And that means that we need a proper roadmap for the region

The uncertainties over the Kosovo status decision underline the fact that it is high time for the EU to reconsider a long-term strategy towards the region. Wolfgang Petritsch´s proposal on a customised accession strategy for the countries of the western Balkans is timely and well-conceived: it would give countries a better sense of direction and would simultaneously mitigate regional fall-out from the Kosovo solution.

Enlargement of the EU from 15 to 27 states has been a spectacular success, pointing to the enormous transformational power of European integration. In this process of on-going unification, the western Balkans represent a major piece of unfinished business. Only Croatia and Macedonia hold the status of accession candidates, while potential candidates like Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, and Kosovo do not have anything more than the vague promise of joining the European Union sometime in the future.

It is true that through the Stability Pact’s creation in mid-1999 the EU has granted all the countries of the western Balkans a “European perspective”. The Thessalonica summit of 2003 then reinforced the prospect of association with, and potential membership of, the Union. But now new foreign political priorities are on the EU’s agenda, support for the western Balkans is decreasing. Enlargement “fatigue” risks becoming translated into policy paralysis, postponing further accessions to a distant future.

This ambiguity over the future of Balkan accessions comes at a critical moment as the EU now faces serious challenges in the region, notably the uncertainties surrounding Kosovo´s future status, as well as the constitutional crisis in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The region still suffers from such structural problems as weak institutions, a poor business environment, high unemployment and poverty. Against this background, the region sees conditionality more as an obstacle than an incentive to developing closer relations with the EU. Much-needed reforms now risk being delayed.

Enlargement fatigue is already endangering the efforts of the EU in Balkans stabilisation. It risks discouraging EU oriented transition, discrediting the reform-oriented political and business elites and further widening the gap between the Balkans’ accession countries and the “left outs“. What is now needed is an explicit political commitment by the EU that promises eventual full membership and excludes any form of “membership lite”.

Western Balkan countries need both the political perspective of EU accession and concrete measures to aid the reform process. The vague and remote prospect of “potential candidature” simply won’t yield the sort of institutional and economic improvements that are needed.

A more effective EU policy towards the region therefore has to be based on a much more pro-active approach, including a pre-accession roadmap with concrete target dates, clear conditions and benchmarks to measure progress. A parallel effort to build trust within EU member states should also get more attention. This should be a shared task for both EU and western Balkan states. Countries in the region need to show their determination to implement of reforms and comply with EU conditionality, while the EU must make it crystal clear that such efforts will be rewarded in just the same way as previous accession rounds.

The western Balkans countries still have a long way to go before they can realistically expect to be full members, yet there is no reason that an intelligent combination of political incentives and re-focused assistance would not help break down this last division in Europe.