (civil) society is
the best demonstration of this process (see in addition Gudkov, 2012).
3. In the context of Western-funded projects, Western donors offer new
life plans for the protagonists on the Russian site. These are diffe-
rent from the old Soviet tradition and attract mostly young people.
The crucial indicators of these life concepts are independence from

state structures, flexible work on projects, and professionalism.
Cooperation with Western partners allows the Russian actors to
professionalize themselves, inter alia to learn new methods, foreign
languages, and to be engaged in international networks, which is espe-
cially interesting for young people. For these reasons they primarily
want to be seen as young professionals and receive acknowledgment
for their good work. Consequently they identify more with their
own group of professionals than with the civil society and want to
be active within this group.
4. On the basis of the reconstructed biographies within the present
study, a general difference could be found between two generations.
The first one (born in the 1960s) represents the people who were
first socialized in the Soviet Union and experienced the Perestroika
as youth and young adults. The second one represents the people
(born in the late 1970s or 1980s) who were socialized during the
Perestroika and experienced their formative years during the time of
the collapse of the Soviet Union and the transformation. The older
generation of civic actors belongs more to the ‘idealists’ who are keen
on democratic values; however they are often stuck in patterns of
behavior from the Soviet period (paternalism, orientation toward a
collective, adaptation). The younger generation tends to belong more to
the professionals who adopt a Western lifestyle and manage the
uncertainty in a flexible and creative way. On the other hand, there
is often an inclination toward collective solidarity lacking in their
attitude. Whereas the older generation has specific concerns in com-
mon with the donors (such as human rights, environmental protec-
tion, and reappraisal of Stalin’s repressions), the younger generation
is more interested in new, professional forms of activity without
having one special focus.
Notes
1. See www.oprf.ru, accessed 20 September 2012.
2. For example the George Soros Foundation and the Ford Foundation gradually
ceased their activity in Russia.
3. For information on the funding of individuals, see the programs of the
Ford Foundation or the MacArthur Foundation along with initiatives from
the Robert Bosch Foundation, the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, and the
Heinrich Böll Foundation.
4. See http://en.sovetpamfilova.ru/Council2009/regdocuments/1799, accessed
20 September 2012.
5. See for example www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/europe/

russia/120918/usaid-will-cease-its-work-russia, accessed 20 September 2012.
6. Only 5 percent of NGOs receive funding from foreign donors. See:
USAID (2011) http://transition.usaid.gov/locations/europe_eurasia/dem_
gov/ngoindex/reports/2011/2011CSOSI_Index_complete.pdf#page=175,
accessed 20 January 2013.
7. The sampling followed the rules of theoretical sampling. The protagonists were
recruited within the group of former scholarship holders of the Heinrich Böll
Foundation in ‘snowball practice’ which uses interpersonal relations and con-
nections between people for the recruitment (see Strauss and Corbin 1990).
8. See information about the scholarship on http://www.ru.boell.org
9. Vsesoyuznaya pionerskaya organizatsiya imeni V. I. Lenina (a mass youth
organization of the USSR for children aged 10–15).
10. All translations of the original interviews in Russian are made by the author;
all names are anonymized. Interview No. 14, 391/12-401/12.
11. Kommunisticheskii Soyuz Molodyozhi (a communist organization in the
Soviet Union for youths of 16 years of age and older).
12. See The Charter of the International Volunteer Public Organization
“‘Memorial’ Historical, Educational, Human Rights and Charitable Society”,
www.memo.ru/eng/about/charter.htm, accessed 20 May 2012.
13. Interview No. 14: 465/14-474/14.
14. Interview No 14: 88/3-90/3.
15. Interview No 14/II: 449/16-454/16.
16. Interview No. 43: 16/1-21/1.
17. Interview No. 43: 32/1-33/1.
18. Interview No. 43: 541/12-547/12.
19. Interview No 43: 107/3-114/3.
20. Interview No 43: 180/4-187/5.
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10
Participation in Civil Society
Organizations and Political Parties
in Post-Communist Europe: The
Impact of Political Divides
Franziska Blomberg and Edina Szöcsik
10.1 Introduction
As we can observe today, post-communist countries have followed diverse

transition paths: some have consolidated as democracies, such as most
of the Central European or the Baltic states. Others, however, cannot be
considered fully consolidated: a good number of these states still show
democratic deficits in several regards, particularly concerning the qual-
ity of democratic procedures. Finally, a number of states today are even
showing tendencies of re-autocratization, such as Ukraine and Russia, but
also Hungary or a number of the South-eastern European states.
The procedural side of democracy rests to a large extent on the func-
tions of political parties and civil society organizations (CSOs). These
actors are considered highly important for the democratization process
through their intermediation between citizens and the state. Political
parties and civil society have been supported in their intermediary
function by external actors who have been exerting considerable effort
to promote democratization and eventually democratic consolidation –
albeit not always entirely successfully (for example Santiso, 2001;
Carothers, 1999; Burnell, 2008). One of the central problems inhibiting
how civil society and political parties contribute to democratization
is their lack of roots in society. In the post-communist states, there is
little tradition of voluntary civic activism – in contrast to party affili-
ated engagement (Dvornik, 2009, 50–1). Many communist states had
already seen civil society emerge and grow stronger before the end
of communism, for example Poland and East Germany. In numerous
states, however, external democracy promotion very strongly supported
civil society’s development and influence, for example Georgia and
191
192 Franziska Blomberg and Edina Szöcsik
Ukraine. Where democratic consolidation has not yet been achieved,

the large number of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) does not
really reflect the true impact of civil society, which in many places actu-
ally remains quite low (Howard, 2012, 40).1 In fact, civic engagement
developed an important function as an income generating ‘civil sector’
in many states (Seifija, 2006). In the post-transition phase, civic activism
has remained significantly lower in post-communist states than in other
regions, as studies by Howard (2003) and Pop-Eleches and Tucker (2013)
have shown. A large number of NGOs lack a broader membership base,
are closely affiliated to the government (sometimes as GONGOs or
QUANGOs2) (Paffenholz & Spurk, 2006, 10–11), or may even suffer from
intimidation and encroachment by the state on their liberties.
Upon closer examination, one can identify significant differences with
regard to civic and political participation among the post-communist
states more than 20 years after the breakdown of the communist
regimes. Therefore, in this contribution, we address the question of
what factors are accountable for whether individuals do or do not
choose to participate in civil society organizations or political parties.
The literature refers to a number of individual or contextual factors,
such as age, economic situation, education, etc., that may offer explana-
tions for why individuals chose to dedicate themselves to engagement
in either civil society or political parties, or both. In addition to this, we
formulate hypotheses on how political divides structure participation
of individuals in civil society organizations and political parties in post-
communist countries. We argue that individuals with different political
party preferences are inclined to participate in civil society organizations
and political parties to a different degree.
In the empirical part, we draw on the European Social Survey (ESS)
that covers 13 post-communist countries in Europe and has been con-
ducted every two years since 2002. First, we show how participation
rates in civil society organizations and political parties have developed
in post-communist Europe over time. Then we test our hypotheses
based on a cross-sectional analysis using data from the year 2008. Our
results show that apart from a number of explanatory factors at the
individual and at the country level, communist party preferences are
associated with higher levels of participation in civil society organiza-
tions and political parties. Our results therefore show that communist
legacies still structure and favor mobilization along the communist
cleavage in post-communist Europe.
In section 10.2 of this chapter, we outline the relevance of political
parties and civil society for democratization. We discuss the status quo
concerning a lack of social roots of political parties and civil society

and its consequences for democratic consolidation. In section 10.3, we
hypothesize how political divisions structure the likelihood of indi-
vidual participation in civil society organizations and political parties.
In the empirical part, section 10.4, we present the research design of our
empirical analysis. In section 10.5, we explore the different trajectories
of the individual’s participation rates in civic and political engagement
among post-communist countries in Europe. We present and test our
hypotheses and demonstrate that the individuals’ likelihood of partici-
pation in civil society organizations and political parties is driven by a
number of individual factors, partisan linkages as well as the economic
and political development of their countries. In the final section, we
discuss our results and outline potential implications for external
democracy promoters.
10.2 The absent social roots of civil society

and political parties in post-communist Europe
With regard to the procedural side of democracy, political parties and

civil society organizations are considered highly important actors for the
democratization process through their intermediation between citizens
and the state.3,4 Stepan (1988) for instance explicitly distinguishes ‘civil
society’ and ‘political society’.5 As interest groups represented in the
government, political parties are theoretically closer to the state sphere
than, for instance, associations or movements. This division is in fact
not that clear cut: while civil society can be aimed more at either civic
interests (for example in local initiatives) or at influence on the politi-
cal level (for example important lobby groups), political parties can also
be aimed more at the citizens’ local interests (in regional groups) or at
the political level (when governments are formed). Thus, individual
engagement in both can be considered either as more directed toward
individual interests or the aim to exert political influence.
Both civil society organizations and political parties represent certain
interests and values, usually along important societal cleavages.6 Also,
both are political and aim to influence political processes and outcomes.7
Different from civil society organizations, a political party seeks to ‘win
and exercise state power’ directly (Diamond, Linz & Lipset, 1995) and
‘pursues a goal of placing their avowed representatives in government
positions’ ( Janda, 1980, 5). Functional approaches8 to civil society sum-
marize the different roles that civil society assumes – from socializing citi-
zens in civic virtues to aggregating interests, monitoring the government,
and so forth. Also in this regard, civic movements or associations are

similar to political parties in many respects. However, in contrast to
other intermediary or interest groups, political parties assume not only
social functions, but also political and governmental functions.9
In most post-communist states, formally democratic institutions have
been established. However, many of these democratic structures are
undermined by undemocratic practices or are even abused or changed
by political actors to (illegitimately) increase their power, leading to
stagnation of democratization or even to re-autocratization. In recent
years, several scholars have shifted their focus from looking not so
much at democratic structures, but at the quality of their functioning.
In many post-communist societies (but not only), a disconnect between
practices and formal institutions persists, where cultural rules and
current practices (corruption, and so on) perpetuate suspicion toward
authorities, reluctance toward civic participation, non-participation in
elections, etc. (see Bliesemann, de Guevara & Kühn, 2010; Richter, 2009;
also Sztompka, 1996, 119; Chandler, 1999, 28). Therefore, changes in
attitudes and behavior are highly crucial for democratic consolidation
so that changes of institutional structures also bring democratic consoli-
dation (Gunther et al., 1996, 152). Otherwise, democracy may come to
a halt or may even be reversed.
In a growing number of cases, again, political parties and civil society
are not able to fulfill their intermediary functions for a number of reasons.
Frequently they lack roots in society. Therefore, their representativeness,
accountability, and sustainability are often weak. Parties with charismatic
leaders are frequently more centered on these personalities than on issues
(Kneuer, 2011). Additionally, civil society is often either too close or too
far from politics to play a corrective function. On the one hand, they are
sometimes not independent from governments or from parties. Political
actors frequently try to co-opt or encroach on civil society organizations,
particularly on trade unions, war veteran groups, or even establish so-called
GONGOs or QUANGOs. On the other hand, many governments still offer
only limited or even mostly ‘symbolic’ possibilities for civil society partici-
pation as shown by progress reports for European Union (EU) accession
candidates. The rise of uncivil and illiberal parties shifted the attention
also to potential ‘dark sides’ or potentially ‘uncivil’ aspects of civil society
(see Croissant et al., 2000, 19, Lauth, 2003, Paffenholz & Spurk, 2006).10
The main reason for individuals not participating in civic and political
organizations is their deep mistrust toward organizations inherited from
communist times (Howard, 2003; Dvornik, 2009; Fish, 1995). Individuals’
attitudes and behavior in post-communist states are strongly shaped by
the dominance of the communist party and by its exertion of power
on and interference in all spheres of social and political life during

communist times. In many of these states, even today, the majority
of citizens mistrust everything political, most notably involvement in
formal political organizations, but also the public display of political
opinions, such as informal activism or NGO activities – particularly
when critical of the government.
A number of states to this day have strong hierarchies, frequently
linked to party politics, from the local to the national level. Public
expression of critical opinions may increase the risk of not being pro-
moted in one’s workplace, of someone’s child not getting a certain job,
etc., as access to work is frequently tied to political affiliation.
Another possible reason why civic organizations and political parties
do not need or do not have the incentive to enforce their grassroots sup-
port is the mechanisms of their financial support. If parties financially
depend on oligarchs, they do not have to reach out for members, yet
they will possibly cater to the needs of their supporters instead of those
of a larger public base. Analogously, if civil society organizations rely on
external funding, they are accountable to these donors and again not to
their domestic societies. If civil society organizations depend on domes-
tic funding by political actors, they frequently have to make a choice
between cooperating, at the risk of becoming co-opted, or facing struggles
or even threats if they are too critical of political incumbents. Again, this
fosters divisions and underpins the importance of friendship networks.
Finally, international actors frequently call for a development of ‘the
civil society’, demanding one strategy, or that ‘civil society speak with
one voice’ in order to facilitate cooperation between state and interest
groups. Yet, obviously, this has proven difficult because in states all
around the world one can find many different values, convictions, and
interests represented by different, more or less powerful groups. In line
with the cleavage theory, they are frequently affiliated with or at least
targeted by corresponding political groups or parties. This in fact makes
up for a democratic plurality of interests and their aggregation and
representation – unless democratic deficits are too significant.
10.3 Individual participation in civil society organizations

and political parties in post-communist Europe: divided
along partisan lines?
Central explanations for individuals’ low political participation in post-

communist Europe argue that legacies of the communist regimes keep
civic and political engagement at low levels. Thus far, explanations have
suggested what communist legacies are and how they impact individual
civic and political participation. One explanation highlights the role of

individuals’ socialization under the communist regime (Howard, 2003;
Pop-Eleches & Tucker, 2013). A second one proposes that communism
left behind a society with a distinct demographic characteristic (Pop-
Eleches & Tucker, 2013). Yet another proposes that communism and
the subsequent transition produced a distinct economic and political
context for broadly based civic and political participation (Kostadinova
& Power, 2007; Pop-Eleches & Tucker, 2013).
We follow the third approach and argue that the political and eco-
nomic context of post-communist Europe is marked by the processes
of democratization, the introduction of market capitalism and nation
building (Offe & Adler, 1991). In the specific context of post-communist
Europe, different political conflicts emerge compared to Western Europe
and these conflicts in turn structure individuals’ involvement in civil
society and political parties. On the one hand, communist legacies might
present a favorable context for mobilization along the communist divi-
sion. On the other hand, opportunity structures for mobilization along
new political divisions in the context of the threefold transition process
of post-communist countries might open up. Therefore, we formulate
three hypotheses on how political divides enhance mobilization along
three different political divides. More precisely, we formulate hypoth-
eses on how individuals are more or less inclined to participate in civic
and political action depending on their political orientation.
10.3.1 Inherited advantages for social democratic and

communist parties
Most social democratic parties are the successor of the previous commu-
nist parties. They have to some extent not only inherited the voters but
also the party organization and the satellite organization from their pre-
decessors. These organizational structures give them an advantage when
mobilizing their voters in different civic and political actions compared
to young parties that emerged during the regime transformation or after.
Communist parties are the direct survivors from the communist regimes.
Even if their property might have been privatized, they probably are able
to rely on some preexistent organizational structure that helps them acti-
vate their voters more easily than young parties. Therefore, we formulate
the following hypothesis on the impact of communist party preferences:
H1: Individuals with social democratic and communist party preferences

are more likely to be involved in civil society organizations and political
parties than supporters of parties belonging to other party families.
10.3.2 The ethno-national mobilization advantage

of nationalist and ethnic minority parties
During and after the end of communism, many states saw significant
ethno-national mobilization, to some extent still serving as a strong
mobilization potential today. Political conflict between the broader
nation and the national minorities in post-communist states is repre-
sented by nationalist and ethnic minority parties. This emergence and
growth of nationalist and ethnic parties has been observed with great
concern. At the beginning of the democratic transition, a number of
researchers argued that in the atomized societies of the multinational
post-communist states, these were the only possible categories through
which politicians and parties could appeal to voters, leading to a more
active nationalist and ethnic minority voter base.
H2: Individuals with partisan preferences for nationalist and ethnic

minority parties are more likely to be involved in civil society organizations
and political parties than supporters of parties belonging to other party
families.
10.3.3 New advantages for green parties and new forms of

activism
Many post-communist states witnessed the emergence of first grassroots
movements that based their initiative on environmental protection
issues – these movements also laid the groundwork for the development
of green parties. The ideology of green parties encompasses environmen-
tal issues, liberal values, civic participation, new and more inclusive
forms of democratic participation, social inclusion and tolerance, etc.
Additionally, many international NGOs and international organizations
support movements and organizations that are close to ‘green ideas’ –
thus they also have more resources at their disposal for mobilization.
H3: Individuals with green party preferences are more likely to participate
in civil society organizations than supporters of parties belonging to other
party families.
10.4 Design
Our empirical analysis draws mainly on the European Social Survey.

It has been conducted every two years since 2002 and covers 13 post-
communist countries in different time periods. The surveys included
cover the following states: Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia,
Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovenia, Slovakia,

and Ukraine. In our descriptive analysis, we use all the available surveys
and sketch a development of individuals’ participation rates in civil
society organizations and political parties over time. For the analysis of
our hypotheses, we use the surveys from 2008 since only at this point
in time all 13 countries are covered. In the following section, we present
the operationalization of the variables included in our analysis.
10.4.1 Dependent variables

We measure the two dependent variables as follows.12 The political par-
ticipation of individuals in parties is measured through the following
survey item (wrkprty):
‘Have you worked in a political party or action group in the last 12

months?’
We measure individuals’ participation in civil society organizations

through the following survey item (wrkorg):
‘Have you worked in another organization or association in the last 12

months?’
Both variables ‘Worked for a party’ and ‘Worked for a civil society organiza-
tions’ are dummy variables. Unfortunately, the question on civic society
involvement is rather vague since there is no definition of organizations
or associations provided. It is open to individual interpretation whether
sports clubs, religious communities, or radical right-wing youth organi-
zations are subsumed under the term ‘organization’.
10.4.2 Independent variables

All variables referring to the party preferences of individuals are opera-
tionalized by their party choice in the last national elections. This
may possibly be problematic since out of the 24,137 individuals only
15,782 voted, which means that we only have about 65 percent of the
information on individuals’ voting choice. We chose this operation-
alization as the most appropriate and excluded other possible options,
because one might think that an operationalization by the item ‘close-
ness to a political party’ could provide a better measurement of party
preferences. However, only 9,401 respondents mentioned a party to
which they feel close. The rest of the respondents do not feel close to
any party.
To identify the partisan preferences of individuals, we classified

the parties according to their party families based on the dataset of
the Comparative Manifesto Project (CMP) (Volkens et al., 2012) and the
ParlGov database (Döring & Manow, 2012). If the two datasets provided
contradicting information or if the parties were included neither in the
CMP dataset nor in the ParlGov database, they were classified based
on information from secondary literature and/or Wikipedia. Of course,
this approach to coding offers room for misinterpretation. However, for
all but very small and politically less significant parties the sources and
ground for the coding are sufficient and allowed enough information
to assure appropriate classification. We include five dummy variables
on the partisan preferences of individuals: social democrat, communist,
nationalist, ethnic minority, and green. These variables were assigned the
value 1 if an individual gave his or her vote to a party that belongs to
the respective party family. They take the value 0 if the individual did
not vote or picked a party from another party family.
10.4.3 Control variables at the individual and the macro level

It could be the case that it only matters if an individual voted and not
which party an individual picked. Therefore, we control whether an
individual voted in the last election or not with the dummy variable vote.
We expect that individuals who participate in elections are more likely
to participate in other forms of civic and political action. Furthermore,
a number of individual factors influence whether an individual par-
ticipates in civil society organizations and political parties. Variables
referring to the characteristics of individuals are all operationalized by
items included in the European Social Survey. Previous studies have
shown that gender matters and that men are more likely to participate
in different forms of political action in post-communist Europe. Gender
is included as a dummy variable in our analysis. Literature argues that
age matters. We include the variable age and squared age in the analy-
sis to be able to capture a non-linear relation between age and civic or
political participation. We include unemployment as a control variable
for resources in our analysis as a dummy variable. Another factor found
in the literature is that the higher the level of education, the more an
individual will engage in civic and political action. Economic wealth
allows individuals to spend resources such as time on civic and politi-
cal action. Consequently, we assume, unemployed individuals are less
likely to participate in civil society organizations and political parties.12
Education is operationalized by two dummy variables and refers to the
highest level of education that an individual attained. Education middle
takes the value 1 if an individual completed upper secondary education.

Otherwise it was assigned the value 0. Education high takes the value 1
if an individual completed tertiary education. Next, we included the
variable satisfaction with democracy in our analysis.13 Dissatisfaction with
democracy may positively affect an individual’s inclination toward par-
ticipation in civil society organizations and political parties. Literature
argues that an individual’s interest in politics positively influences the
likelihood for both, political or civic engagement. Otherwise, without a
certain will to seek information, form an opinion, and be interested in
political processes, individuals will invest their time in other activities.
Furthermore, we include trust in political parties and interpersonal trust
in our analysis. While trust in political parties is assumed to increase
individuals’ participation in political parties, interpersonal trust likely
increases participation in civil society organizations.
Finally, we include two control variables for the economic and politi-
cal development at the national level. The economic situation at the
aggregate level influences an individual’s propensity to be involved and
possibilities for informal civic and political action. In a country with
a prosperous economy, individuals have more resources on average to
take part in civic activities. However, participation in civil society organ-
izations and in political parties may also take place precisely to ensure
personal economic survival. As an important aggregate of friendship
networks or patronage networks, political parties have the possibility
to distribute resources and jobs. Involvement in political parties, con-
nections to parties, and party affiliation can be important for access to
job positions, to money, and to business advantages. We assume that in
less democratic states, clientelism and patronage are more pervasive.14
Furthermore, the scarcer the economic situation and access to jobs
and resources, which tend to be under the control of parties, the more
attractive connections to parties can be. We measure economic wealth as
the gross domestic product (GDP) per capita from a dataset provided by
the statistical center of the United Nations (UN) in the previous year.
Furthermore, we use the logged GDP per capita since we assume that
the marginal effect of an increasing GDP per capita is lower at very high
levels. We control for the political situation in a country by measuring
the level of democracy. In less democratic states, individuals may not
be willing to participate in civil society organizations or political par-
ties, as criticism of important (political) authorities may hold the risk
of personal disadvantages. The level of democracy is operationalized by
the polity index. We use the score of the polity index from the previous
year. The polity score ranges from 10 to 10. Since post-communist
countries’ scores range between 6 and 10, we did not need to transform
the scale of the polity index.
10.5 Analysis
In this section, we first discuss the development of individuals’ partici-

pation rate in civil society organizations and political parties in post-
communist countries in Europe between 2002 and 2010. Subsequently, we
test our hypotheses regarding the likelihood of individuals’ participation
in civil society organizations and political parties.
10.5.1 The development of participation in civil society

organizations and political parties in post-communist Europe
Figures 10.1a to 10.1m (see end of subsection) present the development
of the participation rates in civil society organizations and political
parties in post-communist Europe based on the European Social Survey
between 2002 and 2010. The figures highlight two types of variation
among post-communist countries. First, in some countries the partici-
pation rates are growing, while they are decreasing in others. Second, in
some countries involvement in political parties is more frequent than
involvement in civic organizations, while for certain states we find the
opposite.
10.5.1.1 Increase vs. decrease of involvement

As for most countries data is not available for all five time periods, it
is difficult to detect clear trends. The results show that the participa-
tion rates in civil society organizations and political parties have not
always developed in the same direction. There is no single pattern of
increase or decrease in participation rates in civil society organizations
and political parties in the post-communist countries. Clear trends for
a decrease in both types of involvement are present in Croatia between
2008 and 2010 and in Romania between 2006 and 2008. A trend of
mostly decreasing involvement was found for the Czech Republic from
2002 to 2010 and in Slovakia from 2004 to 2010. Only in Estonia we
identified a clear increase in engagement: individuals increasingly par-
ticipated in the work of civil society organizations and political parties
between 2004 and 2010.
10.5.1.2 Political parties vs. civil society organizations

While between 0.88 percent (Bulgaria in 2006) and 13.97 percent
(Czech Republic in 2002) of the respondents worked for civil society
organizations, between 0.91 percent (Hungary in 2008) and 5.9 percent

(Romania in 2006) worked for political parties. The variation in the par-
ticipation rates in civil society organizations is larger than the variation
in the participation rates in political parties among post-communist
countries. In some states a larger share of individuals has participated in
civil society organizations than in political parties – but we also found
states where the opposite applied. In Bulgaria, Romania, Slovenia, and
Ukraine a larger percentage of individuals worked for political parties
than for civil society organizations. In Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia,
Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and Slovakia, the share of indi-
viduals who participated in civil society organizations was higher than
the number for political parties. Interestingly, for all of these states we
found that this preference for participation in civil society organizations
or political parties appears to remain mostly stable for each state. First,
between 2006 and 2008 a larger share of individuals participated in civil
society organizations than in parties, whereas this trend reversed for
2010. Second, in Hungary, while a larger share of people participated in
civil society organizations between 2002 and 2004 and between 2008
and 2010, individuals more often participated in parties than in civil
society organizations in 2006.
10.5.2 The determinants of individual participation

in CSOs and parties
To test our hypotheses, we estimated Logit-Models on the likelihood
of individuals’ participation in civil society organizations and political
parties.15 The standard errors are corrected as the data is clustered in
countries. Table 10.1 shows the results of the estimated models.
Political party preferences influence the likelihood of being involved in
civil society organizations and political parties only if individuals favor
communist parties. Individuals who voted for communist parties more likely
work for civil society organizations and for parties. Voters for social democratic
parties are not more likely to participate in civil society organizations or
in political parties than voters for other parties. It seems that only com-
munist parties benefit from their long-standing organizations from the
communist era. Thus, hypothesis 1 can only partially be confirmed.
Individuals with other party preferences are significantly more likely
to work for parties but not for civil society organizations. Hypothesis 2
therefore cannot be confirmed: Ethno-nationalist categories seem to
provide an advantage in mobilization only for parties that represent
the ethnic majority in party competition. Neither can hypothesis 3 be
confirmed. Green parties seem unable to derive an advantage from their
203
a. Bulgaria b. Croatia c. Czech Republic

15 15 15
10 10 10
5 5 5
0 0 0
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010
d. Estonia e. Hungary f. Latvia

15 15 15
10 10 10
5 5 5
0 0 0
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010
g. Lithuania h. Poland i. Romania
15 15 15
10 10 10
5 5 5
0 0 0
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010
j. Russia k. Slovakia l. Slovenia
15 15 15
10 10 10
5 5 5
0 0 0
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010
m. Ukraine
15
10
0
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010
Figure 10.1 The development of individual participation rates in civil society

organizations and political parties in post-communist Europe
Note: dotted lines represent the participation rates (in %) in political parties, solid lines refer
to the participation rates (in %) in civil society organizations.
Table 10.1 The determinants of the likelihood of being involved in a civil society
organization or a political party
Work for a CSO Work for a party
Coefficient Robust Coefficient Robust

Standard Error Standard Error
Party preferences
Socialist 0.167 (0.164) 0.012 (0.104)
Communist 0.551*** (0.13) 1.123*** (0.304)
Nationalist 0.075 (0.173) 0.353 (0.315)
Ethnic minority 0.046 (0.232) 0.163 (0.183)
Green 0.304 (0.326) 0.136 (0.309)
Control variables at the individual level

Age 0.002 (0.021) 0.016 (0.016)
Squared Age 0.0001 (0.0002) 0.0003 (0.0002)
Gender 0.22* (0.094) 0.343** (0.105)
Unemployment 0.375* (0.19) 0.008 (0.162)
Education middle 0.623*** (0.133) 0.384** (0.148)
Education high 1.26*** (0.153) 0.81*** (0.154)
Satisfaction 0.008 (0.025) 0.022 (0.02)
democracy
Trust parties 0.032 (0.022) 0.142*** (0.019)
Interpersonal trust 0.05*** (0.013) 0.008 (0.018)
Political interest 0.566*** (0.057) 0.936*** (0.047)
Vote 0.589*** (0.171) 0.878*** (0.195)
Control variables at the country level

Logged GDP per 0.766* (0.382) 0.234 (0.198)
capita
Democracy 0.047 (0.055) 0.12*** (0.033)
Constant ⴚ13.443*** (3.482) 6.557*** (1.676)
Pseudo 3297.553 2390.289
log-likelihood
N 18’202 18’233
Note: * p 0.05; ** p 0.01; *** p 0.001, standard errors adjusted for 13 clusters
in countries.
ideology to mobilize like-minded voters to participate in civil society

organizations.
Regarding the effects of the control variables, we obtained the following
results: The variables gender, education, and political interest significantly
influence the likelihood that an individual participates in a civil society
organization or a political party. Male individuals who completed upper
secondary or tertiary education and are more interested in politics are
more likely to be involved in a civil society organization and a political

party. The variables age and satisfaction with democracy have no signi-
ficant influence on the likelihood of participating in a civil society
organization or in a political party. Older or younger individuals seem
less likely to participate in civic and political action organizations.
Discontent with democracy does not increase the likelihood of working
for parties and for civil society organizations. The other control variables
have different effects on the two forms of participation.
Unemployed individuals are less likely to be involved in a civil society
organization. In economically wealthier post-communist countries,
individuals are significantly more inclined to participate in civic action.
These variables therefore show that individuals are more likely to partici-
pate in civil society organizations if they have the economic resources.
Economic resources do not, however, influence the inclination of
individuals to participate in political parties. The results show that the
extent to which countries are democratic matters for participation in
political parties. In more democratic countries, individuals are more likely
to participate in parties. Furthermore, individuals with higher interper-
sonal trust are more likely to participate in civil society organizations.
Higher trust in political parties is conducive to work for political parties.
10.6 Political and social divisions in civic and political

activism in post-communist Europe
The successful democratic consolidation of post-communist countries

crucially depends on how citizens are connected to civil society and to
political parties and how these, in turn, fulfill their democratic func-
tions. The current literature emphasizes that in post-communist reality,
civil society and political parties frequently lack roots in society, which
impedes both from assuming fully democratic roles. In this chapter,
we have tried to explain the variance in the likelihood of individuals
participating in civil society organizations and political parties in post-
communist countries.
In the theoretical part of our chapter, we aimed to contribute to
the literature on how communist legacies influence civic and political
participation in post-communist Europe and how these affect societal
divisions to this day. We followed the explanatory approach that post-
communist countries have a specific political and economic context
that is shaped by the processes of democratization, the introduction of
market capitalism, and nation building. We hypothesized that in these
contexts different old and new political divides structure individuals’
participation in civil society organizations and political parties. While

the communist divide may still have an impact, we also investigate
whether new political divides and issues such as nationalism or green
politics may have started to unfold an influence on the structure of civic
and political participation.
Empirically, first, we have shown that the rates at which individuals
participate in the work of civil society organizations and political par-
ties have in fact followed different trajectories across post-communist
Europe based on the European Social Survey from 2002 to 2010. To
test our hypotheses, we conducted a cross-sectional analysis relying on
data from the year 2008 covering 13 post-communist countries. Apart
from the explanatory variables on individuals’ party preferences, we
included a range of control variables for the individual and country-
level variation.
Our findings demonstrate that some determinants similarly influence
the likelihood of individuals participating in civil society organizations
and political parties:
• Men with communist party preferences and higher education, and who
are more interested in politics and voted in the last elections, are more
likely to be involved in both civil society organizations and political
parties.
Second, there are factors that only influence individual participation in

civil society organizations:
• In economically wealthier countries, individuals with higher interper-

sonal trust are more likely to work for civil society organizations.
Unemployed individuals are less likely to participate in civil society
organizations.
Finally, certain factors only influence the likelihood of individual par-

ticipation in political parties:
• In more democratic countries, individuals with higher trust in parties are

more likely to work for political parties.
On the one hand, our results support the general assumption of pub-
lications, which find that the historical legacies of former communist
regimes structure civic and political participation in post-communist
Europe. In communist regimes, the party and its satellite organizations
used to be the arena where civic and political action was manifested.
Our findings show that almost 25 years after the breakdown of the com-
munist regimes, the former political divides still structure and nourish
the logic of civic and political participation in post-communist Europe.
On the other hand, our findings show that different segments of
society are more or less likely to take part in the work of civil society
organizations and political parties: women, lower educated individuals,
and the unemployed are less likely to be involved in civic and politi-
cal action. This has direct consequences for the representation, or lack
thereof, of their societal interests in politics. These findings are in line
with and theoretically confirm frequently voiced policy recommenda-
tions from practitioners in the field that these underrepresented groups
still require substantial support to assure their involvement in the politi-
cal channels, which remain not fully democratically consolidated.
Table A10.1 Operationalization of the variables and data sources
Variable Operationalization Data source
Dependent variables
Work for a party Dummy variable: Takes the wrkprty (ESS)
value 1 if the individual worked
in a political party or action
group last 12 months.
Work for a CSO Dummy variable: Takes the wrkorg (ESS)
value 1 if the individual worked
in another organization or
association last 12 months.
Independent variables on party preferences

Social Democrat Dummy variable: Takes the prtvt (ESS) Classification
value 1 if the individual gave its of parties according to
vote to a party belonging to the their party families based
Social Democrat party family. on CMP, ParlGov, and
Wikipedia.
Communist Dummy variable: Takes the
value 1 if the individual gave its
vote to a party belonging to the
Communist party family.
Nationalist Dummy variable: Takes the
Nationalist party family.
Ethnic minority Dummy variable: Takes the
Ethnic minority party family.
(continued)
208
Green Dummy variable: Takes the

Green party family.
Control variables at the individual level

Vote Dummy variable: Takes the vote (ESS)
value 1 if the individual voted
in the last elections; 0 if not.
Gender Dummy variable: 1 for male gndr (ESS)
and 0 for female.
Age Age, metric variable. agea or age (ESS)
Education middle Highest level of education. The edulvla or eisced (ESS)
variable takes the value 1 if the
individual completed upper
secondary education; 0 otherwise.
Education high Highest level of education. The edulvla or eisced (ESS)
variable takes the value 1 if the
individual completed tertiary
education; 0 otherwise.
Political interest How interested in politics. The polintrest (ESS)
variable ranges from 1 (not
at all interested) to 4 (very
interested).
Trust party Trust in country’s parliament. The trstprl (ESS)
variable ranges from 0 (no trust at
all) to 10 (complete trust).
Interpersonal Trust in people. The variable ppltrst (ESS)
trust ranges from 0 (you can’t be too
careful) to 10 (Most people can
be trusted).
Satisfaction with How satisfied with the way stfdem (ESS)
democracy democracy works in country.
The variable ranges from 0
(extremely dissatisfied) to 10
(extremely satisfied).
Unemployment Dummy variable: It takes the uempla and uempli (ESS)
value 1 if in the last 7 days the
individual was unemployed and
was actively or not looking for
job; 0 otherwise.
(continued)
Control variables at the country level

Economic wealth Lagged and logged GDP per United Nations Statistics
capita at current prices in US Division
dollars.
Democracy Lagged Polity index that ranges Polity IV. Project
from 10 (full autocracy) to 10
(full democracy).
Table A10.2 Summary statistics of the independent variables
Variable Observation Mean Std. Dev. Min Max
Social Democrat 20,236 0.173 0.378 0 1

Communist 20,236 0.021 0.144 0 1
Nationalist 20,236 0.045 0.208 0 1
Ethnic minority 20,236 0.040 0.197 0 1
Green 20,236 0.006 0.080 0 1
Age 24,059 47.651 18.494 15 96
Gender 24,117 0.433 0.495 0 1
Unemployed 24,137 0.074 0.263 0 1
Education middle 24,080 0.458 0.498 0 1
Education high 24,080 0.295 0.456 0 1
Satisfaction democracy 22,432 3.810 2.494 0 10
Trust party 23,235 2.532 2.272 0 10
Interpersonal trust 23,994 4.168 2.576 0 10
Political interest 24,001 2.252 0.867 1 4
Vote 22,602 0.698 0.459 0 1
Social Democrat 20,236 0.173 0.378 0 1
Communist 20,236 0.021 0.144 0 1
Nationalist 20,236 0.045 0.208 0 1
Ethnic minority 20,236 0.040 0.197 0 1
Green 20,236 0.006 0.080 0 1
Economic wealth 24,137 9.260 0.500 8.034 10.065
Democracy 24,137 8.503 1.780 4 10
Notes
1. For an overview on civil society’s impact on the different aspects during
democratic consolidation see for example Blomberg (2012).
2. GONGO signifies a ‘government organized non-governmental organization’;
QUANGO means ‘quasi-autonomous non-governmental organization’.
3. For more on the role of civil society and how it is conducive to democracy
and its establishment compare for example Almond & Verba (1963), Putnam
et al. (1993), Lauth (2003), Diamond (1994, 8), Król (1995), Croissant et al.
(2000), Merkel (2000), Gillespie & Youngs (2002), Parrott (1997).
4. Civil society is frequently considered to include all types of formal and infor-
mal civic organizations, including movements, associations, political parties,
and so on, which are rooted in different understandings of the nature of civil
society as either an intermediary sphere (see for example Schmitter (1995),
Howard (2003), Paffenholz & Spurk (2006) or as a ‘third sector’ (for example
van Til (1988), Janoski (1998), Cohen & Arato (1992, 5), Foley & Edwards
(1996)). Other authors rather define civil society based on its actors (for
example the World Bank, 2010; Paffenholz, 2010).
5. ‘By “civil society” I mean that arena where manifold social movements ...
and civic organizations from all classes attempt to constitute themselves
in an ensemble of arrangements so that they can express themselves and
advance their interests. By “political society” in a democratizing setting
I mean that arena in which the polity specifically arranges itself for politi-
cal contestation to gain control over public power and the state apparatus’
(Stepan, 1988, 4; cf. Pearce, 2004, 94).
6. Based on the idea of ‘cleavage theory’ going back to Lipset and Rokkan
(1967).
7. Accordingly, definitions of civil society mostly try to take into account the
many different forms and purposes of civil society organizations. Zinecker
for instance gives the following very encompassing definition of civil
society, which takes into account the actors, spheres, and qualities of civil
society: ‘Stripping down the term civil society leaves a core definition:
civil societies are all those structures and associations formed by actors,
which fill the societal sphere between family, economy, and the state. Civil
societies are political and part of the political regime. They can contain demo-
cratic as well as non-democratic, civilized as well as non-civilized segments,
with either segment outweighing the other. Depending on the balance, civil
society as a whole can be configured democratic, non-democratic, civilized
or non-civilized. Democratic civil societies are civilized, but civilized civil
societies are not necessarily democratic’ (2007, 17).
8. For more on the functions of civil society see also Merkel & Lauth (1998),
Lauth (2003), Croissant et al. (2000), Paffenholz (2010, 24; 2009), and see
Paffenholz and Spurk (2006) for a good summary of the different theoretical
foundations. One of the first lists of civil society’s functions with regard to
democratic consolidation was compiled by Diamond (1994).
9. ‘[P]arties fulfill not only social functions, such as articulating, integrating
society, and aggregating and channeling the citizens’ interests and demands,
but also political functions such as organizing competition and channeling
participation in elections, as well as governmental functions: structuring
political agendas, formulating and implementing policy formulations,
recruiting key governmental and legislative posts, generating governments’
(Kneuer, 2011, 138).
10. According to Lauth (2003), for instance, the potential dark side of civil society
can result in the following: (1) it can aggravate social cleavages (ethnic,
etc.); (2) it can be characterized by fundamental ideological differences;
(3) it can suffer from internal power struggles; (4) it can block important,
democratically secured reforms and can hamper governance efficiency of the
state and thus undermine the state’s legitimacy; (5) its demand for participa-
tion in political decision-making by civil society circumvents the democratic
logic based on electoral processes; (6) it can transport authoritarian tradi-
tions and patriarchal structures.
11. See Appendix A10.1 for the definitions and operationalizations of the
dependent and independent variables and Appendix A10.2 for the summary
statistics of the independent variables.
12. We use unemployment as a measure of the personal economic situation
because, as opposed to income, it is easy to interpret in cross-national
comparison.
13. Discontent could be operationalized in addition by the variables dissatisfac-
tion with economy and the national government.
14. This is a very strong assumption. By no means are clientelistic and patronage
networks absent in consolidated democracies in Western Europe. As there is
no available cross-national measure for clientelism and patronage, we argue
that in less democratic states in post-communist Europe political parties
have a higher control of resources and jobs because they undermine formal
procedures.
15. The two models have been estimated using the statistical package Stata 11.
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Part IV
Concluding Remarks
11
Democracy Promotion and
Civil Society in Eastern Europe:
Conclusions
11.1 Introduction
This volume set out to explore a major puzzle of democratization. Why

has the external support for civil society translated into highly unequal success –
and sometimes outright failure – of democratization across the ex-communist
countries of Eastern Europe? The chapters have made conceptual, theoretical,
and empirical contributions to studying the link between democracy
promotion and civil society. They have examined a variety of civil soci-
ety actors, countries, and external democracy promoters. And they have
identified problems of civil society support and development at various
stages and levels.
In Chapters 1–3, Hahn-Fuhr and Worschech and Beichelt and Merkel
set the stage by outlining the functions of civil society for democracy,
the strategies available to or used by external democracy promoters, and
the outcomes of civil society support in Eastern Europe. Both start out
with a critical assessment of what the external promotion of democracy
via civil society has achieved or can achieve. Hahn-Fuhr and Worschech
theorize that a well-intentioned process of external support for a small,
weakly developed, and hard-pressed civil society produces divisions,
professionalization, and detachment of non-governmental organiza-
tions (NGOs) from the larger society. Beichelt and Merkel highlight how
under the prevailing conditions in Eastern Europe, none of the func-
tions of civil society that external promoters could help support and
develop is likely to produce consolidated democracies. Do the results of
the contributions to this volume confirm this skeptical outlook?
In this concluding chapter, I focus on what we have learned from
the preceding chapters for understanding the links between democracy
promotion, civil society development, and democratization. I start from
217
218 Frank Schimmelfennig
basic models of democracy promotion, describe the role they envisage

for civil society and civil society support, and refer to empirical evidence
regarding the effects of democracy promotion in Eastern Europe.
Attempts to systematize and classify democracy promotion have
mostly focused on the dominant strategy or mechanism. Whitehead’s
distinction of ‘contagion’, ‘control’, and ‘consent’ is an early example
(Whitehead, 1996), to which Schmitter has added the category of ‘con-
ditionality’ (1996, 29). In the context of the rationalist-constructivist
debate in international relations, mechanisms such as ‘socialization’,
‘persuasion’, or ‘social learning’ have been contrasted with coercion and
conditionality (see for example, Kelley, 2004; Schimmelfennig et al.,
2006; Börzel & Risse, 2009; Beichelt, 2012 for a review). The actors
or channels of promotion involved have only been implicit in these
categories or constituted a second and also secondary dimension. For
instance, Schmitter distinguishes between bilateral and multilateral
international contexts (1996, 29), and I have added a distinction
between intergovernmental and transnational channels to the distinc-
tion between mechanisms and strategies (for example Schimmelfennig,
2012). By contrast, building on Levitsky and Way (2005), Lavenex and
Schimmelfennig (2011) propose three models of democracy promotion
that focus primarily on the channels and targets of democracy promotion:
‘leverage’, ‘linkage’, and ‘governance’. These models can also be used to
specify the role of civil society in democracy promotion.
In our classification, we propose to distinguish models of democ-
racy promotion according to multiple dimensions: the target system
and envisaged goals, the main channels, and the typical instruments
(Lavenex & Schimmelfennig, 2011, 889–90). First, democracy promo-
tion can be primarily directed at different systems in the target country,
the political system narrowly defined, the larger society, or issue-specific
sectors. The goals vary accordingly: democratic rules and institutions
in the case of the political system, a democratic political culture when
the main target is society, and democratic governance for issue-specific
democracy promotion. Second, the channels can be intergovernmental
(or top-down), transnational (or bottom-up), or transgovernmental
(horizontal). Finally, instruments vary across the rationalist-constructivist
dimension referred to above: coercion, conditionality, and socializa-
tion. In principle, targets, channels, and instruments are independent
dimensions that can be combined freely in all possible ways. In both
theory and practice, however, the leverage model is described as the
top-down use of conditionality targeted at democratizing the political
system; ‘linkage’ denotes the bottom-up socialization of society; and
Conclusions 219
the governance model focuses on the transgovernmental promotion of

democratic governance in issue-specific regimes. Table 11.1 provides an
overview of the models.
Each of the models also envisages distinct roles and functions for
civil society in democracy promotion (see Beichelt & Merkel as well as
Hahn-Fuhr & Worschech, Chapters 1–3), entails specific advantages and
disadvantages in the promotion of civil society, and suffers in different
ways from the prevailing conditions in Eastern Europe. In democracy
promotion through leverage, civil society benefits indirectly from the
reform of state institutions that increase its protection from the state
and facilitate its watchdog role vis-à-vis the state. As I will argue in this
chapter, the leverage model has the potential advantage of creating
‘boomerang effects’ (Keck & Sikkink, 1998) when direct access of civic
associations to the political system are blocked and of creating a level
playing field for civil society organizations rather than ‘picking winners’
among them. As a downside, the indirect support for civil society may
turn into paternalism. Finally, the effectiveness of political conditiona-
lity in Eastern Europe is inhibited by the weakness of the West’s incen-
tives and bargaining power and the high political adoption costs for the
authoritarian or autocratic regimes that prevail in the region.
According to the governance model of democracy promotion, civil
society organizations also benefit indirectly – from the transfer of sec-
tor-specific democratic governance provisions to their home country.
These provisions enhance their watchdog function vis-à-vis the state
Table 11.1 Models of democracy promotion and civil society
Leverage Governance Linkage
Target Political system Sectors Society

Goal Democratic institutions Democratic Democratic culture
governance
Channel Top-down, intergovernmental Horizontal, Bottom-up,
transgovernmental transnational
Instrument Conditionality Mixed Socialization
Civil society Indirect beneficiary: protection Indirect beneficiary: Direct beneficiary:
from state, watchdog watchdog, social social capital, school
capital of democracy
Advantage Boomerang, level playing field Weak politicization Direct support
Disadvantage Paternalism Performance Engineering
Conditions in Weak incentives, high adoption Weak implementa- Weak societal roots,
Eastern Europe costs tion, clientelism repressive states
Source: Own elaboration based on Lavenex and Schimmelfennig (2011, 890).

bureaucracy but also have the potential to build social capital and feed
it into policy-making. The specific advantage of promoting democratic
governance is its apparently apolitical, technical character, which is
less likely to mobilize state resistance and repression. It may, however,
stabilize rather than undermine autocratic states by improving their
policy performance. Existing evidence from Eastern Europe shows that
the model suffers from the weak implementation of democratic govern-
ance provisions and the dominance of clientelistic rather than civic
networks.
Finally, the linkage model addresses and supports civil society
directly. Democracy promotion through linkage primarily enhances the
function of civil society as a school of democracy and the provider of
social capital. Direct support for civil society is the clear advantage of
this model, which may, however, change into ‘engineering’ civil society
(Ishkanian, 2007). This is especially likely if the domestic societal roots
of civil society organizations and their support by society are weak, as
is the case in many countries of Eastern Europe. Moreover, when faced
with repressive states, such organizations are unlikely to have a democ-
ratizing impact on the political system. In the remainder of this chapter,
I develop these arguments in greater detail.
It should be clear from the start, however, that these three models
are ideal types and by no means mutually exclusive. As Beichelt and
Merkel point out, democracy promotion is most likely to be effective if
it combines ‘leverage’ and ‘linkage’, that is, supports civil society while
pursuing conditional cooperation with the elites.
11.2 The leverage model
In a nutshell, the leverage model conceives democracy promotion as

the use of external incentives to induce the governments of the target
countries to democratize the political system. Leverage constitutes a
top-down strategy of democracy promotion that does little to foster a
civic culture or strengthen intermediary institutions such as civic asso-
ciations or the public sphere directly. This is not to say, however, that
leverage is unrelated to civil society or unable to promote civil society.
First, external democracy promoters may act on behalf and in the inte-
rest of civic associations. This is the thrust of the ‘boomerang effect’ of
international human rights and democracy promotion (Keck & Sikkink,
1998; Risse & Sikkink, 1999, 17). The ‘boomerang effect’ starts from a
situation in which civic associations advocating the democratization of
their country are blocked or oppressed by an autocratic regime, mobilize
Conclusions 221
their transnational networks and turn to international organizations

and democratic countries in search of support. These external actors
then intervene with the non-democratic governments, for example by
publicizing their human rights violations and political oppression,
threatening to withdraw political or material support, or offering benefits
in return for steps toward liberalization or democratization – including
easing the pressure on civic associations and giving them more leeway
in their activities.
Second, even if leverage is not induced transnationally by civic asso-
ciations, it will benefit them indirectly if effective. Although there is
no linear relationship between the strengthening of democratic institu-
tions and the growth of civil society, external leverage used successfully
to extract human rights or democratic concessions from an autocratic
regime, to strengthen the freedom of the media, to increase the vertical
and horizontal accountability of state institutions, or to promote the
rule of law will at least create opportunities for civic associations to
form and operate more freely if there is societal demand for them. These
opportunities are likely to enhance primarily the protection of civil
society from the state (Beichelt & Merkel, Chapter 3) and the watchdog
function of civil society (Hahn-Fuhr & Worschech, Chapters 1 and 2).
They are, however, unlikely to promote its functions as a school of
democracy or provider of social capital directly.
One might argue that top-down external civil society promotion is
normatively more attractive than direct support of civic associations
from the outside. Contributions to this volume echo the strong evi-
dence in the literature that external civil society support benefits civic
associations unequally and artificially nurtures or even ‘genetically
engineers’ (Ishkanian, 2007) a professionalized NGO sector oriented
towards the ideas and incentives of external donors. Top-down civil
society promotion, in contrast, constitutes a policy that limits itself to
promoting a level playing field for civic associations and conditions
under which these can freely develop, which would help avoid such
distortions. On the other hand, however, there is the danger of pater-
nalism. Leverage promotes political reform according to an external,
albeit supposedly ‘universal’, model that might not be in line with the
preferences of civil society and that might lack societal support once
external support decreases.
In principle, a top-down, intergovernmental policy of democracy
promotion can use the entire spectrum of strategies and mechanisms.
In addition to using political, financial, or economic external incen-
tives, democracy promoters can attempt to socialize governments into
adopting democratic attitudes and behaviors. This includes accepting

the value of civil society for democracy and following the norms that
civic associations are autonomous from the state and are allowed to
participate in the public sphere and policy-making. Social learning can
be based on social influence, argumentative persuasion, or the imita-
tion or emulation of role models in the international environment, and
is likely to work if the target actors share a common identity with the
democracy promoters and seek to become part of their community and
if the democracy promoters and the values and norms they promote
enjoy high legitimacy in the target countries (see for example, Johnston,
2001; Checkel, 2005; Schimmelfennig & Sedelmeier, 2005). Yet whereas
Western democracy promoters have used all of these strategies through-
out the post-communist transition period in Eastern Europe, they have
generally proven ineffective unless accompanied by strong conditional
incentives (Kelley, 2004; Schimmelfennig et al., 2006).
The effectiveness of top-down political conditionality depends on a
specific constellation of conditions, too. Conditionality is best conceived
as a bargaining process between the democracy-promoting state or inter-
national organization and a target state, the outcome of which depends
on the relative bargaining power of the actors (Schimmelfennig &
Sedelmeier, 2005, 12–16). Informational asymmetries aside, bargaining
power is a result of the asymmetrical distribution of the benefits of a
specific agreement (compared to those of alternative outcomes or ‘outside
options’). Generally, those actors who are least in need of a specific
agreement are best able to threaten the others with non-cooperation
and thereby force them to make concessions.
Political conditionality has been the hallmark of European Union (EU)
(and, to a lesser extent, North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO))
democracy promotion in Eastern Europe. The EU has set the adoption
of democratic institutions and practices as conditions that the target
countries have had to fulfill to receive rewards from the EU – such as
financial aid, technical assistance, trade agreements, association treaties
and, ultimately, membership. Even though the EU has not singled out
the development of civil society as a condition, the list includes pro-
gress in respect for human rights including the freedom of association.
States that fail to meet the conditions are not coerced into introducing
democratic reforms but simply left behind in the ‘regatta’ to assistance
and membership.
In the absence of coercion, conditionality is effective if the benefits
of external rewards exceed the domestic costs of adopting the condi-
tions. Ceteris paribus, the effectiveness of conditionality increases with
Conclusions 223
the size of the external benefits and decreases with the size of domestic
costs. In addition, the external incentives need to be credible. The tar-
get government needs to be certain that it will receive the rewards if
it fulfills the conditions and not receive them if it does not. Studies of
EU conditionality in Eastern Europe have generally corroborated these
propositions (Schimmelfennig & Sedelmeier, 2005; Schimmelfennig
et al., 2006; Schimmelfennig & Scholtz, 2008). First, political conditio-
nality has only worked reliably with a credible accession perspective.
Only the benefits coming with EU membership have been high enough
to balance the political costs of expanding human and minority rights
and government accountability. Second, however, the membership
incentive has only been effective where adoption costs were moderate.
Political conditionality does not bring about regime change. If govern-
ments fear losing power or compromising the security and integrity of
the state as a result of fulfilling external conditions, they are unlikely
to respond positively. Research shows that EU conditionality is gener-
ally ineffective vis-à-vis autocratic regimes (Schimmelfennig, 2005;
Schimmelfennig & Scholtz, 2008) but also if meeting EU conditions risks
the survival of a democratic governing coalition – unless the reward of
membership or accession negotiations is very close (Schimmelfennig
et al., 2006). By contrast, credible accession conditionality has been
helpful for democratic consolidation and strengthening the rule
of law, for example by improving minority rights or the independence
of courts – improvements that are also relevant for the development of
civil society.
For the countries of Eastern Europe that are the focus of this volume,
however, leverage is therefore unlikely to promote democracy or support
civil society for several reasons. As Shapovalova and Youngs (Chapter 5)
show, the EU has – at least initially – copied its top-down enlargement
policy to the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) (see also Kelley,
2006). First, however, the EU has been reluctant to offer a membership
perspective to the countries of Eastern Europe. In the context of its Eastern
Partnership with Belarus, Moldova, Ukraine, and the countries of the
Southern Caucasus (inaugurated in 2009), the EU is negotiating another
round of association agreements including what it calls ‘deep and compre-
hensive free trade agreements’. These agreements build on the Partnership
and Cooperation Agreements that the EC had concluded with almost all
former republics of the Soviet Union during the 1990s, and are similar to
the Europe Agreements with the Central and Eastern European Countries
(CEECs). They do not, however, include an accession perspective beyond
vaguely referring to ‘open future developments’ in joint relations.
Second, many of the Eastern European non-member countries are

non-democratic, and their regimes would incur high political costs by
meeting the EU’s conditions. The EU has excluded autocratic Belarus
from negotiations for an agreement in the context of the Eastern
Partnership, and it has refused to sign the association agreement with
Ukraine because of democracy and rule of law concerns – in both cases
without a tangible effect in favor of democracy. Another reason for the
ineffectiveness is, third, the relative weakness of EU bargaining power. In
contrast to the Central European countries, Belarus, Ukraine, and other
Eastern European countries have a powerful alternative they can turn to
in seeking international support: Russia. And some, like Azerbaijan, are
so rich in energy resources that they are not economically dependent
on market access to the EU. Finally, the weakness in bargaining power
and conflicting preferences in the region (such as political stability and
energy provision) have compromised the consistency of EU democ-
racy promotion in the ENP framework (Schimmelfennig, 2012). These
limits to effective leverage warrant a closer look at alternative models
of democracy promotion.
11.3 The governance model
In contrast to leverage, the governance model postulates an indirect

way of democracy promotion. Rather than targeting the political system
as a whole and the core institutions of democracy, such as elections,
representation, and the separation of powers, it focuses on sectoral
democratic governance. ‘Democratic governance’ refers to principles
guiding public policy, above all transparency, accountability, and
participation (Lavenex & Schimmelfennig, 2011, 895). Transparency
refers to public access to information about the issues and issue-specific
decision-making. Accountability includes the obligation of public officials
to justify their decisions and actions, the possibility of appeal, and the
sanctioning of misconduct. Finally, participation denotes non-electoral
forms of participation such as involvement of non-state actors in
administrative decision and policy-making.
This is also where civil society comes in most clearly. As in the case
of leverage, the promotion of democratic governance neither involves
nor targets civil society actors directly. It works primarily through
transgovernmental networks composed of administrative officials from
the democracy promoter and the target country in a specific field of
public policy – such as environmental policy or immigration policy.
Democratic governance may also be promoted through international
Conclusions 225
agreements that the target countries conclude multilaterally – or bilaterally

with a democracy-promoting state – especially if such an agreement
contains democratic governance provisions related to transparency,
participation, or accountability.
Such provisions could, for instance, stipulate the right of civic asso-
ciations to have free access to information, to participate, and be
consulted in the policy-making process, or to take legal recourse against
administrative measures. Democratic governance can thus empower
civic associations in the making and administration of public policies.
In this way, it enhances the watchdog function of civil society in the
context of policy regimes. In addition, however, democratic governance
promotion also taps the social capital-related function of civil society.
Involving civil society and civic associations more strongly in policy-
making has the potential to crowd out clientelistic networks and to
‘make democracy work’ better (Putnam, 1993).
This model of democracy promotion is based on the idea of ‘stake-
holder democracy’ (Matten & Crane, 2005) rather than the electoral
or representative democracy targeted through leverage. The civic asso-
ciations it potentially empowers are more likely to be single-issue civic
associations such as environmental NGOs rather than associations
advocating human rights or civil liberties more broadly. In the longer
term, however, a critical mass of issue-specific democratic governance
provisions may sustain a large network of civic associations, transform
the way policy is made and implemented, and even spill over into the
general political system.
Democratic governance promotion is assumed to be the more effective,
the more that transparency, accountability, and participation provisions
are part of the international regimes proposed by an international
organization or democracy-promoting state and agreed by a target
state. Effectiveness is further increased by the sectoral interdepen-
dence between the participating actors and the institutionalization and
density of transgovernmental networks (Lavenex & Schimmelfennig,
2011, 896–7).
One potential advantage of democratic governance promotion is that
it may work under conditions that are unfavorable to leverage. Even
in the absence of a membership perspective, the EU seeks to increase
and deepen issue-specific cooperation and institutionalization with the
countries of Eastern Europe in the framework of the ENP and the Eastern
Partnership. So do other regional and global organizations. These
international regimes offer rich opportunities for transgovernmental
network-building and the dissemination of democratic governance
provisions. In addition, the domestic adoption costs of democratic

governance provisions are considerably lower than in the case of political
conditionality. Whereas they may still impose constraints on political
rent-seeking and corruption in policy areas that are important to the
government, they do not question the authority of the regime in gene-
ral. On the other hand, however, democratic governance promotion
may enhance the performance and effectiveness of public policies in
non-democratic countries without any spillovers into the political
system.
The governance model of democracy promotion is rather new and
research on its effects in Eastern Europe is still in its infancy. First empiri-
cal studies show that transgovernmental networks can, indeed, create or
strengthen democratic attitudes among administrative officials (Freyburg,
2011, 2012) and that the EU has been able to transfer democratic govern-
ance provisions to neighboring countries – in particular in those policy
areas in which democratic governance is an important component of EU
law and international agreements and sectoral interdependence is high
(Freyburg et al., 2009; 2011). Yet these studies also convey that adoption
costs play an important role in democratic governance promotion as
well and that not even the most willing countries such as Moldova or
Ukraine have consistently applied the democratic governance provisions
that they have adopted in recent legislation. Furthermore, the EU does
not seem to promote sectoral democratic governance more consistently
than it does promote democracy and human rights in the ENP context
(Wetzel, 2011).
Finally, we don’t know well whether democratic governance promo-
tion has really strengthened or empowered civic associations. Political
rent-seeking and clientelism continue to be pervasive features of the
post-communist systems, especially in the post-Soviet area (see for
example, Hellman, 1998; Kopecky, 2006; contributions in Stewart
et al., 2011). There is no evidence so far for a spillover of democratic
governance into the general political sphere. The potential of democratic
governance promotion to compensate for the weaknesses of leverage in
Eastern Europe is therefore doubtful.
11.4 The linkage model
Leverage and democratic governance promotion target democratic

institutions and issue-specific governance, respectively, and empower
civil society indirectly by increasing its autonomy and creating oppor-
tunities for participation and influence. According to the linkage model,
Conclusions 227
however, democracy promotion is transnational. Civil society is the

immediate addressee and beneficiary of democracy promotion. The
linkage model is the classic model of promoting democracy by promoting
civil society.
The transnational linkage model is based on two pillars: ‘direct’
democracy promotion through support for democratic civil society and
political opposition groups, on the one hand, and ‘indirect’ democracy
promotion through intensified transnational exchanges with demo-
cratic countries, on the other. In both cases, the role of the external
democracy promoter consists in enabling and empowering societal,
non-governmental actors to work for the democratization of their home
country from below.
The indirect channel of linkage is broadly related to the moderniza-
tion account of democratization. According to modernization theory,
democracy is a function of the level of social and economic develop-
ment of a country. In his pioneering work, Seymour Martin Lipset
studied the social conditions or ‘requisites’ that support democracy
and identified ‘economic development’ – broadly understood as a
syndrome of wealth, industrialization, urbanization, and education –
as the most important one. Economic development goes together with
better education, less poverty, the creation of a large middle class,
and a competent civil service. It thereby mitigates the class struggle
and promotes cross-cutting cleavages. In addition, it nurtures a belief
in tolerance and gradualism and reduces commitment to extremist
ideologies (Lipset, 1959).
A policy focusing on indirect linkage, however, hardly qualifies as a
distinctive policy of democracy promotion at all. First, such a policy is
for the long term. Second, it does not target any specific actors with the
goal of creating or strengthening democratic institutions or activists
but consists in general policies contributing to economic development,
education, or transnational contacts – such as aid and investment as well
as trade and other kinds of exchanges across borders – that may serve
various purposes and are rather unspecific for democracy promotion.
By contrast, direct linkage may be based on the full range of instru-
ments and strategies of democracy promotion. Similar to political
conditionality, civil society organizations may receive financial or
technical support provided that they conform to the conditions of the
donors in terms of goals (such as liberal democracy), instruments (for
example non-violent means), organizational structure, management,
and/or previous experience and success. In general, however, linkage is
the model of democracy promotion in which socialization instruments
play the most important role. In this respect, direct linkage consists in
the dissemination and teaching of values, norms, and best practices
among civil society organizations.
In a first step, linkage seeks to support and enhance civil society in its
function as a school of democracy and builder of social capital. Whereas
civil society is the immediate addressee of democratic promotion via
linkage, the ultimate goal is democracy. Linkage aims at strengthening
and empowering civil society so that it becomes a force for the democ-
ratization of the political system and the quality and consolidation of
democracy once democratic institutions have been established. Civic
associations are thought to, first, spread democratic ideas, then mobi-
lize and organize mass protest and, finally, help sustain and improve
democracy by infusing the political system with new ideas and initia-
tives, observing and criticizing the political elites and state institutions,
and organizing society as an autonomous sphere from the state.
The contributions to this volume generally focus on democracy
promotion by linkage. To evaluate the workings and outcomes of civil
society support, I therefore turn to their arguments and findings in the
final section of this chapter.
11.5 Civil society support in Eastern Europe:

defects and obstacles
In the Introduction, Hahn-Fuhr and Worschech propose an analytical

model to study the sequence of democracy promotion via civil society
support. It starts with the conceptions that donors have about civil
society and the functions it performs in democratization; it goes on to
examine the interaction between external democracy promoters and
civil society groups; and finally looks at the effects of the supported
civil society groups on democratization. In line with the accumulated
knowledge of the second, ‘disillusioned’ phase of research on democ-
racy promotion and civil society in Eastern Europe, Hahn-Fuhr and
Worschech highlight the deficiencies and distortions that each stage in
this promotion-implementation sequence is prone to producing.
First, donor conceptions may be based on ‘Western’ ideas and
theories of civil society and its functions that are out of tune with the
realities of the target countries. Democracy-promoting actors – as well
as most academic observers – generally start from a fundamentally
positive view not only of democracy but also of the functions that
civil society may perform for democratization and democracy. In addi-
tion, they build on conceptions of civil society that have their roots in
Conclusions 229
Western – predominantly liberal and republican – political thinking. By

contrast, civil society support may encounter trade-offs in terms of state
stability, governability, or constitutionalism (Wolff, Chapter 4). In addi-
tion, civil society organizations on the ground may differ significantly
from the theoretical ideal types and operate under conditions that are
not conducive to performing the ascribed functions.
Second, donor strategies and instruments may privilege specific
types of civil society groups and marginalize others. For one, donor
conceptions and the practical exigencies of project management have
contributed to the growth of professionalized NGOs that conform to
the dominant Western ideas of civil society, are capable of comply-
ing with the funding procedures, project management, and reporting
requirements of the donors (Shapovalova and Youngs, Chapter 5), and
crowd out ‘amateur’ civic groups following a local agenda. Civil society
promotion thus ‘genetically engineers’ a non-indigenous type of civil
society organization (Ishkanian, 2007), expedites the division of civil
society (Hahn-Fuhr & Worschech, Chapters 1 and 2), and does not
advance democratization.
Whereas these findings are largely consensual and have been substan-
tiated in a series of case studies, they beg the question whether anything
can be done about the problems of civil society promotion under the
prevailing social and political conditions of Eastern Europe. In this
respect, the contributions to this volume produce a skeptical outlook.
To begin, external civil society support encounters a difficult situation
in Eastern Europe. It is faced with powerful attitudinal legacies from the
communist era – including a deeply entrenched mistrust of the organi-
zations of civil society – that prevent civic associations from thriving
(Howard, 2003). In Chapter 7, della Porta supports this legacy-based
explanation by highlighting the roots of Eastern conceptions of civil
society in the context of anti-communist dissidence movements. They
understood civil society as an autonomous, self-organized sphere, apart
from the state. Rather than seeking to influence the state, democratize
its institutions, and change its policies, as in the Western conception
of social movements, they undertook to create civil society as a self-
contained sphere of freedom and democracy beyond the state and the
realm of politics. This notion of civil society is not only poorly attuned
with the post-communist realities of politics in a democratizing state
(with all its problems and defects); it also makes dissident groups poor
partners for democracy promotion through linkage, which ultimately
seeks to support the active engagement of civil society organizations in
the political process and with the state.
Howard found that the weakness of civil society was a pervasive

feature of all post-communist societies, giving rise to differences in degree
but not in kind (2003, 6–9). Providing further nuance to this finding,
Blomberg and Szöcsik (Chapter 10) show that individual engagement
in civil society organizations and parties varies not only with regard to
individual factors such as gender, education, and age, but also with wealth
and democracy at the country level. They also find that communist
party preferences make it more likely for individuals to work for a party
or a civil society organization. Their results suggest that civil society
promotion faces particularly strong obstacles in the comparatively poor
and authoritarian countries of the post-Soviet space. Moreover, it is par-
ticularly difficult to mobilize citizens with non-communist preferences.
These difficulties are compounded by the unfriendly political and
legal climate in the same countries, as pointed out by Shapovalova and
Youngs in Chapter 5. Public mistrust and state harassment mutually
reinforce or facilitate each other. Because of the public’s indifference
or mistrust, many NGOs are dependent on external financial support,
which in turn makes it easy for the state to denounce them as foreign
agents, further contributing to public mistrust.
Contributors to this volume further point to two reasons why the
nurturing of a professionalized NGO sector according to Western con-
ceptions may be functional or at least hard to overcome. First, as Wolff
(Chapter 4) points out, not all non-state societal actors are inherently
‘good for’ democracy. For instance, ethno-nationalist or religious NGOs
may support a political regime that excludes parts of the population or
limits basic freedoms. Others may not do harm to democratization but
pursue non-political goals. Both kinds of civic groups and associations
are not suitable for democracy promotion through linkage. Second,
after providing a highly differentiated analysis of the functions civil
society actors can usefully perform at different stages of the democra-
tization process and in different partial regimes of democracy, Beichelt
and Merkel (Chapter 3) come to the conclusion that this complexity
is ‘almost impossible’ to grasp and manage for external democracy
promoters. As a cognitive and organizational shortcut, it makes sense
for them to focus on collaboration with a small group of professiona-
lized NGOs.
In addition, the alternatives explored in some of the chapters also
have their limits. Petrova (Chapter 6) analyzes the policies of Polish
and Slovak democracy promoters. She finds that because of their recent
own democratization experience and common legacies their assistance
often has a better fit with the conditions in Eastern Europe than that of
Conclusions 231
Western democracy promoters. Due to their limited financial capacity,

these actors have focused on technical assistance, thus avoiding – by
default – the creation of financially dependent NGOs among their
partners. On the other hand, the same limited financial capacity has
prevented them from having a strong impact on civil society in Eastern
Europe.
A second alternative to the funding of professionalized NGOs is
explored by Busuleanu (Chapter 9): support for individuals (in Russia).
Yet her findings reveal similar trade-offs and problems as in the funding
of civil society organizations. Whereas the beneficiaries of the fund-
ing have been able to increase their autonomy, to expose themselves
to alternative ideas, to further their education, and to professionalize
their work, they tend to remain within their own ‘enclaves of Western-
oriented actors’, removed from the wider public, and not overly
engaged in civic associations.
Finally, Ishkanian (Chapter 8) directs our attention to newly emerg-
ing grassroots initiatives in post-Soviet countries, which reject the
model of foreign-funded professional NGOs. Whereas these grassroots
associations are likely to eschew the donor dependencies and alienation
from local society experienced by these NGOs, it is unclear and doubtful
whether they will have a higher potential to strengthen democracy in
their countries.
In sum, both the findings on democracy promoters from successfully
democratized post-communist countries and on grassroots initiatives
point to interesting alternatives to the engineering and involuntary
division of civil society by potent external donors. In addition, Western
democracy promoters can learn lessons from the problems and deficits
of their past practices and improve their civil society support – for
instance, by limiting themselves to the co-funding of civic associations
that show proof of local membership and local financial support or
by moving away from overreliance on project support. Whether such
alternatives and improvements will at the end of the day make a dif-
ference for democratization in Eastern Europe is, however, still an open
question.
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Index
9/11, 70 civil society

alignment strategy, 23
actor causual links democracy promotion,
non-state actors, 87–8, 90, 94–5, 13–14, 36
99–101, 104–5 civic virtues, 47, 56
powerless, 141 critical, 30–1
regional, 111 concomitant power, 11
advocacy networks, 56 cooperation, 19–20
aid instruments, 94, 100 cross-border resemblance, 12
alienation defending civic rights, 18
inner-societal, 54 definition, 15–17, 193–4
Almond, Gabriel, 52 divided, 31–4
Anti-Austerity Movements, 156–7 engineered, 30–1, 152–6, 165–6
Arab Spring, 1, 94, 99–100, 156–7 facility, 94–5, 97, 105–6
Arab world, 74, 76 forum, 92–3, 100
Armenia, 50, 88–91, 96–8, 151–5, functions, 17–22
158–9, 163–5 global, 138
authoritarianism, 47, 51, 57 growth of, 151–3
authoritarian regimes, 1, 18, 57 meso-level, 5
semi-authoritarian, 50, 52, 57–8, 61 normative theory, 140
autocracy opposition, 18, 30–2
autocratic power, 1 organisations, 191–4
ae-autocratization, 11–12, 44–5, 50 promotion, 1
autonomy, 7, 75, 77 reform, 20–2
from the state, 7 representative, 97–8, 101, 102
power centers, 25 represenation of interests, 20–1
self-stustained, 53 school of democracy, 18–20, 219–20
Azerbaijan, 88–91, 95–8, 101–2, 154 self-regulating, 16
EU-Azerbaijan Action Plan, 89 clandestinity, 142
clientelism, 7, 19–21
Baltic States, 11 Clinton, Bill, 70, 72
Belarus, 88–92, 95–8, 100, 102–3 Cold War, 67, 69–71, 81
Biographical Research, 172, 175, 183 Cold Warriors, 69
Bourdieu, Pierre, 186 Collective Action, 14, 140
Bush, George W., 70, 72 forms of, 6, 16
Color Revolutions, 11, 155, 165
capacity building, 87, 95, 97, 100–1, communication, 7
105, 172 coded, 142
capitalism, 80–1 digital communication channels, 51
CIA, 69 Communist
Cimoszewicz, Wlodzimierz, 112 legacies, 195–7
civic initiatives, 6, 158–65, 191–3 parties, 196–7
Civic Forum, 143, 145 regime, 71
234
Index 235
conditionality, political, 7 powerful means of, 100

conflict pressure-resistant groups, 55
violent, 68, 77 process, 4–6
virtues of, 137, 139 stagnation of, 4, 194
constitutionalism, 75 systematization, 27–9
Cox, Michael, 72–3 target groups, 4
Crouch, Colin, 147 theory, 5
CSO Sustainability Index, 103, 106–7 Third Wave of, 2, 69, 77, 111–12
CSO networks, 96 democracy promotion, 7
Czechoslovakia, 144–5 assistance, 4, 92, 105
business of, 68, 111
Dahl, Robert, 25 causual Links, 36
delegitimization, 80 civil society oriented, 4
democracy, 7 classfication, 217–20
autocratization, 11 constituency of, 3, 33–4
bottom-up, 5 counterproductive effects, 79
competition, 74, 77 democracy-building, 79
decline, 7 external, 5, 150–1, 165–6
deliberative democratic qualities, governance model, 7, 224–6
143 leverage, 220–4
deliberative visions, 137 linkage, 7, 226–8
democratic opposition, 143 Poland, 112–13, 115–17, 124–7, 129
democratic norms, 71 Slovakia, 113, 115–17, 119–20, 124,
democratic outputs, 140 127–9, 131
Democratic Peace, 72–3, 81 Strategy, 116, 120
democratic principles, 74, 76–8 systematical, 5
global spread, 67 top-down, 150
ideological, 69, 78, 80–1 Denmark, 70
instrumental value, 73 destabilization, 74, 76–7
liberal, 69, 71, 74, 79–80 development, 7, 12–13
mainstream democracy, 79 community-based approaches to,
minimalistic models, 147 102
non-democratic norms, 57 dissidents, 92, 175–6
obstacles of, 5 domination, economic, ideological,
participative, 141 political, 71, 80
polyarchic, 25, 69, 79, 81 donors
schools for, 17–19 bilateral, 69
semi-democratic, 52, 56 international, 4, 151, 153
skills, 18 multilateral, 69
transitions, 2 strategies, 32–3, 115–16, 120, 221,
transnational, 5 227–9
democratization, 2, 193–4 support systems, 172, 184–5
development, 4 Western, 6, 35–6, 111–13, 123, 124
dilemmas of, 68, 73–4, 79
effective, 4 Eastern Neighbourhood, 87–96,
external democratizers, 50–42, 99–101, 104–5
54–7, 60 EaP (Eastern Partnership), 5, 86–7,
local, 13 92–3, 95–6, 98, 100, 102, 104–6,
mechanism, 5 223–5
236 Index
EBRD, 42 human rights, 68–71, 75

Economic reforms, 21 activists, 6
EEAS (European External Action universalist conception, 71
Service), 94, 101 Huntington, Samuel P., 2
EED (European Endowment for Third World, instability, 74;
Democracy), 94, 96–7, 101–4 violence, 74
El Salvador, 57 hybrid regimes, 2, 44–5, 49–50, 55–7
elections, 77, 160
voter-mobilization, 120, 127 inequality, 140
elites, 8 influence, 99–100, 103
civic, 3, 117, 125–6 institutions, fragile political, 74–5, 79
emancipation, 79, 140 institutionalization, 45, 48–50, 57,
Europeanization, 13–14 61, 69
top-down, 86, 100 institutional negotiation, 145
European Commission, 5, 42, 86–7, integration,
89–90 economic, 92–3
EIDHR, 23, 88, 90–2, 95, 99, 104–5 Intelligentsia, 175, 180, 186
ENP, 2, 223–5, 86, 88–92, 97–8, 101, International Norm Adaption, 2
103, 105 Iraq, 73
ENPI, 89, 95–6, 105 Iron Curtain, 50
European Social Survey, 192, 197–200 Islamist, 74, 76
European tradition, 139 Isomorphism,
European Union, 5, 70, 86, 99 coercive, 23
accession candidates, 194–5 economic, 92–3
enlargement, 2 Israel, 78
Member States, 86, 96–7, 99, 103,
106 Jamal, Manal, 57
framework, frame socio-political, 7 Kirgizstan, 57

(counter)framing, process of, 22 Lauth, Hans-Joachim, 44–5, 48
fundamental, 77, 80 Lebanon, 1
leverage model, 220–4
Georgia, 1, 11, 43, 50, 55, 88–92, 95, Liberalism
97–8, 102, 105, 161 liberal norms, 72
Germany, 70, 72 linkage model, 7, 226–8
GONGO (a government-organized Local Authorities (LA), 89–90, 95,
NGO), 101, 175, 192, 194 102, 105
governance Locke, John, 46–50, 55, 58
democratic, 224–6 Lockeian function, 51, 55, 58
good, 69, 71
Market economy, 150 macro-economic stabilization, 21
governability, 74–7, 79 marginality, 7
Grassroots Initiatives, 17, 104, 138, Medvedev, Dmitry, 174
144, 151, 153, 155–8, 163–5 mobilization, 138–9, 141–2, 144–5
against elected governments, 45
Habermas, Jürgen, 46, 48, 50, 56, 58, 60 rapid mobilization, 74
Habermas function, 48, 60 societal mobilization, 79
hierarchy, 195 within elected governments, 45
Hobbes, Thomas, 15–16 Moldova, 50, 102, 105
Index 237
Montesquieu, Charles de, 51–2, 58 PCA (Partnership and Cooperation

Montesquieuian function, 46–8, Agreements), 87–8, 98
50 Poland, 3, 112–13, 116–18, 124–6,
movement 129, 144–5
Islamist movements, 76 Government of National
social, 6, 141–2, 146–7 Understanding, 146
Social Movement Organizations Workers Defence Committees
(SMOs), 138, 146 (KORs), 145
transnational social, 138 political Discourse, 142
parameters of, ch. 7, 6
National Endowment for Democracy post-Communism, see Post-Socialist
(NED), 68 post-Socialist, 1, 42, 45, 50–2, 56–3,
NATO, 42 143
(neo-)conservative, 69, 72, 75 civil Society, 173–4, 184–5
(neo)liberal institutions, 145 post-statism, 144
neoliberal, 69, 77, 137, 141, power
145–7 abuse of, 21–2
Netherlands, 70 public sphere, 12, 15, 17–18, 35
networks, 180–3 autonomy, 58, 137–41, 146
NGOs, 3, 150–4, 191
Communist, 195–6, 205–7 Radicalism, 137, 139, 141, 145–6
cooperation, 102–3 Reagan, Ronald, 68–9, 80
foreign aid, 114 Realism
legitimate social actor, 114, 118 realist interests, 72
international, 138 regime, 2, 5, 12, 142ff.
Polish, 116, 119, 130 authoritarian, 1
professionalized, 6, 115, 125, 130, Communist, 71
150–4, 172–4, 221, 229–31 democratic, 67, 72–5, 81
single issue organization, 114 hybrid, 2
Slovak, 113–14, 121–3, 131 stagnating, 44–5, 50–3, 56–7, 61
social-democratic, 196–7, 202 Visa, 92
representation, 20–1, 77
Occupy movements, 99 Revolution of 1989, 138, 140
O‘Donnell, Guillermo, 25 Rose Revolution, 1, 12, 88 (see
Orange Revolution, 86, 88 Georgia)
Oxfam, 96 Round Table, 144–5
Rule of Law, 69–70, 75, 80
Paine, Tom, 16 Russia, 153, 155–62, 171–86
Palestine, 57
Parliamentarism, 92 Samizdat, 142–3
participation, political, 192–3, Serbia, 1, 11
206–7 service providers
horizontal, 138 social, 30–1
Nationalist, 197, 202 political, 28, 30–1
parties, political; Slovakia, 113, 116–17, 119–20, 124,
ethnic-minority, 197, 199 127–9, 131
Green, 197, 199 social capital, 18–21, 34–6, 46–7,
European, 8 49–50, 58–9
Political, 18–20, 191–5 social cleavages, 74
238 Index
social media, 157 transition

socialization, 2, 54–7, 59 democratic, 2
society economic, 2
parallel, 143 social, 2
oppressed, 79 trust, 18, 25–6
pluralist, 29–30, 143 lack of, 171, 200, 205–6, 229–30
societal mobilization, 79 mutual, 141
subcultural division, 60 Tulip Revolution, 1
solidarity, 17, 140–1, 144–5
sovereignty, 76 Ukraine, 11, 43, 50, 55, 57–8, 86–91,
counterweights to, 75 96, 102–3, 105, 157, 161
popular, 76 UN Children’s Fund, 88
Soviet Union, 11, 176–80 United Kingdom, 70
education system, 176–9 United States, 68
post-Soviet, 59 National Security Strategy, 70, 72
transformation, 181, 187 Unity of Goodness, 67ff.
stagnation, 8, 45, 49–51, 54, 59, 61 universalizing community, 141
state power, 17–19 USAID, 69–70, 72, 91, 101, 103,
strategic alliances, 71 106–7, 153, 155
Sub-Saharan Africa, 69
Sweden, 70 Verba, Sidney, 52
system Visa liberalization, 93
socialist, 3
War of ideas, 69
TACIS, 87–9 Whitehead, Laurence, 25
technocracy, 69 World Bank, 69
Tilly, Charles, 25–6
de Tocqueville, Alexis, 18, 46–8, 52, Youth organizations, domestic, 11
56, 58–60 Yugoslavia
Tocquevillean function, 52, 59 post-Yugoslav society, 60

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List of Figures and Tables vii

8 Engineered Civil Society: The Impact of 20 Years of

2.1 Classification of civil society theories 16

2.1 Functions of civil society in actor-oriented theories 19

6.3 Democracy sectors targeted by Polish and Slovak civic

Timm Beichelt, European University Viadrina, Germany

1.1 External support for civil society:

established democracies to processes of regime change. Consequently,

1.2 About this book

We inquire into the interplay of external democratization and civil

conflicts as an impediment to further democratization. The chapter

of civil society support from the viewpoint of three models of democracy

2. We define ‘EU Neighborhood’ here according to the EU’s definition of the

Democratization in post-socialist Europe followed two general paths

unchanged among external democracy supporters and scientific civil

empirical research is questioning core theoretical assumptions on the

2.2 Logics of external civil society support

2.2.1 Civic actors in society: donors’ underlying assumptions

participation of the bourgeois class. Eighteenth century philosopher Tom

Civil Society as a Sphere Civil Society as an Actor

Empirical–Analytical Systemic Pro State: Contra State:

Figure 2.1 Classification of civil society theories

Following this analytical distinction, civil society can be conceptua-

2008 on the CIVICUS project). Non-governmental organizations and

approach conceptualizes civil society either as an integrative power which

Table 2.1 Functions of civil society in actor-oriented theories

Republican Perspective Liberal

Direct and Participation Conflict Checking and

↓ Interrelations to Support for Election

democracy through civil society’. The single functions of this group

organizations may directly teach potential future leaders in technical

multiple networks minimize the dependency on monopolistic networks

Porta & Tarrow, 2004). In a process of framing and counter-framing,

2.2.2 Civic actors and external donors: interaction processes

been emphasized as central processes that influence the character of

organizational characteristics, strategies, and action repertoires. As a

2.2.3 Civic actors in democratization: relations to the

Democratization is described and defined in a plurality of theories.

an integrative model of democratization in which ties and relations of

2.3 Democracy promotion via civil society:

As stated in the beginning, the aim of this chapter is to define hith-

Figure 2.2 Democracy promotion via civil society

Analytical step A concerns the donors’ underlying concepts of civil

of the process is which democratizing function a donor promotes, and,

2.4 The divided civil society

The starting point of this volume is a major puzzle of democracy promo-

With regard to the differentiation into social and political functions in

Table 2.2 The divided civil society

Function in Direct (1) (3)

sector which was hitherto underdeveloped or nonexistent in many

2.5 Democracy promotion via civil society:

External donors usually frame their support of civil society as democ-

Figure 2.3 Democracy promotion and the divided civil society

its targets, contents, and ideas towards the voluntary-political subtype

2.6 Conclusion: theories need to be linked,

On the basis of our theoretical discussion and model of external

external civil society promotion and subjecting them to debate should

civil society – social and political actors, volunteer and professionalized

A. de Tocqueville (1956), Über die Demokratie in Amerika. Fischer.