The Europeanization dynamic in the Republic of Moldova

The policy initiative which aims to deepen and strengthen relations between the EU and Moldova is in the context of the Eastern Partnership, launched in 2009 within the framework of the European Neighbourhood Policy. The article aims to identify avenues of Europeanization of Moldova, considering however the tensions involved in the alternative of cooperation and modelling civil society, institutions, policies and economy, that is the Eurasian Economic Union. Europeanization works differently in the case of countries outside the EU, especially in the cases of new democracies having the EU as a relevant foreign partner. Departing from the Association Agenda of the Association Agreement, this paper aims to analyse the evidences of Europeanization in


Introduction
The European Union (EU) is committed to the stability, development, and prosperity of former soviet countries. As countries geographically close to the EU, it has been of the EU's interest to support their development since the transition towards democracy. EU cooperation and financial support are linked to certain conditionalities, which Lavenex and Schimmelfennig 1 call EU's external governance, but for Gawrich et al. 2 the same phenomenon is seen as an external dimension of Europeanization. 3 Europeanization consists of the phenomenon of the EU influencing other States and political spheres by sharing and spreading its routines, norms, values and institutions and also being influenced by them (top-down and bottom-up dynamics). 4 The EU has developed over time an external dimension that puts it as an agent of democracy promotion and values' sharing. As for its neighbours, the case is even more so. Lavenex and Schimmelfennig 5 believe this EU's external influence in its neighbours has evolved into a new third model since the European Neighbourhood Policy's creation, with functional cooperation between the administrations as another axis of EU's democracy promotion and value's sharing.
According to Gawrich et al. 6 , we can distinguish three dimensions of Europeanization research when reviewing the early 1990s' literature: i) Membership Europeanization, which refers to the impact of the EU on its member-states (current members); ii) 1 LAVENEX, Sandra; SCHIMMELFENNIG, Frank -"Concentric circles of flexible 'EUropean' integration: A typology of EU external governance relations". 2 GAWRICH, Andrea; MELNYKOVSKA, Inna; SCHWEICKERT, Rainer -"Neighbourhood Europeanization trough ENP. The Case of Ukraine".
We can identify Europeanization dynamics as a modernization 7 mirror for former soviet countries. Geopolitics is the major factor in the European motivations.
Located between the EU and Russia, the EaP's countries can be considered strategic neighbours for the EU's borders. Domestic economic structures of each EaP country have translated into different responses to the adaptation and adoption of cooperation and compatible policies and reforms regarding EU's expectations. Thus, the bilateral relations with these countries have evolved at different paces.
In this article we intend to focus on Neighbourhood Europeanization, more specifically we look for concepts, theoretical constructions and data selection for Moldova.
However, the large view of the contribution is to introduce a model to be applied to the six Eastern neighbours: Moldova, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, and Ukraine.
We consider the European Neighbourhood Policy 8 (ENP) and the agreements within its framework as a top-down Europeanization process. The ENP is an EU foreign relations instrument for developing countries, including those in the neighbourhood willing to be closer to the EU. The ENP follows a blueprint for enlargement, as a response to the European Security Strategy (ESS). In 2003, the European Commission presented a new framework for relations with the Eastern and Southern Neighbours. Since the new policy was launched, the privileged neighbours started to create mutual commitments to build common values and actions for reaching a good governance, rule of law and the promotion of economic and democratic principles.
The ENP process is supported by an Action Plan (AP) prepared for neighbouring countries that are not in the EU's enlargement agenda. The APs introduced specific degrees of goals in different countries in order to implement ENP's policies. The APs would draw on a common set of principles and bilateral relations to contribute for regional and sub-regional cooperation to reinforce efforts to meet the objectives of the ESS. In this sense, different impacts of Europeanization can be found in the neighbours, especially if we consider the "neighbouring outsiders". 9 Thus, we have to consider each country individually to assess some measures of success of this initiative, particularly in light of the 10 years of the Eastern Partnership (EaP).
The EU contribute with financial assistance to the ENP's countries as to promote reforms and adjustments, influencing policies, institutions, laws (political, 7 SPRUDS, Andris -"Introdutory Remarks". 8 The ENP is an EU programme for its South and Eastern neighbours to foster stabilisation, security and prosperity. 9 The EU's neighbouring where there is no immediate accession perspective (GAWRICH, Andrea et al. 2009, p. 5). economic, institutional, etc.) and enhancing their local and national transformation towards a democratic model in line with the EU's.
The ENP's policies are valuable for both the EU's and its neighbours' priorities in a variety of sectors, like key areas for stability: Democracy Promotion, Justice and Home Affairs, and Economic Cooperation and Trade. Thus, the adoption of EU-aligned regulations and norms and the institutional adaptation to accomplish the ENP policies can be observed as a measure of a top-down Europeanization.
Public surveys can help identify the bottom-up Europeanization process.
Public opinion reveals when citizens' perception can be seen as a way of explaining the proper functioning of EU's institutions and standards, usually without the use of coercion mechanisms in the European daily life. Positive perceptions empower EU institutions and impact their effectiveness. That because compliance matters. In other words, the less a rule requires strength and coercion mechanisms to be obeyed, the more effective it is. Such effectiveness, however, depends on the extent to which this standard is recognized by the society that must respect it as legitimate.
The article enlightens the impact of the EaP after one decade of it. The result is a preliminary effort to create a series of variables and a set of data about Moldova's case, but looking at providing analytic instruments for studying other EaP countries.
Gawrich et al. 10 draw on the concept of Europeanization to analyse EU's influence and rule transfer in the case of countries with no membership perspective.
According to them, the lack of an ascension perspective potentially limits EU's leverage and effectiveness in exerting its influence and promoting its values and changes. This article's hypothesis is that Europeanization is a large phenomenon surrounding the integration region. The different levels of impact 11 , however, could be measured as a function of the interests of a given country to build strong links with EU norms and values. Considering the case of the former soviet countries, especially when there is no perspective to become an EU member-state, the harmonization of laws, norms, the learning process from EU's institutions and democratic model is a decisive reference for the development of the new democracies from Eastern Europe. acknowledged. Once the EU exists, there is a new phenomenon to be explored not only regarding its member-states, but also in the neighbourhood outside of the EU's borders.

Methodology
Whether or not Europeanization, EU's existence has an impact on the neighbouring outsiders.
Thus, even "countries outside the EU are also going through the same process of change-for example, because they are part of the global process of diffusion" (see • Voice and Accountability: combines data sources to capture the extent to which a country's citizens are able to participate in selecting their government, as well as freedom of expression, freedom of association, and a free media.
• Political Stability and Absence of Violence: assesses the likelihood of political instability and/or politically motivated violence, including terrorism.
• Governance Effectiveness: reflects the quality of public services and the civil service, and the degree of its independence from political pressures, the quality of policy formulation and implementation, and the credibility of the government's commitment to such policies.
• Regulatory Quality: assesses the ability of the government to formulate and implement sound policies and regulations that permit and promote private sector development.
• Rule of Law: captures the extent to which agents have confidence in and abide by the rules of society, and in particular the quality of contract enforcement, property rights, the police, and the courts, as well as the likelihood of crime and violence.
• Control of Corruption: assesses the extent to which public power is exercised for private gain, including both petty and grand forms of corruption, as well as the "capture" of the State by elites and private interests. Since the EU is a result of regional integration, it is not built on mechanisms and strategies of popular participation that characterize democratic processes. It is in fact a model of cooperation between States that was initially supported by intergovernmental agreements according to rules of Public International Law. Considering the EU has achieved an unparalleled social and political integration by becoming a polity 14 , it is expected that it would accurate its democratic deficit, even ex-post. Not only because of the importance of the Union's legitimation, but also because democratic recognition implies the ability of its rules and policies to impact social behavior.
We start from the assumption that if public opinion data is positive in relation to the EU, its policies, standards, regulations and institutions are strengthened -the EU becomes thus more effective. In other words, perception data that reveals a good assessment of the EU's role, a positive view of being part of the EU, a representative capacity of its institutions, or if there is a perception of confidence or support towards EU's institutions, reveal an ability to make EU's policies more effective.
Institutions and norms work best when they are best evaluated, perceived as representative, fair and legitimate. The positive perception signals the EU is empowered and, as a consequence, greater compliance with EU's rules and policies are expected.
Compliance has a fundamental role in preventing the application of sanctions resulting from non-compliance with the norms and policies. An important concept here is the effectiveness of the norms. According to jurists as Bobbio 15 , a norm is more effective the less it needs to use its coercion and force mechanisms to be applied. Thus, prevention and compliance are the best mechanisms for recognizing the effectiveness of EU's standards.
The selected responses from the public opinion report assess the population's recent opinion on the EU and the values associated to it, but also reflects the heterogeneity within Moldova -which is corroborated by census data.

Results: Looking for evidences of Neighbourhood Europeanization in Moldova
A few failures and successes can be identified from a comparative analysis. In this paper we focus on the case of Moldova to design a model of analysis that could be a reference for other observations. Data and variables considered to analyse Moldova's case of Europeanization can be applied to other EU neighbouring outsiders countries.
The spreading of EU's values, norms, institutions, policies, and ideas might take place in several different ways. As Montesano et al. 16 put it, within the framework of the ENP, Europeanization regards the ability of the EU to make use of its 'normative' clout as a mean to foster stability and development in target countries of its interest.
Both EU's concern to create a surrounding neighbourhood of well-governed countries to the East and South of its borders and the ever-closer proximity of

Top-down impacts of Europeanization in Moldova
The Association Agenda foresees a number of domestic adjustments to EU directives and standards. Wolczuk 18 highlights the key instrument in achieving the AA's set goals of political association and economic integration with the EU is legal approximation. For the partner country this means taking on extensive, binding commitments to align its laws and institutions with the acquis in order to stimulate political and economic development and institutional modernization. 19 The analysis of the implementation reports indicates the changes promoted 19 The acquis communautaire is the set of norms and laws, substantive rules and policies -all which composes the EU Community Law system. 20 When assessing the reports, we considered cooperation examples the implementation of dialogue and working groups, trainings with external support or upon external orientation, valuation visits from the EU, access to information from European sphere (e.g. database access) and actions defined as improvement in the bilateral or multilateral cooperation of Moldova and the EU and its member-states. By looking at the governance indicators for Moldova, it is possible to note that ten years after the first available data (1996)(1997)(1998)(1999)(2000)(2001)(2002)(2003)(2004)(2005)

Bottom-up impact of Europeanization in Moldova
The bottom-up Europeanization can be defined as the influence and impact understood from the reorientation of a (sub-)national actor's champ d'activité 23 towards EU institutions, policies, politics, values and the perception of the EU phenomenon.
We consider that the increase of the good evaluation and positive perception of the EU's institutions, economy and politics correspond to a way to legitimate the 23 McCAULEY, Darren -"Bottom-up Europeanization Exposed: Social Movement Theory and Non-State Actors in France".  However, significant differences were found within most socio-demographic groups, reflecting the country's heterogeneity. Of the 48% that have a positive image of the EU, 95% are native Romanian speakers, 61% are young citizens, 75% classify as highly educated citizens and 62% reside in the centre of the country. Ethnic diversity is a significant feature of Moldova's population, as Table 2 illustrates, with different geopolitical orientations (Russia-led and Western-led), which in its turn reflects on the public perception of the EU.  The three most important personal values appointed for most of the respondents happen to be key topics in the Moldova-EU relations, strengthened over time with the AA and the DCFTA. Nonetheless, the most important personal value for 47% of the Moldovans is the absence of corruption, which is only strongly associated with the EU for 50% of the interviewees.  The analysis of the public opinion survey prompts further connections related to identification with the EU. As Cram 24 puts it, conscious or explicit identification with the EU may also emerge in the latent political community as the EU becomes a meaningful presence for its citizens. The deepening in EU-Moldova relations beyond purely cooperation has also reflected in the population's perception and identification with EU's norms and values, as Figure 2 shows. The attachment and identification of the European public with the EU gives to its policies, norms and institutions legitimacy and compliance -and that is particularly true for the case of the neighbouring countries.
Also, it is important to note that a growing identification with the EU opposes the Russian identification still very present in the country. 25 Cram 26 states that to appreciate functional benefits, individuals must experience those benefits and for identification to occur they must relate those experiences and benefits to the level of authority concerned. The amounting of EU's actions in Moldova and cooperation between member-states and the country have certainly increased the reaped experiences and benefits by the population.

Discussion
The neighbourhood matters for the EU. When it comes to democracy promotion, not coincidently human rights and rule of law were the most important values identified by the survey respondents. Deutsch et al. 28 refer to a 'double process of habit-breaking', that is, the process through which citizens, exposed to the benefits available from a new level of governance, can start to break the habit of allegiance to the existing political unit. Thus, we could argue the more citizens are exposed to an EU-touched environment, the more the recognition that EU's values, norms and actions might coincide with the existing expectations. The expectations' fulfillment also promotes the legitimation of EU's institutions.