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How enlargement to the East progressed
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First reactions from the Community: Europe Agreement |
The 2004 enlargement process was trigged by the collapse of communism in Central and Eastern Europe, by the process of transformation and the severe economic and social problems that followed this collapse and by an understandable desire on the part of these countries to receive help and support from the West.
The first response of the EU to this new situation was to enter into a bilateral Association Agreement with a large number of CEEC countries. The core objective of the Europe Agreement was to establish a large European market encompassing all associated states. A great deal was expected of these countries: They were expected to adopt the rules of the internal market and to restructure fundamentally their domestic economies. To do this, the EU granted these countries financial aid within the scope of a number of programs.
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Copenhagen Criterion |
The following illustration summarizes developments up to this point in time.
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Membership applications from CEEC countries between 1994 and 1996 |
Once the Central and East European countries had made an official application to join the EU between 1994 and 1996 (Cyprus and Malta made their applications in 1990), the European Council requested the Commission to prepare a report in accordance with Treaty requirements. The objective of this report was to scrutinize the situation in each of the potential candidate countries and to determine the degree to which they met the membership criterion and whether or not they were in a position to take on the responsibilities and obligations of membership.
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Commission reports 1997: Agenda 2000 |
The Commission published these reports in July 1997 in a document called „Agenda 2000“. Based on the membership critereon laid down by the Copenhagen European Council, the Agenda 2000 comes to the conclusion that Hungary, Poland, Estonia, the Czech Republic and Slovakia might be in a position to meet the conditions set out and, initially at least, recommends beginning accession negotiations with these countries plus Cyprus. Nevertheless, this report also makes it clear that just because negotiations will begin at the same time does not necessarily mean that they will reach a conclusion at the same time. According to the report, the speed at which a conclusion is reached should depend on the progress made in each individual country. |
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Strengthening measures aimed at bringing the CEECs into line with the EU |
The Commission also recommended strengthening measures aimed at bringing the CEECs into to line with the EU before membership and announced that it would publish a yearly report beginning at the end of 1998 on the progress that had been made. This report would be used to assess the situation in the other countries not included in the first round of negotiations and to make a decision as to whether accession negotiations could be entered into. |
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Accession negotiations begin with the
1st group 1998
2nd group 2000 |
In addition to a large number of recommendations from the Commission in its Agenda 2000 document aimed at involving the applicant countries in enlargement process, the European Council decided at the end of 1997 in Brussels to adopt a proposal to convene bilateral intergovernmental conferences to begin negotiations with those countries that were well on the way to fulfilling the necessary requirements. These countries were Cyprus, Hungary, Poland, Estonia, the Czech Republic and Slovenia. Negotiations with this "first wave" of applicant countries - the so-called "Luxemburg Group" - began in the spring of 1998.
In December 1999, Heads of State and Government meeting in Helsinki decided to enter into membership negotiations with the "second wave" nations, also known as the "Helsinki Group", (Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Rumania and Slovakia). Accession negotiations officially began with these countries on the 15th of February 2000 in Brussels.
The following illustration provides an overview of the developments so far.
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"Road map" to enlargement starting in 2002 |
In November 2000 the Commission published a strategy paper on enlargement containing a "road map" designed to ensure that the EU would be in a position to receive new members starting at the end of 2002. The European Council of Nice approved this strategy paper. The European Council of Nice was also responsible for the Treaty of Nice (ratified on 26.02.01), which was drawn up to ready the EU for enlargement and which involved institutional modifications among others.
The European Council of Laeken in December 2001 concluded by declaring that the enlargement process was irreversible and emphasised the determination of the EU to conclude the current membership negotiations by the end of 2002.
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Deepening and enlargement: Intergovernmental conference convened |
In terms of our determining factors, another interesting fact is that this Summit meeting also reached agreement on setting up a convention on the future of the EU, which was charged with preparing an intergovernmental conference in 2003/2004 to address the issue of a European Constitution. Another very interesting point here is the fact that the membership candidates were also invited to take part in the convention, without being given the opportunity to block solutions that had been reached amicably between the existing member states.
If we investigate this set of circumstances using the determining factors that we have already identified, we get the following results. Here again the tension between closer cooperation and enlargement is clear to see!
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European Council of Copenhagen December 2002 |
The next important stage along the road to enlargement was the European Council of Copenhagen in December 2002. The accession negotiations with the ten candidate nations were completed, the 1st of May 2004 was set for their membership and the financial agreement for 2004 - 2006 was finally agreed upon. This represented the first really difficult moment in the new 25-member-state Union.
In addition to this, the European Council also set 2007 as the date for the membership of Bulgaria and Rumania and decided that the decision as to possible negotiations with Turkey should be dropped based on a report by the Commission in December 2004. Moreover, the conclusions of the Presidency stated that the new member states should be completely involved in the intergovernmental conference concerned with preparing and adopting a European Constitution.
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Signing of the accession contract in April 2003 |
After the European Parliament, whose approval is absolutely necessary, agreed, the heads of state and government and foreign ministers of the member states and the ten membership candidates signed the accession contract on the 16th of April 2003 at a ceremony in Athens.
The accession contract also contained rules on how the 10 new member states would take part in the EU institutions from the signing of the contract until the official membership date of the 1st of May 2004. During this period the new member states held official observer status in all of the Council's committees and included the right to expression. But they were not entitled to take part in voting.
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2003: Referendums in the candidate countries |
The next decisive hurdle for the continuation of the accession process was the referendums to be held in nine of the membership candidate countries (with the exception of Cyprus, which had decided not to hold a referendum) which would decide on the membership contract that had been negotiated and on whether or not each country would join the EU. The following illustration gives the results of these referendums.
It should also be pointed out that these referendums demonstrate clearly that the enlargement process was by no means a phenomenon that was restricted to the government level! On the contrary, the national parliaments and, indeed, the citizens of the countries holding a referendum were very much involved, meaning that the governments were forced into making sure that a majority of their population were in favour of the expansionary course. This also applied, of course, to the existing member states. This means, then, that the enlargement process involved and linked a number of different levels together. Indeed, this is a very decisive point and one that makes analysis so difficult!
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1st of May 2004: Enlargement to the East |
But let's return to the final part of our chronology of enlargement to the east. Lets take a leap forwards to the 1st of May 2004; this is day on which all ten candidate nations became official members of the EU with all its rights and responsibilities. This was without any doubt an historic day for the EU. Not only was this a day on which the Union grew from 15 to 25 member states, it was also a day on which the EU changed and will continue to change it in the future.
I think that another important stage in the process to integrate the new member countries was the European elections on the 13.06.2004, in which MPs from the new countries were elected to the European Parliament for the first time.
The final step in the integration process was the delayed Barroso Commission, which started work at the end of November 2004 along with the new institutional rules for a Union now made up of 25, or rather 27 members. These new rules included changes to the distribution and weighting of votes in the Council of Ministers and the fact that each country was now allowed to send one Commissioner only.
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[Author: Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Schumann]
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