Balkanlarda ve Karadeniz bölgesinde bir yakınlaşma faktörü olarak çevrenin rolü

Environmental protection, cooperation and integration are three elements tending to interact at an international level. The tendency to regionalization in the Black Sea area (the BSEC countries) raises the issue of the effectivity of such an interaction in this region. Political and economic disparities and deficits, armed conflicts, as well as the existence of more attractive forms of regionalism than the Black Sea area, like EU or NATO, are factors that prevent a dynamic of integration in the area from developing in a close future. Concerning environmental protection?s role, the belonging to different political and economic frameworks, as well as the lack of interest on environmental issues caused by economic weakness and a lack of democratization are factors making difficult the creation of a framework for a regional cooperation in the environmental field, cooperation which is absolutely necessary for the area?s environmental recovery. At an international and regional level, initiatives that could create conditions for a rapprochement and an integration exist, but it seems too early to argue that environment plays or can play a decisive role to stimulate such dynamics. Today, regional cooperation in the environmental field has to take place in order to save the Black Sea which is in a critical situation, and should not yet be seen as a tool for integration in an area still not ready for this kind of developments. The adoption and effectiveness of European standards are a condition to regional integration, integration which would then be strengthened by the environmental factor.