The unprovoked and illegal war of aggression of Russia against Ukraine ended the assumption that a conventional war within Europe is a relict of the past. With the European Security Architecture in crisis, if even still existing, the EU member states understood the importance of their neighboring countries in South Eastern Europe and in Eastern Europe for their own security. With the granting of EU candidate status to Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia, the nearly two decades long period of enlargement-fatigue came to an end. However, six states in the so-called Western Balkans have been in the process for many years and yet Croatia was the last country to become a member of the EU in 2013. Challenges are still manifold when it comes to the rule of law, corruption, nationalism, emigration on the side of the candidate countries. On the other hand, especially in the countries of the Western Balkans the EU has lost its credibility due to not following its own promises after reforms. The way into the EU is still long and technical, but there are many attempts to make the process more feasible and merit-based. However, the EU also needs to address the most crucial questions on how it wants to deal with an enlarged EU. How is this possible when decision-making processes on foreign policy decisions are still based on unanimity? While the decision to grant the countries in the east a European perspective has widely been acknowledged as a geopolitical decision, what does that imply for the values of the EU, codified in Art 2 of the EUV? How credible is this European perspective for the candidate countries who are all on different tracks and made different reforms? What is the cost of non-enlarging the EU? With an expected shift towards right-wing parties in the upcoming EU elections in June, what does that mean for a “New EU”? These and other questions have been addressed in this Podcast with the excellent experts Kristof BENDER and Milena MIHAJLOVIĆ.

Guests:

Kristof Bender (Austria) is the Deputy Chirman at the European Stability Initiative (ESI). He leads various ESI research projects on EU enlargement and on South Eastern Europe. Educated in sociology in Vienna and Paris, he has worked in South East Europe in various capacities since 1997, including managing higher education projects in Bosnia for the World University Service, as Attaché for Humanitarian Affairs in the Austrian Embassy in Belgrade, as a researcher for the International Centre for Migration Policy Development and as a consultant for various institutions, including the Austrian Federal Chancellery, DFID and SIDA. Part of the ESI team since early 2000, Kristof has been living in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia, and is currently based in Vienna. He is also a Europe’s Futures fellow at the IWM Vienna (Institut für die Wissenschaften vom Menschen), a board member of the Kosovo Civil Society Foundation (KCSF) and an advisory board member of Institute Alternativa (Montenegro).

Milena Mihajlovic is one of the founders and Programme Director at the European Policy Centre (CEP), independent, non-profit think-tank based in Belgrade, Serbia. Milena is a proven expert in the field of public administration reform, in Serbia and in the Western Balkan region. Before co-founding CEP, Lazarevic worked for almost six years as a civil servant in the Serbian administration, first in the EU Integration Office of the Serbian Government (SEIO) and later in the Ministry of Public Administration. She is a Soros scholar and has an MA degree in European studies from the College of Europe and an MA in European Administrative Law from Belgrade University.

Moderation:

Stephanie Fenkart, Director of the IIP

The episode was recorded on 13 May 2024.