Source: http://www.eiop.or.at/eiop/texte/2004-010.htm
Timestamp: 2017-03-24 11:55:55
Document Index: 533302516

Matched Legal Cases: ['§10', 'Art. 49', 'Art. 98', 'Art. 237', 'Art. 205', 'Art. 237', 'Art. 49', 'Art. 237', 'Art.49', 'art 3', 'Art.308', 'Art.235', 'art\n1977', 'art 1977', 'art\n1977', 'Art.49', 'Art. 4', 'Art.11', 'Art.177', 'Art.6', 'Art.7', 'Art.49']

EIoP: Text 2004-010: Full Text Behind the Copenhagen façade. The
meaning and structure of the Copenhagen political criterion of democracy and
the rule of law Dimitry Kochenov European Integration online Papers (EIoP) Vol. 8
(2004) N° 10; http://eiop.or.at/eiop/texte/2004-010a.htm Date of Publication in
: 12.7.2004 | Abstract |
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Send your comment! to this paper | Contents: Introduction I. Democracy and the Rule of Law before Copenhagen,
Hierarchy of the Copenhagen Criteria II. The structure of the Copenhagen political criteria
as follows from the Copenhagen-related documents a. Copenhagen-Related Documents b. Structure and Relevance of the
Copenhagen-Related Documents c. The Structure of the Copenhagen Political
Criteria d. An Organic Combination of
Democracy and the Rule of Law III. The Main Elements of the Criterion of Democracy
and the Rule of Law a. Free and Fair Elections b. The National Parliaments c. Functioning of the Executive d. Functioning of the Judiciary e. Anti-Corruption Measures IV. Conclusions
Introduction With regard to the primary law of the European Communities it might seem
absolutely clear what kind of criteria an applicant state should meet in order
to have reasonable expectations to join the European Union. According to
Article 49 TEU every candidate should be a European state, sharing the values
of Article 6(1) TEU, i.e. democracy, human rights protection and the
rule of law. In addition to the primary law of the Union, however, the accession of
the new members is also governed by a set of, arguably, quasi-legal
means (Hillion, 2002, 402), including the Copenhagen criteria (Presidency
Conclusions, Copenhagen 31-22 June 1993) and a vast body of documents adopted
by the Commission, the Council and the European Council, regarding their
implementation (see infra). The scope, meaning and
legal effect of these documents is much less clear. It is possible to predict that the Copenhagen criteria will continue
playing an important role in the regulation of the future rounds of
enlargement, including, of course, the one to accommodate Romania, Bulgaria
and, probably, Croatia, which has recently been awarded a candidate country
status. At the same time, the broad and all-inclusive character of the criteria
creates uncertainties in the candidate countries willing to achieve compliance
with the Unions demands in the shortest possible time and has not been
clarified enough by the Union. 2 Trying to bridge this gap, the paper will identify a detailed meaning of
the Copenhagen political criteria of Democracy and the Rule of Law based on the
analysis of the primary sources and on the experience of the previous
enlargement rounds. Not aiming at providing an analysis of the concepts of
democracy and the rule of law from a theoretical viewpoint, the article will
focus on the discussion of the meaning conferred to them by the European Union
for the purposes of the regulation of the enlargement process. It is far from
being clear what kind of democracy and what kind of rule of law the Union
requires the candidate countries to adhere to. It is up to the researchers to
find out what European Council actually included among the requirements of
democracy and the rule of law. Focusing on the Copenhagen political criteria and especially
on the requirement to have the institutions guaranteeing democracy and the rule
of law in place, the paper will proceed on the basis of the assumption that the
famous accession criteria and the political criteria in particular, as
formulated at Copenhagen are not clear and precise enough in order to serve as
a real measurement tool for the progress made by the candidate countries
towards accession (Engelbrekt 2002, 46). The 1993 Copenhagen European Council, aiming at simplification,
improvement and depoliticisation of the enlargement regulation,
(since, in principle, all the applicant countries were destined to join
the Union on the basis of the same criteria and [] on an equal
footing (Luxembourg European Council 12-13 December 1997, §10), in
reality made a giant step towards vagueness and unpredictability (Hillion 2002,
402), requiring the countries willing to join to comply with criteria so vague
and general, that the principles of assessment of compliance (non-compliance)
with them were far from being clear. Thus, despite this apparent
depoliticisation, the accession process nevertheless remains a
political one (Inglis 2000, 1209). It took both the Union and the candidate countries four long years
before the meaning of the criteria was to some extent clarified. The situation
arose when all the countries with aspirations for membership had to do their
best to align their legal and political systems with a general political
statement without getting any guidance whatsoever from the Union  the
inventor and the enforcer of the criteria. The meaning of the political
criteria only started to become clear in 1997, upon the release of the
Commissions Opinions on the Application for Membership (allowed for by
Art. 49 TEU) made by Central and East European countries and the Agenda 2000.
Thus the predictable and just enlargement practice was in
fact more like a game of guesses. By stating this we should not however,
disregard the historical approach to the meaning of the concepts behind the
criteria in the context of previous enlargements: the analysis of the role
democracy and the rule of law played back then can undoubtedly shed some light
on the meaning of the Copenhagen political criteria. In the light of the pre-Copenhagen developments in the enlargement law,
the paper will also address the question whether the level of scrutiny of the
state of democracy in the candidate countries has changed since the
introduction of the Copenhagen political criteria. Composed of four parts, the paper will proceed as follows: firstly, based on the historical analysis of the legal
regulation of enlargements, the roots and hierarchy of the Copenhagen criteria
will be identified; secondly, the paper will outline the
structure of the Copenhagen political criteria based on the documents released
by the Union; thirdly a number of substantive components of
the Copenhagen criterion of democracy and the rule of law will be discussed.
The paper will conclude with an overview of the resulting
set of the elements of the criteria and outline their possible implications on
the legal regulation of the future enlargement rounds. 3 I. Democracy and the Rule of Law before Copenhagen,
Hierarchy of the Copenhagen Criteria
Democracy and the rule of law have been part of enlargement criteria
from the moment of creation of the ECSC. References to these principles can be found (explicitly or implicitly)
in the preamble to the draft Treaty Establishing a Constitution for Europe,(1) preamble to the EC Treaty, Opinions of the
Commission,(2) and in numerous declarations of the
Council, Commission and the European Parliament.(3)
The same applies to the ECJ jurisprudence.(4) All
these documents put the principles in question and especially the principle of
democracy among the milestones of European integration. It is unjustified to state that these principles first appeared in the
Copenhagen criteria and had later been included into the list of requirements
that each candidate country has to comply with in order to become a member of
the European Union by way of reference to Article 6(1) TEU. The introduction of
the reference to Article 6(1) TEU can be viewed as a codification of the
existing customary regulation (Fierro 2003, 137). All the three articles regulating the enlargement of the initial
Communities ( Art. 98 ECSC, Art. 237 EEC and Art. 205 EURATOM) were allowing
European states to apply for membership. No direct reference to the
principles of democracy and the rule of law has been made, which does not mean
that democracy and the rule of law were less important than other principles
regulating enlargements. As early as in 1952, Robert Schuman proclaimed that cette Europe
est ouverte à tous les pays européens libre de leurs choix
(Hoffmeister 2002a, 93), a principle, reflected in the Copenhagen political
criteria 41 years later. The criterion of Europeanness present in the Treaties was interpreted
very broadly, sometimes to include the principles of democracy and the rule of
law. Academic literature discusses possible implications of different
definitions of Europeanness (Fine 2003; Hoffmeister 2002a ), mostly focusing on the
geographical (Hoffmeister 2002a; Preston 1997, 213) and civilizational
understandings, the latter to include democracy and the rule of law as part of
the European political tradition. The European Commission, too, clearly chose a combined approach, not
limiting the definition of Europe to geographical factors, stating that the
term European combines geographical, historical and cultural
elements (European Commission 1992, point 7)  thus following a
scholarly approach already formulated on the eve of the first enlargement of
the Communities: [L]e terme européen ne constitue pas
seulement une limitation géographique; il a également un contenu
historique, culturel, économique et politique, et désigne les
pays qui font ou qui pourraient faire partie de lEurope libre.
(Soldatos and Vandersanden 1968, 687) 4 The importance of the principles of democracy and the rule of law in
the context of enlargements was reflected in the enlargement practices of the
Communities: the Association Agreement with Greece was frozen after the coup
dEtat of the colonels (Contogeorgis 1978, 23); the application of the
Francos Spain to join the Communities had been left unanswered because of
the dictatorial nature of the regime in place (Carrillo Salcedo 1978, 170).
That is to say, the democratic system in the applicant countries has always
been a precondition for the membership of the Communities. An even more explicit inclusion of democracy into the list of necessary
requirements to be met before accession to the Communities was made by the
Commission in 1978, when it clarified the meaning of Art. 237(1) EEC, (the
predecessor of Art. 49 TEU) in its submission in Mattheus v.
Doego(5) case, also bringing democracy and
geography together: Article 237 should be interpreted as follows: It
permits the accession of the state only if: - that state is a European
State; and - its constitution guarantees, on the one hand, the existence
and continuance of a pluralistic democracy and, on the other hand, effective
protection of human rights.(6) Two important conclusions follow from the submission. Firstly, since nothing is said about the achievement of a certain level
of economic development, economy was not at issue (and did not in fact make
part of Art. 237(1) EEC) that is to say, historically speaking, political
criteria had absolute priority over the economic ones. That is certainly
reflected in the enlargement practice before Copenhagen. The largely
unfavorable economic assessment of Greeces application for membership
made by the Commission (Preston 1997, 50 et seq.) was simply disregarded(7) by the Council.(8) Secondly, it is clear from the submission that the level of scrutiny
exercised by the Communities in the field of democracy and human rights was
minimal: the requirement to have an established democracy was limited to the
constitutional guarantees, not taking into account the real situation in the
acceding countries. Given both these observations, a legitimate question arises: did the
situation remain the same after the adoption of the Copenhagen criteria or
these criteria completely changed the enlargement practice? As far as the hierarchy of the criteria is concerned, the Copenhagen
criteria being clearly designed as a set of three elements of equal importance
were very soon modified by the European Council and the Commission in order to
accommodate a well established pre-Copenhagen tradition of giving priority to
the state of democracy in the candidate countries in the course of accession.
The key documents to reflect such a modification are the Presidency
Conclusions of the Luxembourg European Council (12-13 December 1997), which
held that compliance with the Copenhagen political criteria is a
prerequisite for opening of any accession negotiations (para 25)(9) and the 1999 Commissions Composite Paper,
which made an important step towards striking the right balance of
keeping up speed [of enlargement] without sacrificing quality (1999
Composite Paper, 4). In the Paper the Commission followed the European Council
in altering the conditionality principle based on the Copenhagen criteria. From
that time on it was recommended to open negotiations with all the countries
satisfying only the Copenhagen political criteria, thus giving them priority
over two other groups of criteria adopted by the 1993 Copenhagen European
Council. 5
The Commission recommended to stress the absolute priority of the
Copenhagen political criteria before beginning and continuing the accession
negotiations with any candidate country (1999 Composite Paper, 30). It
became clear that the EU is not ready to start the negotiations with a
country if there are any doubts concerning the democratic conditions, the
respect for human rights and the protection of minorities (Verheugen
2000, 441). This principle is in no way a nouveauté for the
enlargement practice, especially taken into account the examples of Greece and,
to a lesser extent, Spain and Portugal. Thus the Commission, together with the
European Council reinvented the old and well established practice introducing,
a certain deviation from the initial Copenhagen idea. Of course, the fact that a candidate country satisfies the political
criteria does not mean that it can enter the Union without meeting the economic
conditions, as the examples of Bulgaria and Romania show.(10) Thus there is a clear deviation from the previous
enlargements where the country could join the Union notwithstanding the
negative Commissions Opinion on the state of this countrys economy.
Knowing that the hierarchical arrangement of the criteria with priority
given to the political conditions of guaranteeing democracy, human rights
protection and the rule of law has not changed since the Copenhagen European
Council conclusions of 1993, it is important to know whether the level of
scrutiny of democracy and the rule of law has changed compared to just
constitutional guarantees required at the time of Mattheus. The Commission answers this question in the affirmative. From the
Composite Papers it is possible to conclude that the whole approach of the
Commission to the assessment of democratic reforms in the candidate countries
has changed since Mattheus. The requirement to have constitutional
guarantees in place has been reinforced by the principle of look[ing] at
the way democracy functions in practice, instead of relying on formal
descriptions of the political institutions (1998 Composite Paper, 3). It
is thus possible to conclude that the constitutional guarantees alone without
any practical implementation would not stand the scrutiny and would not allow
the candidate to meet the Copenhagen political criteria. The assessment of
compliance of the candidate countries with the Copenhagen criteria is well
documented, which allows the researchers to trace the implementation of this
strict scrutiny principle by the Commission in practice. It follows that in order to give an answer to the question whether the
character of the assessment of democracy and the Rule of Law in the candidate
countries has changed since the 1993 Copenhagen summit it is necessary to
analyse a block of documents related to the implementation of the Copenhagen
political criteria and their content, which will also bring us to the
achievement of the goal of the paper, i.e. mapping the criterion of
Democracy and the Rule of Law as understood by the Union Institutions. II. The structure of the Copenhagen political criteria as
follows from the Copenhagen-related documents II.a. Copenhagen-Related Documents The 1993 Copenhagen European Council, while having established the
criteria, did not clarify the principles for the assessment of the progress
towards meeting them or the actual means to measure the conformity with them,
stating only that the European Council will continue to follow closely
the progress in each associated country towards fulfilling the conditions of
accession to the Union and draw the appropriate conclusions. 6
The European Council was doing so for a number of years mostly limiting
itself to regular confirmations of the policy (Essen European Council 1994;
Cannes European Council 1995; Madrid European Council 1995) chosen at
Copenhagen and to the monitoring of the progress (Madrid European Council 1995,
Annex 6) in relations with the Associated Countries (on Europe Agreements see
Beurdeley 2003; Hoffmeister 2002b; Maresceau 1993a, 1993b). Only the Madrid
European Council (15  16 December 1995) made the first move(11) towards making the new enlargement a reality, asking the
Commission to prepare the Opinions on Applications for Membership of the Union
made by Central and East European countries,(12)
as required by Article 49(1) TEU (Art.O(1) TEU at
that time) in order to enable the Opinions to be forwarded to the Council
as soon as possible after the conclusion of the IGC (Madrid European
Council 1995; Florence European Council 1996) and to embark upon
preparation of a composite paper on enlargement (Madrid European Council
1995). The Composite Paper, mentioned by the Amsterdam European Council (16
 17 June 1997) as a Comprehensive Communication was not
included in the list of documents that the Commission had to draft in relation
to the accession process according to the TEU. At Amsterdam it was established
that the Communication had to contain the main conclusions and
recommendations from the Opinions and give its views on the launching of
accession process including proposals on reinforcing pre-accession strategy and
further developing pre-accession assistance building on ongoing reforms of
PHARE (Amsterdam European Council 1997), thus summarising the Opinions
and providing an assessment of the achievements of the candidate countries with
regard to meeting the Copenhagen criteria. Upon the presentation of such a Communication entitled Agenda
2000 on July 15, 1997 (released together with the Opinions on the
Applications of ten CEE Countries for Membership of the European Union,(13) which followed the Decisions of the Council of
Ministers to implement the procedure of Art.O TEU (now Art.49 TEU)(14)), a new
phase in enlargement regulation started. The release of yearly progress
reports, stating whether each of the candidate countries met the criteria,
assessing the preparedness of the candidates for accession, accompanied with a
summarizing document(15) containing a
synthesis of the analysis in each of the regular reports as well as a series of
recommendations [and] also set out the state of play on the negotiations and
the reinforcement of the pre-accession strategy (1998 Composite Paper,
1), aimed at the assessment of the progress made by the candidates towards
meeting the Copenhagen criteria. This enabled the Union to make the criteria
not just a wish-list or a statement of expectations, but a workable
tool in governing the accession. Making the annual assessment of compliance
with the Copenhagen criteria a reality, the principles of the evaluative and
inclusive character of enlargement were proclaimed: the Luxembourg European
Council (12  13 December 1997) stated that all the candidate countries
are destined to join the European Union on the basis of the same criteria
and [] on an equal footing (Luxembourg European Council 1997, para
10). Once the criteria are recognised to be met, the Commission and other
Institutions do not lose the right to return to the issue later. An example for
this is an attempt made by the European Parliament to return to the issue of
the Copenhagen political criteria in the context of the Romanian application,
in the beginning of 2004.(16) Six rounds of Progress Reports have been released by now,(17) every round being accompanied by an analytical Paper.(18) Following the requirement of the Madrid
European Council, two of such Papers (1998, 1999) being entitled
Composite Papers,(19) while four
others  Strategy Papers.(20)
After the closure of accession negotiations with the candidate countries and
signing the 2003 Treaty of Accession,(21) the
release of Commission documents assessing the progress continued,(22) which lead to the issuance of ten Comprehensive Country
Monitoring Reports(23) and a Comprehensive
Monitoring Report(24) summarizing their findings.
7 In order to enable this incredible amount documents to make a difference
in the enlargement regulation, an enhanced pre-accession strategy
consisting of increased pre-accession aid and the introduction of the Accession
Partnerships (Maresceau 2003; Inglis 2002; Hillion 2002, 416) was introduced by
the Luxembourg European Council. The second part of the strategy is of special
interest to us. Intended to be a new instrument and a key-feature of the
enhanced pre-accession strategy (Luxembourg European Council 1997), the
Accession Partnerships made the Copenhagen criteria legally enforceable (Inglis
2000, 1186), since the reception by the candidates of financial aid from the
Union was made dependent on their performance related to meeting the Copenhagen
criteria.(25) Part 3 of the Partnerships states
that the main priority for each candidate State relates to their ability
to take on the obligations related to the Copenhagen criteria. Accession Partnerships are adopted by the Council on the proposal of the
Commission and aims at articulating the most important steps to be made by the
candidate countries in order to achieve compliance with the Copenhagen
criteria. The legal ground for their adoption was Council Regulation 622/98
(aadopted on the basis of Art.308 EC (ex. Art.235 EC)), which was
provided for by the 1997 Luxembourg European Council. Four rounds of Accession Partnerships have been decided concerning the
majority of the candidate countries by now: in 1998,(26) 1999(27) (with the exception
of Cyprus, Malta(28) and Turkey(29)) and in 2002.(30) The fourth
Accession Partnership round, that of 2003(31)
covers the three remaining candidate countries. A vast number of documents were drafted in relation with the
implementation of the Copenhagen criteria. It is, however, important to point
out the fact that there is no single document to clarify the meaning of the
criteria. Only a complex analysis of all the documents can help with the
discovery of the actual set of concrete developments necessary in order to meet
the criteria. Taken into account the considerable number of documents, it would
be practical to classify them into two main groups: general documents, dealing
with a number of candidate countries and documents assessing the progress made
and compliance with the criteria by single candidate countries. Only the
textual analysis of these documents will allow us to answer the question
whether the level of scrutiny exercised by the Commission has really been
changed since Mattheus. The first group includes yearly Composite and Strategy papers, Agenda
2000 and 2003 Comprehensive Monitoring Report. The second group consists of a
much wider range of documents: 1997 Opinions, six rounds of Regular Reports by
the Commission, ten 2003 Comprehensive Country Monitoring Reports and the
Accession Partnerships. (the overall body of documents belonging to both these
groups will further on be referred to as Copenhagen-related
documents). II.b. Structure and Relevance of the Copenhagen-Related
Documents Documents belonging to both groups in our classification are organised
to follow the structure of the Copenhagen criteria, which enables us to clearly
identify the sections which are of special interest for the purposes of the
present paper. The structural similarities between all these documents can be
explained by the fact that the 1997 Luxembourg European Council, upon giving a
positive assessment to Agenda 2000, deeply rooted in the criteria, recommended
the Commission to follow the Agendas methodology in the future. 8 All the Opinions on the Candidate Countries Applications for
Membership released on July 15, 1997 contain the text of the Copenhagen
criteria in full (All the Opinions, 5) as well as chapters, specifically
dedicated to them: B. Criteria for Membership (which is the core of
the opinions, chapter A being the introduction and chapter C being the
conclusion), divided into subchapters following the structure of the Criteria
themselves, the first subchapter being B.1. Political Criteria.
Regular Reports of the Commission on the progress of the candidate
countries follow the structure of the 1997 Opinions, aiming inter alia
at analys[ing] the situation in respect of the political conditions set
by the European Council (democracy, rule of law, human rights, protection of
minorities) (All Regular Reports, A.a.), and containing, just as the
Opinions, subchapter B.1. Political Criteria, on which the present
paper will focus. The structure of the Comprehensive Monitoring Reports on Accession
Countries Preparation for Membership is different from that of the
Opinions on the Application for Membership and of the Regular Reports on
Progress towards Accession, as the Monitoring Reports are built around the
chapters of the acquis. At the same time, they certainly deal with the
assessment of the state of democracy and the rule of law in the acceding
countries further promoting the compliance with the Copenhagen political
criteria. In the 2002 Towards the Enlarged Union Strategy Paper,
the Commission itself recognised that there are a number of areas where
further improvements need to be made in the context of political and
economic criteria (italics are mine). That is to say, the fulfilment of
the political criteria is still on the agenda, even after signing the Treaty of
Accession. The same logic applied to the opening of negotiations. The
Commissions statement that the criteria are met does not mean that in the
candidate countries everything is perfect (Maresceau 2003, 25).
The relevant part of the Monitoring Reports is Section 1 of chapter
C. Commitments and Requirements Arising from the Accession
Negotiations, addressing a set of five issues: 1.Administrative and
Judicial Capacity, 2.Public Administration, 3.Judicial Capacity,
4.Anti-corruption Measures and 5.Translation of the acquis into the
language of the candidate country. The general structure of most of the Composite Papers and Strategy
Papers is more or less the same. One chapter (usually called Progress by
the candidate countries in meeting the membership criteria) of every
Paper usually reproduces the structure of the Copenhagen criteria,(32) including three sub chapters: 1. Political
Criteria; 2.Economic Criteria and 3.Other Obligations of Membership. The 2002
Strategy Paper contains four sub-chapters in the Chapter scrutinizing the
Copenhagen criteria, the last sub-chapter being 4.Overal Conclusions and
Recommendations. Only the organisation of the 2003 Strategy Paper is different
from all the others. The document is structured following a country by country
logic of assessment. Elements of two chapters of this document are of interest
for the purposes of the present research: Chapter B. Bringing Bulgaria
and Romania into the Union (and especially sub-chapters B.1.
Progress made by Bulgaria in meeting the membership criteria and
B.2. Progress made by Romania in meeting membership criteria) and
Chapter C. Turkey in the enlargement process (and especially
sub-chapter C.1. Progress made by Turkey in meeting the membership
criteria). The 2003 Comprehensive Monitoring Report is structurally based on the
chapters of the acquis and thus differs greatly from all the Strategy
Papers and Composite Papers. The Accession Partnerships are also rooted in the Copenhagen criteria.
9 Thus, the narrowed down block of documents adopted in relation to the
Copenhagen political criterion dealing with democracy and the rule of law
contains the following elements: Sub-chapters B.1. Political Criteria of the
Commissions 1997 Opinions. Sub-chapters B.1. Political Criteria of the
Commissions Regular Reports. Sub-chapters 1. of Chapters C. Commitments and Requirements
Arising from the Accession Negotiations of the Commissions
Monitoring Reports. Sub-chapters 1.Political Criteria of the Composite
/Strategy Papers Chapters Progress by the candidate countries in
meeting the membership criteria (until 2002) and sub-chapters B.1., B.2.
and C.1. of the 2003 Strategy Paper. Some elements of the Comprehensive Monitoring Report on the
preparedness of the ten acceding countries for EU membership. Sub-chapters Political Criteria of the Accession
Partnerships. Having outlined the scope of the sources to be used for the analysis,
the paper will proceed by framing the structure of the elements of the sources
relevant for the present discussion. The comparative overview of the structures
of these documents will enable us to make first conclusions concerning the
content of the Copenhagen political criteria. II.c. The Structure of the Copenhagen Political
The text of the criteria includes several separate elements. Based on
the textual interpretation of the whole list it is possible to outline four
main components: Democracy; The Rule of Law; Human Rights; Respect for and protection of minorities. The text of the Community documents dealing with the criteria, however,
offers a slightly different, somewhat simpler classification. Sub-chapters B.1.
Political criteria of the Commission Opinions and Progress Reports
follow a binary structure: B.1.1. Democracy and the Rule of Law and
B.1.2. Human Rights and Protection of Minorities. The same division
can be found in the Accession Partnerships. That is to say, a binary division
of the Copenhagen political criteria is introduced. The text of the sub-chapters of the Composite/ Strategy Papers is more
monolithic. It is possible, however to make a distinction between the elements
of the set of criteria, especially bearing in mind that these Papers represent
a concise summary of the most important findings and conclusions made by the
Commission in the individual country Progress Reports. Before outlining the classifications of the Copenhagen political
criteria introduced by the Commission Papers it is necessary to make one
general observation: contrary to the Commissions rhetoric concerning the
absolute priority (1999 Composite Paper, 29) and importance of the
political criteria, a record-low space in the Papers is reserved for the
political criteria analysis: the sub-chapter dealing with the political
criteria is usually around 2 pages long,(33)
which is not much, especially compared to a dozen of pages dealing with
economic conditions. Of course, the number of pages devoted to a certain
problem might be viewed as not important, but the Commission makes it too
short, causing disappointment in scholarly literature (see e.g.
Maresceau 2001, 19) and contradicting its own principle of full and
impartial assessment. It is difficult to explain the reasons for the reluctance
of the Commission to provide more details concerning the Copenhagen political
criteria. 10 It is obvious at the same time that any analysis of the state of
democracy, rule of law, protection of human rights and minorities in thirteen
countries squeezed into two pages is deemed either to be purely superficial or
to describe a situation in 13 ideal democracies. Unfortunately, as we know from
the Federalist papers, humans are not angels and the situation in the candidate
countries is very far from any democratic ideal, as the Regular Reports
themselves tend to demonstrate. Notwithstanding the limited space dedicated to the assessment of the
political criteria in the Papers, accents made by the Commission at these two
or three pages of every Paper might provide important food for thought. First
of all, the binary division of the political criteria, which is a common
practice for the Opinions, Regular Reports and Accession Partnerships, is
abandoned in the Papers for the sake of new classifications. 1998 Composite Paper structures the Political criteria
subchapter the following way: Democracy and the Rule of Law; Human Rights; Minorities The 1999 Composite Paper demonstrates an even further deviation from the
classification given in the Reports and Opinions, partially adopting a
country-by country approach. In relation with the Copenhagen political criteria
it discusses the following topics (in order of appearance in the Paper): Slovakia; Turkey; Strengthening of the judiciary; Corruption; Childrens rights in Romania; Minorities; Roma; Hungarian minority It is clear that the Paper focuses on the situation in the most
problematic countries and areas, without adopting any balanced assessment of
the state of play in the area of the political criteria. The approach taken by 2000 Paper is different again. The overall
structure of the sub-chapter Political criteria is better
articulated than that contained in the previous paper. The sub-chapter contains
two parts: a) Overall development and b) Conclusions.
The first identifies the main problem-areas related to the political criteria
(highlighted in bold script): Public administration; Judiciary; Corruption; Childcare institutions in Romania; Trafficking in women and children; Gender equality; Minorities; Roma; Situation in Turkey. 11 This list demonstrates how wide the scope of the political criteria is
according to the Commission. 2001 Paper keeps the sub-division of the Political criteria
sub-chapter into Overall development and Conclusions
and contains the same list of problem-areas, adding a passage on the problems
related to pre-trial detention. The same structure is kept in 2002 Paper with
the only difference that the number of problematic areas is slightly
decreasing. All in all, it is clear that the general structure to address the
question of assessment of compliance with the political criteria was formulated
in the Commission Papers only in the year 2000 and focuses on the most
problematic areas, rather than on the general description of the situation
related to the candidate countries progress. It is thus less instrumental
for the present research than the structure adopted by the Opinions and Regular
Reports, which remained unchanged starting with the 1997 Opinions until the
year 2002 (i.e. until the conclusion of accession negotiations with 10
candidate countries) and clearly follows the wording of the Copenhagen
political criteria. It is also possible to state that the way the structure of the Papers
was changing as well as the extremely small amount of space dedicated to the
political criteria in the Papers talks for the superficial character of
analysis contained therein. Upon reading the Papers not only is it unclear what
the Copenhagen political criteria mean in detail (notwithstanding the fact that
the complete wording of the criteria is present in every Paper), but also on
which grounds this or that issue had been picked for discussion, let alone the
causes for structural differences between the Papers. Following the classifications proposed by the Institutions, the first
proposed structure of the political criteria, composed of the four elements has
to be dismissed. It is reasonable to follow the structure of the Opinions
/Regular Reports, which contains a Democracy and the Rule of Law
criterion without dividing it into two. The Commission does not make a
distinction between democracy and the rule of law,
preferring to place them together. Meanwhile, this distinction is an obvious
and very important one. The literature suggests that the principle of democracy
and the rule of law have been understood by the Commission in the context of
enlargement in the form of an organic combination (Hoffmeister
2002a, 94) of the two. II.d. An Organic Combination of Democracy
Frank Hoffmeister rightfully pointed to the fact that the
principles of democracy and the rule of law are two
distinct concepts (Hoffmeister 2002a, 93). How justifiable is it to merge
them to create one organic combination? The rule of law has been one of the milestone principles of the
law of the European Communities right from the moment of their creation.
Although not being part of the Treaties until Maastricht,(34) it certainly had played a very important role in the field
of Community law before (Arnull 2002; Fernandez Esteban 1998; Mackenzie Stuart
1977; Bebr 1965). The ECJ also stated that the EEC Treaty, albeit
concluded in the forms of an international agreement, none the less constitutes
the constitutional charter of a Community based on the Rule of Law.(35) 12 At this point it might be necessary to recall that the Rule of
Law is not only a Community law term, as it is lying at the
crossroads of different constitutional traditions (Fernandez Esteban
1998, 65). Practically, the Treaty refers to different national concepts,
depending on the language, as the English term does not have exact translation
in other European languages (Fernandez Esteban 1998, 66). The Rule of Law in EU
law thus coexists with Etat de droit, Rechtsstaat and other
national doctrines of the Member States, which, while being close in meaning,
are however not identical (Hoffmeister 2002a, 94). This is to say that in order
to achieve consistency in the interpretation of the Treaties in all the Member
States, the Rule of Law at the Community level cannot be understood the same
way as a corresponding concept (Etat de droit, Rechtsstaat) is
understood in the national legal order. An autonomous Union concept of
the rule of law needs to be identified (Arnull 2002, 240). Since the
Treaties are silent on this subject not indicat[ing] which meaning should
prevail in the Community law context (Hoffmeister 2002a, 94; also Arnull
2002, 240), it is necessary to turn to scholarly authority. Lord Mackenzie
Stuart characterised the Rule of Law in Community Law as follows: those
who administer the Communities are themselves subject to limitations imposed by
law and that those who are administered have rights in law which must be
protected (Mackenzie Stuart 1977, 3). But how well would such a definition fit within the framework of the
Copenhagen political criteria? The Criteria addressed to the reforming
candidate countries should definitely be understood in the light of the
national concepts existing in the candidate countries and corresponding to the
Rule of Law. Being a document definitely belonging to the Community legal
order, the Copenhagen criteria, however, are aimed at outlining the necessary
level of achievements in the field of the national reform required of the
candidate countries in order to become members of the European Union. Thus the
Community definition, once formulated, will hardly be helpful in depicting of
the Rule of Law requirement as part of the Copenhagen political criteria. The
rule of law included into the Copenhagen criteria definitely belongs to the
national legal systems of the candidate countries, which corresponds to the
principle that the Communities rest on the concept that Member States are
free and democratic societies which share the belief that relations between
citizen and the state should rest upon the rule of law (Mackenzie Stuart
1977, 5 and 104). The concept includes several necessary elements, which remain in every
democratic legal system and to a large extent stem from the British doctrine.
Dicey characterised the rule of law the following way: This peculiarity
of our polity is well expressed in the old saw of the Courts: La ley est
le plus haute inheritance, que le roy ad; car par la ley il même et
toutes ses sujets sont rulés, et si la ley ne fuit, nul roi, et nul
inheritance sera. (Dicey 1893, 174) According to Arnull, a modern
vision of the concept usually includes the following elements: Laws must be an effective guide to action, they must be
publicised, reasonably clear and prospective, rather than retrospective in
effect. [] There must in addition be an independent and impartial
judiciary with responsibility for resolving disputes over precisely what the
law requires and providing effective remedies where the law is breached. The
judiciary must respect the rules of natural justice and be accessible to those
who claim that their rights have been infringed. Controversies must be decided
timeously and according to rational and reasonably predictable principles.
Judgements and the reasoning on which they are based must be made public so
that they can guide future conduct and be the subject of critical
scrutiny. (Arnull 2002, 240-1) 13 The principle of democracy is usually understood as providing
necessary guarantees for people to participate in governance. Just as in the
case of the rule of law, the principle of democracy included into the
Copenhagen political criteria is clearly different from that applying to the
Union at large. Multiple studies suggest that in case democracy is in principle
possible outside a nation state, its understanding at the national and at the
Community level might be different (Cf.: Mancini 2000; Weiler 1997; 1995; Grimm
1995 and Höreth 1998 (for the summary of the debate)). Dahl suggested a list of criteria for a democratic process (Dahl 1989,
106-14), which is instrumental in clarifying what democracy is about. Those
criteria include effective citizens participation (citizens should have
adequate and equal opportunity to express their preferences in the course of
taking binding decisions, placing questions on the agenda and expressing
reasons underlying their choice); voting equality at the decisive stage (the
choice expressed by one citizen is equal to that expressed by any other);
enlightened understanding (adequate and equal opportunity given to each citizen
to discover and validate the choice which would better suite his/her interests)
and control over the agenda (the opportunity to decide how matters should be
placed on the agenda exclusively belongs to citizens). In the context of the Copenhagen criteria democracy is usually described
in a much narrower way. Hoffmeister characterises the principle of
Parliamentary Democracy as follows: Parliamentary democracy means, in essence, that fair and
free multiparty elections must be held on a regular basis for the creation of a
free Parliament so that the people take part in the exercise of public
power (Hoffmeister 2002a, 94). Upon making a brief outline of the meaning of democracy and the rule of
law, theoretically following from the Copenhagen criteria, the difference
between the two concepts is apparent. Merging them might thus appear to be problematic but not impossible. The
paper will proceed with the analysis of the body of the Copenhagen-related
documents, specified supra in order to snapshot the Unions
understanding of the Copenhagen political criterion of democracy and the rule
of law. III. The Main Elements of the Criterion of Democracy and
The structural analysis of the documents related to the implementation
of the Copenhagen criteria suggests that the Commission and the Council mostly
concentrated on four main issues while addressing the criterion of Democracy
and the Rule of Law. These issues are: the functioning of the legislature, the
functioning of the judiciary, the functioning of the executive and
anti-corruption measures. This classification mirrors the structure of the Regular Reports.
Sub-chapters B.1.1. of the 1997 Opinions were arranged slightly differently:
they did not contain sections dedicated to anti-corruption activities and
focused not only on the analysis of the consistency of the situation of one or
another branch of power in a given candidate country with the requirements of
democracy and rule of law. Clearly, the Commission was not interested in
restating these structures every year in the Reports, which is why these
sections have been omitted already during the first round of Reporting 
in 1998, anti-corruption sections been introduced instead. 14 None of the Reports contains a special section dealing with elections
and the democratic process in the candidate countries. At the same time, the
Composite /Strategy Papers usually mention elections (from municipal to the
presidential level) held in these countries. The same is valid for the Reports
and Opinions. This is why it seems reasonable to include the elections among
the elements of the Commissions Rule of Law and Democracy assessment.
To summarise, according to the documents released by the Union regarding
the application of the Copenhagen criteria, it is possible to outline five main
areas of scrutiny related to the assessment of the Democracy and the Rule of
Law criterion: elections the functioning of the legislature the functioning of the executive the functioning of the judiciary anti-corruption measures Needless to say, the present list might seem far from what one could
expect from the democracy and the rule of law check, especially taken into
account the fact that the first element, dealing with the electoral process,
although included on the list, does not necessarily follow directly from the
organisation of the Copenhagen-related documents. The separation of powers in the candidate countries is absolutely
necessary in order for them to satisfy the criterion. It follows from the
methodology of assessment adopted by the Commission, consisting in scrutinising
each branch of power separately from the others. III.a. Free and Fair Elections Every Composite /Strategy Paper informs the readers of free and
fair elections held in one or several candidate countries: Free and fair elections have taken place, at Parliamentary or
Presidential level, in Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Lithuania and
Latvia []. In these cases, the candidate countries have proved to have
stability of institutions enabling the public authorities to function properly
and democracy to be consolidated (1998 Paper, 3; similar wording: 1999 paper,
15; 2000 Paper, 15; 2001 Paper, 10). Almost the same wording is repeated in the majority of the Annual
Reports and Commissions Opinions, which provide little information, apart
from cliché statements like the elections were free and
fair and in line with international standards and commitments on democratic
elections (2002 Latvian Report, 19). Some Opinions also underline the
smooth and peaceful character of the handover of power (Polish and Hungarian
Opinions). All in all no more than two or three lines are usually dedicated to
elections in every Composite /Strategy Paper, which can be considered
insufficient, as elections are at the core of the democratic process. The usual conclusion made by the Commission is that the candidate
countries have continued to strengthen their democratic systems of
governance (1999 Paper, 15; 2000 Paper, 15; 2001 Paper, 10). 15 Silence about the insides of the electoral process is broken only
rarely. It is done by the Commissions acknowledgement of a change in the
electoral law, as it was done in the case of Estonia in the 1999 Report, when
the Commission stated that election alliances [were] prohibited. Mergers
between the parties [were] only allowed before elections (1999 Estonian
Report, 10), or in case of Latvia in the 1998 Report, where the Commission
informed the readers about the Constitutional amendment, reducing the voting
period in Parliamentary elections from two days to one (1998 Latvian Report,
8). It is difficult to interpret such statements made by the Commission:
generally, it is unclear whether it welcomes the development, wants to
recommend it to other candidate countries, or just demonstrates that it is
informed about it. Usually, no assessment of the reform in relation to the Copenhagen
political criteria is given. The same applies not only to the minor changes in
electoral laws, but also to the important ones, like lifting the linguistic
knowledge requirements for the candidates standing in parliamentary elections
(2002 Estonian Report, 21; 2002 Latvian Report, 20). It seems reasonable to interpret any mentioning by the Commission of a
legislative development in a candidate country as an acknowledgement of the
positive character of the development in question, unless stated otherwise.
Thus, the paper adopts a positive assessment presumption,
concerning the information provided in the Opinions and Reports (in case no
analysis is given by the Commission). Of course there are cases when the
Commission gives a positive assessment of a certain development, such examples
being, however, extremely rare. It especially concerns the regulation of State
and private financing of the political parties and their expenditure (1999
Lithuanian Report, 11; 2001 Polish Report, 16; 2002 Polish Report, 21; 2001
Slovak Report, 15; Latvian Report, 24). It is one of the few areas related to
electoral law where the Commission unambiguously states that [the
developments] mark an important step towards ensuring transparent working of
the political system (2001 Polish Report, 16). Besides the reluctance of the Commission to explore the intricacies of
the elections in the candidate countries, it is clear from the Reports that in
order to satisfy this part of the Copenhagen Democracy and the Rule of Law
criterion it is necessary to have regular elections without, probably, any
severe irregularities. What is unclear is how many election rounds would be needed in order to
qualify as a country satisfying the criterion. The Copenhagen-related documents
are not helpful with an answer to this question. As the Slovakian example
shows, one election can drastically change the Commissions assessment:
unable to meet the political criteria in 1997, in 1999 it was already
considered democratic enough. Although it supposedly met the criteria because
of the improvements in the field of the minority protection, and the
functioning of the Parliament and the Executive, it is also possible to link
the change in the Commissions assessment with the fact that Mr. Meciar
was no longer in power. III.b. The National Parliaments National Parliaments (see Ram 2001), according to the Commission, should
carry out [their] duties in conditions which comply with the normal rules
for the operation of democracy (Slovak Opinion 1997), which follows from
the Commissions Opinion on the Slovak application for membership of the
European Union, and which was not the case in Slovakia in 1997. 16
The majority of Reports inform that Parliament continues to
operate satisfactorily, its powers are respected and the opposition plays a
full part in its activities (1998 Bulgarian Report 8; 1999 Bulgarian
Report 12; 1998 Czech Report, 8; 1998 Estonian Report, 8; 2000 Estonian Report,
14; 2001 Estonian Report, 16; 1998 Hungarian Report, 8; 1998 Romanian Report,
8; 1998 Latvian Report, 8). Although very short, such an assessment provides
necessary information in order to create a list of elements of the criterion.
Coupled with the Regular Reports assessment of developments in the light
of assuring better minority representation in Parliament, the Commissions
assessment of a Parliament, meeting the Copenhagen political criteria includes
a number of elements. In order to meet the Copenhagen political criteria it is necessary to
have a Parliament: Which operates satisfactorily; The powers of which are respected; With an opposition playing full part in its activities and Where the minorities (in case they are present in the state) have a
possibility to be represented. Besides the 1997 Opinion on Slovak application and the 1998 Slovak
Report, there were no cases when the Commission would announce that the country
fell short of meeting the Copenhagen political criteria. Thus the majority of
examples of insufficient operation of Parliament included into the
Copenhagen-related documents represent the dissatisfaction of the Commission
with some practices, which, however, does not mean that the practices in
question prevent the candidate countries from being characterised as
meeting the Copenhagen political criteria. The analysis of the Copenhagen-related documents reveals the following
picture of a Parliament satisfying the criterion of Democracy and the Rule of
Law. The Commission presumes that a Parliament satisfying the criterion of
Democracy and the Rule of law should respect the scope of powers of other
branches of power and be harmoniously integrated into the system of State
organs(36); be efficient(37) and adopt legislation in a timely manner,(38) without ever slowing down the tempo of adoption of
legislation (2002 Polish Report, 22) and providing at the same time a
reasonable(39) amount of scrutiny of the
legislative proposals. According to the findings of the Commission, the inability to scrutinise
legislation properly is mostly caused by three factors: ever increasing volume
of legislation, tight deadlines and insufficient resources (2002 Romanian
Report, 21) from which it follows that in order to meet the Copenhagen
political criteria a Parliament should be provided with necessary resources and
time to deal with the legislation effectively. Its powers and the mandates of the MPs should be respected and it should
play a real role in the law-making, meaning that all the extraordinary
legislative procedures, such as legislating by the executive ordinances, which
potentially mixes legislative and executive powers (1999 Romanian
Report, 11) should be limited and well-justified (2001 Romanian Report, 17).
The Commission has asserted that normal Parliamentary procedures should
be used in all but exceptional circumstances (2002 Romanian Report, 22).
The opposition should play a role in the work of the Parliament, which
also includes being represented in the Committees (1999 Paper, 14; 1998 Slovak
Report, 8) and being able to chair some of them (Slovak Opinion 1997). Problems
might arise in the case when opposition parties, being offered places in the
Parliamentary committees, do not accept them. The proper functioning of the
committees and supervisory boards in such a situation was qualified by the
Commission as hampered (2001 Slovak Report, 15; 2002 Slovak Report,
21). 17 All the stages of the legislative process, including the proposal of
legislative amendments should enjoy the highest degree of transparency, giving
the public a possibility to follow the process in real time (2002 Romanian
Report, 21). Ethnic minorities should be represented in Parliament(40) and there should be no special linguistic
knowledge requirements applied to the candidates running for office (2002
Estonian Report, 21; 2002 Latvian Report, 20). The legislation related to the adoption of the acquis should
preferably be adopted with the help of special organs,(41) special (i.e. simplified) legislative procedures, or
bodies in Parliament (2001 Bulgarian Report, 15; 2002 Bulgaria Report, 20; 2001
Czech Report, 16; 2000 Lithuanian Report, 16) and be in line with the acquis
(2001 Czech Report, 17). The goal of accession to the European Union
should be clearly set.(42) All the above-mentioned being said, the picture of an ideal
Parliament satisfying the Copenhagen criteria is still far from being clear.
The Commission does not seem to be consistent enough in its treatment of a
number of issues. Picking topics for discussion sometimes differs strangely
from country to country. Romania, for example, is criticised in one report for
the lack of transparency of legislative procedure at the stage of the
introduction of amendments and this issue never appears in the Reports again.
Double standard in assessment of the legislative procedures is also apparent:
while simplified legislative process is welcomed in the areas dealing with the
adoption of the acquis, the use of it in other areas is heavily
criticised. The assessment made by the Commission also differs depending on the
country in question. The reluctance of Parliament to follow the Constitutional
Court decision in Slovakia is taken by the Commission as a very alarming
development, while in Hungary, the Constitutional Court Ruling announcing that
the lack of minority representation in Parliament is unconstitutional is not
paid attention to for more than ten years and the Commission considers the fact
that several minority MPs managed to get to Parliament even without such a
system in place as a positive development (2002 Hungarian Report, 20). In other
words, the Reports can sometimes create a distorted picture of reality. This
made scholars wonder why on certain sensitive political issues the
Commission seems unable to perform its reporting function in a truly objective
and independent manner (Maresceau 2003, 34).(43) From the analysis of the Copenhagen-related documents it follows that
the threshold for meeting the Copenhagen political criteria by Parliaments is
very low. Only Slovakia once failed the political criteria test. All the other
countries, however badly there Parliaments functioned, still managed to pass
it. Following the criticisms of the Commission, it is possible to state that
the criteria are met even if Parliament is not a necessary part of the
structure of state machinery, absolute majority of legislation being adopted by
the executive. The criteria are met even when the Constitutional Court
decisions concerning Parliamentary election systems are ignored for years or
the Parliament operates so slowly that it does not satisfy even the most urgent
needs of the candidate country. It follows that in order to meet the Copenhagen political criteria it is
necessary to have a Parliament in the system of Governance, let it pass at
least some legislation and assure that the body of MPs would change at regular
intervals. Thus even in the cases when the Copenhagen-related documents are
critical of certain practices in the candidate countries, it does not mean that
those countries fall short of meeting the Copenhagen political criteria. 18 III.c. Functioning of the Executive The Copenhagen-related documents generally pay more attention to the
assessment of the functioning of the Executive than to the assessment of the
Legislature.(44) There can be two reasons for
this: either the Commission underlines the special importance of the executive
or the area of the Executive is more problematic than that of the legislature
in the view of the Commission. Having a look at several Reports might suffice
to conclude that the second reason might prevail. The 1999 Czech Report, for
example, emphasises that a unified system of public administration is absent,
and that inadequate management, lack of training, low pay and the lack of
coordination between the ministries determine the state of the Czech executive
(1999 Czech Report, 12). This did not, however, prevent the Czech Republic from
meeting the Copenhagen criteria. Generally, the issue of the reform of the Executive, although discussed
in a detailed way in the Regular Reports, is mostly ignored in the Composite
Papers. Both of them do not contain a single word on this matter. The attitude
towards the administrative reform is changed in the Strategy Papers. Each of
them dedicates 4 or 5 lines to the consolidation and modernisation of public
administration and to the creation of a legal framework for civil service (2000
Paper, 16; 2001 Paper, 10; 2002 Paper, 13). Some Papers also mention the
division between political and administrative responsibilities and the
establishing of the codes of conduct for civil servants (2002 Paper, 13). Only the 1998 Polish Report contains a sub-division of the section
dealing with the executive into two parts: 1. State Administration Reform and
2. Status of Civil Service (1998 Polish Report, 9). It is reasonable to adopt a
more detailed division of the criterion, based on the actual text of the
Regular Reports, where the Commission, while discussing the state of play in
the Executive of the candidate countries, mostly concentrates on the following
issues: The creation of a unified system of civil service; Decentralisation and the structural reform of administration; Public access to information; Effective consultation with interested parties and The accountability of the administration. The Civil Administration reform in the candidate countries should result
in the creation of independent, efficient and professional civil
service (1998 Bulgarian Report, 8). The Commission puts much emphasis on
reporting on the progress of the civil service reform in the candidate
countries and on outlining the further necessary steps to be taken with a view
to the timely and successful completion of reforms. The Commission puts forth an ideal executive: effective, professional,
accountable, well regulated and transparent. From the Copenhagen-related
documents it follows that the reform of the executive should be based on a
comprehensive government strategy(45) and include
a complex of legislative amendments rebuilding the system of the executive.(46) A special emphasis is put on the necessity of
adopting the Civil Service Law, in the absence of which reform is impossible
(2001 Czech Report, 17). The reform of the legislation should include the
promotion of the civil servants status(47)
guaranteeing a strict division between the career civil servants and political
appointees,(48) which foster political
independence and reduce the scope of political interventions in the appointment
of the officials (2000 Czech Report, 18).
Other important issues are increasing the transparency of
appointments,(49) promotions (2001 Estonian
Report, 16; 2002 Estonian Report, 22), remuneration(50) of civil servants and the increase of their salaries,(51) as well as the creation of a system of
specialised training for the civil service officials(52) since the lack of qualified personnel is recognised as a
common problem for all the candidate countries (1998 Estonian Report, 8; 1999
Estonian Report, 11; 2000 Estonian Report, 14). Training in EU affairs and
languages is especially emphasised.(53) The
adoption of the Codes of Ethics for civil servants (Kudyrka 1999) is another
issue of great importance (2001 Bulgarian Report, 16; 2001 Czech Report, 17).
Special bodies(54) with real(55) powers should be created to assume responsibility for the
management of all the civil service in the country, including appointments,
training and the systematic assessment of the performance of civil servants.
The civil service should also be integrated and well structured both
vertically, including a creation of municipalities and a degree of regional
autonomy (Horváth 2000)(56) (going in line
with the European Charter on Local Self-Governance);(57) and horizontally, including a clear structure and a
comprehensive and balanced relationship between all the organs within the
administration (2000 Romanian Report, 16). The gap between adoption of the acts
and their effective implementation should be constantly diminishing (2000
Bulgarian Report, 15). The creation of special units to deal with the acquis-related
matters is always considered a positive step. There are numerous examples to
this: the mentioning in the 2000 Bulgarian Report of the special units
responsible for the EU integration created in every ministry (2000 Bulgarian
Report, 14), creation of special European Committees (2000 Lithuanian Report,
16), Co-ordination Councils, to bring together the chairmen of all the units
responsible for the chapters of the acquis in a particular candidate
country (2000 Bulgarian Report, 15), appointment of Ministers, responsible for
the European integration (2002 Bulgarian Report, 21). The whole system of the Executive should be transparent(58) and accountable, open to consultation and to the
coordination of policies with the affected parties in the society.(59) It should also be completely demilitarised,
including the police (2000 Bulgarian Report, 15; 2001 Romanian Report, 18),
which should be composed of civilian public servants, serving the rule of
law (2002 Romanian Report, 24). Such an ideal executive should also be timely in conducting
reforms. On several occasions the Reports were explicitly pushing the candidate
countries to speed up the reform. This is clear not only in the cases of legal
gaps, but also as applied to the transitional periods for entry into force of
the most important pieces of legislation. The 2002 Czech Report, for example,
is critical about the 2006 deadline for full entry into force of the Czech
Civil Service Act, stating that an acceleration of the timetable for
implementation would be desirable (2002 Czech Report, 21). Just as in the case of the legislature, even in a situation when almost
all the aforementioned features of the executive are absent, the country still
meets the Copenhagen political criteria. The majority of the candidate
countries did not have any difficulties with meeting the political criterion
related to the organisation and functioning of the executive in 1997 when the
Commissions Opinions were released and at the same time only few of them
had a Civil Service law back then. The Commission itself used to admit that
training had been insufficient, salaries  too low, the transparency of
administration had only existed on paper and the appointments had often been
highly politicised; not to mention the military nature of the police, the
unclear structure of organs and a number of other factors. 20 Thus it follows that the threshold for meeting the criteria in the field
of the structure and regulation of the executive is even lower than that
applied to Parliaments. The most important element of reform, as it seems, is
to demonstrate the willingness to move forward towards the ideal
executive. Once the Commission is assured of that, this element of Democracy
and the Rule of Law criterion is met. III.d. Functioning of the Judiciary As far as the judiciary is concerned, the inherent weakness of the
judiciary (1998 Paper, 3) is listed among common problems of all
candidate countries. Recognising the importance of the issue, the Composite
Papers did not, however, allocate much space to the discussion of the judicial
reform in the candidate countries. The 1999 Paper, for example, only says that
A common challenge for all the candidate countries is the
strengthening of judiciary. Considerable effort has been made to train judges,
fill vacancies and launch a process of reforms aimed at improving the handling
of cases (1999 Paper, 15; also 2000 Paper, 16). A change in the assessment of reform in this field only came about with
the adoption of the 2002 Strategy Paper, which included the six most important
elements of reform, praising the candidate countries for their progress in the
adoption of basic legislation, strengthening the human resources of the
judiciary, improving working conditions, the introduction of the mechanisms of
due-enforcement of court decisions, the improvement of citizens access to
justice and the tackling the problem of backlogs (2002 Paper, 13). Together
with the emphasis put on the importance of the independence of the judiciary in
the 2001 Paper (2001 Paper, 10) and the discussion of the issue in the 1998
Opinions and Regular Reports, the Paper provides enough information for the
analysis of this aspect of the Copenhagen political criteria. Following the most important reform-grounds it is possible to structure
the discussion of the elements of the Copenhagen political criteria related to
the candidate countries judiciary as follows: Independence of the judiciary; Training of judges; Filling the judicial vacancies; Improvement of peoples access to justice; Improvement in the handling of cases; Effective enforcement of court decisions. From the textual analysis of the Copenhagen-related documents it follows
that in order to meet the criterion of Democracy and the Rule of Law, the
judiciary should be independent(60) well
staffed(61) and well trained,(62) well paid,(63) efficient,
respected(64) and accessible to people. The
self-governance of it should be real, including the non-interference of the
other branches of power in the training of judges in a special Judicial
Institute,(65) the work of their self-governing
bodies(66) and their appointment,(67) as well as the work of courts.(68) The Lithuanian Constitutional Court ruling which found that
some powers of the Ministry of Justice of the republic in the administering of
justice contradicted the Constitution ( Jarainas et al.
2003, 588) was welcomed by the Commission and mentioned in the 2000 Regular
Report.(69) The budget of the judiciary should
also be largely in the hands of the judges.(70)
The Reports also demonstrate that lowering of the judges salaries is a
breach of judicial independence: 2002 Lithuanian Report regards the Lithuanian
Constitutional Courts decision on prohibition of lowering of salaries of
judges(71) as a positive development (2002
Lithuanian Report, 23). 21 The handling of cases should be speedy and efficient, with no backlogs,
as judges should be specialised in different fields (2001 Hungarian Report, 17;
1999 Lithuanian Report, 12), well trained(72) and
assisted by auxiliary staff (2001 Czech Report, 19), whose competences have to
be clearly assigned by law (1999 Bulgarian Report, 12). The courts
infrastructure should be of good standard and remains further
upgraded (2002 Estonian Report, 25). Training of judges should include
human rights (2001 Czech Report, 19; 2002 Czech Report, 23), functioning of
market economy (2000 Bulgarian Report, 17) and European Union law (2002 Czech
Report, 23; 2000 Lithuanian Report, 17). According to the Commission, the situation with the training of judges
in the field of EU law is especially good in Hungary, where judges are obliged
to follow a postgraduate course in EU law(73) and
Poland, where training in EU law is also compulsory (2001 Polish Report, 20).
In several cases, the Reports point at obvious conflicts between the principle
of judicial independence and an urgent necessity to improve the training of the
judiciary. The Czech Constitutional court found that independence of the
judiciary is incompatible with either compulsory training or re-evaluation of
judges competence. Unlike the academics, who saw a source of concern in
such a development ( losarík 2002) , the Commission, reporting on it
remained neutral (2002 Czech Report, 22). Another example is provided by
Estonia, where the re-training of judges is compulsory and the Reports assess
the progress of the Estonian judiciary very positively. At the same time, the
fact that 60% of judges and prosecutors have undergone 112 hours of
training each (2000 Estonian Report, 15), reported by the Commission,
does not mean that enough progress has been achieved. The Report continues
finding that lowest-level courts decisions are unsatisfactory (2000
Estonian Report, 15). In-service training of the judiciary is also practiced in
other candidate countries, for example Romania (2000 Romanian Report, 17). The appointment of judges should be transparent (2000 Bulgarian Report,
17) as well as their promotion opportunities (2000 Bulgarian Report, 17; 2002
Estonian Report, 24). Their performance should be evaluated (2000 Bulgarian
Report, 17; 1999 Latvian Report, 12) based on the uniform methods and
criteria (2002 Bulgarian Report, 25), not interfering with the
independence of the judiciary. Access to legal aid should be provided to all,(74) and speedy(75)
court decisions, based on modern law,(76) have to
be respected and willingly executed by other branches of power and the parties,
assisted by a bailiffs (2001 Czech Report, 18; 2002 Latvian Report, 21) system
in place. The recommendations of the Commission might sometimes be really
far-reaching, including the requirement of Constitutional change. 2001
Bulgarian Report, for example, demands that the Constitution of the republic be
changed in order to better address the magistrates immunity (2001
Bulgarian Report, 17) and the structure of judiciary.(77) No need to mention that the system of judiciary in all the candidate
countries was quite different from the ideal standard by the time
they were recognised by the Commission as meeting the Copenhagen criteria. This is to say in order to meet the Copenhagen political criteria as far
as the judiciary is concerned, a heavily understaffed and insufficiently
trained body of judges without any technical assistance, slowly passing
unsatisfactory decisions, which are often not executed at all (a
picture following from the Commissions criticism of the candidate
countries which met the criteria) seems to be enough. 22 Thus, the existence of the system of courts and adherence to the goals
of independence and effectiveness of the judiciary and the rule of law make up
the necessary threshold in order to meet the Copenhagen political criteria.
III.e. Anti-Corruption Measures The last element of the structure of the Copenhagen political criterion
of Democracy and the Rule of Law relates to anti-corruption measures.
Obviously, logically speaking, the section on the fight with corruption does
not go well within the classification based on the assessment of the state of
play in all the branches of power of the candidate countries. The majority of
issues discussed in the anti-corruption section have already been covered by
the sections dealing with the state of preparedness for accession of the
branches of power of the candidate countries. At the same time, once it has
been decided to stick to the classification to be found in the Regular Reports
in order to be as close to the Commissions view as possible in the
present assessment, it is necessary to discuss the Commissions attitude
to this element of democracy and rule of law criterion. The fight with Corruption is outlined as a separate subject in all the
Commission Papers (1998 Paper, 3; 1999 Paper, 15; 2000 Paper, 16; 2001 Paper,
10; 2002 Paper, 13) and all the Regular Reports. While the Papers mostly talk
about the importance of the problem and some improvements, the Reports provide
a rather detailed analysis of progress in the area of fight against corruption.
According to the Commission, corruption is widespread in the candidate
countries in various sectors, including, in particular, customs service,
municipalities, medical services, the police, taxation authorities and courts
(1999 Bulgarian Report, 13). Unfortunately, the authorities do not respond to
it adequately (1998 Polish Report, 11). It is possible to divide the anti-corruption sections of the Reports
into two main elements: internal, including the elaboration of national
programmes of fight against corruption, amendments to national legislation,
simplification of licensing regimes, etc. and external, including
ratification of the main international anti-corruption documents and
participation in the Council of Europe Group of Countries for Fight Against
Corruption (GRECO). The internal aspect of fight against corruption mostly consists of
several elements: drafting and implementation of a comprehensive
anti-corruption programme (1998 Bulgarian Report, 9; 2001 Bulgarian Report, 19,
2001 Hungarian Report, 18; 1999 Polish Report, 15), adoption of special
Anti-corruption acts (1998 Bulgarian Report, 9; 1999 Estonian Report, 11; 2002
Lithuanian Report, 25), amending national penal legislation (1998 Bulgarian
Report, 9; 1999 Bulgarian Report, 13; 2000 Bulgarian Report, 18; 2002 Bulgarian
Report, 26; 1998 Czech Report, 9; 1999 Czech Report, 14; 2001 Czech Report, 20;
1999 Hungarian Report, 12; 2002 Hungarian Report, 26) and the structure of the
law-enforcement organs (2001 Czech Report, 20; 1999 Hungarian Report, 12),
introduction of tighter controls over the civil servants,(78) improvement of regulation of lobbying activities (2001
Hungarian Report, 18; 2000 Lithuanian Report, 18), adoption of public
procurement laws (2000 Bulgarian Report, 18) and simplification of licensing
regimes (2001 Bulgarian Report, 20; 2002 Bulgarian Report, 26; 1999 Polish
Report, 15). The Commission also welcomes the creation of special organs and posts
outside the law enforcement machinery, like the Czech Minister without
portfolio, whose task is to deal with corruption and the Analytical Commission
headed by him (1999 Czech Report, 14), or the Corruption Prevention Division of
the State Revenue Service (1999 Latvian Report, 13), or the High Commission of
Ethics in Office (1999 Lithuanian Report, 12). 23 External aspect of fight against corruption includes ratification of a
number of international documents(79) and
participation of the Council of Europe Group of States against Corruption
(GRECO). IV. Conclusions
The changes, introduced into the legal regulation of enlargements with
the fifth enlargement round are enormous. This unprecedented enlargement also
served a testing ground to try some new approaches to the enlargement
regulation. The Copenhagen criteria rightfully occupy one of the leading places
among the newly-introduced enlargement regulation instruments. The majority of
the criteria formulated by the Copenhagen European Council in 1993 represent a
codification of the enlargement practices existing before. The European Council
and the Commission, together with the Council of Ministers managed to build the
whole enlargement regulation around these criteria. This process started with
making the Reporting on the compliance with the criteria a regular exercise and
was further enforced by two developments: firstly by the attaining by the
criteria of a legally binding effect, following the entry into force of the
first Accession Partnerships and secondly, by giving the Copenhagen political
criteria a priority among the whole set of criteria, which allowed the Union
make the criteria instrumental at all the stages of the enlargement process.
Not only was the accession in itself but also the time of opening of accession
negotiations linked to the compliance with the criteria. Based on the political
conditionality and on the Copenhagen criteria as its main tool, a concept of
merit-based enlargement was introduced. Only the state of preparedness of the
candidate countries, impartially assessed by the Commission could be the basis
for the decisions to include an applicant among the candidate countries and to
start the enlargement negotiations. At the same time, already after the release of the Opinions on the
Application for Membership of the European Union by the Commission it became
clear that the fifth enlargement did not really become a merit-based process.
The Commission failed its task to make the Regular Reports on preparedness to
the accession full and impartial. The reason for this can be found in the
Copenhagen criteria themselves. With a wording so broad and overinclusive,
neither the candidate countries nor the Commission really knew how to apply
them in practice. The general uncertainty about the meaning and the scope of
the criteria resulted in a situation when the preparation to enlargement could
be compared at a certain point to a game of guesses. The enlargement process
suffered because of ambiguity of the meaning and vagueness of the Copenhagen
criteria. After the reporting on the candidates progress towards accession
became regular, the body of the documents related to the implementation of the
Copenhagen criteria started growing incredibly fast: dozens of documents were
released every year. The structure of the elements of the first Copenhagen political
criterion Democracy and the Rule of Law proposed by this paper is
based only on the documents released by the Union in relation to the criteria,
which allows understanding the Unions standpoint better. These documents
can help clarify what meaning the Union conveyed to Democracy and the Rule of
Law for the purposes of accession. Surprisingly, it is clear that the Union does not make a distinction
between the principles of democracy and the rule of law, uniting them in one
organic combination. As the paper has demonstrated, these notions
are not synonymous and their fusion can potentially be problematic. It is
possible to observe that the Copenhagen related documents give priority to the
assessment of the rule of law, without concentrating on the analysis of the
democratic process in the candidate countries in necessary detail. 24 Overall, the democracy and the rule of law criterion, as understood by
the Institutions, consists of five elements, including free and fair elections; the functioning of the legislature; the functioning of the executive; the functioning of the judiciary and the fight against corruption. There are also 16 sub-elements of the criterion (see figure 1). Figure
1 From the structure adopted by the Commission for the assessment of the
candidate countries compliance with the criterion it is clear that the
division of powers is a necessary element of the criterion. The Copenhagen-related documents do not provide an in-depth analysis of
the criterion, which follows, firstly, from a marginal amount of space
dedicated to the analysis of democracy and the rule of law in the documents
(even the criterion of Minority protection is analysed in greater detail) and,
secondly, from the general approach of the Commission to the assessment
exercise. The Commission does not give reasons for picking certain issues for
discussion while being silent on other matters. Generally following the same
structure, in its reports the Commission raises different questions. This
difference does not only vary from country to country, but also from one
reporting round to another. Also, the assessment of developments given by the
Commission is often ambiguous. Some developments in the candidate countries are
mentioned without any positive or negative accompanying assessment, which
sometimes makes the interpretation of such statements very difficult. This
paper adopts a positive assessment presumption, interpreting such
statements made by the commission as acknowledgements of positive developments.
Following from the analysis of the Copenhagen-related documents, the
main problem in relation with the criterion of Democracy and the Rule of law is
that the Union put the threshold to meet this criterion so low that the main
idea behind the introduction of the criteria was disregarded. The Commission
clearly was not critical enough in its conclusions. According to the reports,
the criterion of democracy and the rule of law is met, for example, even in the
situations when the executive legislates instead of Parliament, when the
quality of court decisions is unacceptable, the system and legal
regulation of Civil Service are absent and bribery is flourishing. An ambiguous
situation was created, where the texts of the reports mainly contradicted the
conclusions drawn from them. As a result, the institutions and especially the Commission failed the
task of linking the acknowledgement of the fulfilment of the Copenhagen
criteria with the real progress in the candidate countries. By announcing in
1997 that all the CEECs applicants apart from Slovakia met the criteria, the
Commission deprived itself of needed room for manoeuvre.(80) In the light of these observations it becomes clear that while from the
procedural point of view the fifth enlargement was very different from the
previous enlargement rounds, substantively, the requirement to have the
institutions guaranteeing democracy and the rule of law in place was very
similar to a formal condition applied during the previous enlargement rounds
and reflected in the Commissions submissions in Mattheus case.
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(1) Especially the passage about
drawing inspiration from the cultural, religious and humanist inheritance
of Europe, the values of which, still present in its heritage, have embedded
within the life of society the central role of the human person and his or her
inviolable and inalienable rights, and respect for law, OJ C 169,
2003. (2) See e.g. the Commissions
opinion on accession of Greece: European Commission, Opinion of 23 May 1979,
OJ 1979 L 291, at 3; and on the accession of Portugal and Spain:
European Commission, Opinion of 31 May 1985, OJ 1985, L 302, at 3. (3) See e. g. Council Declaration of
European identity, enforcing human rights and democratic rule (13-14 December
1973), Joint Declaration of the European Parliament, The Council and The
Commission on the respect of fundamental rights (5 April 1977), European
Council Document, adopting the Joint Declaration (7-8 April 1978), Bull.
EC 3-1978; European Parliament Declaration on Fundamental Rights and
Freedoms (12 April 1989), The Council, Commission and European Parliament
Joined Declaration on democracy, transparency and subsidiarity (25 October
1993), etc. (4) See e. g. Case 138/79
Rocquette Frères v. Council [1980] ECR 3333; Case
139/79 Maizena GmbH v. Council of the European Communities [1980]
ECR 3339; Case C-388/92 European Parliament v. Council
[1994] ECR I-2067; Case C-65/93 European Parliament v.
Council [1995] ECR I-643. (5) Case 93/78 Mattheus v. Doego
[1978] ECR 2203. (6) Case 93/78 Mattheus v. Doego
[1978] ECR 2203, at 2208. (7) The Council is not obliged to follow
Commissions Opinions on application for membership. According to
Art.49(1) TEU it acts unanimously after consulting the Commission.
Similar wording was contained in Arts. 237(1)EEC and 205(1) EURATOM (acts
unanimously after obtaining the Opinion of the Commission). (8) Accession Treaty signed on 20 May 1979,
OJ 1979 L 291/5 and entered into force on 1 January 1981. (9) Interestingly, further on this statement
was misquoted by the European Council itself. Referring to the conclusions of
the Luxembourg European Council, the Cologne European Council (3-4.06.1999)
stated that decisions on the opening of further negotiations can only be
taken on the basis of the criteria established by the Copenhagen European
Council, without referring solely to the Copenhagen political criteria.
See Conclusions of the Presidency, para 59. (10) Both these countries met the
Copenhagen political criteria in 1997 but were not invited to join the Union
together with other 8 Central and East European countries in the year 2004.
(11) The delay is easily explainable: the
European Union was not itself ready to accommodate the new Member States. For
this reason the possibility of enlargement was linked to a completion of the
institutional reform of the Union, which has been stressed during several
European Council meetings, starting with the 1993 Copenhagen European Council,
where it was stated that The Unions capacity to absorb the new
Members, while maintaining the momentum of European integration, is also an
important consideration in the general interest of both the Union and the
candidate countries (SN 180/93, at 12). That is why the opening of any
accession negotiations was postponed until the conclusion of the 1996 IGC, see
Presidency Conclusions of the Essen European Council (9-10.12.1994) and
Florence European Council (21-22.06.1996). (12) Hungary (31 March 1994); Poland (5
April 1994); Romania (22 June 1995); Slovakia (27 June 1995); Latvia (13
October 1995); Estonia (24 November 1995); Lithuania (8 December 1995);
Bulgaria (14 December 1994); Czech Republic (17 January 1996) and Slovenia (10
June 1996). (13) Agenda 2000  Commission
Opinion on Estonias Application for Membership of the European Union,
Brussels, 15.07.1997, DOC/97/12 (further Estonia Opinion);
DOC/97/13 (Hungary Opinion); DOC/97/14 (Latvia
Opinion); DOC/97/15 (Lithuania Opinion); DOC/97/16
(Poland Opinion); DOC/97/17 (Czech Republic Opinion);
DOC/97/18 (Romania Opinion); DOC/97/19 (Slovenia
Opinion); DOC/97/20 (Slovakia Opinion). The Opinion on Malta
was released two years later, following the March 1998 communication from the
Maltese government stating the desire to reactivate Maltese application for
membership in the EU. On 5 October the Council request the Commission to update
its 1993 Opinion on the application of Malta, which resulted in the
Commissions Report Updating the Commission Opinion on Maltas
Application for Membership, Brussels, 17.02.1999, COM(1999) 69 final. The
Cyprus Opinion was released on June 30, 1993; see DOC/93/5. (14) Council Decision concerning the
Application made by Estonia was taken on 4.12.1995; Latvia on 30.10.1995;
Lithuania on 29.01.1996; Poland on 18.04.1995; Czech Republic on 29.01.1996;
Slovakia on 17.07.1995; Slovenia on 15.07.1996; Hungary on 18.04.1995; Romania
on 17.07.1995; Bulgaria on 29.01.1996. (15) Since the release of such documents
is not regulated by the TEU or the Copenhagen (1993) European Council
Conclusions, it was done upon the request of the European Councils, starting
with Luxembourg (12 and 13 December 1997). Agenda 2000 contained a proposal to
make the assessment of progress on a regular basis. (16) See Bull. EC No 8649, 2004, at
6. (17) The first round (1998) did not
include a Report on Malta, since the Maltese application was still suspended,
and the last round (2003) only included three reports: on progress of Romania,
Bulgaria and Turkey, since they were released after the signing of the 2003
Accession Treaty. 1998 Regular Reports from the Commission on
Progress towards Accession by Each of the Candidate Countries were released on
4.11.1998 (further 1998 Reports). All in all 12 reports were
drafted. 1999 Regular Reports from the Commission on Progress
towards Accession by Each of the Candidate Countries were released on
13.10.1999 (further 1999 Reports). All in all 13 reports were
drafted. 2000 Regular Reports from the Commission on Progress
towards Accession by Each of the Candidate Countries were released on 8.11.2000
(further 2000 Reports). All in all 13 reports were drafted.
2001 Regular Reports from the Commission on Progress towards
Accession by Each of the Candidate Countries were released on 13.11.2001
(further 2001 Reports). All in all 13 reports were drafted.
Bulgaria  SEC(2001) 1744; Cyprus  SEC(2001) 1745; Czech
Republic SEC(2001) 1746; Estonia SEC(2001) 1747; Hungary 
SEC(2001) 1748; Latvia  SEC(2001) 1749; Lithuania  SEC(2001) 1750;
Poland  SEC(2001) 1751; Romania  SEC(2001) 1752; Slovakia 
SEC(2001) 1753; Slovenia  SEC(2001) 1754; Malta  SEC(2001) 1755;
Turkey  SEC(2001) 1756. 2002 Regular Reports from the
Commission on Progress towards Accession by Each of the Candidate Countries
were released on 9.10.2002. See COM(2002) 700 final. All in all 13 reports were
drafted. Bulgaria  SEC(2002) 1400; Cyprus  SEC(2002) 1401; Czech
Republic SEC(2002) 1402; Estonia SEC(2002) 1403; Hungary 
SEC(2002) 1404; Latvia  SEC(2002) 1405; Lithuania  SEC(2002) 1406;
Poland  SEC(2002) 1407; Romania  SEC(2002) 1408; Slovakia 
SEC(2002) 1409; Slovenia  SEC(2002) 1410; Malta  SEC(2002) 1411;
Turkey  SEC(2002) 1412. 2003 Regular Reports from the
were released on 5.11.2003. All in all 3 reports were drafted: for Bulgaria,
Romania and Turkey. (18) The Vienna European Council
(11-12.12.1998) welcomed the first Progress Reports from the Commission and
asked for the preparation of the second round of Reports, Presidency
Conclusions, para 58; The third round of Progress Reports was asked by the
Helsinki European Council (10-11.12.1999), Presidency Conclusions, para 6; and
so on. Thus all in all 97 documents were drafted by the Commission in response
to the Luxembourg European Council request. (19) 1998 Composite Paper Reports on
Progress towards Accession by Each of the Candidate Countries, COM(1998)
712 final; and 1999 Composite Paper Reports on Progress towards Accession by
Each of the Candidate Countries, COM(1999) 500 final. (20) The Commission issued four Strategy
Papers: 2000 Enlargement Strategy Paper Report on Progress towards Accession
by Each of the Candidate Countries, COM(2000) 700 final; 2001 Making a
Success of Enlargement Strategy Paper and Report of the European Commission on
the Progress towards Accession by Each of the Candidate Countries,
COM(2001) 700 final, SEC(2001) 1744-1753; 2002 Towards the Enlarged Union
Strategy Paper and Report of the European Commission on the Progress towards
Accession by Each of the Candidate Countries, COM(2002) 700 final,
SEC(2002) 1400-1412; 2003 Continuing Enlargement Strategy Paper and Report
of the European Commission on the Progress towards accession by Bulgaria,
Romania and Turkey, COM(2003) 676 final (21) OJ L236, 2003. (22) As requested by the Presidency
Conclusions of the Copenhagen European Council (12  13 December 2002),
para 5. (23) 2003 Comprehensive Monitoring Reports
on Preparations for Membership by Each of the ten new Member States were
released on 5.11.2003. (24) 2003 Comprehensive Monitoring
Report of the European Commission on the State of Preparedness for EU
Membership of the Czech Republic, Estonia, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary,
Malta, Poland, Slovenia and Slovakia COM(2003) 675 final. (25) Art. 4 of the Regulation 622/98. (26) Council Decisions of March 30, 1998:
98/266/EC (Bulgaria); 98/267/EC (Czech Republic); 98/264/EC (Estonia);
98/259/EC (Hungary); 98/263/EC (Latvia); 98/265/EC (Lithuania); 98/260/EC
(Poland); 98/261/EC (Romania); 98/262/EC (Slovakia); 98/268/EC (Slovenia). See
OJ L121/1-46, 1998. (27) Council Decisions of December 6,
1999: 1999/857/EC (Bulgaria); 1999/858/EC (Czech Republic); 1999/855/EC
(Estonia); 1999/850/EC (Hungary); 1999/854/EC (Latvia); 1999/856/EC
(Lithuania); 1999/851/EC (Poland); 1999/852/EC (Romania); 1999/853/EC
(Slovakia); 1999/859/EC (Slovenia). See OJ L335/1-61, 1999. (28) For Malta and Cyprus see Council
Regulation (EC) 555/2000 on the implementation operations in the framework of
the pre-accession strategy for the Republic of Cyprus and the Republic of
Malta, OJ L68/3, 2000. Accession Partnerships: Council Decisions of
March 20, 2000: 2000/248/EC and 2000/249/EC, OJ L078/10 and 17
respectively. (29) Council Regulation (EC) 390/2001 on
the assistance to Turkey in the framework of the pre-accession strategy and in
particular on the establishment of an Accession Partnership, OJ L058/1.
The first Accession Partnership: Council Decision of March 8, 2001 2001/235/EC,
OJ L085/13. (30) Council Decisions of January 28,
2002: 2002/83/EC (Bulgaria); 2002/84/EC (Cyprus); 2002/85/EC (Czech Republic);
2002/86/EC (Estonia); 2002/87/EC (Hungary); 2002/88/EC (Latvia); 2002/89/EC
(Lithuania); 2002/90/EC (Malta); 2002/91/EC (Poland); 2002/92/EC (Romania);
2002/93/EC (Slovakia); 2002/94/EC (Slovenia). See OJ L044/1-101,
2002. (31) Council Decisions of May 13, 2003:
2003/396/EC (Bulgaria); 2003/397/EC (Romania); 2003/398/EC (Turkey). See OJ
L145/1-40, 2003. (32) Chapter 2 of 1998 Composite Paper,
2001 and 2002 Strategy Papers; Chapter 3 of the 1999 Composite Paper and 2000
Strategy Paper. (33) 1998 Composite Paper dedicates to
Political criteria a half of page 3 and page 4; 1999 Paper: pages 14, 15 and
half of 16; 2000 Paper: half of 15, 16 and 17; 2001 Paper: pages 10, 11, 12;
2002 Paper: pages 13 and half of 14. (34) Where it appeared in the TEU Preamble
and Arts. J.1(2) (now Art.11(1) TEU) and 130u(2) (now Art.177(2)EC). Art.6(1)
TEU introduced at Amsterdam increased the importance of the concept, especially
in the light of the Art.7 TEU procedure, allowing for the suspension of the
Member States rights in case of a serious and persistent breach of the
principle; and in the light of Art.49 TEU, as amended by Amsterdam, which
introduced adherence to the principle of the Rule of Law as a necessary
requirement for those willing to join the Union. (35) Opinion 1/91 of 14 December 1991
(Draft agreement relating to the European Economic Area) [1991] ECR 6097. (36) The Commission criticised the
creation of committees of enquiry with the terms of reference exceeding those
granted by the Constitution, see Slovak Opinion, at functioning of
Parliament; instances when a Parliament ignored a Constitutional Court
Ruling, see 1998 Slovak Report, at 9. (37) The Commission demonstrated concerns
with the situations when the candidate countrys Parliament was only able
to adopt a small part of draft laws introduced by the Government, see 2000
Romanian Report, at 15. The Commission welcomed progress in the filed of
Parliaments efficiency (see 2001 Romanian Report, at 16), including the
reforms of the Parliamentary structure (see 2001 Slovenian Report, at 15). It
also monitors the reforms of Standing Orders, see 1999 Slovenian Report, at 13;
2000 Slovenian Report, at 14 (outlining the problem); 2001 Slovenian Report, at
15 (monitoring the status of the new Standing Orders); 2002 Slovenian Report,
at 20 (discussing the finally adopted Standing Orders). (38) The Commission criticised the
countries where the procedures to adopt legislation were too long, see
Slovenian Opinion, at Functioning of Parliament, 1999 Czech Report,
at 12; 2000 Slovenian Report, at 13. (39) The situation when too much scrutiny
is provided was criticized by the Commission, see 2000 Slovenian Report, at 14
and 2001 Slovenian Report, at 15. Too little scrutiny is not an admissible
situation either, see 2002 Romanian Report, at 21. (40) The Commission repeatedly pointed out
the negative character of the lack of a system of minority representation in
Hungarian Parliament, which is required by the Constitution, see 1998 Hungary
Report, at 8; 1999 Hungary Report, at 11; 2000 Hungary Report, at 13; 2001
Hungary Report, at 15. (41) See e.g. 2000 Bulgarian
Report, at 14; 1999 Czech Report (concerning the Senate), at 12; 2000 Czech
Report (concerning the Chamber of Deputies), at 16; 1998 Lithuanian Report, at
7; 2002 Polish Report, at 22. (42) By either adoption by Parliament of
its own strategy of integration into the Union (see 2000 Latvian Report, at
15), or of a special resolution (2001 Lithuanian Report, at 17). See also 2002
Czech Report, at 20. (43) Discussing minority protection,
Maresceau came to a conclusion that the reports produced by privately-sponsored
Institutes are more detailed and often contradict the findings of the
Commission. Maresceau (2003), 34. See OSI Reports: <http://www.eumap.org>. (44) Such a conclusion can be made after a
simple comparison of the average number of pages dedicated to the Legislature
and the Executive in the Regular Reports. (45) 1998 Bulgarian Report, at 8; 2000
Estonian Report, at 14 (emphasising the lack of a comprehensive strategy for
public service reform); 1998 Romanian Report, at 8 (welcoming the fact that the
strategy for reform is under elaboration). (46) 1998 Czech Report, at 8; 1999 Czech
Report, at 12; 2000 Czech Report, at 18; 1998 Lithuanian Report, at 8; 1999
Romanian Report, at 12; Slovak Report, at 10. (all stating that the Civil
Service Law is absent); 1998 Polish Report, at 10, giving positive assessment
to the draft of the new Civil Service law to amend the 1996 version of it and
1999 Polish Report, welcoming the revision of the Civil Service law, at 14.
(47) 2001 Latvian Report, at 15. A
situation may arise when only a marginal proportion of those employed in the
administration has such a status. 2001 Polish Report, for example, points out
that only 0.7% of the administration workers have a civil servants status
(at 18). The increase in percentage of those holding the status among the
employees in the Administration is regarded by the Commission as a positive
development: see 2001 Bulgarian Report, at 15. (48) 2000 Lithuanian Report, at 16; 2000
Czech Report, at 18 (criticism of the fact that such a division is not in
place). (49) Recruitment of high level staff
without an open competition via suspension of some provisions of the national
Civil Service Act is not desirable: 2002 Polish Report, at 22. (50) The situation when a large portion of
remuneration is constituted by bonuses and allowances is criticised by the
Commission as lacking transparency: 2001 Estonian Report, at 16. System of
remuneration should be unified and should cover all the civil servants: 2001
Latvian Report, at 15. (51) 2000 Bulgarian Report, at 14.
According to the Commission, low salaries cause high turnover of staff in the
civil service, consequences of which are harmful. See 1998 Estonian Report, at
8; 1999 Estonian Report, at 11. (52) Including, for example, a special
institute for Public Administration: 2000 Bulgarian Report, at 14; 2002 Czech
Report, at 21; 2000 Lithuanian Report, at 16. Progress in the field of training
of the civil servants is closely monitored: 2002 Bulgarian Report, at 23; 2000
Hungarian Report, at 14; 2000 Lithuanian Report, at 16. (53) 2002 Czech Report, at 21; according
to the Hungarian 2001 Civil Service Law, every civil servant is obliged to be
proficient in at least one EU language and pass an examination on EU related
matters, 2001 Hungarian Report, at 16. (54) 2002 Czech Report, at 21 (discussing
the General Directorate for Civil Service); 1998 Romanian Report, at 8
(welcoming the initiative to create a Commission for the Civil Service). (55) The Reports provide examples where
such a body is not de facto in charge of the management of civil
service, which is not admissible. See 2001 Romanian Report, at 18. (56) 1999 Bulgarian Report, at 12,
discussing the creation of decentralised institutions in 28 oblasti
(Bulgarian administrative regions); 1998 Czech Report, at 15, creation of 14
Higher Self-Governing Units; 1998 Polish Report, discussing the reform of all
the three levels of Polish self-government, including the voivodshps
(main regions); see also 2001 Polish Report, at 17; 1998 Romanian Report,
at 8. (57) European Charter of Local
Self-Governance, CETS No. 122, Strasbourg, 15 October, 1985. (58) Access to public information is very
important in this context. Estonian Public Information Act of 2001 provides an
example of legislation fully approved by the Commission: 2001 Estonian Report,
at 17. (59) 2000 Bulgarian Report, at 15
(insufficient coordination with the interested parties); 2001 Bulgarian Report,
at 16 (consultation needs to be further improved). (60) The lack of legal framework
guaranteeing judicial independence is criticised. 1998 Bulgarian report, at 8;
1999 Bulgarian Report, at 12. In the view of the Commission judicial
independence does not mean excessive immunity: 2001 Bulgarian Report, at
17. (61) 1998 Bulgarian Report, at 8; 1998
Romanian Report, at 9; 1998 Czech Report, at 8, pointing at the necessity to
fill the judicial vacancies and outlining the importance of the problem. (62) The training of judiciary is often
found unsatisfactory (2001 Bulgarian Report, at 18; 1998 Czech Report, at 8;
1999 Czech Report, at 11) or even announced a top priority for reform (1998
Estonian Report, at 8). (63) Some reports stress the fact that the
salaries of judges are low (1998 Czech Report, at 8; 1998 Latvian Report, at
9), while in some countries the situation is different, the salaries of judges
being relatively high (2000 Czech Report, at 19; 1999 Lithuanian
Report, at 12) or equal to the highest incomes in the public sector
(2000 Romanian Report, at 18). (64) The Reports talk about the necessity
to create a society where the courts enjoy public confidence: 1998 Bulgarian
Report, at 8; 1999 Bulgarian Report, at 12. (65) 2002 Czech Report, at 23; 1998
Romanian Report, at 9; 2000 Romanian Report, at 17. The Reports are critical of
delays with granting the Romanian National Institute of Magistracy a
self-governing status: 2002 Romanian Report, at 25. (66) 2002 Czech Report, at 22; 2002
Estonian Report, at 23; 1998 Hungary Report, at 8; 2002 Lithuanian Report, at
23 (all either just stating that such an organ has been created or also
containing its structure and scope of powers); 1999 Lithuanian Report, at
12. (67) 2001 Romanian Report, at 20. The fact
that too many members of the Superior Council of the Magistracy in Romania are
appointed by the Ministry of Justice is in breach of the principle of judicial
independence. (68) The cases when the courts are
administered by the executive are criticised. See 2001 Estonian Report, at 18;
2001 Latvian Report, at 19; 2002 Latvian Report, at 21. Any guidelines or
directions given by the executive to the Courts are in breach of the principle
of judicial independence: 2001 Romanian Report, at 20. (69) 2000 Lithuanian Report, at 16. (70) The Commission is critical about the
practices of judicial budget cuts in some candidate countries: 2001 Bulgarian
Report, at 18. (71) Ruling 158 of 12 July 2001 of the
Lithuanian Constitutional Court. (72) Specific training is necessary before
the entry into profession: 2000 Bulgarian Report, at 17. (73) 1999 Hungarian Report, at 12; in
Lithuania every applicant for a judicial post is supposed to be trained in EU
law: 1999 Lithuanian Report, at 12. (74) The situation when provision of
legal aid remains fragmented is not admissible, 2002 Estonian Report, at
25. See also 1999 Bulgarian Report, at 12; 2000 Bulgarian Report, at 17; 2002
Hungarian Report, at 25; 2001 Polish Report (stating that access to
justice remains limited), at 24. (75) The length of proceedings (both
criminal and civil) is often characterised as considerable. See
2000 Czech Report, at 19; 2000 Latvian Report, at 17; 1998 Lithuanian Report,
at 8 (76) Much attention is given to the
amendments of legal acts, especially of procedural laws. See: 1998 Bulgarian
Report, at 8; 1999 Bulgarian Report, at 12; 2000 Bulgarian Report, at 16; 2000
Czech Report, at 18; 2001 Czech Report, at 18; 2002 Czech Report, at 22; 1999
Estonian Report, at 11; 2001 Estonian Report, at 17; 1999 Latvian Report, at
13; 1999 Lithuanian Report, at 12; 2000 Lithuanian Report, at 17; 1998 Polish
Report, at 10; 2000 Romanian Report, at 17. Special emphasis is made on the
regulation of the investigation procedures (1998 Bulgarian Report, at 8) and
pre-trial detention time (1998 Bulgarian Report, at 8; 1999 Bulgarian Report,
at 12; 1998 Latvian Report, at 9). (77) 2002 Bulgarian Report, at 23. Reforms
of the structure of the judiciary are closely followed by the Commission and
usually get positive assessment: 1998 Bulgarian Report, at 8; 2002 Czech
Report, at 23; 1999 Lithuanian Report, at 12. (78) 2000 Bulgarian Report, at 18; 2001
Hungarian Report, at 18. It also includes the requirement applicable to the
officials to declare property, income and expenses (2000 Bulgarian Report, at
18; 2000 Lithuanian Report, at 18), and the lifting of immunity for prosecution
of high ranking officers (2000 Lithuanian Report, at 18). (79) Council of Europe Convention on
Laundering, Search, Seizure and Confiscation of the Proceeds from Crime,
Strasbourg, 8.XI.1990, ETS no.141; Council of Europe Criminal Law Convention on
Corruption, Strasbourg, 27.I.1999, ETC no.173; Council of Europe Civil Law
Convention on Corruption, Strasbourg, 4.XI.1999, ETC no.174; Organisation for
Economic Co-operation and Development Convention on Combating Bribery of
Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions, 21.XI.1997,
DAFFE/IME/BR(97)20. (80) Arguably, the Union may change its
tactics in the future. Especially in the case of Turkey it is clear that the
criteria are applied more cautiously. ©2004 by Kochenov formated and tagged by MN,