Table 5.9: The betweenness-centrality of sources of current information about LEADER
Real network Virtual network
including the MARD-Homepage Consulted actors 52 actors of both potential LAGs and 9 organisations
Network size 68 69
Actor Betweenness
(%)
Actor Betweenness
(%)
Ranking LEADER-animator
(LAG-BU) 0.77 LEADER-animator
(LAG-BU) 1.19
County Council 0.18 MARD-Homepage 0.98
Employee of commune
BU-2 (LAG-BU) 0.09 County Council 0.18
Employee of commune BU-2
(LAG-BU) 0.13
Programme agencies
MARDa 0.00 MARDa 0.00
DARD 0.00 DARD 0.00
Selected actors Regional manager
(LAG-MA) 0.02 Regional manager
(LAG-MA) 0.07
Distribution
Min 0.00 0.00
Max 0.77 1.19
Mean 0.02 0.04
Note: a Includes entries of media published by MARD.
The LEADER-animator and one active employee of a commune (BU-2) in LAG-BU keep their high betweenness in the virtual network, even though they do not have the highest out-degree and cannot reach as many people directly as the MARD-Homepage. These two persons cross-link different sources of information and the members of the LAG-BU. Hence, although a homepage can potentially serve a high number of actors and can thus effectuate balancing power in an information network, personal involvement on the part of individual actors is needed for cross-linking and for integrating actors without access to the internet, as well as for ensuring that the idea behind LEADER is well understood.
Social Networks and Rural Development – LEADER in Romania 101 features of potential LAGs’ development. Therefore, the consideration of the pre-implementation phase becomes much more crucial, and a timely review of LEADER activities appears meaningful. Bringing together stakeholders directly and indirectly involved in the pre-implementation phase, multi-perspective reflection, which can be understood as social learning, is likely to enhance the steering of the further implementation process. While High and Nemes (2007) highlight the potential value of social learning when evaluating LAGs’ development endogenously, the present results underline that bringing together potential beneficiaries, the administration, and other key actors also appears promising.
Disentangling the analysed network processes, it is clear that EU-wide networking (not only within LEADER, which will be further examined in Chapter 9, is a key element of successful LEADER implementation: external actors, especially foreign ones, are central in the networks of initial information about LEADER. Furthermore, they might facilitate partnership processes and contribute to better governance. The work of supra-regional organisations is also important. They assist LAGs in complying with the complex LEADER guidelines and developing new modes of governance.
Another decisive network feature is the network-radius. The more actors with different network-radii are involved in local initiatives, the stronger the group tends to be. Ideally, strong local ties, which imply social control and facilitate the creation of trust, organisational structures, and capacities, are combined with weaker, far-reaching relations for obtaining relevant information and external support. Weak ties signal the LAG’s openness and thus its ability to win and integrate new members. Moreover, numerous weak (and/or strong) ties of individual private and civil actors are important. Such a large personal network confers the reputation needed to maintain the power balance with local governments.
Administrative networks are crucial. If they are weak, as in Romania or other NMSs, smooth implementation of LEADER is threatened. Cornerstones in the process, such as the preparation of applications, must be set off and undue influence of other parties avoided.
Therefore, effective and efficient transfer of credible information is essential. The administration’s website is a potentially strong tool for information dissemination; however, its potential is currently not being sufficiently fulfilled in Romania. Printed media have a comparatively low impact; instead, more face-to-face communication is decisive for bringing the complex LEADER approach close to the people. ‘Facework’ contributes to creating inter-personal trust (Giddens 1991). Besides, when direct interaction between beneficiaries is missing, trust is further constrained by unclear procedures with regard to programme implementation. Those severe impacts of administrative shortcomings point to the need for a more detailed examination of the origin of such failure of the politico-administrative system, which will be subject of Chapter 7.
Early provision of information on LEADER enables timely capacity-building. Moreover, the findings stress that by whom and when information on the programme is first received largely determines the development of a potential LEADER region because that is when the basis of a LAG is formed. The development of LAGs can take very different directions, e.g.
communally driven or bottom-up. Most Romanian LAGs evolved from local governments’
microregion-associations. Hence they can build upon their already formally established organisational structures; however, they face challenges in integrating other actors, particularly private ones, due to their closeness and inflexible structures tailored to the communal authorities. The case study of a bottom-up evolved LAG shows that privately initiated informal networks, which are driven by common objectives, are likely to grow into diverse networks. Despite the bottom-up evolved case-study LAG showed openness and diversity, the inclusion of mayors turned out to be problematic.
While in some NMSs, e.g., Lithuania (Macken-Walsh 2010), problems in the development of potential LAGs occurred due to the lack of third-sector organisations, in Romania deficits in
participation due to the reluctance and even conscious avoidance of information dissemination is a major issue. The mayors hold a key communication role at the local level, yet they are not particularly interested in promoting the programme’s participatory approach because they fear losing power. Participation is at the heart of LEADER; however, it is a criterion that is difficult to verify in the LAG-selection process. Thus, in communal-driven LAGs, participation is often limited to a minimum. Only those actors needed for founding the required PPP are invited to join. Kovács Katona et al. (2006) describe this phenomenon in a similar way for Hungarian entrepreneurs and Lošták and Hudečková (2010) for local elites in the Czech Republic.
Despite their non-LEADER-like features, microregion-associations will probably be more competitive in the selection process due to their specific structures, powerful mayors, and their administrative capacities. They often have experience with EU programmes, which helps to cope with the complex LEADER guidelines and to elaborate a regional development strategy. Also, in other NMSs, such as Poland (Furmankiewicz 2006; Furmankiewicz et al.
2010) and the Czech Republic (Hudecková and Balzerová 2010; Maurel 2008), it is reported that local governments are central in LEADER processes. In Hungary and the Czech Republic, many LAGs also developed from microregion-associations (Hudecková and Balzerová 2010; Maurel 2008). The reasons for empowering local governments and/or their associations in other NMSs are similar to those found for Romania.
The developments in the case regions have shown that time is a crucial factor in the implementation process of LEADER. The findings from the network analysis underline that time for capacity-building is essential if a true LEADER approach is to be followed. If time is not a prohibiting factor, then the open, participatory, and integrated notion of LEADER increases the probability that actors of greater social distance come together within the process of forming a LAG. However, building the trust and strong ties needed for founding a partnership in such heterogeneous groups requires more time than in closed and already consolidated networks of selected known actors. In Romania, time is furthermore particularly essential for establishing social capital for counteracting the lack of trust between public and private actors and the general aversion against collective action. It is not only a matter of a difficult working relation between local governments and third sector organisations, as found by Furmankiewicz et al. (2010) in Poland, but also about entering into a formal contract. This obstacle seems to be more severe than in the other NMSs.
Governance-related LEADER principles become irrelevant if those in power are unwilling to share political influence. In Romania, hierarchical political-administrative structures, especially with the leading role of the mayors and the strongly positioned county councils, are therefore an obstacle to LEADER. It is found that actors of high supra-regional reputation were needed for curtailing local governments’ dominance. Indeed, in other NMSs as well, local governments often have the leading role in decision-making processes (Furmankiewicz et al. 2010; Maurel 2008). In addition, in Romania, the superior County Council tries to steer local development processes.
Generally, local actors seem to lack initiative and need leadership. Passivity strengthens the traditional political institutions and inhibits better governance. Overcoming this deeply rooted heritage of the socialist era can hardly be achieved by capacity-building in the pre-implementation phase; rather, it is a long-term process. Having studied cooperation in the agricultural sector in post-socialist countries, Tisenkopfs et al. (2011) conclude that farmers consider collaboration more positively if they become aware of Western experiences. This will certainly be an important factor for LAG building in Romania. The present findings further suggest that it would be interesting to investigate the relevance of trust in social capital formation in and through the mediation and transmitting processes driven by regional-external actors, which turned out to be crucial to overcoming the aversion to formal partnerships and to plausibly transferring the idea of LEADER in greater detail.
Social Networks and Rural Development – LEADER in Romania 103 Although it is rarely found and is probably initially less successful in the LEADER competition in Romania, the study has shown that slowly-grown, open, bottom-up networks might be the better choice for kicking off integrated rural development and new modes of governance in the longer term. These networks have incorporated LEADER principles such as participation and are therefore better prepared to use the regional endogenous potential.
Having established and properly nurtured social capital, they are likely to be more sustainable even without external funding. LEADER provides not only (initial) funding, but also offers thought-provoking stimuli, which have the potential to fruitfully pervade Romania’s local communities gradually and finally initiate truly endogenous local development efforts.