EU's copenhagen political criteria and the political culture of the western balkan countries: are they compatible?

Abstract

The European Union considers the establishment of a stable democratic system as a precondition for the EU membership. Political culture of a country is regarded as one of the most important determinants of the consolidation of a democratic political regime in that country. This paper looks at the question of how compatible are the political cultures of the Western Balkan countries with democratic values and in turn with the EU's Copenhagen political criteria. The hypothesis that a democratic political system requires a democratic political culture has been tested. The individualsurvey data from the World Values Survey have been analyzed in the paper. Western Balkan political cultures are found to be compatible with democracyin some respects and not to be compatible in some others. However, somecountries which seem to have the least demoratic political culture such as Macedonia achieved more progress on democratization compared to othercountries which had more democratic political cultures that that of Macedonia.