Enlargement of The European Union - Success and Fatigue

Success and Fatigue

Enlargement has been one of the EU's most successful foreign policies, yet has equally suffered from considerable opposition from the start. French President Charles de Gaulle opposed British membership fearing US influence. A later French President François Mitterrand opposed Greek, Spanish and Portuguese membership fearing they were not ready and it would reduce the union to a free trade area.

The reasons for the first member states to apply, and for them to be accepted, were primarily economic while the second enlargement was more political. The southern Mediterranean countries had just emerged from dictatorships and wanted to secure their democratic systems through the EEC, while the EEC wanted to ensure the same thing and that their southern neighbours were stable and aligned to NATO. These two principal forces, economic gain and political security, have been behind enlargements since. However, with the recent large enlargements in 2004, public opinion in Europe has turned against further expansion.

It has also been acknowledged that enlargement has its limits, the EU cannot expand endlessly. Former Commission President Romano Prodi favoured granting "everything but institutions" to the EU's neighbour states; allowing them to co-operate deeply while not adding strain on the EU's institutional framework. This has in particular been pushed by France and Germany as a privileged partnership for Turkey, membership for which has faced considerable opposition on cultural and logistical grounds.