The horrors of two world wars prompted France, West Germany and others to join forces and create today's European Union. Seventy years later, war has returned to the continent. From the rubble in Ukraine, something resembling the sentiment that moved the founding fathers of the EU is emerging again. There is now talk of admitting as many as nine new members, including Ukraine. Joining the world's most successful club of peaceful, prosperous democracies would put that war-ravaged country – and its fellow aspiring members in the Western Balkans, Georgia and Moldova – on a new and promising path.
For the EU itself it would also be nothing short of historic, the completion of a great continental union and the end of a process that began with the victory over the Nazis. Barring one or two future candidates (perhaps one day including Britain), the shape of the EU would be broadly set. But the way the EU works would have to change.
Expanding the EU from 27 to, for example, 36 will be difficult. But after a long time in which the idea of expansion lay dormant – Croatia, the most recent newcomer, joined ten years ago – it is back on the agenda. Leaders from across the continent, including aspiring new members, will meet on October 5 in the Spanish city of Granada. The next day, those who are already members of the club will outline what reforms will be needed to keep the show running with more (and more diverse) members. A difficult process will follow. The applicants and the EU machine will both have to change. A stated date of 2030 for the completed expansion is optimistic, but worth aiming for.
Leaders thinking about the future shape of the Union should remember that enlargement has been its most successful policy. Grand projects like the euro, the single market and the regulation of tech giants are important, but much of their value comes from the fact that their reach extends beyond France and Germany to Finland, Greece, Slovakia and Spain. Imagine how much less powerful the EU would have been in helping Ukraine if it had not already embraced four countries bordering the war zone. Further expansion could increase Europe's geopolitical weight, as French President Emmanuel Macron, once a skeptic of expansion, now appears to recognize.
The EU can no longer afford to string its nine potential members along by dragging out their applications without any realistic hope that they will join. Leaving Europe's neighbors in a gray zone opens the door to those who want to destabilize the continent, starting with Russia's Vladimir Putin. This unhealthy dynamic has fueled the cynical and sometimes dysfunctional politics of the six Western Balkans countries and the other three candidate countries. None of these will be easy to integrate. Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine all have Russian troops occupying parts of their territory (as did Germany until 1990). All current countries seeking to join are considered only “partially free” by Freedom House, an American think tank. (Turkey, while technically still a candidate, is far from ready, unfortunately.)
As it embarks on this mission, the EU must make three strong commitments. The first is a message of hope to the candidate countries: as long as they implement the reforms necessary to be worthy members, they will be admitted. A similar promise was made to the Western Balkans in 2003, but was promptly forgotten. Applicants must still meet the same criteria that others have met to join the EU, in particular by upholding democracy. The conditions for joining the euro must be strict. But those who make good faith efforts should receive more help as their journey progresses. Some benefits of membership could be granted gradually as economic reforms take root, including access to the internal market. At the same time, it must remain clear that the ultimate destination is full EU membership, and not a limbo from outside.
The second commitment is that the EU's own internal reforms should not delay the accession of those willing to join. Yes, the union needs to rethink its internal workings: a bigger EU will not be better if it is stuck. Once it is expanded to 36, it would be foolish to allow one country's government to veto collective action, as is now the case for foreign affairs and taxes. The common agricultural policy, which consumes a third of the bloc's budget, will need drastic reforms and downsizing to prevent too many subsidies flowing to Ukrainian oligarchs who run farms the size of some EU countries. Admitting poorer members will divert development funds from some current recipients. But the EU cannot keep the door closed while it puts its own house in order.
The final need is to learn from previous expansions. Most countries that reform to join the EU stay on the right track and become both freer and more prosperous. But a handful have taken a turn for the worse: Hungary and Poland have defied the EU standards they have signed up to. If the club wants to take a chance on newcomers with shaky managerial records, it must have mechanisms in place to punish bad behavior. A good start would be to make it easier for EU funds to be withheld from unreliable regimes. This has rightly started to happen.
Grow, grow, grow
The prospect of welcoming a group of newcomers is daunting. But Europe, after careful consideration, has jumped into the unknown before – and made it work. Greece, Portugal and Spain were all brought in about a decade after toppling nasty dictatorships and are now thriving as powerful democracies. Between 2004 and 2007, the bloc accepted a dozen new members, most of whom were under the Soviet yoke. That almost doubled the number of EU countries and increased the club's population by 27% – almost double what is now proposed. What seemed impossible then is now remembered as inevitable and essential.
If Europe wants to be a power in the world, it must above all demonstrate that it has the capacity to act. Postponing enlargement because it is too difficult to implement would weaken the continent and thus the core of the Union, not least if today's Russian aggression is followed tomorrow by American isolationism. As terrible as the war conditions are, they have created the impetus for an EU that is both bigger and better. Europe must find a way to build it.