EU enlargement could see much bigger bloc

THE eyes of much of Europe are, squarely, on next year’s key European Parliament elections. Yet, an increasing number of key European Union (EU) officials, including EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, are looking further ahead to the Europe of the 2030s, by which time the bloc could have grown to over 30 members.

For some historians, the bloc’s biggest achievement in recent decades has been various waves of enlargement. It is no coincidence therefore that von der Leyen visited the Western Balkans in recent days where no less than six states are aspiring to EU membership – Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia. This showcases how the bloc could grow to more than 30 members in the 2030s with not just the Western Balkan states under consideration for accession, but others too, including Ukraine, Moldova and Turkey.

The European integration process began in the 1950s, with six founding members, and the bloc has steadily expanded, Brexit aside, since. This includes the accession in 2004 of new members from formerly communist Central and Eastern Europe (the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia), plus Mediterranean countries (Malta and Cyprus).