CIAO DATE: 02/02

Coping With Uncertainty: The 'Vienna and Berlin Mechanisms' In Light of the Experience of Their First Decade

Pál Dunay
Director, International Training Course, Geneva Centre for Security Policy

1999 - 2000

The Geneva Centre for Security Policy (GCSP)

Introduction

When the East-West conflict came to an end the character of the CSCE changed in parallel with it. The CSCE could be described as a series of conferences until 1990. It started to develop to become an international organisation right after the end of the Cold War. It was the request of participating states to avoid the fate of many intergovernmental organisations through building a sizeable bureaucracy, formalised procedures and a rigid body of substantive rules. CSCE institutions were intentionally kept weak and small in the beginning and have gained size gradually later. There was a gap to be filled in, however. Namely, the institutions were not there to deal with the substantial conflicts that seemed so unlikely during the euphoric moments of the Paris summit of November 1990 and became so real a few months later. The bridge between the series of conferences and the classical intergovernmental organisation has been built through certain mechanisms.

Most of these mechanisms deal with various aspects of dispute settlement. As the CSCE/OSCE has always been identified with the broad concept of security, so have the mechanisms been dealing with different aspects of potential security problems. The four mechanisms that were established in the early 1990s deal with the following matters:

1. Consultation and co-operation as regards unusual military activities, the so-called Vienna mechanism;
2. Consultation and co-operation with regard to emergency situations, the so-called Berlin mechanism;
3. The human dimension mechanism, or so-called Moscow mechanism;
4. The procedure for peaceful settlement of disputes, or Valletta mechanism. The four mechanisms are the products of less than fifteen months between November 1990 and February 1992.

The first three mechanisms have addressed one aspect of international security or the other. The Vienna and Berlin mechanisms deal with matters that would fall in the first basket of the activity of the CSCE. The Moscow mechanism is clearly related to the third, humanitarian basket. The Valletta mechanism does not deal with specific aspects of security but addresses dispute settlement generally. It seems the basic difference between the Vienna, Berlin and Moscow mechanisms on the one hand, and Valletta on the other is not only in the specific character of the former ones and the general character of the latter. It is that the former ones make an attempt to predict those security problems that may emerge in the post-Cold War environment and might require urgent reaction of the community of CSCE states. The Valletta mechanism, as was mentioned above, does not specify the problems that may require dispute settlement and the matter of urgency is also missing. More precisely put, it specifies certain security problems negatively. Namely, it excludes some of the most important and politically sensitive matters from among the ones that could be subject to the mechanism. There is another major difference between them, however. Whereas some however limited practice has evolved concerning the former three, the Valletta mechanism has never been invoked. Valletta was furthermore superseded by the Convention on Conciliation and Arbitration within the CSCE adopted by the Stockholm Council meeting in December 1992 among the parties.

This paper deals with the Vienna unusual military activity and the Berlin emergency mechanisms exclusively in light of its application during the 1990s. It explores them for two reasons:

1. After their fairly frequent application, right after their introduction in the early-1990s, they were invoked in 1999 under different conditions.
2. As the OSCE is looking for new conflict management mechanisms it is worth taking a look the means it has at its disposal. Without this it may well be that the participating states re-invent the wheel.

The reason not to address the Moscow mechanism is simple. With the establishment of the function of the High Commissioner on National Minorities at the Helsinki summit of July 1992 the politically most controversial human rights matter, those of minority rights, could be dealt with by another forum. Moreover, the Warsaw Office of Democratic Institutions and Human Rights has also "eaten up" a good part of the matters to be covered by the Moscow mechanism.

The Vienna and Berlin Mechanisms: Assumptions, Foundations, Regulation

The genesis of the Vienna unusual military activity and the Berlin emergency mechanisms date back to the preparation for the November 1990 Paris summit of the CSCE. The former was on the agenda of the ongoing talks on confidence- and security-building measures with the participation of each CSCE participating state. The latter was discussed in the preparatory committee of the Charter of Paris for a New Europe in the same circle of participants in Vienna. The former was completed and became part of the CSBM document of 1990, and later appeared in subsequent documents replacing it. The emergency mechanism was not approved by the participating states in that instance, however.

Most participating states were of the view that such an emergency mechanism was necessary. It was the United States, the country that could be associated most often with arbitrariness and unilateralism in the 1990s, that opposed the emergency mechanism in Vienna. Every other state deemed such a mechanism necessary or was ready to live with it at least. The U.S. did not deem such a multilateral mechanism necessary and it was impossible to make it understand it was highly unlikely the mechanism would be used "against" it. Bearing in mind its dominance in international relations that has become increasingly clear during the past decade it was understandable. The U.S. interpretation of its role probably regarded its influence sufficient to address any major political conflict it opposed bilaterally. This attitude could have served as early warning to the allies and partners of Washington just a few months after the end of the Cold War. The U.S. will not necessarily embark upon more multilateralism in order to reassure them. Furthermore, the U.S. still maintained an intimate, more precisely intimately adversarial, relationship with the Soviet Union. Moscow, apparently a status quo power in decline, was interested in maintaining the then formally still existent bipolar structure of international affairs. The Soviet Union that had already faced some ethnic rivalries on its territory and challenges against its integrity in the late 1980s disliked the idea of a multilateral mechanism that would permit external interference in its internal affairs.

Two months passed after the debates in the "prep.com." in Vienna and an illuminating example was offered to those who nurtured certain illusions concerning the peaceful evolution of the international system in the future. On 13 January 1991 Russian black berets gave an example how the Soviet Union will react upon the independent-minded forces of Soviet republics. The shooting happened at demonstrators in Vilnius, the capital of the then republic of Soviet Lithuania. It could have happened elsewhere in the Soviet space as well. The United States then understood with some delay what European diplomats pointed to in Vienna was reality. The Soviet Union could soon fall apart and the process may induce extensive use of violence. The U.S. was no longer interested to object against a vaguely formulated political emergency mechanism for the sake of the Soviet Union and due to its own indifference was going along with the emerging consensus. Not to mention that the mechanism was based on the draft of the European Community and the U.S. at the time was far less ignorant of the position of its main allies than in some cases in the second half of the 1990s.

The first meeting of the CSCE Council in June 1991 could thus approve the emergency mechanism by consensus. The meeting was overshadowed by the approaching hostilities in Yugoslavia. Even though the U.S. Secretary of State James Baker called on to maintain the unity of Yugoslavia it was clear history did not evolve along the lines of the desire of western politicians. The ongoing events gave ample evidence that a political emergency mechanism may soon well be necessary. The place where it could be invoked was no longer a distant place, a political no man's land in the south of the USSR. It was an area in the middle of southern Europe adjacent to countries of increasing strategic importance, a number of fragile new democracies, like Albania, Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania.

The Soviet Union, in the last months of its existence, did not play any particular role except for increasing the number of countries whose agreement was necessary in order to launch the mechanism from 12 to 13. The Soviet delegation argued in favour of this change in order to prevent that the then 12 European Community member countries could agree upon invoking the mechanism without the support of any other state. Bearing in mind the historical situation it was impossible to imagine that the accord of 12 countries would not be supported by a number of other democracies. The Soviet step in Berlin was thus clearly nothing but lip service.

By the summer of 1991 there were two mechanisms that could address not particularly well-defined potential conflict sources. Whereas the unusual military activity mechanism focused on activities of military forces, the emergency mechanism was conceived to deal with politically pressing problems, potential conflicts. If one takes a close look it is clear that on an abstract level of analysis each addresses the same problem: the uncertainty and unpredictability of the source of insecurity. Consequently they are not rooted in the post-Cold War environment only in the sense they were passed in the beginning of the 1990s immediately after the end of the East-West conflict. They go beyond this and their roots are in post-Cold War reality that has been characterised by uncertainty, a feeling that anything may occur in the less happy half of Europe any time.

A thorough threat analysis could indicate participating states started out from the assumption either there will be no conflict in Europe or if there are their sources cannot be predicted. Nobody knows who will launch them and for what cause. So it is better "to be prepared" for every eventuality. This was the message of the early post-Cold War era. Each, to some extent, relies on the same means. It puts a problem on display for the community of CSCE participating states in the hope that the international attention will influence the country whose activity deviates from the values shared by the others. To put it differently when post-Cold War conflict sources were considered it was the tacit assumption of CSCE states that when a conflict breaks out it will not be due to the lasting, premeditated, malign intentions of a participating state, hence it can be influenced through such soft means. Therefore the follow-on actions that may be contemplated by the participating states beyond invoking the mechanism are similarly soft. It either consists of convening another meeting on higher level or of assessing the situation and agreeing upon recommendations or conclusions (Berlin mechanism). The execution of fact-finding and monitoring missions is the option according to the Vienna mechanism. It is for the above reason that neither has an instrument to enforce sanctions. As the assumption turned out to be wrong in some cases (e.g. Serbia) so remained the therapy ineffective.

There are differences between the two mechanisms as well. The most important is the definition of the behaviour that may result in the invoking of the mechanism. The Vienna mechanism can be launched in case of "any unusual and unscheduled activities of ... military forces outside their normal peacetime locations which are militarily significant". The Berlin mechanism is less specific. It mentions "a serious emergency situation which may arise from a violation of one of the Principles of the Final Act or as the result of major disruptions endangering peace, security or stability". In theory if one pays attention to the above wording the Berlin mechanism could incorporate the Vienna one. It was certainly not the intention of the "Founding Fathers", however. On the contrary, it was specifically excluded and the document that established the Berlin mechanism stated it "will not be used in place of the mechanism concerning unusual military activities". The idea was that while Vienna deals with military risks, Berlin does it with respect of political concerns "endangering peace, security and stability". This is a reiteration of the broad security concept of the CSCE as a starting point. As security encompasses a broader area than just military matters, the separation of military and political causes of conflict is somewhat artificial. In both cases the respective mechanisms can be invoked by any participating state on its own. It is, however a further major difference that in case of the Vienna mechanism it remains under the full and exclusive control of the state that launched it. In case of the Berlin mechanism on the other hand, as was mentioned above, though the process can be launched by any participating state no meeting can be convened without the support of 12 other participating states. Thus, only thirteen states together can guarantee the necessary political attention that stems from the emergency meeting. One would conclude that in theory the Vienna mechanism can be launched successfully easier than the Berlin one. Consequently, when the activity has a military component it would be tempting to launch the former, rather than the latter.

If one takes a look at the procedural aspect of the two mechanisms there are major similarities between them. One may state that "Vienna" served as example to "Berlin" at various instances. Both mechanisms are invoked by a requesting state seeking information from the receiving state concerning a situation or an unusual military activity. The latter is obliged to respond to the request in 48 hours in both cases. "The request and the reply will be transmitted to all other participating States without delay." Due to the fact the bilateral communication is shared with all other participating states the process is characterised as "multi-bilateral". Following this if the requesting participating state does not find the reply of the responding state satisfactory the process continues.

In case of the Vienna mechanism the requesting party has two choices. It may either ask for a meeting with the responding state or of all CSCE/OSCE participating states. It is not clear from the text whether it is mandatory to go through the bilateral phase before the matter continues with the involvement of all participating states. Even though the sequencing of the text (and nothing else) would indicate this requirement the practice established does not support such reading. It is entirely up to the requesting state to decide whether to chose the bilateral or the multilateral option. One should consider whether the unusual military activity is so severe that makes invoking the mechanism with the participation of the entire CSCE/OSCE community necessary or it is suffice to hold a bilateral meeting and submit information to other countries. The other issue one should consider is whether the immediate invoking of the multilateral meeting without a preceding bilateral one does not exhaust the available options and thus deprive the requesting party from further steps on the "escalation ladder" in case of further unusual military activity.

In case of the Berlin mechanism the requesting state has no choice. If it is of the view that the underlying situation has remained unresolved it may request that an emergency meeting of the Committee of Senior Officials (now Senior Council) be held. As the original request seeking clarification as well as the reply of the requested state are transmitted to all other participating states it is correct to assume that they are familiar with the situation. The chairman of the Senior Council will be informed about the readiness of at least other 12 participating states to second the request for an emergency meeting within 48 hours. If such support is provided the meeting will be held. In order to give some lead time to hold the meeting the Chairman will notify all participating States about the time it is convened. This has to happen between minimum 48 hours and maximum three days. In case of the Vienna mechanism the regulation requires that the meeting be convened within no more than 48 hours. Contrary to the Vienna mechanism where the requesting state is in the position on its own to decide whether it wants to have a meeting to be convened, in case of the Berlin mechanism it is a demanding task to provide for the necessary support to move from the "request - reply" phase of the process to its "meeting" phase. As the emergency meeting calls the attention of the public to the subject matter of the mechanism states have reason to seek to prevent this. It would certainly be the best to give a reply to the request concerning the "developing emergency situation" that satisfies the requesting state. The practice of the first nine years of the emergency mechanism has demonstrated, however that states invoking the mechanism are usually determined not to accept the explanation, to continue the process and move to convening the meeting. In that case the only "escape route" is to prevent that other 12 states would second the request for the meeting. As the support of other states is dependent upon political considerations it is less probable that great powers with an active role in complex interdependencies would face the "meeting" phase of the emergency mechanism in case of their eventual wrong-doings.

The Berlin mechanism is organised in a manner that a focused meeting could be held speedily. This is guaranteed by a set of rules. It must not last more than two days. The agenda will consist of a single item and it is identical with the notification for which the meeting was convened. The topic of the meeting will not be open to amendment. These regulations no doubt provide for the emergency character of the meeting procedurally. As it was pointed out above the most important shortcomings of the Berlin and Vienna mechanisms are not in the procedural rules, rather in the inapplicability of the mechanisms to determined, malign leaderships with a premeditated agenda to violate certain basic principles of international co-operation. They cannot be influenced by public exposure or other soft means inherent in the Berlin and Vienna mechanisms.

The Application of the Vienna and Berlin Mechanisms in Their First Decade

Both mechanisms have been invoked a few times only, bearing in mind their nearly one decade-long existence. It is thus difficult to contemplate whether the number of cases could give sufficient information concerning the functioning of the mechanisms. They were most often invoked not much after their adoption that was followed by their joining other "Sleeping Beauties" of European security. There was an instance in 1999 when under fundamentally different conditions they have unexpectedly reappeared on the horizon just in order to disappear again.

In the first half of the nineties three emergency meetings were convened in relation to the conflict in the former Yugoslavia, one concerned the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh. The former ones occurred in 1991, 1992 and in 1994, the latter in 1993. The unusual military activity mechanism was launched particularly often in 1991 in relation to the war in the former Yugoslavia by Austria, Italy and Hungary. The former two launched multilateral meetings whereas the latter stopped short of it and went for a bilateral exchange with Belgrade in the Conflict Prevention Centre in Vienna. Between the mid-1990s and 1999 neither the Vienna, nor the Berlin mechanism was invoked. On 1 April 1999 Belarus launched the Vienna mechanism, on 21 April Russia did the same with respect to the Berlin mechanism. Both were addressed to several countries that were participating in the Kosovo operation or hosted foreign troops on their territories in relation to it. The claim of Belarus was addressed to seven countries, including five member-states of NATO, that of Russia to every member state of the Atlantic Alliance. Both requests ended up in failure (contrary to the CFE on-site inspection request in Italy. There the inspection was conducted according to the rules of the Treaty).

If one looks at some cases more closely the following conclusions can be drawn:

1. The most important is that it happened very seldom, one may say exceptionally, that the reason to launch the mechanism had no major military component. In spite of that the Berlin mechanism dealt with political conflict sources, whereas the Vienna mechanism with military conflict sources the reasons to launch the Berlin mechanism also had some military relevance in most cases. Among the causes to launch the Berlin mechanism one finds the activity of the federal Yugoslav armed forces to fight Slovene and Croat attempts to gain independence in 1991. There is the activity of the same forces in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1992. The long lasting and stalemated conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh also resulted in the launching of the Berlin mechanism. In that case it would have been impossible to decide whether it was a political or a military conflict had the mechanism not been invoked in an instance when in the spring of 1993 Armenia conducted a successful military operation on the territory of Azerbaijan. The Russian initiative to address the war of the Atlantic Alliance against Milosevic in the spring of 1999 is a further evident example to invoke a political conflict mechanism in a primarily military matter. This leaves us basically with one single case that had nothing to do with the military aspect of security. Namely, in 1992 Hungary requested clarification from the Federal Republic of Czechoslovakia concerning the Gabcikovo/Nagymaros barrage system. The reference here was made to Hungary's sovereignty and territorial integrity, two basic principles of the Helsinki Final Act. Even though the reply of Prague was regarded "completely dissatisfactory" by Budapest the process was discontinued without entering the multilateral phase.
2. The first activation of the mechanisms took place soon after the Berlin Council meeting of June 1991. Understandably, the modalities of the application of the new mechanisms were not clear to the participating states. It was on this basis that Nils Eliasson, director of the CSCE Prague Secretariat, reviewed the activity under the mechanisms at the next Council meeting as follows: "The crisis came a little early - the new structure has not matured. One delegate joked that we needed a nice little conflict we could settle easily and show the world." The German chairman of the fifth emergency meeting and later CSCE Secretary General Wilhelm Hoeynck complained more critically that "the limited range of instruments at the CSCE's disposal was a hindrance to managing crises". It can be realised that the hostilities in the Yugoslav Federation were not the kind of crises anyone would have dreamt of in order to "calibrate" the newly established mechanisms. One can present doubts however whether any significant crisis would be "suitable" to prepare the participating states and the organisation proper to react upon crises. In light of the experience of the 1990s one has reason to conclude that due to their unique character limited lessons can be drawn from individual crises.
3. Separate cases did not follow the same pattern. If one takes into consideration the discussions that surrounded the launching and the continuation of the mechanism in one case or the other the following can be concluded. The procedure followed usually was not due to the weight of the conflict or the different reaction of the requested party, but to other factors. Broad political or diplomatic considerations impacted upon the way the mechanism was applied by participating states. This was the case particularly with respect of the Berlin mechanism. As was mentioned above, in most cases the requesting party was not satisfied with the reply of the responding state. In spite of this the process in some cases continued with a multilateral meeting in others not. It may be that the party requesting clarification does not continue the process as it has already achieved its goal by attracting the attention of all the other OSCE participating states. In other cases, even though the necessary support of other 12 participating states to go multilateral apparently existed, the interest vanished. This was the case when Hungary requested the CSSR to provide information concerning the Gacikovo/Nagymaros barrage system and the change of the flow of the Danube. There the Hungarian government did not want to continue the process. This was due to the heavy diplomatic pressure it faced from some of the country's major partners. They argued that the dispute settlement shall continue in front of other forums, like the International Court of Justice. In case of Russia's request for clarification concerning the spring 1999 NATO operation against the regime of Milosevic Moscow has achieved it wanted by making its point clear publicly at each and every forum at its disposal. It has certainly found it satisfactory that the West was motivated to involve Russia in the resolution of the post-Yugoslav conflict. Furthermore, from the adverse reaction of NATO member-states Russia could feel that there is no point in continuing the exchange. Not to mention that in that case it could have been difficult to find 12 further countries to second a Russian request for the convening a meeting with the involvement of all OSCE participating states. Nevertheless, this could not have been the reason why Russia did not make an attempt to have such a meeting convened. The situation described may be interpreted as a conspiracy of a powerful coalition of states. It can also be interpreted in a benign manner as a change of power relations in the international system where the enforcement of certain values (human rights, self-determination) gains wide-ranging support and that of others (sovereignty, territorial integrity) do not.
4. The Berlin mechanism was most often invoked in hard security related matters. It may be for this reason that with the exception of Russia in 1999 adjacent countries launched the mechanism that were directly concerned by certain developments in their neighbourhood.

From the practice of the Vienna unusual military activity mechanism two elements are worthy of mention.

1. Except for two cases the process has each time continued multilaterally with the participation of all CSCE/OSCE participating states. The two exceptions were launched by Hungary vis-a-vis Yugoslavia in 1991 and Belarus against seven countries in 1999. In the former case Hungary asked for clarification concerning the frequent violation of its airspace by Yugoslav aircraft. As somewhat similar matters induced Austria and Italy to have multilateral meetings convened Hungary could have opted for it as well. It consciously rejected that option and opted for a bilateral meeting at the Conflict Prevention Centre in Vienna. One would praise Hungary for its thoughtful attitude as did many major partners of the country. The bilateral meeting meant to "retain" the multilateral option in case the violation of Hungary's sovereignty continues. It must be borne in mind that some events beyond the control of Hungary resulted in a situation that virtually precluded the application of the multilateral option. When during the war against the Milosevic regime in the spring of 1999 the Republic of Belarus invoked the mechanism it did not even convene a meeting with those seven countries to whom it addressed its request for clarification of the ongoing unusual military activity. Belarus asked certain pertinent questions about the international legal foundations of the operation in Yugoslavia, the size of formations that participate in it and the prospect of its continuation. The delegation of Belarus could register two weeks later that three states did not respond to the request in time. The UK, Italy and FYROM exceeded the 48 hours time limit set by the Vienna document on confidence- and security-building measures. One state, Bosnia and Herzegovina did not respond at all. The reason for not continuing the process beyond requesting clarification concerning the unusual military activity could be due to one factor or the other mentioned above in relation to Russia's invoking the Berlin mechanism.
2. The "unscheduled and unusual" military activity that is subject to the Vienna mechanism is formulated ambiguously. Many different types of militarily significant activities outside the normal peacetime location of military forces can be subject to it. Some were under the impression that it had been intended "to reveal covert operations that might conceal preparations for a military assault". This impression is unfounded. The idea of those who drafted the document was to offer a vague formulation in order no significant activity be excluded from the agenda of the mechanism. It is correct that in light of other arms control commitments that cover many unconcealed activities, like major exercises, troop movements, etc. it was expected the agenda of the Vienna mechanism will broaden in the direction of significant concealed activities. It is correct to remind in this respect that the Vienna Document does not require "to report unusual military activities" unless under other rules of the Vienna CSBM document. Reality did not follow the tacit expectation and the mechanism was invoked without exception in cases of high profile military activities, mostly large scale maneuvers of Yugoslavia and NATO. One could not count with this as it was the assumption in 1990 that Europe will continue to be free of war, similarly to the preceding 45 years. As the assumption turned out to be unfounded so has the function of the mechanism changed.

Conclusion

The number of cases in which the Berlin and Vienna mechanisms were applied during the 1990s was very small. Most experts in statistical analysis would stop here and state it is impossible to draw conclusions of general relevance from a few cases. Even though I share this opinion there might be conclusions to be drawn for the functioning of international relations in Europe in the 1990s in the mirror of the evolution of the role of the two mechanisms. The decline of the application of the two mechanisms not much after their introduction is due to a number of factors: 1. The decreasing reliance on them not much after they had been launched demonstrated a significant move away from the uncertain security posture of the early-1990s. The uncertainty at the time stemmed from two factors. The scenario was uncertain as it was unclear what type of conflicts would emerge in the whole region east of the European Union and NATO. The countries where such threats could possibly emerge could not be confined to a handful of states. As the West increased its leverage in east-central Europe and started to understand the differences between various local actors the situation changed fundamentally. The sources of threat (ethnic rivalry, mutually exclusive territorial claims) have become better defined. The number of potential grave violators of norms of international behaviour has also been shrinking significantly. Consequently, the assumptions on which the mechanisms were based have changed. Few actors and strictly confined scenarios characterised the late 1990s and will the beginning of the 21st century. These changes could make the two mechanisms largely irrelevant in themselves. 2. Another less welcome factor is there as well. Namely, contrary to the past when attempts were made to engage or placate potential problem countries and trouble-makers through a wide range of means, those soft mechanisms that do not provide major perceived carrot and do not carry significant stick are not regarded adequate any longer. Whether states (and leaders) have become rogue by themselves or were declared to be rogue powers by outside forces is open to question. With respect of a "rogue" partner only such means are adequate that are backed by credible sanctions, that is by coercive means of influence. This was the treatment applied to the major wrong-doer, Slobodan Milosevic in the Kosovo operation of 1999. The United States that most often champions to declare a country to be a rogue state - with an immediate bearing upon its partners and allies - seems to perceive an optimal international system as one of democracies. For it a system of democracies is not identical with a democratic international system, however.

In sum, two major tendencies have made both mechanisms largely inapplicable. On the one hand, an increasing number of states have joined the western sphere of influence, the zone of democratic peace that does not require such mechanisms in order not to threaten militarily or endanger politically other countries. On the other, there is a strictly limited number of actors in Europe that cannot be effectively influenced by soft mechanisms that highlight certain "deviations" from basic principles and rules of European co-operation. In those cases the Berlin and Vienna mechanisms may continue to be necessary, though insufficient to influence the activity of some states. 3. It is a further factor of different character that the evolution of the CSCE/OSCE made mechanisms, including the two ones presented here above, unnecessary. The institutional structure has evolved rapidly in a direction that resulted in the establishment of quasi-permanent institutions, among others the Permanent Council. When there are bodies that make constant exchanges of the participating states possible mechanisms where similar issues can be addressed understandably do not flourish. It is open to question, however whether the attention of the public can be maintained by the activity of a permanent institution similarly to the attention that surrounded the meetings convened under the Berlin or Vienna mechanism.

The prospect of the two mechanisms to play a role in the future is slim. An increasing number of states have been integrated in or linked to the western zone of stability. They are anxious not to give ground for the invoking of such mechanisms. Furthermore, in case they do not comply fully with those norms that prevail in the region they face "gentle" pressure at other forums. The rogue, or for that matter "rogue-d", states that should be influenced by the two mechanisms among others fall out of the system as in their cases soft measures are regarded insufficient or rather inadequate. Last, but not least there are states, primarily the Russian Federation, in whose case a multitude of other measures are considered to be applicable rather than the two mechanisms. Bilateral channels are applied in order not to make certain differences public, or the Code of Conduct is invoked, rather than the Vienna mechanism. In sum, the decline is apparent and it is due to the changes in the international system rather than dependent upon the changing will of the OSCE participating states. Despite such a sober assessment it may well be necessary to consider the formal existence of these mechanisms when the OSCE participating states contemplate to bring new mechanisms into life instead of relying upon "old" ones.