OPINION - Three decades of SEECP: Assessing regional cooperation in South-East Europe

• Dr. Idlir Lika is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Ibn Haldun University, Istanbul.

The heads of state and foreign ministers of the 13 member states convened yesterday in Sofia for the annual South-East European Cooperation Process (SEECP) Summit, marking 30 years since this regional cooperation mechanism was launched. The adopted Summit Declaration reaffirmed the continued importance of cooperation, stability, security, and sustainability across South-East Europe at a time of geopolitical crises and conflicts shaking the global security architecture. The current regional situation shares several parallels with, yet also fundamentally differs from, the context that existed 30 years ago.

SEECP’s past

SEECP was founded in the aftermath of the Dayton Accords, which ended the war in Bosnia. It was a time when domestic politics in almost every South-East European state was being radically transformed. Entrenched leaders and ruling parties across the region began to lose their grip on power – such as Slobodan Milosevic in Serbia, Sali Berisha in Albania, the Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS) in Montenegro, and the then-ruling post-communist parties in Bulgaria and North Macedonia – as regional countries truly embarked on the path of Euro-Atlantic integration. Quite a bit has been accomplished in the three decades that have passed since then. Montenegro dissolved its union with Serbia, Kosovo declared independence, North Macedonia settled its long-running name dispute with Greece, and today all but four of the 13 SEECP participants (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Moldova, and Kosovo) are NATO members. Moreover, only Kosovo lacks official candidate status for membership in the EU. Hence, notwithstanding all remaining challenges, SEECP appears to have ushered in a broader pattern of progress for the region as a whole.

Türkiye’s indispensable role

A crucial difference relates to the role of Türkiye. Geopolitically speaking, Türkiye has always been, and remains, by far the most powerful actor in the region. It surpasses all other countries in terms of the two core ingredients of latent power: population and wealth. However, Türkiye’s ability to project power was rather limited in the 1990s and during the first decade of the 2000s. It was an actor mired in its own internal problems, plagued by chronic political instability and the undue influence of the three unelected components of the state apparatus – the military, judiciary, and bureaucracy – over elected officials. However, the consolidation of AK Party rule from 2010 onward radically altered these dynamics by ushering in, among other developments, major institutional transformations, domestic reforms aimed at religious conservative and ethnic minority constituencies, and an ambitious indigenous defense industry program. These reforms transformed Türkiye both geopolitically and discursively into a much more influential actor, regionally and globally.

Within SEECP, Türkiye is the lynchpin of regional security, and the need for its role is arguably greater than ever given the unprecedented crises facing the world in Ukraine and the Middle East. This reality is recognized by both the EU and the US, and voices have emerged on both sides of the Atlantic calling for Türkiye to play a larger regional role in ensuring security and stability. In brief, SEECP’s motto on its 30th anniversary – Compass towards Stability, Security and Sustainability – becomes truly meaningful only by recognizing Türkiye’s key role and unique position as a bridge of cooperation and multilateralism between South-East Europe and the Black Sea, Caucasus, and Middle East regions.

The way ahead

Finally, it bears emphasizing that, despite providing a framework for regional cooperation, and despite the urgency of such cooperation under current geopolitical conditions, SEECP’s role remains largely symbolic. Geopolitical and identity-related issues divide several participant states and prevent them from acting as a unified bloc in any meaningful sense. For starters, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Greece, Serbia, and Moldova do not formally recognize Kosovo, while Bulgaria continues to block North Macedonia’s opening of formal accession negotiations with the EU. Most importantly, there does not appear to be an easy way out of the longstanding historical rivalry between Türkiye and Greece, SEECP’s two key participant states. As such, the way forward should entail setting aside those differences and focusing instead on issues where participants’ interests and expectations largely converge. Such fields include advancing the EU accession process for candidate states, strengthening Black Sea security, and enhancing regional energy security.

*Opinions expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Anadolu.