The development of the Polish environmental movement was separated into two stages. The first stage began in 1989, during the period of protest against the communistic government. The NGOs were politically active and struggled hard to keep their organizations alive during those politically trying times. The second stage was the participation and maturation stage. Not only protest was going on, but more mature forms of activity were developed. Currently, several projects are running, they think of alternatives and try to control and influence the government.
The East-East cooperation is not as important as East-West cooperation; it is much more lucrative to deal with Western NGOs. They provide more assistance, money and knowledge. Poles find it difficult to work together, because they never learned to. There is a lack of democratic tradition here. From Western NGOs, Eastern partners can learn how to cooperate. Additionally, cooperation with the West still has more prestige than cooperation with Eastern neighbors.
Another problem with East-East cooperation is that is it not an effective to influence your government. It doesn't help an environmental NGO in lobbying for their own countries problems; only border problems or global problems are viable for East-East cooperation and most of the NGOs in Poland do not deal with these kind of problems.
Of course, building cooperation is a time consuming process, it takes time to get to know each other, to build good relationships to start East-East cooperation. We need to change our traditional way of thinking and problem solving in the environmental NGO community.
There are at least 5 scenario's for development. The first is the establishing of a (stronger) political wing of the 'Green Movement'. Now there are 17 green parties acting in Poland, but most of them are 'sofa parties', this means that there are so few active members, they can sit together on one sofa. The second possible scenario is a radicalization, because the environmental NGOs are facing a political wall right now. The government is not at all interested in environmental issues, so maybe with radicalization they can break down this wall. Another possibility is an ongoing slow maturation of the whole movement. Together with an ongoing integration and a broader and stronger internal (=national) cooperation. The fourth scenario is the possible diminishing of the environmental movement in Poland. The Polish government is not interested in environmental issues. For Polish environmentalists all hope is set on joining the European Union and receiving ongoing support from Western countries. But in the mean time, the current trend is of Western nations shifting their interest towards former Soviet Republics, instead of Poland. The last possibility for the future development of the Polish 'Green Movement' is dispersion; return to the local communities, with effort centered on small scale projects.
The future of cooperation between CEE countries is not dependent on the environmental movement. Political, economical and military factors are the determining factors for the future. The developments in the former Soviet Union are completely uncertain; there is a big question on what the future will hold. The fact that there is a different culture and nuclear power is available, could be dangerous factors for the future of Poland.
East-East cooperation has to be promoted, but in the same time it shouldn't be artificial. Natural reasons for East-East cooperation are needed. A bit pushing is ok, but within a fitting framework. Attractive funds will give a lot impetus for East-East cooperation, for example, the REC should set the conditions for such cooperation, otherwise a lot of phony East-East cooperation will result.