The countries of the Eastern Partnership (EAP) – Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine - as well as the Russian Federation are characterized by common structural problems and at the same time diverging development paths. All these countries are democracies according to their own expectations, but many of them often grant restricted levels of freedom to their civil societies. The democratic consolidation in most of them countries is considered as faltering or not yet completed. In the economic sector, the ongoing crisis shows that none of the countries had developed a sustainable strategy for growth and the vulnerability to external shocks stays high. The social situation of the population is consecutively uncertain, young people are often looking for prospects abroad. more