Tendencies of developing dialogue between public administration and civil society organizations in the Republic of Moldova, Georgia and Armenia

The dialogue and cooperation between the public administration and civil society organizations in the three Eastern Partnership states - the Republic of Moldova, Georgia and Armenia has seen a positive, albeit rather slow, development since the declaration of independence of these states until now. During this period, some interesting and effective models of dialogue and collaboration between public administration and civil society organizations were developed. The results of the research show that in institutions / communities where this dialogue is valued at its fair value, the community benefits from effective governance, focused on citizens’ issues, and the degree of interest and involvement of citizens in community affairs is higher compared to those communities where this dialog is missing. The dialogue between the public administration and civil society organizations in the three states is characterized by a low level of trust between representatives of the authorities and those of civil society organizations. National legislation in all 3 states provides for certain forms of public consultation, involvement of citizens and civil society organizations in governance processes. However, local public authorities do not have the institutional capacity to organize and maintain this dialogue, at least to the extent required by national law. In all three countries, civil society organizations face severe funding shortfalls. This does not allow them to develop organizational departments that would monitor the quality of implementation of national and local public policies.