政治貪腐與歐盟東擴 - 政大學術集成

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(1)International Master’s Program in International Studies National Chengchi University 國立政治大學國際研究英語碩士學位學程. Political Corruption and European Union 政治Enlargement 大立. ‧ 國. 學 ‧. 政治貪腐與歐盟東擴 n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. Ch. i Un. v. e n g c(藍銘磊) hi Milot Ramadani. Advisor: Professor Yen-Pin Su (蘇彥斌), Ph. D.. July, 2020. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(2) Abstract. The enlargement of the European Union (EU) entails a vast range of issues. In addition to necessary institutional requirements, why are some countries more likely to become EU members than others? While previous studies have mainly focused on the role of economic factors, democratic regime, and cultural identity, few studies examine how levels of corruption affect the probability of EU accession. This thesis contends that the level of corruption is a crucial factor for the EU to consider an applicant country’s qualification for obtaining the candidacy status or the membership of the EU after the fifth enlargement (2004-2007). Specifically, I hypothesize that a higher level of corruption tends to reduce the probability of joining the EU, and such a reduction effect is stronger after 2007, compared to. 政治大. the effect before 2008. Using data for 19 European countries from 1990 to 2018, my quantitative analysis supports my hypothesis. The comparative case studies of Croatia and. 立. Kosovo further illustrates the impact of corruption on the prospect of joining the EU. Overall,. ‧ 國. 學. this thesis aims to fill the gap in the literature of European Union politics and provide policy implications for countries that intend to apply for EU membership.. ‧. Keywords. sit er. io. 摘要. y. Nat. European Union, EU Enlargement, Political Corruption, Croatia, Kosovo. al. n. iv n C hengchi U 請國比其他國家更有機會成為歐盟會員國？先前的研究主要從經濟因素、民主體制與歐盟東擴涉及非常廣泛的議題。申請國除了要符合必要的制度性要求外，為何有些申文化因素進行探討。然而，目前從貪腐的角度來研究加入歐盟可能性之相關文獻並不多見。本論文主張，在歐盟第五次擴大之後（2004-2007），歐盟在決定是否給予申請國會籍或候選資格時，會更傾向將申請國的貪腐程度納入考量。具體而言，本論文假設「申請國貪腐程度愈高，會降低加入歐盟的可能性，而這個降低的效應在 2007 年之後比在 2008 年之前來得更強」。本論文利用 19 個歐洲國家自 1990 年到 2018 年的數據資料進行量化分析，實證結果支持本文假設。同時，本文對於克羅埃西亞與科索沃所作的比較案例研究，亦顯示貪腐對於加入歐盟可能性的影響。總體而言，本論文試圖為歐盟政治的文獻提供補充觀點，同時也為有意加入歐盟的國家提供政策啟發。關鍵字：歐洲聯盟；歐盟東擴；政治貪腐；克羅埃西亞；科索沃. 2. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(3) Table of Contents. Abstract.................................................................................................................................................. 2 Acknowledgments ................................................................................................................................. 4 List of Figures and Tables ...................................................................................................................... Figure 1. Political Corruption and Predicted Probabilities of EU Accession after 2007 ...................... 27 Figure 2. Political Corruption in Western Balkan Countries 2003-2018 .............................................. 28 Table 1. Country-Year Observations in the Dataset ............................................................................. 23 Table 2. Logit Models of Political Corruption and EU Accession ...................................................... .26 Table 3. Consistency of Results ............................................................................................................ 29 Table 4. Additional Models .................................................................................................................. 31 Chapter 1. Introduction........................................................................................................................ 5. 政治大 Chapter 2. Existing Explanations立 on EU Enlargement ................................................................... 14 1.1 Puzzle ................................................................................................................................................ 5 1.2 Debates on European Integration ..................................................................................................... 9. 2.1 Economic Factors ........................................................................................................................... 14. ‧ 國. 學. 2.2 Political and Cultural Factors ........................................................................................................ 15 2.3 Corruption and EU Enlargement .................................................................................................... 16. ‧. Chapter 3. Quantitative Analyses ...................................................................................................... 22 3.1 Operationalization and Measurement ............................................................................................ 22. y. Nat. sit. 3.2 Methods and Estimation Techniques .............................................................................................. 25. al. er. io. 3.3 Empirical results ............................................................................................................................. 25. n. Chapter 4. Case Study of Croatia ...................................................................................................... 33. Ch. i Un. v. 4.1 Background: Corruption in Croatia ............................................................................................... 33. engchi. 4.2 Mechanisms to Fight Corruption in Croatia .................................................................................. 37 4.3 EU Conditionality, Anti-Corruption Efforts, and Croatia’s Accession to the EU .......................... 40 Chapter 5. Case Study of Kosovo ...................................................................................................... 47 5.1 Background: State Building Process and Corruption in Kosovo ................................................... 47 5.2 Mechanisms of Fighting Corruption in Kosovo .............................................................................. 52 5.3 Anti-Corruption Progress and the Prospects of Kosovo’s Accession to the EU ............................ 57 Chapter 6. Conclusion ........................................................................................................................ 63 References ............................................................................................................................................ 65. 3. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(4) Acknowledgments. I would like to express my appreciation and gratitude to the individuals and institutions that offered support for my master’s thesis. To my advisor Dr. Yen-Pin Su who tirelessly offered advice and support for this thesis. I am honored and grateful to have worked with professor Su who serves as an inspirational person in both academic and personal level. I would also like to thank members of my thesis committee Dr. Vivianne Weng and Dr. Nick Lin who gave me constructive academic advice. To National Chengchi University and The International Cooperation and Development Fund (TaiwanICDF) for giving me the opportunity to study in Taiwan. To my Family who always supports and loves me unconditionally. I would like to express my appreciation to my father and mother who taught me the importance of academic pursuit and development. I am forever grateful for their irreplaceable guidance and advice that is essential for my achievements. I express my sincerest love to my parents who motivated and supported me throughout my academic journey.. 政治大. 立. ‧ 國. 學. To my sister who consistently gives me knowledge and to my friends who encouraged and supported me throughout my studies.. ‧. io. sit. y. Nat. I wrote this thesis with my utmost efforts and I am proud of my work. This topic of this research was inspired by its relevance and by always having in mind the amelioration of Kosovo.. n. al. er. This master’s thesis is dedicated to Bardhyl Ramadani and Suzana Ramadani.. Ch. My sincerest gratitude and appreciation.. engchi. 4. i Un. v. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(5) Chapter 1. Introduction. 1.1 Puzzle. There are many existing definitions of corruption in general and political corruption in particular. This studies focuses on the political corruption in particular. Amundsen (1999, 36) defines political corruption as misuses of public authority where political decision-makers are involved. The 1889 edition of The Oxford English Dictionary defined political corruption as: “perversion or destruction of integrity in the discharge of public duties by bribery or favor; the use or existence of corrupt practices, especially in a state, public corporations etc.” Joseph Nye defines corruption as s behavior which deviates from the formal duties of a public role. 政治大 or violates rules against the exercise of certain types of private-regarding influence” (Nye 立. because of private-regarding (personal, close family, private clique) pecuniary or status gains;. 1967, 419). This study will focus on political corruption as a misuse of power by public. ‧ 國. 學. officials for the sake of private gain. Moreover, the political corruption selected for this paper is related to the variable retrieved from the Varieties of Democracy (V-DEM) Institute, that. ‧. measures corruption in the executive, judicial and legislative levels (Coppedge et al. 2019).. sit. y. Nat. Countries who consider the application for becoming a member of the European Union. io. n. al. er. should comply with the criteria for membership application based on the Treaty of Lisbon in. i Un. v. 2007. Article 49 and the obligations under Article 2 of Treaty on European Union states that. Ch. engchi. any European State that respects values of respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, rule of law and human rights, and is committed to promote such values, has the right to apply for the EU membership. When a state applies, the Council of the EU should notify both the European Parliament and the applicant’s respective national parliament, and the application must be agreed by European Council and the European Commission. Furthermore, the agreement between Member States and applicant state should be submitted for ratification by all contracting states according to their respective constitutional requirements.. The process of EU accession consists three major stages. First, the country becomes a candidate for the EU membership. Second, the country starts accession negotiations. Third, after successful negotiation, the country becomes a member of the EU. In more detailed description, a country has to go through several specific steps and procedures of accession.. 5. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(6) First, given country submits the application to the Council of the EU. Second, EC gives its opinion on the application submitted. Third, all the member countries have to decided unanimously in order for a applicant country to become a candidate country. And fourth, if all conditions are met, accession negotiations open in agreement with all member states. The European Commission proposes the negotiation framework as the basis of the talks, and during the negotiations the country prepares to implement EU laws and standards. The acquis communautaire has 35 chapters in different policy areas, once the negotiations in all areas are finalized, the European Commission gives its opinion whether the country is ready to become a member state or not. Based on the opinion of the Commission, the EU member states will deicide unanimously to close the negotiation process and the European Parliament must give its consent. And the final step is when all the member states and the candidate country sign. 政治大. and ratify the accession treaty, the applicant country will become a member of the European Union.. 立. ‧ 國. 學. In June 1993, the European Council held a meeting in Copenhagen, in regards of the future membership to the EU of the Central Eastern Europe (CEE) countries. European Council. ‧. suggested that accession will take place soon as the CEE countries show their ability to attain specific economic and political conditions set by the EU. Since then, those conditions, which. Nat. sit. y. are known as the Copenhagen criteria, include the stability of institutions which guarantee. io. er. democracy, the rule of law, respecting human rights, and protecting minorities. Moreover, the Copenhagen criteria also demands countries to have well functioning market economy and to. n. al. Ch. i Un. v. hold ability to cope with the competitive nature of the market of EU. And lastly, the. engchi. Copenhagen criteria requires countries to fulfill the obligations of membership, including the willingness to achieve common political and economic goals and join the European Union (Hillion 2004, 2). Previous research on enlargement process paid attention to the political and legal transformation in the candidate countries set by EU conditionality. In this process, the candidate countries had to adopt not only the EU acquis communautaire, but also principles and rules related to democracy and rule of law that are foreseen in Article 6(1) of the Treaty on European Union, for which the union did not have competences over old member states (Sedelmeier 2011).. In 2004 and 2007, seven Central Eastern European countries (Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Bulgaria, Romania), three Baltic Republics (Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia) and two Mediterranean countries (Malta and Cyprus), became members of the 6. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(7) European Union. This period of enlargement is known as the fifth wave of EU enlargements. In 2013 Croatia became the 28th member of the EU, thus becoming the only Western Balkan country to gain accession as of 2020, whereas, six other Western Balkan countries remain non-members (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia). Nevertheless, the European Commission’s Western Balkan Strategy in 2018 provided a major boost for the region’s aspirations to become EU members. The strategy reconfirmed the future of the Western Balkans as an integral part of the European Union (European Commission 2018a). Moreover, in February 2018, European Commission announced the six flagship initiatives that sees EU taking specific actions in the next two years to support the changes in areas of mutual interest in Western Balkans. Among others, the initiatives aimed to strengthen rule of law (which also includes fight against corruption. 政治大. and organized crime), reinforce cooperation on security and migration, to expand EU Energy Union to Western Balkans. The strategy also included the need for the EU to prepare to. 立. welcome new members to the union once they have met the criteria (European Commission. ‧ 國. 學. 2018c).. ‧. After each enlargement, the EU applies a constructive accession policy approach, which lays its attention to different aspects depending on the nature of the region and countries, and also. Nat. sit. y. takes into account lessons from previous memberships (European Commission 2012a). For. io. er. the future enlargement of EU strategy that includes Western Balkan countries, European Commission suggested that countries of the region should meet all necessary conditions, and. n. al. Ch. i Un. v. the emphasis was given in strengthening of democracies, reforming the rule of law which. engchi. includes the fight against organized crime and corruption. Moreover, the Commission further requests for countries to employ economic reforms to ensure competitiveness in the European market. And the last requirement is the regional cooperation and reconciliation for addressing the legacies left by the Yugoslavian wars that devastated the region in the 1990s (European Commission 2018a).. Corruption for EU is a phenomenon that hinders economic growth, channeled away from the productive outcomes of the economy and undermines the coherence of public spending. It is estimated that corruption brings a cost of 120 billion EURO per year for the EU economy (European Commission 2017, 1-2). The Convention against corruption involving public officials derived by The Council of the European Union in 26 May 1997, aimed to ensure that every EU country takes necessary measures to criminalize corruption that involves public 7. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(8) officials. The convention was designated to fight corruption against European or national officials of EU countries by strengthening the judicial cooperation between EU countries. In September 2005, the European Commission signed the 2003 United Nations Convention Against Corruption (UNCAC), and in November 2008 ratified it, making the European Commission a party of the convention.. The primary interest of this study lies on the future enlargement policy to include Western Balkan countries as part of larger, integrated EU. In addition to the formal requirements, what makes a non-member state more likely to be granted a candidacy for becoming an EU member or a formal EU membership? Previous studies have shown that the probability for a non-member state to join the EU is dependent on various factors. For instance, Mattli and. 政治大. Plümper (2002) and Schimmelfennig (2002) find that the level of democracy is positively associated with accession to the EU. In addition, Katchanovski (2011) and Schimmelfennig. 立. and Sedelmeier (2006) demonstrate that a non-member state with a higher level of economic. ‧ 國. 學. development is more likely to become an EU member.. ‧. Given that the level of democracy and the level of economic development matter for applicant countries to obtain EU membership, some studies suggest that an applicant. sit. y. Nat. country’s level of corruption might be related with its prospect of EU accession (Grubiša. io. er. 2010; Kartal 2014; Vachudova 2014). If so, does the level of corruption always matter for explaining to what extent an applicant country is likely to join the EU? Or, is the corruption. n. al. Ch. i Un. v. issue becoming increasingly important for future applicants? Without systematic analyses for. engchi. addressing these questions, the relationship between corruption and probability of EU accession remains a puzzle.. To fill the empirical gap in the literature, I focus on how corruption shapes the prospect of EU accession after the fifth EU enlargement in 2007. Specifically, I argue that after the fifth enlargement, the corruption situations in Bulgaria and Romania made the EU reconsider the criteria for applying EU membership. In other words, the EU started to pay more attention to non-member states’ situation of corruption for evaluating the qualification for EU membership since 2007 (Grubiša 2010; Vachudova 2014). Therefore, a non-member country is less likely to join the EU after 2007 if it suffers a high level of political corruption. In this thesis, I adopt a mixed method approach to present quantitative and qualitative evidence to support my argument. 8. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(9) 1.2 Debates on European Integration European integration has two aspects: “deepening” (supranational centralization), and “widening” (expansion of membership). EU started as supranational regulation on coal and steel with its six original members and further expended to EU with currently 28 members states and with ambition to further expand (Schimmelfennig 2010). European integration are defined in three dimensions. The first dimension is sectoral integration, also known as broadening, which is a process where policy areas previously governed at national level get transferred partially or fully regulated by EU. The second dimension is vertical integration, also known as deepening, which is related to the sharing of competencies between. 政治大 state (Schimmelfennig 2010, 37). As Schimmelfennig and Rittberger (2015, 37) argue, 立. institutions of EU. considering the extension of sectoral and vertical integration of given. horizontal integration includes enlargement of EU as its most important process.. ‧ 國. 學. How can we understand the nature of the EU integration? There are two theoretical debates.. ‧. The first debate is between supranationalist and intergovernmentalist theories, revolving. y. Nat. around whether regional integration is a self-reinforcing and transformative process or not.. io. sit. For intergovernmentalists, integration remains under the control of the member states, and. er. these states ultimately and collectively decide the speed of the integration. On the other hand,. al. n. iv n C U h e nto gfurther set off a self-reinforcing process which leads and is no longer controlled c h iintegration supranationalists argue that integration is a process in which its institutions of member states. by member states, and it thus transforms the EU and the societies within the union. (Rosamond 2007, 19). Grabbe and Sedelmeier (2010, 376) argue that internal integration has become more complex, reaching beyond member states; it does not offer only opt-outs for its members but also opt-ins for non- members such as Schengen area for Iceland, Norway, Switzerland, and more recently all of Western Balkan states except Kosovo. The EU further has extended its functional reach effectively through the process of EU enlargement; prior to accession it demands fulfillment of such rules but without declared end-goal of membership (Grabbe and Sedelmeier 2010, 377).. Intergovermentalists explain the supranational institution-building as a bargaining that comes from states that had specific geopolitical interests in specific historical circumstances.. 9. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(10) Whereas, Moravcsik (1993) argues that liberalism focuses on the preference of state formation rather than geopolitical interests of nation states in contrast with realists who focus on state-centrism on international level. Neofunctionalists argue that Europe moved from the anarchic state system to supranational institutionalism by following the societal and market patterns and pushing political elites to advocate for such arrangements. Neofunctionalists recognized that policy initiatives derived from the supranational institutions could have spillover effects that lead to further integration; however, these phenomenon is not automatic. It requires for nations who redefined their identities and loyalties to actively seek further integration (Diez and Wiener 2009, 9-10).. The second theoretical debate revolves around the concept of enlargement, which has been. 政治大. caught up in the different perspectives of contemporary rationalist and constructivist debate. Rationalists argue that candidate states and members states calculate the costs and benefits of. 立. a potential enlargement of the EU (Pollack 2001). Member states will accept new member if. ‧ 國. 學. that membership will increase the utility of the current members. However, rationalist further argue that members who are not benefiting from the enlargement of the union should be. ‧. compensated in some form. Rationalist theorists assume that all member states’ preferences in regards of enlargement are set by the expected cost of single states. EU states or. Nat. sit. y. institutions are keen for enlargement if they expect to benefit from the enlargement. Whereas,. io. er. non-members seek to join EU, relying on the expectation that they would benefit more from membership than any other form relation with the European Union (Schimmelfennig and. al. n. Sedelmeier 2006, 103).. Ch. engchi. i Un. v. What is known as external incentive model that derives from rational choice is a bargaining model that focuses on the actors and assumes that conditionality is a bargaining mechanism between rational actors, decisions of whom are calculated by material and political interests and cost-benefit (Zhelyazkova et al. 2018, 18). According to this model, EU bargaining comes from conditioning candidate countries to adopt and implement the rules that target their government in order to acquire rewards. In case of compliance of these conditions EU will reward given country, and in case of failing to comply it will withhold the reward. Such rewards range from financial assistance to full membership to the union. These tactic can be seen in the Kosovo case where visa liberalization was promised in case of fulfilling certain requirements by EU. However, despite Kosovo fulfilling those requirements, it was not rewarded by EU (Zhelyazkova et al. 2018, 18-19). 10. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(11) Constructivist theorists, on the other hand, argue that enlargement is closely related to the collective identities and norms and values of the community. According to constructivist theory, EU will accept new members if they are ready to identify themselves with EU community and also if they are ready to accept the values and norms of the union (Schimmelfennig and Sedelmeier 2002, 513-14). The debates within the integration theories and the enlargement concept find their way into the Eastern enlargements of 2004 and 2007. The two enlargement developments remain a puzzle among scholars who argue that large EU members such as Germany and France should have been opposed to the Eastern enlargements and yet they were in favor (Risse 2004).. 政治大. Schimmelfennig (2003) uses a sociological institutionalist perspective to argue that EU has a liberal community of states that as long as the applicant countries show commitment to. 立. democracy, human rights, market economy and strengthening the rule of law, member states. ‧ 國. 學. are likely to agree for other members to join the Union. In terms of discourse for the Eastern enlargement, representatives of EU used the community discourse in order to legitimize the. ‧. request of CEE countries to become members. This dominant discourse as “part of us” made it difficult for opponents of this enlargement to make objections (Risse 2012,12).. sit. y. Nat. Constructive institutionalism focuses on the process of “norm socialization” where domestic. io. er. political elites and the population incorporate EU norms. Instead of dealing with the manipulation of cost-benefit calculations of candidate countries, constructivist argue that the. n. al. Ch. i Un. v. rule transfer can only be effective when people in candidate countries identify themselves. engchi. with union and are prone to change behavior through mechanisms set by EU that have impact on domestic level through socialization and persuasion (Checkel 2005). Social constructivists put their attention to the independence of the structure of the state and the importance of ideas, norms, institutions, and identities in the realm of international politics. Moreover, sociological institutionalism can serve as a constructivist-inspired approach to study how Europeanization affects domestic change related to the formation of collective identity and how this phenomenon affects further integration (Risse 2004, 173-74).. National identity and European collective identity is an aspect that is often discussed among scholars. Eurosceptics argue it is impossible for an European identity to be formed since there is no such thing as European people. However, empirical studies and survey data show that there are individuals that have multiple identities, and people who feel like they belong to 11. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(12) Europe parallel with their national identity and other identities they hold. Anderson (1991) argues that European Community is “imagined community”, whereas other scholars argue that European identity is not necessarily exclusive and should not be conceptualize as if with the increase of one’s European identity, one’s national identity would decrease. In other words, people can be have multiple identities without having the need to choose one single identification (Risse 2005, 295), and this argument is supported by survey data that shows many citizens in Europe can be identified with both national and European identities (Hooghe and Marks 2004, 417). Moreover, Risse (2004, 154) argues that EU has created a hegemony of European identity, and one example is that the accession of the CEE countries to the EU was framed as the “return to Europe,” as if these CEE countries were not part of the continent before. This also resonates with the Western Balkan countries that have a sense of becoming part of “Europe’. Europe and EU are often used interchangeably meaning that EU has. 政治大. managed to occupy the meaning of being European, therefore states that are part of the. 立. continent but not EU members often feel a sense of being outsiders (Risse 2004, 154).. ‧ 國. 學. The debate between supranationalist and intergovernmentalist theories and the debate. ‧. between rationalists and constructivists focus on the nature of EU integration and the concept of enlargement, respectively. This thesis focuses on the “widening” or horizontal aspect of. Nat. sit. y. integration. My primary focus is to study what determines the prospect of Western Balkan. io. er. countries to become EU members. Since the violent unrest occurred with the dissolvent of Yugoslavia and the Yugoslav wars, the intention of EU to accept new members relies on the. n. al. Ch. i Un. v. idea that it is in EU’s interest to have a stable Western Balkans. This idea goes in line with. engchi. the IR theory of institutional liberalism; international organizations are crucial factors in conflict management, collective security, cooperating and maintaining peace. (Acharya 2014). EU’s interest on expanding itself relies on maintaining stability in the continent. The incentives also relate to commercial liberalism that stands for economic interdependence and free trade, a concept which commercial liberalists would consider as minimizing chances of war, by increasing its cost to the involved parties (Burchill et al. 2005,63-4). Furthermore, the incentives of Western Balkan countries for joining the EU is more related to the rationalist approach, which suggests that becoming the EU members could help them to pursue more economic interests by enjoying the single market, free movement of commercial and human capital, and more investments from other EU members. 12. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(13) While these theoretical debates help us further understand what regional integration is about, we need to focus on specific factors that explain the probability of EU accession for individual countries. In the next chapter, I provide discussion of existing explanations on EU enlargement, and propose my testable hypothesis about the relationship between political corruption and EU accession.. 立. 政治大. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. Ch. engchi. 13. i Un. v. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(14) Chapter 2. Existing Explanations on EU Enlargement Descriptive case studies and specific policy analysis cover the majority of the literature of EU enlargement. Schimmelfennig and Sedelmeier (2006, 501-2) argue that this bulk of studies lack comparative research designs in different aspects: dependent variables are usually underspecified, important aspects of enlargement are often ignored, and independent variables are reluctant to explore alternative explanations. Moreover, the theoretical approach on the subject of EU enlargement is undermined by the tendency to craft the design on single cases, which further hinders the possibility to explore alternative explanations (Schimmelfennig and Sedelmeier 2006, 502). Grabbe and Sedelmeier (2010, 378) state that in EU studies, enlargement started becoming an interest for research only in the 1990s. In this. 政治大. section, I will provide discussions on various explanations of EU accession.. 立. 2.1 Economic Factors. ‧ 國. 學. Mattli and Plümper (2002, 552-3) argue that political leaders of the EU are assumed to aim. ‧. for maximizing economic growth, and thus they are less willing to allow accession for. y. Nat. candidate countries that are incompetent to make financial contribution for the EU and that. io. sit. have negative externalities that would undermine the prosperity and security of the EU.1. n. al. er. Economic gains are a crucial concern for the EU member states for promoting enlargement. It. i Un. v. is because enlargement would lead to larger markets, and trade theorist argue that this would. Ch. engchi. potentially lead economies to achieve higher production levels that would decrease the average cost of outputs.. Furthermore, although trade and investment with less economically attractive countries might be risky, enlargement would mitigate the risk by offering more opportunities for investments and more suitable environment to conduct business (Brancati 2001; Mattli and Plümper 2002). In other words, economic gains for both members and non-members could come from the single market deriving from the removal of barriers that affect trade and production. 1. For instance, illegal migration is a negative externality that is considered as a source of instability, and it tends to trigger xenophobia among member states (Wallace 2002), which might lead to decline of incentives to settle for further enlargement.. 14. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(15) (Smith and Venables 1988). Moreover, the single market boosts efficiency of the output of both labor and capital, and it further boost growth rates (Baldwin 1989).. Apart from the economic gains, economic fitness of candidates is another important determinant of EU accession. One of the EU’s economic required criteria for membership focuses on whether the country has a well-functioning market economy and whether a country has the capacity to deal with competitiveness of the EU market (Hillion 2004, 2). Even though the level of economic development is not explicitly mentioned in the accession criteria, it still remains a major aspect of the enlargement process. Previous studies have argued that economic development level has positive impact on EU accessions because wealthier countries may face less hurdles to implement required reforms for application and. 政治大. accession, and they have less need of economic aid from the EU (Katchanovski 2011; Mattli and Plümper 2002; Schimmelfennig 2002).. 學. ‧ 國. 立. 2.2 Political and Cultural Factors. ‧. As Mattli and Plümper (2002, 557) contend, the desire for non-member countries to join the. y. Nat. EU is crucial for EU accession, and such desire is heavily linked with the sense of. io. sit. identification of with liberal democratic values that are essential to the EU, such as rule of. er. law, political and social pluralism, freedom of speech and private property. In fact, the EU. al. n. iv n C h eidentity the union. It is because a liberal collective i Uto the belief in human rights, n g cishrelated. also considers well-functioning democracy as a main attribute of a nation to function within. which is fundamental for constituting the EU. This argument is similar to constructivist perspectives, suggesting that the more mutual attraction by having similar liberal and democratic traits, the deeper the horizontal institutionalization becomes.. Rationalists argue that EU member cannot afford to ignore the democratic credentials of candidate countries because if non-liberal countries were allowed to join the EU, it could potentially lead to conflict within the organization (Schimmelfennig 2001, 60). Previous literature on EU accession takes democracy into account as a factor that effects EU enlargement (Katchanovski 2011; Mattli and Plümper 2002; Schimmelfennig 2002).. 15. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(16) Another important determinant of EU accession is about cultural identity. Grabbe and Sedelmeier (2010) argue that the more the non-member state identifies with EU, the more likely for members to endorse accession for the given country. Katchanovski (2011) and Schimmelfennig (2002) argue that cultural and religious affinity might affect EU enlargement. Both authors have classified states as Western, Slavic-Orthodox, and Islamic states, based on the clash of civilization theory (Huntington 1996). Based on Huntington’s preposition that the foundation of European Community rests on European culture and the West Christianity they share, Schimmelfennig (2002, 600) argues that countries who are classified as Slavic-Orthodox and Islamic will be restricted to become members of EU and NATO regardless if they are liberal states and are located in Europe (Huntington 1993, 27; Schimmelfennig 2002, 600). Whereas, Katchanovski’s (2011) position relies on the clash of. 政治大. civilization theory that countries with majority Protestant and Catholic post-communist populations are more likely to become members of the EU, compared to countries which. 立. have predominantly Muslim or Orthodox Christian populations.. ‧ 國. 學. 2.3 Corruption and EU Enlargement. ‧ y. Nat. While many existing studies examine the economic, political, and cultural factors for. io. sit. explaining EU accession, few empirical studies have examined the impact of corruption. In. er. fact, after the four enlargement in 2007, the issue of corruption has attracted more attention. al. n. iv n C h e nonghow empirical gap in the literature, I aim to focus i U shapes the prospect of EU c hcorruption. by the EU when evaluating non-member states’ qualification for EU membership. To fill the. accession. Specifically, I argue that a non-member country is less likely to join the EU after 2007 if it suffers a high level of political corruption.. Previous studies regarding corruption and EU enlargement have largely focused on the control of corruption after accession (Kartal 2014). Vachudova (2009) shows that countries that became EU members in 2004 and 2007 exhibit an increasing trend of corruption, with an exception of Estonia and Slovenia. In fact, after the fifth enlargement, Bulgaria and Romania became the center of attention due to corruption issues (Kartal 2014; Spendzharova and Vachudova 2012). In 2008, EU reacted by freezing several funds for these two countries in order to expect their measures for combating corruption (IISD 2008). More importantly, Vachudova (2009, 44) argues that after the fifth enlargement, member states had. 16. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(17) “enlargement fatigue” which made them show less willingness to accept new members. Postcommunist countries that were preparing to join EU between 1997 and 2002 faced many challenges from the conditionality that was set for their accession (Grabbe 1999; 2002).. Rule of law conditionality was limited and started to get more emphasized on the accession of Bulgaria and Romania, since these two countries were characterized with weak capacity of the state and high political costs domestically, that showed a record of poor rule of law compliance compared to other countries of CEE that became members of EU in 2004 (Noutcheva and Bechev 2008; Spendzharova and Vachudova 2012). In fact, the issue of fighting against corruption did not appear to be as significant before 2007. It is true that Bulgaria and Romania used to have serious corruption problems before obtaining the EU. 政治大. membership, but for political reasons, EU failed to address this issues in its reports. Vachudova’s (2009, 54) study even shows that Bulgaria’s levels of corruption increased. 立. when the country was nearing the conclusion of negotiations and EU accession.. ‧ 國. 學. Warner (2007, 28-30) argues that political corruption is very much present in the European. ‧. Union itself; politicians and companies get involved in corruption acts within the institutional arrangements of member states, the union and the international financial institutions.. Nat. sit. y. However, the conditionality for the Rule of law has changed since the accession of Bulgaria. io. er. and Romania in 2007; the strategies of EU enlargement have further transformed the conditionality related to the rule of law into a more strict and sound system compared to. n. al. Ch. i Un. v. forms of conditionality for previous accessions. Compared to previous accessions, where. engchi. some countries had to settle important political and rule of law issues after obtaining membership, now applicant countries have to substantially settle those issues before being considered to become members of the union (Zhelyazkova et al. 2018, 24).. Compared to the EU member states, the Western Balkan countries show relatively poor performance in terms of control of corruption (Lilyanova 2017, 2). Widespread corruption in Western Balkan countries has become one main challenge for EU accession. Since corruption is believed to undermine the economic development and good governance of states, Western Balkan countries are urged to undertake reform and show incentives to fight corruption, which has become a key requirement for EU accession (Lilyanova 2017, 3-4).. 17. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(18) While Serbia, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Albania Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo remain non-members, they all have intentions to join the EU. However, the challenges these countries are facing include fighting corruption and organized crimes, and building effective public administrations and independent judiciary, and the EU is eventually developing the tool to address these challenges by learning from past experiences of EU enlargements (Vachudova 2009, 59-60). One important EU institution that was created to help combat corruption for future applicant countries is the European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX).. It is true that fighting against corruption is not part of the acquis for accession, so it is only indirectly related with the formal criteria for accession. However, EU member states have. 政治大. applied their learned lessons from the 2004 and 2007 enlargements when it comes to the process of pre-accession concerning Western Balkan prospective members, but EU leverage. 立. for Western Balkan countries has been weakened since EU has been inconsistent to enforce. ‧ 國. 學. requirements in order to push forward the pre-accession process and has lacked experience and expertise to use its leverage in strengthening the rule of law and fight against corruption. ‧. (Pridham 2007; Vachudova 2014, 123-4). Therefore, the EU may come about to enforce higher standards for Western Balkan countries when it comes to strengthening the rule of law. Nat. sit. y. and fight against corruption (Kochenov 2008). In 2013, Croatia became the latest member of. io. er. the Union and the first after the fifth enlargement. It serves as a showcase that EU has evolved its leverage on emphasizing the fight against corruption, reforms in judicial system. n. al. Ch. i Un. v. and rule of law, as shown in the earlier process for Croatia’s accession.. engchi. The big difference in conditionality for Croatia compared to previous accessions is the innovation of “benchmarking” which enables European Commission to add certain condition before opening negotiations. Opening and closing of these benchmarks were set as condition for opening and closing negotiations on certain chapters. These benchmarks required candidate country to take important reforms prior to accession and to adopt certain laws, strategies and action plans (Grubiša 2010; Šeperić 2011, Vachudova 2014). The number of chapters for Croatia increase from 31 to 35 compared fifth enlargement round. Croatia received 127 benchmarks, 23 were opening benchmarks in eleven chapters, and were 104 closing benchmarks in 31 chapters (Šeperić 2011). Closing benchmarks related to fight against corruption are part of Chapter 23 “Judiciary and Fundamental Rights”, particularly closing benchmark 5 which requires Croatia to show a track records with concrete results in 18. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(19) investigation and court processes for cases related to corruption and organized crime, especially high level corruption cases. Whereas for closing benchmark 6, Croatia should show results in improving the laws related to conflict of interest and taking effective measures in fighting corruption.. In the pre-accession process for the CEE countries, all candidate countries had done impressive progress to establish democracy, rule of law and market economy. Nevertheless, corruption in the post-communist transition for these countries have persisted. The EU Commission has made it clear that fighting against corruption is an important task that candidate countries need to take over in order to become members of EU, especially because it undermines the quality of democratic institutions and markets (Open Society Institute 2002,. 政治大. 16). Moreover, prevalent corruption is considered a threat to meeting EU accession requirements, and it also undermines economic growth (Lilyanova 2017, 3).. 立. ‧ 國. 學. However, for the eastern enlargement, the European Commission did not establish clear benchmarks for candidate countries to combat corruption. Therefore, there was no clear. ‧. indication what benchmarks should be employed to assess the anti-corruption progress for candidate countries (Open Society Institute 2002, 22). However, after the accession of the. Nat. sit. y. CEE countries, the EU began to discuss new issues for the future EU accession. Learning. io. er. from the past enlargement experiences, the EU started to pay more attention to anticorruption efforts as a pre-accession leverage for the EU to make a change in approach to. n. al. Ch. i Un. v. anti-corruption policies. This new approach introduces benchmarks and focuses on. engchi. harmonizing legislation with international standards to provide more concrete results (Lilyanova 2017, 3).. Corruption became a mainstream practice for Western Balkan countries after experiencing armed conflicts and post-communist transition, the region was characterized with high levels of corruption (Lilyanova 2017, 3). Corruption in Western Balkan is considered of “systemic” nature, it is characterized with state capture and it underpins states’ modes of operation . Patron-client relations have surged into fundamental institutions such as judiciary, law enforcement and anti-corruption agencies (Marović, Prelec and Kmezić 2019, 27). According to Transparency International (2016, 4-6), the EU accession process has become a major mechanism for anti-corruption efforts for the aspiring countries of future enlargement of the EU; although some progress has been done, the efforts have not met the expected 19. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(20) requirement. Key problems in terms of corruption in the region include: 1) institutional overlap in fighting and preventing corruption in Serbia and Kosovo; 2) limited cooperation between prosecution and police in Kosovo, North Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia; and 3) poor understanding of complex corruption cases by prosecutors and judges in Albania and Kosovo (Transparency International 2016, 4).. Based on the above discussion, it makes sense that the level of corruption should be negatively associated with the probability of EU accession for the non-member states, in particular after 2007. It is because the EU has “learned the lessons” from Bulgaria and Romania that rampant corruption will undermine a country’s economy and democracy, and thus further hinder a better integration with the EU. In short, I generate my testable hypothesis for empirical tests:. 立. 政治大. The reduction effect of corruption on EU accession after 2007 is stronger and significantly. ‧ 國. 學. different from the reduction effect of corruption on EU accession before 2008.. ‧. To this hypothesis, I conduct a mixed-method approach for quantitative and qualitative analyses. For the quantitative analysis, I collected data for 19 European countries from 1990. Nat. sit. y. to 2018 and examine the relationship between the level of corruption and the prospects of EU. io. studies. There are three reason for this case selection:. n. al. Ch. engchi. er. accession. For the qualitative analysis, I select Croatia and Kosovo for comparative case. i Un. v. The first reason is related to the similar past that these two countries share: both countries have experienced post-communist transition and armed conflict after the transition. Moreover, both countries have experienced dubious market privatization process and highprofile corruption. After the Croatian War of Independence ended in 1995 and the Kosovo War ended in 1999, both countries were ruled by former military members. Croatia experienced war profiteering from former military members involved in suspicious arm deals, and also some of them becoming very rich in a short amount of time (Grubiša 2010). In Kosovo, the problems with laws related declaration of assets and wealth and low political willingness to prosecute illegal accumulated wealth by public officials remains a serious issue (Sutaj and Canhasi 2015).. 20. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(21) Second, the financial investment and the expertise offered by the EU for Croatia and Kosovo to fight against organized crime and corruption have made the two countries a showcase of EU’s consistent efforts to push for fighting corruption. The EU has offered important assistance for Croatia’s State Prosecutor's Office for the Suppression of Organized Crime and Corruption (USKOK) to effectively prosecute high-profile corruption cases. The most expensive mission ever deployed by EU, European Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX), has provided assistance to strengthen the rule of law and to fight organized crime and corruption in Kosovo. The case of Croatia is unique because the attention of corruption in pre-accession process were never as strongly emphasized for countries that joined the EU earlier. Despite the fact that Kosovo has not been recognized by some EU members (Cyprus, Greece, Romania, Slovakia and Spain), and only been considered as a potential candidate in. 政治大. the future, the enormous investment of the EULEX demonstrates that the EU has considered anti-corruption efforts seriously for future enlargement.. 立. ‧ 國. 學. The third reason is that Croatia is a successful case in which fighting against corruption enhances the probability of obtaining EU membership, whereas Kosovo is a case that has not. ‧. even been granted candidacy status but has been making great efforts for combating corruption. For Croatia, the EU generated “benchmarks” where fighting against corruption. Nat. sit. y. was seen as pre-condition for opening negotiations, and Croatia had to take effective. io. er. measures in prosecuting corruption before the negotiations for accession opened. Whereas for Kosovo, the anti-corruption performance has been used as a leverage for visa liberation. The. n. al. Ch. i Un. v. comparative analyses will illustrate the mechanism about how corruption affects the prospects of EU accession.. engchi. 21. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(22) Chapter 3. Quantitative Analyses. 3.1 Operationalization and Measurement. The unit of analysis for this study is country-year. I collected data for 19 European countries from 1990 to 2018. For most observations, the beginning year is the year when the given country showed interest to become member or officially applied for membership, and the end year depends on when the country successfully obtained the membership or candidacy status. For countries that never obtained the membership or candidacy status within the research scope of this thesis, the end year is 2018 (Bosnia and Herzegovina; Kosovo).. 政治大 their candidacy status was granted one year right after the year when they applied for 立. Croatia and North Macedonia are the exceptions for my coding rule in my dataset. Because. membership, which indicates that the criteria for getting candidacy was not demanding at that. ‧ 國. 學. time, I consider the year when they successfully obtained the candidacy as their beginning year. Moreover, because North Macedonia has not obtained the EU membership within the. ‧. research scope of this thesis, the end year for North Macedonia is 2018. Table 1 shows the. n. al. er. io. sit. y. Nat. observations included in my dataset.. Ch. engchi. 22. i Un. v. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(23) Table 1. Country-Year Observations in the Dataset Country. Time-span. EU Membership Status at the End Year. Region. Albania. 2009-2014. Candidacy. WB. Bulgaria. 1995-2007. Member. CEE. Bosnia and Herzegovina. 2008-2018. Non-Member. WB. Cyprus. 1990-2004. Member. MED. Czech Republic. 1996-2004. Member. CEE. Estonia. 1995-2004. Member. BL. Croatia. 2004-2013. Member. WB. Hungary. 1994-2004. Member. CEE. Lithuania. 1995-2004. Member. BL. Latvia. 1995-2004. Member. BL. North Macedonia. 2004-2018. See notes below. WB. Malta. 1996-2004. Member. MED. Montenegro. 2008-2010. Poland. 1994-2004. Romania. 立 1995-2007. Serbia. CEE. 2009-2012. Candidacy. WB. 1995-2004. Member. 1996-2004. Member. CEE. 2008-2018. Non-Member. WB. ‧. Kosovo. CEE. Member. ‧ 國. Slovenia. WB. 學. Slovakia. 政治Candidacy 大 Member. CEE. n. al. er. io. sit. y. Nat. Notes: 1. BL (Baltic), CEE (Central Eastern European), Mediterranean (MED) and Western Balkans (WB). 2. North Macedonia applied for EU membership in 2004 and obtained the candidacy status in 2005. Because the time for getting the candidacy is short, I consider the year 2004 as the beginning year for the empirical analyses. In addition, because North Macedonia has not obtained the EU membership within the research scope of this thesis, I consider the year 2018 as the end year.. Ch. engchi. i Un. v. The dependent variable for the empirical analysis is EU accession. It is a dichotomous variable for indicating whether a countries obtains the candidacy for joining the EU or obtains the EU membership. It is coded 1 if a country obtained an EU membership or obtained a candidacy status for EU membership, and 0 otherwise.. The main independent variable for this study is Political Corruption (lagged by one year). Considering various measurements of corruption, I chose political corruption based on various reports that emphasize that the Western Balkan countries are captured by corrupt politicians who are linked by organized crime, and this is documented by different international reports that consider political corruption as a major concern among EU officials on the enlargement process (Ben-Meir 2019). For political corruption, I collected data developed by Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) Institute. The variable is measured by the. 23. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(24) political corruption index, which entail questions such as: How pervasive is political corruption? This index includes six types of measurements of corruption, covering areas of levels of polity, focusing on different aspects such as executive, legislative and judicial corruption. On the executive aspect, the index focuses on bribery and corruption due to embezzlement. Furthermore, the index measures corruption on the highest level (leaders/cabinet), and in the public sector. The index measures petty and grand corruption; briery and theft (Coppedge et al. 2019).. Previous literature suggests that the level of economic development of countries is an important determinant for EU accessions (Katchanovski 2011; Mattli and Plümper 2002; Schimmelfennig 2002). Therefore, I include a logged transformation of GDP per capita in. 政治大. USD to control for the probability that countries with higher levels of economic development are more likely to become members of EU. The data were gathered from the World. 立. Development Indicators (World Bank 2020).. ‧ 國. 學. In addition, studies of EU enlargement suggest that the more democratic a candidate country,. ‧. the more likely that it obtains an EU membership (Schimmelfennig 2002; Mattli and Plümper 2001; Selck and Deckarm 2013; Katchanovski 2011). Therefore, I include the level of. Nat. sit. y. democracy to control the probability that more democratic countries tend to become members. io. er. of the EU. This variable is measured by the Freedom House Index, a composite index of civil liberties and political rights constructed by Finkel, Pérez-Liñán, and Seligson (2007). The. n. al. Ch. i Un. v. value of this variable ranges from 1 to 13, with a higher score indicating that country is more. engchi. democratic. Thee data are from the Freedom of the World data from Freedom House (2020).. Moreover, I include a variable of the percentage of population that is Muslim (Pew Research Center 2017) as a control variable in the empirical models. As Katchanovski’s (2011) contend, the European countries where the majority of the populations are Protestant and Catholic tend to have a higher chance to obtain EU membership, compared to countries whose population is predominantly Muslim or Orthodox Christian. In this sense, it is possible that countries with more Muslim population might be less likely to join the EU. Last, I control for the number of population (in millions) for considering that country size might matter for the possibility of joining the EU.. 24. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(25) 3.2 Methods and Estimation Techniques. To test my hypothesis about the relationship between political corruption and EU accession, I employ discrete-time survival models (Box-Steffensmeier and Jones 2004). I use this method because there are time-varying covariates in the model and the data are structured as countryyear. This assumes there are discrete intervals in time, even though a country can end up with being an EU member or candidate at any point during the year. Because the dependent variable is a dichotomous variable, the survival model in my analysis is basically a logistic regression that also takes time into consideration. Because each country is measured repeatedly (each year), the standard errors are likely not independently and identically distributed (Woolridge 2003). To address this “group effects” problem, I robustly cluster standard errors by country (Zorn 2006).. 立. 3.3 Empirical results. 政治大. ‧ 國. 學. Table 2 displays the results of three discrete-time models using different samples. Model 1. ‧. considers all samples, Model 2 considers the sample between 1990 and 2007, and Model 3. y. Nat. considers the sample between 2008 and 2018. As can be seen, the coefficients of political. io. sit. corruption are not statistically significant for Model 1 and Model 2. However, political. er. corruption has a statistically significant coefficient in Model 3, indicating that after 2007, a. al. n. iv n C political corruption. Figure 1 shows the h predicted e n g probabilities c h i U of EU accession based on country is less likely to obtain EU membership or EU candidacy if it has a high level of. different scenarios of political corruption. The results show that the probability of EU. accession decreases with the level of political corruption. Overall, the findings in Model 3 and Figure 1 provide a strong support for the hypothesis.. 25. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(26) Table 2. Logit Models of Political Corruption and EU Accession. Model 1 (All Samples). Model 2 (Pre-2008 Sample). Model 3 (Post-2007 Sample). 1.477 (1.097). 0.511 (1.892). -4.327** (2.026). 0.942*** (3.304). 1.439** (0.631). -9.046** (3.780). Level of Democracy. 0.220 (0.236). 0.277 (0.541). 4.082** (1.666). Muslim Population (%). 0.003 (0.013). -0.049. 0.025** (0.011). Political Corruption. Logged GDP Per Capita. ‧ 國. 0.162. 0.240. 19. 14. 188. 137. io. n. al. 41.472** (18.761) 0.349 7 51. er. Number of Observations. -17.736*** (6.732). Nat. Number of Countries. -12.989*** (3.765). ‧. Pseudo R squared. (0.016). 學. Constant. (0.010). -0.739** (0.313). y. 立. Total Population. (0.031) 政治大 0.021** 0.027. sit. Variable. i Un. v. Notes: Robust standard errors in parenthesis. *p<0.1; **p<0.05; ***p<0.001 The dependent variable: 1=obtained EU membership or obtained EU candidacy; 0=otherwise.. Ch. engchi. 26. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(27) Figure 1. Political Corruption and Predicted Probabilities of EU Accession after 2007. 立. 政治大. ‧. ‧ 國. 學 y. Nat. sit. Moreover, a T-test for comparing the equality of coefficients of political corruption between. al. er. io. Model 2 and Model 3 shows that the difference in the effects of political corruption is. v. n. statistically significant at p<0.1 level (see Table 3). In other words, while the level of political. Ch. i Un. corruption matters for the probability of obtaining an EU membership or candidacy after. engchi. 2007, it does not matter much for the probability of obtaining an EU membership or candidacy before 2008. In short, this finding supports the hypothesis.. 27. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(28) Figure 2. Political Corruption in Western Balkan Countries 2003-2018. 立. 政治大. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. Ch. engchi. 28. i Un. v. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(29) Table 3. Consistency of Results Variables. 立. Significant Significant Significant Significant. ‧. ‧ 國. Significant Insignificant Insignificant Insignificant. T-Test Statistic 1.745 2.736 -2.172 -2.250 2.444. 學. Political Corruption Logged GDP Per Capita Level of Democracy Muslim Population (%) Total Population. Pre-2008 Post-2007 政Sample治大Sample Insignificant Significant. Note: The T-test statistic must have an absolute value of at least 1.96 to be significant at p<0.05 and of at least 1.65 to be at p<0.10.. sit. y. Nat. The analyses in Table 2 demonstrate interesting results of the control variables. Regarding. io. n. al. er. the effects of the level of democracy on EU accession, the coefficients of this variable are. i Un. v. statistically insignificant in Model 1 and Model 2. However, the level of democracy has a. Ch. engchi. positive and statistically significant effect on EU accession for the post-2007 sample. The Ttest in Table 3 shows that the effect in Model 3 is significantly different from the effect shown in Model 2. This finding indicates that holding other variables constant, a more democratic country is more likely to obtain EU membership or candidacy after 2007.. Model 1 shows that a country with a higher level of economic development is more likely to obtain EU membership or Candidacy, supporting the argument made by Katchanovski (2011). The result of economic development for Model 2 also shows similar pattern. Surprisingly, the result of economic development for Model 3 is very different from the results in Model 1 and Model 2. For the post-2007 sample, a country with a higher level of economic development is less likely to obtain EU membership or candidacy.. 29. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(30) Another surprising result is about the percentage of population that is Muslim. The result in Table 2 show that the coefficient of this variable does not reach statistical significance in Model 1 and Model 2. However, for the post-2007 sample, a country with more Muslims tends to have a higher probability of obtaining EU membership or candidacy. This result contradicts with the findings of Katchanovski (2011). Last, the results in Model 1 (all samples) demonstrate that larger countries are more likely to join the EU, while Model 3 shows that smaller countries are more likely to join the EU after 2007.. Robustness checks. To make sure that my results are not driven by the particular coding of my dependent. 政治大. variable and independent variable, I conduct two tests to check the robustness of my findings. In Model 4 and Model 5, I estimate logit regressions using regime corruption as an. 立. alternative independent variable. Data for this variable are obtained in Varieties of. ‧ 國. 學. Democracy (V-Dem), the regime corruption variable is operationalized in a scale from 0 (low) to 1 (high), and it measures the extent of political actors using political office for. ‧. private or political gain, more specifically to focuses on political actors that hold position in political offices and are involved in acts that relate to the concept of neopatrimonialism. The. Nat. sit. y. index is a combination of various indicators that concern the executive, the legislative and the. io. er. judiciary; those indicators are executive embezzlement, executive bribes, legislative corruption and judicial corruption. Moreover, this variable is also closely related to political. n. al. Ch. i Un. v. corruption index that is also used in this study (Coppedge et al. 2019). The correlation. engchi. coefficients of political corruption and regime corruption in my dataset are 0.96 for the pre2008 sample and 0.89 for the post-2007 sample, respectively. The results show that while regime corruption has no statistically significant effect on the probability of EU accession for the pre-2008 sample, it has a negative and statistically significant effect on the probability of EU accession for the post-2007 sample. This finding again suggests that corruption matters for explaining EU accession after 2007.. 30. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(31) Table 4. Additional Models Logit Models. Ordered Logit Models. Model 4 (Pre-2008 Sample). Model 5 (Post-2007 Sample). Model 6 (Pre-2008 Sample). Model 7 (Post-2007 Sample). -0.108 (1.876). -3.066** (1.529). -. -. -. -. 1.784 (5.012). -9.393*** (3.260). Logged GDP Per Capita. 1.509** (0.672). -8.091** (3.645). 3.061** (1.404). -16.394*** (5.850). Level of Democracy. 0.198 (0.484). Variables. Regime Corruption. Political Corruption. -0.749** (0.317). 0.069* (0.048). -1.317*** (0.481). -17.212*** (6.299). 34.658** (17.338). -. -. 0.238. 0.349. 0.256. a l14. sit. y. ‧. Number of Observations. 0.026 (0.017). n. Number of Countries. 0.048** (0.019). io. Pseudo R squared. -0.097* (0.054). Nat. Constant. 0.026** (0.012). 0.308. er. Total Population. 7.429*** (2.681). -0.051 (0.032). 學. Muslim Population (%). ‧ 國. 立. 治政 3.840** 0.734 大 (1.212) (1.633). Ch. 137. 7. e n g 51c h i. i Un. v14. 7. 137. 51. Notes: Robust standard errors in parenthesis. *p<0.1; **p<0.05; ***p<0.001 The dependent variable for Model 4 and Model 5: 1=obtained EU membership or obtained EU candidacy; 0=otherwise. The dependent variable for Model 6 and Model 7: 2=obtained EU membership; 1=obtained EU candidacy; 0=otherwise.. In Model 4 and Model 5, I use a different dependent variable for operationalizing EU accession. Specifically, I construct an ordinal variable that it is coded 2 when a country obtained the EU membership, 1 when a country obtained the EU candidacy, and 0 otherwise. I estimate ordered logit regressions on this new dependent variable. As can be seen in Model 6, the coefficient of political corruption is statistically insignificant. In contrast, the results in Model 7 suggest that political corruption has a negative and statistically significant effect on 31. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(32) the probability of EU accession. This finding suggests that the likelihood for a country to join the EU after 2007 decreases with its level of political corruption. Overall, the analyses in Table 4 show that my hypothesis is supported, and results are robust across different model specifications.. 立. 政治大. ‧. ‧ 國. 學. n. er. io. sit. y. Nat. al. Ch. engchi. 32. i Un. v. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(33) Chapter 4. Case Study of Croatia. 4.1 Background: Corruption in Croatia. Political corruption was recognized as a serious phenomenon in Croatia only after 2000. In the early studies of perception on corruption from Transparency International, Croatia was placed 74th out of 105 countries in 1999 (Grubiša 2010, 75-6). The ranking indicated the corruption levels in Croatia at that time were considerably high, which would classify it among countries with “systemic corruption”. Under the nationalist regime of President Franjo Tuđman, Croatia was considered as unable to efficiently fight corruption, and the authoritarian style of governance by Tudjman (1990-1999) and the Croatian Democratic. 政治大 with the EU (Jovič 2006). Since then, perception of corruption in Croatia has been changed 立. Union (HDZ) brought the country to a decade of unofficial isolation with no formal relations over time. In 2003, under the Račan coalition of center-left government, the rank of Croatia. ‧ 國. 學. in terms of perception of corruption raised to 51st, but dropped to 66th in 2009 (Grubiša 2010, 76). Corruption situation in Croatia is rather different from other countries who underwent. ‧. transition. After the collapse of Yugoslavian socialist system, Croatia has been suffered by. sit. y. Nat. the post-conflict legacies and the ruling of authoritarian governments.. n. al. er. io. Grubiša (2010, 76-8) analyses several causes or events that caused rampant corruption in. i Un. v. Croatia, first being the legacy of the old system, particularly the self-managing Yugoslav. Ch. engchi. socialism which was accompanied by communist mentality and corruption culture. The system was characterized with strong party control and in other hand market economy was functioning parallel but with dirigisme form the state. The period was characterized with petty corruption of bribes and grifts, and the lack of functioning market economy and favored short cuts for service from the state paved way for corruption. Moreover, party nepotism and cronyism were also what characterized the League of Communists. The second aspect to induce corruption was the war which had a non-transparent procurement process in terms of arm buying after the UN embargo. Moreover, many anti-communist political elites were involved in arm trades smuggling funds for the defense and many war veterans enriched themselves through embezzling funds for the defense and involved in illicit arm transactions.. 33. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(34) The third aspect was the privatization process of state-owned enterprises which was not transparent, the enterprises were sold to politically suitable clients that belonged to the ruling political elite of nationalist party rather than at the best offer and price as is the practice in the open market economy. A number of these enterprises was distributed to war veterans. The fourth aspect is rather ideological and relies on the political culture of nationalist revolution, since the war against the Serbian aggression created a nationalist state, which did not resemble post-modern state but rather a national state that did not have the role of serviceprovider. The fifth cause, according to Grubiša, derived from the same nationalistic ideology; it created massive bureaucracy and a massive public administration overcrowded with party followers of the nationalist elite that were in charge from 1990 to 2000, and more than two thirds were employed without public competition. This system generated a bureaucratic. 政治大. apparatus that satisfied the needs of the party loyalists rather than the people of Croatia. Sixth cause had to do with hyper-normativism that was generated by power-center state. 立. undermining the service provided to the public. The hyper-normativism generated laws that. ‧ 國. 學. regulate various aspects of social and political life, but lacking laws that would serve to fight corruption, mainly on the aspects of conflict of interest, political campaigns, and party. ‧. financing, those laws passed by the legislature only after 2011, as a result of pressure from the EU set but the conditionality for EU accession.. sit. y. Nat. io. er. After the death of Tudjman in 1999, the rotation of power in 2000 generated a liberal coalition of parties that launched program that promised institutional change and the. n. al. Ch. i Un. v. restoration of the rule of law that would go in line with European integration. The. engchi. international community supported the new coalition with incentives of Croatia’s membership to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the European Union. In 2001, Croatia and EU concluded the Stabilization and Association Agreement, with substantive reforms to revamp the judiciary and formal initiatives to fight corruption that brought Croatia close to the EU (Elbasani and Šabić 2018, 1325). The collapse of nationalist government and the death of Franjo Tuđman brought political corruption to debate in Croatia. Proposed by the center-left coalition led by Prime Minister Ivica Račan, The National Program for Combating Corruption was passed by the Croatian Parliament in 2002, and Office for Combating Corruption and Organized Crime (USKOK) established in 2011. However, in 2003, the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) returned to power and the efforts to fight corruption stagnated and brought back the perception that corruption levels were higher in Croatia (Grubiša 2010; Šeperić 2011). 34. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.

(35) The corruption history in Croatia became clearer during the post-communist transition, during the period there was a widespread opinion that corruption is present in society from top to bottom. Data in previous studies show that low-level of corruption is much higher than the high level of corruption, the latter started to be handled by the State Office for Combating Corruption and Organized Crime (Čaldarović et al. 2009).. Croatia was marred by recruitments of political militants and party loyalists in main state institutions such as privatization boards, state-owned enterprises, judiciary, security services, and academic institutions. These actions served to strengthen the hegemonic party rule, and opened way for questionable privatization process and black markets that paved in way for corruption in Croatia (Boduszyński 2010). In 2006, a project call FP6 “Crime as Culture”. 政治大. was started, the project focused on perception of corruption in Croatia and 6 other European. 立. country. The methodology applied in this project comprised of two aspects of corruption. ‧ 國. 學. “low-level” and “high-level case”. Other studies that measured corruption in Croatia were 1995 World Value Survey, 1996 Croatian Social Capital Study, and 1999 European Value. ‧. Survey (Štulhofer 2004, 76) Results suggested an increase of perception of corruption in Croatia, whereas results in 2006 showed progress and decrease in perception of corruption. sit. y. Nat. for Croatia in the Social Survey Program (ISSP). Previous studies show that that Croatia’s. io. er. reported cases of corruption increased throughout the years 2002-2006. However, the indictments and conviction rates showed opposite trajectory. The study shows that in 2006. n. al. Ch. i Un. v. only 11% of 328 cases were convicted and imprisoned for maximum of 30 days (Čaldarović, et al. 2009, 10-11).. engchi. The anti-corruption policy remained limited by misuse of public office in order to fight corruption high political level, an aspect which the European Mission consistently insisted on (Grubiša 2010). The effective way to fight political corruption was to unify the legal instruments and issue new regulations. Since the existing provisions of Criminal Code and the laws of preventing conflict of interest, public procurement, the right to access information, and financing political parties needed new provisions to formulate the Law on Fighting Political Corruption (Grubiša 2010). Grubiša (2010) argues that giving emphasis to forms of political corruption such as nepotism, cronyism, patronage, and other forms of forms of corruption would give different environment to mobilize the society in prevention and fight against corruption. Furthermore, he argues that such laws would also include 35. DOI:10.6814/NCCU202001374.