The relationship of the governments and other state institutions of Albania with the civil society and more specifically with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the country has passed through different cycles: first in the chaos of the first years of transition there was mutual hostility between the two and also large amounts of indifference and contempt. Years passed and the relationship somehow improved with some forms of communication and even basic superficial consultation. In the last years more sophisticated forms of engagement emerged: the cooptation of civil society, the corruption of several organizations to make them shut up, the use of their expertise to justify measures and add legitimacy to actions and the denigration of others to falsify their points. However in the last 2 years it seems that the relationship has reached the apex, the most interesting and even post-structuralist version of a liaison: the imitation and overtake of basic functions and activities from one side to the other. To be more concrete the government and state institutions of Albania have found a spring of inspiration in typically NGO activities and are engaged to imitate and replicate them at full throttle.
Let’s take the last weeks as an example:
The Parliament, specifically the part of the parliament which deals with European integration, organized a EU summer school; the Centre of Excellence in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs organized talks about foreign policy as seen from youth perspective and the Centre for Openness and Dialogue (just look at that name!) in the Prime Minister’s office hosted former German chancellor to talk about the future of the EU in the midst of immigration crises.
Take any week and you shall see the most important structures of the executive cabinet organizing a multitude of typical think tanks’ and cultural associations’ stuff: from capacity building academies to exhibitions, from policy paper presentations to debate forums. The executive and legislative are slowly aiming to become the hub for discussing, debating and even challenging their own policies, trends and decisions, however democratic and open one can believe such a debate can be. It takes a bit more difficulty to debate the host at their own house party.
Of course there is nothing fundamentally wrong with this activities and with the fact state institutions are their organizers. But where do this kind of activities come from? Who has organized them before? Is this template originally from the current organizers or have they conveniently snatched up this events from NGOs that have implemented them for years facing fundraising hurdles? It is an ultimately rhetorical question.
One funny consideration of this situation is to say: how much free time do these people have at hand? Are they really superheroes that fulfill all state obligations, give solutions to the daily challenges of citizens, pass and implement constitutional reforms, take care of the economy and still come up with quite numerous interesting cultural and social activities that just seemed copied out of an NGO annual report?
However more serious examination is necessary. Competing civil society organizations and cultural associations at their own turf, the government ignitions are in fact exterminating them since donors are and will for a long time be more inclined to support them instead of NGOs when it comes to a similar idea. The donor community should also reconsider their sudden fascination with all things state related. While it is true that when state take care of things details such as audience size, media coverage and a speech by minister take care of themselves much easily, the objective of the activity becomes PR and promotion of specific agendas which are not always in the public interest.
The trend of state institutions and government ministers to become more open, more communicative and inclusive of debate is very welcome. However this should not imply that now they constitute an arch-NGO of some sorts scoring media points and looking good in the eyes of some foreigners. There are plenty of other propaganda tools to make use of without pulling the carpet out of the feet of current civil society of Albania, a carpet already thin and frail.
