Global–Local Linkage in the Western Balkans: The Politics of Environmental Capacity Building in Bosnia-Herzegovina

Abstract

This article argues that efforts by international donors, in particular the EU, to build the capacity of environmental NGOs in Bosnia‐Herzegovina has less to do with fostering democratic stability and civil society, and more to do with establishing a new epistemic community. Among critics, the technocratic, apolitical and rather benign term ‘capacity building’ has become code for the transformation and undermining of ‘local’ knowledge, the disregard for existing ‘capacities’, the construction of new networks of experts and the importation of rationalities based on West European discourses and constructions of ecological risk, sustainable development and policy responses. Not surprisingly, the weaker the post‐socialist state – legacies of ethnic conflict, the severity of economic collapse – the greater the extent to which capacity‐building assistance seeks to transform policy communities, actors and networks. From the perspective of environmental mobilisations in Bosnia‐Herzegovina, it is argued that the limitations of environmental capacity‐building assistance are due in large part to the failure of donors to distinguish between different ‘capacities’, and their insistence on prioritising the development of project grant expertise and organisational management know‐how over and above other developmental needs. The article illustrates the extent to which environmental movement organisations either require very basic developmental assistance or need more bespoke support that will enable them to engage effectively in political and legal contestation with the state. The article concludes that while aspects of environmental capacity‐building assistance are clearly having a positive impact, the rigidity of donor aid and the framework of project grants as the mechanism for delivering assistance are limiting the impact to a narrow elite of organisations, of which some are neither non‐governmental nor linked to indigenous local environmental networks within civil society.

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Environmental politics in the Western Balkans: river basin management and non-governmental organisation (NGO) activity in Herzegovina

“…The environmental non-governmental organisations (ENGOs) that exist within these states lack capacity, are somewhat embryonic, and are entirely dependent on foreign donor assistance (Fagan 2008). Their development, though not entirely dissimilar, has been much slower compared to the movements of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE).…”

Scientific collectives in region-building processes

“…By contrast, far less attention has been devoted to the regional scale, despite its importance in international environmental cooperation. To be sure, a number of authors have studied regional science-policy interaction, including in the Mediterranean (Haas, 1990), the Baltic Sea (VanDeveer, 2004), and the Balkans (Fagan, 2007). Yet very few have underlined the specificity of the regional level.…”