Civil Society Development in the EU Eastern Partnership Countries

EU has gradually become proactive actor in democracy promotion in the Eastern neighborhood, while several external events (Ukraine's Orange Revolution, Rose revolution in Georgia) played a role in this transformation.In the lecture we discuss this EU 'external democracy-promotion' via various funding programs (EU Neighborhood policy instrument, others), creation of Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum ; but also related problems such as possible loss of independence of NGOs as their priorities become externally driven. I will also bring some practical examples of my own experience, working with development cooperation projects with NGOs in EaP Countries. About the Lecturer: Margit Säre is a short term Cross-Border Research fellow, investigating transboundary civic environmentalism in the Salish Sea -Cascadia border region. For last fifteen years she has been involved in Estonian environmental NGO and working with transboundary water management, cross border environmental networks etc. in Estonian-Russian border area as well in various Eastern European countries.