Paper Titles & Abstracts

In December 2006, two weeks before the accession of Bulgaria and Romania (which marked the completion of the historical fifth enlargement of the Union), the European Council approved a renewed consensus on enlargement which shaped significantly the development of EU enlargement policy. On the basis of the lessons learnt from the previous enlargement rounds, the Commission outlined a set of concrete measures aimed at improving the quality of the accession process, which highlighted the growing relevance of EU's integration capacity; the need for a systematic use of benchmarks and the relevance of the early stages of the accession process for tackling challenging issues such as judicial reform and the fight against corruption (European Commission, 2006). Despite the growing body of literature on the mechanisms and the effectiveness of EU enlargement policy, and the continuous engagement of the Union with Turkey and the Western Balkan countries, the impact of the revised enlargement strategy remains under-researched. In order to analyse the evolution of EU enlargement policy and its potential to overcome the growing anti-enlargement sentiment in EU member states, the paper discusses the implications of the renewed consensus for the inter-institutional dynamics between the Commission and the Council and the advancement of the ongoing accession process. The study, which draws on more than 80 extensive interviews with senior EU and national officials and examination of key EU documents, highlights the growing set of challenges to further enlargement of the Union and concludes with a reflection on the future integration of South-Eastern Europe into the EU.