Creeping EU Membership in South‐east Europe: The Dynamics of EU Rule Transfer to the Western Balkans

Abstract

The countries of the Western Balkans have all been subsumed under a pre‐accession framework that is comparable to previous enlargement rounds, but with two main differences: the EU has thus far refrained from naming a timetable for eventual membership and supports flexible forms of integration in different policy fields. With only a loose prospect of membership, how strong is the EU’s influence in the Western Balkans? With our empirical examples, drawn from energy policy and Justice and Home Affairs, we argue that the incentive of membership remains powerful in terms of initiating EU rule transfer. The key to successful rule adoption in the Western Balkans is to provide clear and tangible short‐term incentives. Rather than full membership, the result is sectoral integration and a creeping process towards EU membership.

Key Words:

• Energy policy
• European integration
• Europeanization
• external governance
• Justice and Home Affairs
• south‐east Europe

Acknowledgement

The authors wish to thank Oliver Treib and Christopher Reynolds who commented on earlier versions of the article. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this article are entirely those of the authors and should not be attributed in any manner to the Austrian Energy Agency (AEA).

Notes

1. Under the term ‘Western Balkans’, the EU subsumes Croatia, Albania, Macedonia, Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo under UN‐Resolution 1244.

2. There is an enormous amount of literature on the phenomenon of Europeanization, most of which is concerned with the effect of EU institutions on the political systems of its member states and the challenges facing national political systems when adapting to the European normative and strategic environment (Mény 1996; Börzel and Risse 2000; Cowles Green, Caporaso, and Risse 2001; Knill and Lenschow 2001; Tonra 2001; Featherstone and Radaelli 2003). Others consider Europeanization as an equivalent of European integration, i.e. the emergence and development of distinct structures of governance at the European level (Cowles Green, Caporaso, and Risse 2001, 3). For Johan Olsen (2002, 937) the term also stretches beyond Europe and means the export of ‘political principles, institutions and identities typical of Europe to the rest of the world beyond European territory’. Only after the most recent enlargement process finished has interest in Europeanization beyond the borders of the EU been growing (Grabbe 2003; Papadimitriou 2003; Lavenex 2004).

3. Several youth organizations and NGOs launched the campaign ‘Visa, forget about it’ aimed at achieving a full visa liberalization towards Macedonia. See the homepage of the campaign: http://www.aegee-skopje.org.mk/CD/index.htm.

4. Similar to Macedonia, the other Western Balkan countries (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Serbia) also signed a visa facilitation and readmission agreement with the EU in September 2007. The agreements entered into force on 1 January 2008 and were considered to be the first step towards visa‐free travel. On 30 January 2008 the European Commissioner Franco Frattini officially opened a dialogue with the Serbian Deputy Prime Minister Bozidar Djelic on the abolishment of visas for Serbian citizens travelling to the EU. In doing so, Serbia was the first country in the region with which the European Commission opened a dialogue on visa abolition (for details, see Trauner 2009).

5. The coordination of energy was delegated to the Commission by the Istanbul Conclusions of the Stability Pact in 2001.

6. Memorandum of Understanding on the Regional Electricity Market in South East Europe and its Integration into the European Union Internal Electricity Market (‘The Athens Memorandum 2002’), 15 November 2002, Athens; Memorandum of Understanding on the Regional Energy Market in South East Europe and its Integration into the European Community Internal Energy Market (‘The Athens Memorandum 2003’), 8 December 2003, Athens.

7. Press statement by the Serbian EU Integration Office, 17 April 2008, Belgrade.