THE EU, RUSSIA, AND THE ACCESSION STATES: WATER MANAGEMENT AND INSTITUTIONAL INTERACTION ON THE NEW EUROPEAN BORDER

The Water Framework Directive stipulates a management model based on hydrological borders and watersheds as opposed to traditional political and administrative borders. The accession of the Baltic States and Poland to the EU will move the EU’s north-eastern external borders eastwards. It will place new demands on institutional interaction at regional and local levels, and on the implementation of water management policies. In the EU a contemporary trend involves a shift of political power from the national state to the European Union, and from the national central state level to the regions, in a system of multi-level governance. Within the Russian Federation, a process of re-centralisation of political power has taken place. This provides a radically different framework for the implementation of water management than the multi-level system of the EU, and the current system in Russia presents a significant challenge to EU-Russian cooperation. This paper analyses transboundary water management in the northeast of Europe, using a case study of Russian-Estonian relations, and examines the potential institutional problems facing the implementation of the EU Water Framework Directive. It especially examines the difficulties facing the political and administrative management of diffuse source pollution