The long road of hope & deception: Who will be part of the EU family in 2030?
11 November 2+23
The long road of hope & deception: Who will be part of the EU family in 2030? What a new approach to EU enlargement policy could look like? By giving Ukraine and Moldova the EU candidate status last year, European leaders have renewed their commitment to EU enlargement. Once again enlargement seems high on the political agenda. Yet, if we look at the Western Balkans we see a different picture. Serbia and Montenegro have been negotiating for over a decade and don't seem any closer to membership today. Similarly, Albania and North Macedonia are not moving forward. And Bosnia is as unlikely to join as Turkey. The once hopefull road to EU accession has been replaced by frustration for all candidates states today. What has gone wrong?
One explanation is the EU's unwillingness to take in new members. Many argue that institutional reforms are needed before enlarging the EU family. With 37 members they fear that decision making could become near to impossible. While these concerns are legit, no one knows how long this reform reform-process could last. In the meantime candidate countries are left in limbo, the EU loses influence and nationalist anti-European forces gain ground in the region.
To adress there challenges, the French and German governments convened a "working group on EU institutional reforms". In September 2023, this working group of 12 experts made recommendations on how to prepare the EU for new members; how to increase its capacity to act; and how to strengthen the rule of law.
For this event, we welcomed Dr. Daniela Schwarzer, who is a member of this working group and one of the leading expert on European and international affairs. We discussed the future of EU enlargement policy with an expert in the field: What is needed now to revive the enralgement project? What is at stake? And what future do we envision for the EU in 2023?
