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This article investigates the European Union’s (EU) efforts to incorporate civil society organizations (CSOs) into its funding programmes, focusing on Turkey and Serbia – two long-standing accession countries that have received significant amounts of pre-accession aid. The EU’s long-established commitment to CSO inclusion extends beyond internal policies, encouraging their participation in policymaking and EU integration process in accession countries. Despite considerable initiatives promoting CSO engagement, questions remain about which CSOs are included in EU consultation mechanisms. Through comprehensive interviews with EU and national officials and CSO representatives, this study analyses the factors shaping CSO representation in EU-funded programming. Findings reveal persistent disparities in CSO inclusion, influenced by structural limitations, EU funding priorities and contextual factors within candidate countries. The resulting epistemic exclusion produces testimonial quieting of certain organizations, wherein they cannot find an audience for their testimonies. Notably, certain CSOs are consistently granted access to consultation processes, enabling them to shape programme design and obtain valuable resources, while others face systemic exclusion. This creates distributive injustice, as excluded CSOs miss out on crucial information and networking opportunities. This article, therefore, shows how EU consultation mechanisms, by reproducing hierarchies within local civil societies, perpetuate feminist epistemic injustice in civil society funding governance.
Özge Zihnioğlu (Mon,) studied this question.