EU Expansion Policy Under Pressure from Leftist Governments
On November 4, European Commission (EC) Foreign Affairs
Commissioner Hans van den Broek presented the European Parliament
with a report on the progress made by 11 candidate countries
towards meeting economic and political requirements for accession
to the European Union (EU). In the report, the EC did not
recommend enlarging the "fast-track" group of six countries --
Hungary, Poland, The Czech Republic, Slovenia, Estonia, and
Cyprus -- by any of the candidates from the second group of the
aspirant member states. The Commission enumerated reasons why
none of the countries from the second group, which includes
Lithuania, Latvia, Slovakia, Romania, Bulgaria, and Malta, should
be put on a fast track to EU membership. More significantly, the
EC suggested that even the "first division" group could be
reduced. Van den Broek's report sent a warning to two of the
"first division" candidates -- the Czech Republic and Slovenia --
regarding serious problems that these countries would face in
meeting the EU membership criteria "if the stagnation observed in
these countries continues." Another country from the first
group, Poland, has been criticized for lagging in meeting the
economic requirements and for having "mixed achievements" in
adjusting its legislation to EU standards. Although detailed
negotiations between the EU and the first six candidates will
begin in Brussels on November 10, as originally scheduled, the
signal sent by the EU to Eastern and Central Europe is anything
but encouraging.
Candidate countries' reactions to the EC report understandably
reflected their disappointment over what they believe is
unjustified criticism. The strongest negative reaction to the
report came from the Lithuanian Prime Minister Gediminas
Vagnorius, whose country hoped it would be invited to join the EU
entry negotiations by the year-end. Vagnorius said that the EU's
decision to postpone the launch of accession talks with Lithuania
until next year came as a complete surprise. "Since the
beginning of this year, Lithuania was not given any indication of
failures that would prohibit a start to entry negotiations with
the EU," Vagnorius said. The Lithuanian Prime Minister stressed
that his country "does not understand and cannot agree" with the
EC report on Lithuania, and called on the EC to provide
statistical evidence to back its claim that Lithuania is not
complying with the EU admission criteria. Vagnorius said that,
in fact, his country has demonstrated, most recently during the
Russian economic crisis, that it has a stable democratic
political system and a strong, market-oriented economy.
Like Vagnorius, former Czech Prime Minister and current Chairman
of the Civic Democratic Party (ODS), Vaclav Klaus, said that the
EC's evaluation of the progress his country made towards
fulfilling EU membership criteria was biased. It wasn't long ago
that the Czech Republic was considered by the West to be the
country with the best chances of a speedy accession, primarily
thanks to strict pro-market economic policies designed and
implemented by Klaus. In an interview with the Czech daily
Lidove Noviny, Klaus suggested that the generally negative tone
of the EC report reflected a shift in the EU's expansion policy.
"In some countries, there is a strong campaign against the
enlargement of the EU," told Klaus the daily.
Just as concern is growing about an increasingly assertive and
confrontational Russia, Eastern and Central European leaders are
awakening to the fact that the EU's commitment to expansion is
shifting. This shift is due to the fact that many Western
European countries are now being ruled by socially-oriented
center-left governments. A major concern of these governments is
that, if the Union's borders were opened to the East, the EU
would be flooded by cheap Eastern European labor, resulting in
increased unemployment in the West. The main initiator of the
shift in the EU towards more controlled and more conservative
enlargement of the Union is Germany, under its new Chancellor,
Social Democrat Gerhard Schroeder. Schroeder has sent several
recent signals toward Eastern Europe, making it clear that the
expansion policy of his government will differ substantially from
that promoted by his predecessor, Helmut Kohl.
At an informal EU summit in Austria on October 24, Schroeder
stated that EU expansion might be "more difficult than expected"
and warned against raising the aspiring member countries' hopes.
Schroeder said, "It is important that we proceed with membership
negotiations with our eyes open. We should not give the
candidate countries any false illusions." Shroeder reiterated
his conservative approach to EU expansion again during his trip
to Poland on November 4. Following talks with Polish Prime
Minister Jerzy Buzek on the subject of the EU enlargement,
Schroeder said, "In contrast to my predecessor, I do not have
enough sense of fantasy to name a date for EU enlargement. We
should stop citing such date to avoid creating illusions."
Previously, it had been suggested that Poland and the other five
"fast-track" EU candidate countries could join the EU in four to
five years.
Germany, which will assume the EU Presidency for the first half
of 1999, is indisputably the strongest supporter of the shift
toward a more restrictive and protracted enlargement process.
Germany, however, is not the only party pressuring Brussels with
to slow down the expansion. Currently, two thirds of Western
European countries are ruled by socialist governments, looking
for a "third way" -- some kind of compromise between laissez
faire economics and strong central government control. Given the
commonality in political views between Germany's Schroeder and
Britain's Blair, and the strong socialist orientation of France's
Jospin, we can expect a radical change in what has until now been
a liberal and enthusiastic EU enlargement policy. Eastern and
Central European countries can expect frustration and delay at
best, and rejection at worst.
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