Documents Emerson, Michael 8 results

"The UK government is currently considering its options for its future relationship with the EU, which will inevitably have an important trade policy content. While the Prime Minister, Theresa May, has said that there is no suitable ‘off-the-shelf' model available, there are several models under discussion that can at least serve as references in evaluating the pros and cons of various approaches. Each of the models under debate so far (called in shorthand WTO, Norway, Switzerland, Turkey and Canada) has its own respective qualities, but each of them also entails serious drawbacks from a UK standpoint. There is a new model that has so far been ignored in the debate, namely the Association Agreements, which include Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Areas (DCFTAs), between the EU and Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova, which came into force earlier in 2016. Like the other models, it is obviously not for outright copying, but it has some important features that are likely to be of interest to the UK.

The plan for Brexit was made a bit clearer by the Prime Minister's announcement on 2 October 2016, that Article 50 would be triggered by the end of next March and that a ‘Great Repeal Bill' would, from the moment of withdrawal, retain in the first instance all existing EU law that was relevant as sovereign UK law. The Prime Minister also said that the UK would seek a free trade deal with the EU, but this undoubtedly would be conditional on the UK undertaking, inter alia, legally binding commitments to retain legislation deemed essential for any high degree of access to the single market. For whatever ‘bespoke' deal that the UK might seek, the EU side will not accept a package that seems to make the secession process an easy one for others to follow. Moreover, in the event of a negotiating impasse at the end of the two-year period set by Article 50, the ‘guillotine' could fall with the risk of imposing greater costs on the UK than on the EU.

In the event that negotiation of a comprehensive Association Agreement were found to be infeasible, a simpler option might be to achieve free trade by staying in the Customs Union, although there would still associated conditions and many other issues to resolve."

"The not-yet EU member states of the Balkans and three states of Eastern Europe – Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine – have much in common: geographic proximity to the EU, political priority to become members of the EU, and similar struggles to improve their political and economic governance in line with EU standards and values.

The EU's main differentiation between the two groups is over the ‘membership perspective', which has been offered to the Balkans but not to the East Europeans. Beyond this formal political stance, however, in practice the EU been extending virtually the same comprehensive array of economic and political instruments to both groups by signing Association Agreements with the three Eastern European states.

This paper breaks new ground by comparing the record of both groups in terms of the quality of their political and economic governance. Using original material and existing sources, it finds that the two groups are comparable at two levels; it looks at both the frontrunners and laggards in each group. Most striking is that the East European frontrunner, Georgia, ranks even slightly ahead of the Balkan frontrunners. This leads into a case for reconsidering the EU's present political doctrines over both its enlargement and neighbourhood policies, which are manifestly obsolescent.

The paper concludes with three options for how the EU might adapt to these realities and make consequential policy changes. "

"This book contains the first comprehensive and independent comparative assessment of the fundamental political challenges facing Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine in the context of their Association Agreements with the EU. Issues analysed in depth include the functioning of democratic institutions, the rule of law, the role of oligarchs and the advance (or not) of policies to combat corruption. Also analysed is the ‘hybrid' aspect of the political regimes and societies in all three countries, as between their west and east European orientations.
Original research results are presented for the first time comparing the performance in political and economic governance of the three eastern European states with the non-EU states of the Balkans. Quantified performance benchmarks of ratings and comparative rankings have been developed for this purpose, and the results show comparable performances of both front-runners and laggards in both groups, with Georgia emerging as the most advanced case. The significance of these results is that while all states of both groups aspire to EU membership, the EU itself only extends ‘membership perspectives' to the Balkans, which poses important political issues that remain to be addressed by the EU and its associated partner states."