1. The Eastern Partnership as an opportunity structure for Georgian ngo’s Thijs Rommens Institute for International and European Policy K.U. Leuven, Belgium thijs.rommens@soc.kuleuven.be PhD. research 2008-2012

2. Impetus for research Critical assessment EU democracy promotion post accession Critical assessment democratisation and europeanisation agenda in Georgia --> ambiguity

3. Research question Have the policies of the EU transformed the political environment for Georgian ngo’s, making the EU’s policies a political opportunity structure for them?

4. Theoretical framework Democracy assistance not as: - socialisation - conditionality but as: (network) governance (Börzel, Lavenex,…)

5. Methodology Single case study Qualitative research Process tracing

6. Data collection Literature - primary: EU and domestic governmental - secondary: material produced by ngo’s Elite, semi structured, interviews - exploratory interviews: EU, Ge’n officials, ngo’s - ngo’s members working on EU/ENP/EaP Small scale survey - ngo’s active within National Platform (80)

7. Hypothesis 1)EU: opportunity structure for Georgian ngo’s 2)Creation of new patterns of relations between ngo’s, EU, government 3)Opening up constructive dialogue

8. Preliminary results Limited bottom up interest from ngo’s Slowly growing process of inclusion of ngo’s from side of EU Limited creation networks certain policy fields

9. Some issues Separating EU from other actors? Operationalising concept ‘governance’ Ngo’s:- analytical framework -Link to (civil) society

10. Questions & comments