Sinziana-Elena Poiana Ioana Lupea Irina-Madalina Doroftei Alina ...

now EU. If the new Europe is to be uniquely the product of economy and Brussels' bureaucracy, will
its labyrinths created at the beginning of the new century put into practice Kafka's labyrinths from the
beginnings of the last century?’ (Michnik, 2001, p.6) What made EU’s strong initial attraction, the
identification with Europe, was later revealed as an important source of misunderstandings and
reciprocal disillusionment (see Rupnik, 2003).
Political elites, those who keep winning elections on the count of their openness towards European
values, have quite a different stance. While fully unaware of cultural affairs, and truly committed to
Europe as a development dream, most of them remain fairly ignorant in European affairs. A TV crew
scorned Romanian MPs after the publishing of the European Commission highly publicized Progress
Report on Romania and Bulgaria in 2003 because few were able to name the organization which
produced such reports or even place it in Brussels. Prior to 2007, party position papers on European
accession produced by individual parties in Romania and Bulgaria remained the exception rather than
the norm. The discourse on Europe was fairly general and nonspecific. The few technocrats who had
some knowledge on Europe were all involved in negotiations on both sides, either the domestic
government or the local EU delegations that represent the European Commission. Most of the local
expertise, which was both quantitatively and qualitatively limited was mobilized by EU- funded
agencies like the European Institutes. The purpose of such agencies was to inform policy by producing
impact accession studies, but actually the few good studies that were occasionally produced originate
from independent think-tanks.
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