RECENT REGIONALIZATION DISCOURSES AND PROJECTS IN ROMANIA WITH SPECIAL FOCUS ON THE SZEKELYLAND.

• Author: Benedek, Jozsef

1. Introduction

   The question of regionalization has received large academic attention in very different contexts (Jones, Goodwin and Jones, 2005; Costa-Font and Rico, 2006; Zhang and Wu, 2006; Lentz et al., 2007; Mate, Neda and Benedek, 2011; Hammond and Tosun, 2011; Ertugal and Dobre, 2011). There are different perceptions of the question whether the state can influence the regional development and, if yes, which are the proper strategies and instruments to do it. The most recent examples of the British and Spanish devolution are related to the general concept of state modernization and recognition of ethno-cultural and regional diversity. But in detail, the question is not viewed only as a political one, it is also related to high expectations of better tailored public policies and an improved economic governance as well (Rodriguez-Pose and Gill, 2005). Other authors consider that regions are a significant scale of governance for the implementation of public policy, like natural resource management (Lockwood et al., 2009). In addition, with no exception the asymmetric regionalization in Europe is characteristic for countries with significant ethnic minorities (Belgium, Spain, UK, Italy, Finland), which means that the ethnic dimension plays an important role in shaping the regional structures of these countries. The process of decentralization and of the establishment of regional governments in these countries is well-documented (Keating, 1998; Baldini and Baldi, 2014; Guinjoan and Rodon, 2014), while the outcome of the asymmetric regionalization is evaluated very differently, from the socalled failed federalization (Baldini and Baldi, 2014) to successful reform of federalism (Cappelletti, Fischer and Sciarini, 2014).

   In this broader framework the debates about the regionalization and the reshaping of the administrative-territorial units in Romania come into a new light. It can be seen as a part of a general decentralization process started 25 years ago, after the fall of communism. The post-communist reworking of the public administration has created stronger institutions at county level and at the level of localities, while the discussions about the role of the development regions--created in 1998, was hindered by the ethnic question raised from the autonomy projects of the Hungarian community and fears of territorial segregation. Former President of Romania, Traian Basescu, together with the then ruling Democratic Liberal Party (PDL) initiated a regionalization project in 2011, which failed at that time, but recently, in 2013, the former government coalition USL (Social-Liberal Union, formed by the Social-Democrat Party and the National Liberal Party) has picked up the topic again. The regionalization discourses and projects developed by different actors are referring to both new administrative-territorial divisions at regional level, as well as to the decentralization of administrative competences from the state level to the regional level.

   The main issue addressed by this article is the emergence and evolution of the post-communist regionalization process in Romania, focusing on the highly sensitive question of the Szekelyland. We want to demonstrate that the intensity, the forms and institutional arrangements of the regionalization are strongly embedded in specific national contexts. We assume that the EU integration process, historical heritage, ethno-cultural diversity and the institutional framework are the main factors influencing different regionalization projects and discourses in Romania. Until very recently, just a handful of empirical researches have been undertaken on this topic. Our investigation is uncommon in the Romanian contemporary context; therefore the main empirical material is original and exploratory.

   The article proceeds as follows: in the next section, we present the role of the EU integration to explain the establishment of a regional level, represented by the development regions. In the third section, we focus on the evaluation of the regional debate after the EU accession. The fourth section presents different scenarios for a new regionalization, while section five discusses the ethnic dimension of the regionalization. The final section concludes by discussing the limitations and implications of the regionalization process in Romania.

2. Regional policy and the 'weak' regionalization in the EU pre-accession period

   During the Romanian political, economic and social transition period the evolution of the relations between the state and sub-national territorial units in Romania followed the above presented international trends. The construction of the regional level, together with the majority of the CEE-region, stood in close relationship to the EU enlargement process of the country and to the implementation constrains of the EU pre-accession funds (Keating and Hughes, 2003). The institutional framework for the regional policy has been established in the Law no. 315/2004, which sets the goals, the institutions, and the instruments for regional development. According to it, the main goals of the regional policy in Romania are: the reduction of regional disparities; the institutional preparation for the accession to Structural Funds; the connection of sectoral economic policies to the regional level; the support of the inner-, international-, and interregional cooperation. Territorially, a regional level has been created, by grouping the 41 counties according to several criteria in eight development regions, equivalent to the EU NUTS II level. These regions lack legal status which means that they are not real administrative-territorial units. They have a framework function for the establishment, implementation and evaluation of regional development policies, as well as a technical function as basic territorial units for the collection of specific statistical data according to the EUROSTAT regulations. The new NUTS II regions were implemented by creating a new institutional network for their administration: the National Council for Regional Development (NCRD), the Regional Development Councils (RDCs) and the Regional Development Agencies (RDAs).

   Two basic problems are emerging from the implementation of this law (Benedek and Horvath, 2008). At first, the criteria for area designation are heterogeneous and not consequently applied. This problem is not related specifically to Romania, it is linked to the weak regulations at the EU level. Compared to the EU average, the Romanian development regions are too large in terms of their total population and surface. One of the regions is culturally very heterogeneous (Southeast) and in several cases the county representatives demand the reassignment of their county due to economic interdependence with counties assigned to other regions. In addition, in two counties where the Hungarians are the majority of the population (Harghita and Covasna) there is a growing claim for territorial autonomy, the political representatives of the Hungarian minority proposing a distinct development region for these two counties (Csutak, 2007). EU countries comparable in size with Romania but with stronger decentralization have a greater number of both NUTS II and NUTS III regions, according to their internal constitutional arrangements (Spain has 18 NUTS II units and 52 NUTS III units, while Italy has 20 NUTS II regions and 103 NUTS III areas). The 1993 Structural Fund Regulation provided for greater flexibility in area designation, enabling NUTS units to be subdivided, an opportunity not used in Romania. Also, the implementation of EU competition policy enables Member States to target assistance at specified labor market areas, another possibility not being taken into consideration in Romania.

   The second main problem is related to the fact that the development regions in Romania do not have financial and legislative competencies. They fulfill two main functions: a statistical function and an implementation function for the EU cohesion policy. It means that they have no executive or legislative powers, and are subordinated to the governmental level which distributes the financial resources to them. The regionalization was top-bottom oriented and it is the result of consulting a very limited number of actors.

3. The regional debate after the EU accession from 2007

   The territorial reorganization of the state was put back on the political agenda by former state president Traian Basescu and the then ruling party (PDL), in early 2011. This time, however, in contrast to the debate of the early 1990s, the main catalyzing forces behind the initiative were more pragmatic. On the one side, stood Romania's brief experience as an EU member state, with the lowest absorption rate of EU funds during 2007-2013, while, on the other hand, there were the inefficiencies of an oversized and highly centralized public administration, the 'Fat Man' as called by the President himself (Zachmann, 2013). These inefficiencies, especially during the austerity measures implemented as a result of the 2007-2008 Global Financial Crisis, became untenable. In these circumstances, a thorough administrative-territorial reform was proposed, with the transformation of the eight development regions into administrative-territorial entities, although without the drafting of a concrete policy proposal. At a certain point, however, the political debate lost these initial objectives and considerations and began to shift toward ethnical aspects of the regionalization, especially in the case of Szekelyland. As a consequence of a heated debate, and without a clear support from the coalition partner DAHR (Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania), there is no surprise that the reform proposal disappeared as vehemently from the public space, as it became to dominate it. At the same time, we have to mention that the PDL's strong support for the proposal was also coming from internal, political...