New regionalism in Europe's Black Sea Region: the EU, BSEC and changing practices of regionalism

Abstract

What kind of region is the wider Black Sea area (WBSA)? Is it constructed by practices of regionalism framed by the Organisation of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation (BSEC), or does it follow a more inclusive scheme of integration, propelled by European Union (EU) policy instruments such as the Black Sea Synergy? This paper investigates the very nature of regionalism in the Black Sea region by focusing on trade integration. It measures and compares how patterns of intra-regional and cross-regional trade have been diverted in the WBSA by the BSEC and the EU between 1993 and 2008. The paper argues that the WBSA, overall, has inherited strong intra-regional trade preferences, but it questions the actual capacity of the BSEC to act as an effective promoter of regionalisation. It shows in particular that the EU has been reshaping the patterns of trade in the WBSA in a more significant manner than the BSEC. This indicates a shift from regionalism à la BSEC (nesting the WBSA within Europe), to EU-driven regionalism (interweaving differentially the WBSA states within a larger continental-scale scheme regionalism).

Keywords:

• new regionalism
• economic integration
• European Union
• Organisation of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation
• Black Sea Synergy

Acknowledgements

The authors of this paper are listed alphabetically. The authors are grateful to the editors of this special issue and for their insightful comments on earlier versions of this article. The authors thank Dr Richard Connolly for the assistance with methodology and data collection, University of Birmingham. Also, the authors are thankful to Prof. Stephen G. Hall of the University of Leicester for his helpful comments on the earliest draft of this paper. Our sincere gratitude to Dr Carol Weaver of Leicester University for ensuring that this article is in good English. Florent Marciacq is supported by the National Research Fund, Luxembourg (AFR 2718121).

Notes

In this paper, the WBSA refers to the region defined by the European Commission in its Communication on the EU's Black Sea Synergy. It contains Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova, Ukraine, Russia, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Turkey (European Commission 2007a).

The Organization of the BSEC counts as founding members: Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Georgia, Greece, Moldova, Romania, Russia, Turkey and Ukraine. Serbia joined the BSEC as Serbia-Montenegro in 2004.

The Black Sea Synergy has the same membership as the BSEC minus Albania and Serbia.

Despite (or precisely because of) these functional and geographical overlaps, the relationship between the EU and the BSEC organisation did not flourish. The European Commission has acquired the status of observer in the BSEC in 2008, but inter-organisational cooperation remains otherwise very limited and has not produced concrete progress.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mukhtar Hajizada

Current address: Center for International and European Studies (CIES), Kadir Has University, Kadir Has Caddesi, Cibali 34083, Istanbul, Turkey.