Paper Titles & Abstracts

The present study considers the impact of European Union (EU) policy on the Commonwealth of Independent States' (CIS) economic development and transformation of its political institutions. The first agreements providing the formal link between the European Community and individual CIS countries were the PCAs, concluded to develop economic, cultural and political cooperation as well as to promote democratic principles of governance in the post Soviet space. The paper seeks to answer the question whether there is a link between the conclusion of the PCAs and economic growth; secondly, through this, it attempts to contribute to answering the broader question of how the EU perceives and positions itself as a normative power with its current neighbourhood and partnership policies. Methodologically, the paper relies on the EU's external governance and rules export theories, the institutional economics literature which establishes the link between political institutions and economic growth, and to the theoretical and econometric models showing the link between the conclusion of the agreements and government democratisation. Most empirical analysis of this type has been conducted on trade agreements concluded with African countries and the EU's Association Agreements. However, not enough studies analyse quantitatively agreements with Eastern European countries. The empirical estimation of the impact of PCAs on the growth of GDP in 12 CIS countries during 1992-2005 was performed applying the panel data method. Although none of the countries showed that the conclusion of the agreement had an essential impact on growth rates, in such countries as Kazakhstan, Moldova, Russia, Ukraine and Uzbekistan, the coefficients of the post-agreement trend were positive and these cases will be analysed further individually.