HOW DID THEY (E.G. SPAIN, POLAND) PREPARE FOR THE EU ACCESSION? LESSONS FOR TURKEY

KAREL LUKAS

Representative, Confederation of Industry of the Czech Republic, Brussels

Lisbon renewal strategy to rectify that situation either, we were with Poland very active and I’d say successfully attracting FDI’s and that proved really to be very important for the development, not only of our labor market but of course of the technology as well. So I can tell you and it is a pleasure that this last year of the EU membership of Check Republic may be considered perhaps the most successful year of our post revolution development with solid growth of 4+% rate of growth, we’ve exceeded 16.000 Euros per capita in purchasing power parity in GDP we made new market openings, we’ve increased our export by nearly 24% in that year which is unparallel to our history, we are now in fact for the first time I remember in my adult life, we are having positive balance of commerce which is unseen in Check Republic. We improved business climate, we as I said attracted a lot of investments and we have had relative success in drawing on solidarity funds from the EU, it should be quicker but anyhow we are doing our best and of course we used other possibilities of work and study opportunities abroad so nothing really happened very much, this is what we envisaged but it is good to state that and we are using the whole infrastructure of the EU to learn quickly and to be valid, here I’d like to say that it is very important to switch to or to enter all structures in Brussels that are active in favor of political acceptance an in favor also of business acceptance of particular candidate country and we profited a lot from our membership in various sectorial but also horizontal I would say organizations like UNICE where I have the pleasure of representing my industrial union, it is really good for the learning, it is good to make friends, to make partners and supporters of your own issue I’d say when you need it and it is the only way in fact how you can really push through certain important items in the agenda of the EU. So this is relatively bright picture that I am describing we had quite a few problems as well, we may dwell on it perhaps in our discussion, I’ll gladly be very sincere about it and should I perhaps at the end tell you what I modestly think you should try to do then I’d perhaps formulate only 4 or 5 brief points. I’d wish more then recommended because it is not easy I know that, that you can formulate your state interest for the stage of negotiations on what Americans call by partisan level. It is really advisable that you include opposition into that sort of formulating your interests because it was recommendations and debates when you don’t need it when you have to show certain force in front of your negotiators, we tried and we didn’t succeed necessarily very much but I would wish it for Turkey. Then I would recommend that you pay special attention to law enforcement, we heard that from Prime Minister yesterday and from many of you, it is very important, in the Check Republic we have such a legal chaos today even lawyers don’t know what to do about commercially because the pace with which you have to transport the aqi communitaire as such that you make mistakes and it reflects on judicial system and of course we are loosing all cases in Strasbourg and all the rest of it, law enforcement and quality of your legal system should be really very fine and attention should be paid to that. There is also an advice from the energy sector that I observed very much and that can be parallel in other sectors, there is no reason to hurry very much in accepting certain legislation, it is better to or not too advance to much you know, not to be quick and pioneer certain things when there is a normal schedule implanted in that legislation we did some mistakes in energy sector where we separated distribution from production of electricity fro example only to learn later for example that our competitors didn’t do it because it was not written in such a way and the legislation…..great pains we had to do it again against our interest in for example against the advice of competition authorities and so on. It is better to have the average line in sectors, not in IT. There only the sky is the limit and I would finish by telling you that I would also invest as much as possible and I sense it in this conference into creating real bases within the civic society for EU, for European cause because usually it is a situation that achievements are never publicized and they are never very much appreciated whenever problem comes up, you have so many media and so many wise people against you that you need to lean on to certain bases knowledgeable, informed even enthusiastic people I’d say for the cause of Europe and I’d say that you should certainly invest in preparation of groups of young people and intelligent people to prepare the projects, future funding from the European funds, I think it is very important it pays back, we haven’t done it in such a way that I’d have wished but we are catching up now. So these would be my recommendations and I wish you good luck of course.

I would perhaps briefly say that my main concern would be to find and then set good team of collaborators for the negotiation and then seek a larger backing. Good team means in my reminiscences when I still took part not in the accession talks but in the association talks European agreement, it seemed to me and I resented the fact that Foreign Ministry monopolized too much the whole matter yes with good explanations I think that was wrong perception one should have involved from the very beginning as much as possible other ministries, civil service, brightest brains we had simply good interaction of those who were responsible for various fields. On my own initiative I would go also to the opposition not only to the governing party because that can even change 2 – 3 times during long term negotiations, I would simply present them the problems and I would seek their advise, I would work very seriously with the whole political spectrum of the country as much as they would show willingness to take part, I would very much work with media in my country and I would also try to create basis I spoke about in the civic society that is indispensable for the final success of negotiations.

Question (İlyas Hanioğlu): Karadeniz Teknik Üniversitesi Uluslararası İlişkiler Bölümü. İlk sorum özellikle Çek Cumhuriyeti temsilcisine ve diğer temsilcilere. Federalleşmesi veya gelecekte konfederalleşmesi tartışılan AB’nin bu süreç içersinde ilerlemesi durumunda özellikle ulus devletler bağlamında baktığınız zaman, kendilerinden ne tarz ödün verebilirler veya bu konudaki stratejileri nedir? İkincisi de, küçük bir yapıcı eleştiri durumunda ben iki gündür tartışmalara katılıyorum ancak Çek Cumhuriyeti temsilcilerinden ve kısmen de İngiltere temsilcileri haricinde Türkiye ile ilgili açık desteklerini ve açık muhalefetlerini ifade etmedi hiçbir ülke temsilcisi. Bu konuda hergün buraya katılma veya üst düzey insanlarla görüşme imkanı olmayan öğrencilerin biraz daha kesin şekilde aydınlatılmasını rica ediyorum.

I want to address two questions in particular because we have to create space for those asking so many other questions. Corporate social responsibility I think is a must today and in a country like mine it is a two-tier issue. We have so many foreign companies coming and of course buying and owning our companies that they brought in the culture of corporate social responsibility themselves and my Union of Industrial & Transport for example was very much demanding from its members, Check companies to the same of course and I can state that today it is the case…..and I would like to give only an advise to the gentleman who was asking about this white color mobility, I think any candidate country can exceed before becoming member a lot of programs that EC is developing for many years that in fact take care of mobility of white color group I’d say be it students, professors, business people definitely and many other groups of people so I am pretty sure that in Turkey’s case this will become a reality and you should also be active in this respect and start simply using those structure also the funds that are involved, that would be my advice. Thank you.