EU Twinning Projects in Serbia: Analysis of Policy Areas and the Influence of Member States

This article examines the developments around the application of the Twinning modality in Serbia, from 2004 to 2019, its sectoral distribu-tion and impact, and the frequency of EU member states’ participa-tion. Besides providing an accurate state-of-play, it attempts, for the first time in the literature, to map the influence of member states in Serbia’s EU accession process through their participation in Twinning projects. Findings show that, in the given period, more than half of the Twinning projects dealt with the justice and home affairs and ag-riculture policy areas. This is in line with the importance attributed to those sectors in EU and Serbian strategic documents. The article fo-cuses on a macro-analysis of such projects in Serbia, revitalising their link with the wider Europeanisation process. More specifically, the identification of specific aspects of the Europeanisation process takes place through Radaelli’s approach. Furthermore, political and econom-ic relations between Serbia and EU member states, which are viewed as Europeanisation facilitating factors and goals, are also discussed, e.g. through bilateral trade and the influx of Foreign Direct Invest-ments.

Fotios Fitsilis

Fotios Fitsilis


Dr Fotis Fitsilis has an academic background in law, economics and engineering. While operating on a global scale, he has been active in various fields, from telecommunications and logistics to management and governance. Since 2008, he is a lead researcher at the Scientific Service of the Hellenic Parliament. He has authored several books and scientific publications with primal interest in institutional development. Dr Fitsilis teaches at the National School of Public Administration and Local Government, Athens, and has been visiting Professor at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid. In 2017, he founded the Hellenic OCR Team, a crowdsourcing initiative for the study of parliamentary data.

Aleksandra Jovanović

Aleksandra Jovanović


Dr. Aleksandra Jovanović has an academic background in law, political sciences and industrial policy. Since 2006, she has been involved in the accession of Serbia and the Western Balkans candidates to the EU, by being senior adviser to the European Committee of the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, as well as by providing support on EU-related issues to the Speaker`s Office. She is an author of numerous position papers on political and legislative aspects of the EU accession process and an author of one monograph in the field of SMEs and industrial development in Serbia.



1. What are the major advantages of institutional Twinnings compared to other forms of technical assistance, when it comes to the transformation of public administration in candidate countries?
2. Would one expect that international and/or economic relations play a significant role when a candidate country is choosing particular EU member state as Twinning partner?
3. In which way Twinning projects contribute to a candidate country’s Europeanization process?
4. Under which conditions may the findings from the study on Twinnings in Serbia be exported to other candidate countries?

Articles

Contemporary
Southeastern Europe

CTA CURRENT ISSUE CTA bg line CTA bg Dots