EQUAL - Final report - eng - navreme

1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
EVALUATION OF CIP EQUAL TRANSNATIONAL CO-OPERATION PRINCIPLE
The transnational cooperation was an obligatory part of the Community Initiative Programme EQUAL
and a number of the participating organisations would not have included it in their projects on their
own. However, the evaluation has proved that the participating bodies in absolute majority have
gradually begun to perceive it as a component part of the programme and often, in spite of the initial
disbelief and low expectations, they evaluate it as a very valuable and unexpectedly rewarding
part. In a wide scale of particular results and outputs it is possible to find a common denominator: it
is widening of the views, or in general “the experience“, widening of the context of thinking,
perception, attitudes, behaviour, solutions etc.
The most significant factors influencing efficiency and success of the transnational cooperation seem
to be, according to the evaluation, compliance, as the case may be sharing the project
objectives among partners, selection of a partner and partially the innovation rate of a
particular project. Above all, thanks to this fact the preparatory and the initial stages of the
project, which consequently have the principal impact on the whole implementation, seem to be as
essential for the success of the transnational partnership. In this respect, also the cooperation with
the managing authority and the quality of its support is mentioned as the key factors, too.
In the course of the whole evaluation it also showed up that the Community Initiative Programme
EQUAL had impacted in a specific context in the Czech Republic and it had interfered with it quite
significantly. Without the framework understanding of this context it is neither possible to interpret
the results nor to understand the findings. The following aspects of more general framework of
the programme effects have shown up as the most substantial:
• Wider experience from implementation of similar programmes was missing on all parts –
managing and support structures, recipients (organisations; partnerships), clients; the
programme brings not only new methods of work, but it also sets a different climate as a
whole thanks to the volume of means that are disposed of. Above all, the suite of the “europrofessionals”
- people, who have an idea, in a better case even direct experience in work
within the EU context, who have the necessary personality and knowledge qualifications, who
have adequate language knowledge, etc. - is only coming into existence. This is valid more
noticeably on the part of the managing structure.
• Non-profit organisations in the Czech Republic are still unstable altogether as regards the
sources of financing insomuch that the overwhelming majority of them practice the crisis
management permanently instead of the strategic management. Reserves, own free sources
that would not be spent in the operation and, above all prospect of any more stable financing
with a more long-term perspective are missing completely. The situation is different in
the implementation agencies that came into existence without their own mission for the
purpose of “implementation” of the European projects and do not follow wider objectives or
topics – these do not need to “feed” from the projects the operation of the insufficiently
financed non-profit organisations and the administrative demands do not burden them
excessively – account of them has been taken since the beginning (it means the funds for a
coordinator’s and administrator’s salary are really used in this way and it is not necessary to
pay from them normal employees of the organisation, who shall then “administer” the project
somehow aside – in addition to their normal duties).
• A tradition of formally negotiated partnerships that are not agreed on the basis of personal
relations but on the basis of explicitly formulated objectives, clearly divided roles, rules
stipulated in advance and open communication are missing. This relates both to transnational
and national partnerships.
The comparison among the Czech Republic and the other EU countries included in the evaluation is
interesting, above all because it has not been possible to trace any considerable difference in the
respondents’ reactions to the same questions and themes; however, it is possible to trace the
differences in comparable extent of cases, namely the substantial ones. The individual partial
differences may be followed best in the results of the questionnaire investigation; however, it may be
stated in general that the differences resulting from “maturity” and “immaturity” are concerned –
namely both in good and bad meaning. Maturity and self-confidence of the senior EU Member States
Navreme Boheme, s.r.o. 9