On 8th June the Center for European Enlargement Studies (CENS), supported by the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (FES), held a conference entitled “A weakening European magnet?—The attractiveness of the European Union in the new decade.” The event brought together distinguished experts from the world of academia and civil society dealing with European integration policy.

President and Rector John Shattuck opened the conference, expressing his pleasure at CEU hosting the important event, particularly at a time when Hungary is about to take up the role of the EU rotating presidency.

Heinz Albert Huthmacher, Executive Director, FES, opened the discussion on the future extension of the EU, pointing out the main challenges that the Union is facing with regard to the accession of Western Balkans countries. He emphasized that the EU was a successful actor in the world during the past two decades, however, due to the current financial and economic crisis its international role has been slightly diminished. At the same time, an unclear vision concerning the enlargement process and the continuous perception of a “democracy deficit” are further factors, which have had a strong negative impact on the attractiveness of the EU. In this context, he explained, it is of the utmost importance for the future of the European Union to revitalize the confidence of EU member states, as well as the common understanding of what the EU is all about: joint actions are better than acting alone, and hence cooperation on the international level is of primary importance for the EU in the new decade.

The first conference panel attempted to sketch an image of the situation that the European Union is facing by analyzing its attractiveness and credibility from an external perspective. The key topic was the ability and readiness of the EU to adapt itself to a new geopolitical context by creating new allies while remaining a policy shaper locally and globally. Andras Deak, Research Director, CENS, who also acted as the moderator of the first panel, stressed that the perceived weakness of the EU must also be viewed with regard to its historic achievement of doubling the number of its member states in the past decade. At the same time, he stressed, prosperity and welfare, the fundamental core concepts underlying the EU, are no longer the monopoly of the Union, and the lack of a clear strategic vision undermines the force of the EU magnet. Stephen Bastos, German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP), underlined that the Euro and economic crises that European Union is faced with are two sides of the same coin. He argued that in spite of past achievements what are needed now are new projects, and new approaches that will turn the EU back to its previous powerful position. He believed that people-to-people contacts were of most importance in this framework. Concerning the enlargement process, he stated that beyond Croatia, the enlargement dream of the other Western Balkan Countries would need to be postponed beyond 2020. Bastos also touched upon the role of Germany within the EU, as well as its key position with regards to setting the external action of the union.

Mihailo Crnobrnja (Dean, Faculty of Economics, Finance and Administration, Belgrade) listed five reasons in his talk that have reduced the magnetism of the European Union vis-à-vis Serbia: 1) The economic and financial crisis, which highlighted the fragile fundaments of the EU. 2) The failure of the Lisbon Treaty to bring some impetus to the EU and to make it stronger and more efficient. 3) ‘enlargement fatigue’ together with ‘enlargement disappointment,’ notably after the accession of Bulgaria and Romania. 4) The long and drawn out accession process where it is difficult to see results. 4) There is no EU policy towards the Kosovo issue, and even though voices from Brussels proclaimed that there is no relationship between Kosovo and Serbian European integration, it is evident that the question is important.

Elena Gnedina (Research Fellow, Queens University, Belfast) presented the key findings of her research on Ukrainian business interest vis-à-vis Europe. She proclaimed that Ukraine suffers from some serious problems, such as the lack of crucial energy reforms and the continuing constitutional crisis, and that Ukraine’s European integration seems to be the imitation of reforms rather than a real reform process. Concerning the relations of Ukraine with Russia, Gnedina pointed out that Russia is not an all-powerful magnet for the Ukraine, but that “the EU needs to care about Ukrainian business elites in order to save the integration agenda through economic pragmatism, making concession in DFTA, as well as raising public awareness.” Gergely Romsics (Research Fellow, Hungarian Institute for International Affairs, Budapest) focused on the external causes of the weakness of the European magnet arguing the role of the European Neighborhood policies (ENP) as the main instrument for the accession countries. He underlined that the development trends within international relations are changing, and that EU External Action needs to take into account this shift in diplomatic practice.

The second conference panel analyzed the internal structural weaknesses of the EU in terms of the role the EU is playing within its broad global environment. It was moderated by Krisztina Vida, Research Fellow, Institute of World Economics, Budapest. Iain Begg (Professor, London School of Economics, London) started the panel with a short discussion of the Maastricht framework, which after more than two decades, is still at the core of the EU system of governance. He went on to declare that in the short term the uncertain speed of recovery is the EU’s most pressing problem, while in the long term it is demographic change. Begg argued that the greatest flaws of the existing EU structures were: the lack of crisis-management provisions, limited political space for decision-making, and a weak enforcement mechanism. He concluded his speech by stressing that the EU is in need of clear and strategic leadership. Tibor Dessewffy (President, Demos, Budapest) emphasized in his talk the need for a new design of the EU in order to remain relevant in this transforming, complicated and complex environment. He stressed that most of the problems originated in member states and that it was not “Brussels” who should be given the blame for the problems caused. Ivo Slosarcik (Jean Monnet Chair, Charles University, Prague) argued that in order to strengthen the internal coherence of the Union, conditions should not only be applied to accession countries but also internally in the EU. He stressed that Member States need to be made aware that they need to comply with rules even once they are inside the “club”. He analyzed the example of the Visegrad countries to underline his argument, and to highlight the differing expectations of future development. The last panelist of the conference, Thilo Bodenstein (Associate Professor, CEU, Department of Public Policy) presented a formal model in which he used the example of the EU Mediterranean Policy to underline his point that differing countries needed to be given options for various levels of association with the Union in order to make these policies successful. He argued that the EU was not aware of the internal costs of political and economical reform, and that this “asymmetric information” was the main cause for policy failures—as it could be observed in the Barcelona process, among others.