by Cyrille Lucas
How long would you be willing to wait to be admitted into a club? Some countries, like North Macedonia, for example, have been waiting for almost twenty years to join the European Union. It wouldn’t make you feel welcomed, would it? The last time a country joined the EU was ten years ago, when Croatia became a member in 2013.
Given these facts, it is no wonder that each passing year less and less people in the candidate states believe that joining the European Union would benefit their country. And to be honest, looking at the state of things in the bloc, they are right to feel skeptical about it. According to the Balkan Barometer 2023 poll from the Regional Cooperation Council, the support for EU membership in the region is now 59 percent. That is 3 percent less than in 2021. This may seem like a small setback, but given the pace of the accession procedures, in time that can cost the EU its potential new members.
The lowest support for EU membership can be found in Serbia: only 34 percent believe their country should join the bloc. The main reason behind the statistics is probably the feeling of being cast aside for political reasons. No wonder the Serbs are strengthening ties with other players on the global scene, like Russia or China. Playing hard to get only works for a while, until the other one loses interest and moves on. In the long run, if the EU doesn’t want to push Serbia and other countries in the Western Balkans into the laps of Asian powerhouses, they must get serious with the enlargement talks.
EU accession should be a clear procedure that sets the same standards for all parties wanting to join the bloc. Take North Macedonia for example: they’ve even changed the name of their country to move further down the path of becoming an EU member state, yet they are still waiting for a date to start accession talks. Or Serbia, the most advanced country among those listed as candidates for membership, is clearly not happy that in the meantime finding a solution to the Kosovo question also became a requirement for joining. No wonder that according to the Spring Eurobarometer 2023 survey results, only 31 percent of Serb citizens say that EU membership would be a good thing; 36 percent believe it would be neither a good nor a bad thing, while 32 percent believe it would be a bad thing. 61 percent don’t trust the EU as an institution compared to 32 percent who have trust in it. When asked about how attached they feel to the EU, 23 percent feel attached, while 76 percent say they do not.
It is fair to say that there is growing frustration in the Western Balkans region among the countries that have been waiting in the anteroom of the EU for a while – some for decades – and seeing that the European Commission wants to fast-track Ukraine doesn’t ease their negative feelings. Instead of setting roadblocks for the enlargement procedure, the EU should move on as swiftly as its overly bureaucratic institutions can. Otherwise, it is possible that the candidate countries will have enough and move on from their potential partnership with Brussels – Beijing, Moscow and Ankara would love to grab that opportunity for sure.
