The 2025 EU Enlargement Package: Why enlargement is back on the agenda
- Conor Long
- 4 days ago
- 5 min read
Introduction:
European Union enlargement has re-emerged as one of Europe’s most geopolitically significant debates. When Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the EU, and to a wider extent, the continent as a whole, was forced to alter its geopolitical strategies. The EU now has to re-evaluate its borders. Just as many former Warsaw Pact states began pursuing EU membership after the Cold War, many Eastern European states are now seeking closer ties with the EU following the 2022 invasion. These countries include Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova, all of whom applied for EU membership in February or March of 2022, almost immediately following the outbreak of the invasion.
Other states in the region seeking membership include Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Montenegro, and Albania, all of which are at various stages of the accession process. Serbia is also an EU candidate but faces issues regarding rule-of-law and governance. Furthermore, it also needs to further align its foreign policy with the EU and cut bilateral ties with Russia. Kosovo, who also has applied for EU membership, faces enormous obstacles, as it is not even recognized by five EU countries including Spain, Slovakia, Romania, Greece and Cyprus. Then there is Türkiye, who has been a long-standing EU candidate since 1999, but needs to overcome political and human rights issues. While some of the Western Balkan states were already on the way to joining the EU prior to the invasion, the process has been accelerated and there is a renewed focus on greater EU Expansion. Now, the European Union must balance its enlargement with these countries with its own internal cohesion, stability, and capacity.
Ukraine and Moldova:
Earlier this month, on November 4th, the 2025 EU Enlargement Package was announced. The Enlargement Package is essentially a report carried out by the European Commission to evaluate EU-aspiring countries across a number of categories including public administration, democratic governance, rule of law, and alignment with EU standards. According to this year’s Enlargement Package, there appears to be a significant difference between the progress made between East European states and the Western Balkans. The report highlighted the great strides taken by Eastern Europe following the 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Of course, Ukraine is one of, if not the most important candidate, given the ongoing conflict. Yet, despite the hardships Ukraine faces from the Russian offensive, it has implemented numerous reforms in the past year, further aligning itself with EU values. Only last year, Kyiv was told it was too corrupt to join Nato. This year, the EU has praised the war torn nation in its efforts to improve its anti-corruption institutions, stating that the “National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU), the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO), and the High Anti-Corruption Court (HACC) have continued to deliver on their mandates and strengthen their track record in investigating and prosecuting high-level corruption”. Saying that, the European Commission have requested that Kyiv should continue their efforts to prevent any backsliding. Nevertheless, the EU have incited that they are ready to advance negotiations with Ukraine regarding membership, despite Hungary threatening to veto Ukrainian EU accession.
Following Ukraine, Moldova was also praised for their alignment with EU norms, through the improvement of their institutional and legislative quality. However, the President of Moldova, Maia Sandu warned Brussels not to ‘move goalposts’ on EU membership, suggesting that a clear timeline to EU accession was paramount to Moldova’s political success at home and in Europe. Despite the evident focus on Ukraine, the EU has committed €1.9 billion to Moldova in grants and loans through its Reform & Growth Facility, to aid its economic growth and EU integration, ensuring it will not be left behind. Evidently, in light of Russian aggression, both Ukraine and Moldova are key to the EU’s strategic depth and expansion.
Western Balkans:
Moving westwards, Montenegro seems destined to be the newest member of the EU family, with many analysts predicting it could be part of the EU by 2028, given it is in the most advanced staged of negotiations compared to other candidates. Then there is Albania, North Macedonia, Serbia, and Kosovo, who are part of the EU’s Growth Plan for the Western Balkans, which seeks to integrate them into EU market. Albania and North Macedonia, similar to Montenegro, have also made substantial progress, but face challenges in some sectors. However, other Balkan countries such as Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo and North Macedonia face significant hurdles regarding governance issues, complicated bilateral relations and political instability that hinder their EU aspirations. In sum, it seems that the eastern countries such as Ukraine and Moldova, closer to the threat of Russian aggression, are at the forefront of EU expansion talks and are generally advancing more rapidly than their western counterparts. Countries in the Western Balkans apparently have a longer road ahead of them, yet are slowly but surely continuing their march towards membership. Despite this, the 2025 EU Enlargement Package stressed that enlargement is solely a ‘merit-based process’, focusing on reforms and EU alignment rather than geopolitical factors.
Conclusion:
Since Croatia joined the EU in 2013, the EU has not seen any new members, and for the rest of the 2010s, EU expansion seemed to stagnate. The invasion of Ukraine in 2022 changed that, forcing the EU to reassess its borders. Despite largely being an economic union, the EU was forced to put geopolitical strategy and security front and center of its actions moving forward. So, what effects does EU enlargement have on the European geopolitical landscape? First and foremost, it strengthens the EU’s economic and political prowess on the continent, thereby countering Russian influence on more vulnerable states in the Balkans and Eastern Europe. It also helps stabilize neighboring non-EU states, connecting them to the EU market and holding them accountable to EU standards through reforms. Most of all, it shows the world that the EU is no longer just an economic union, and that it is capable of adapting to emerging 21st century geopolitical threats.
EU enlargement is no longer a pipeline dream, but an active process towards regional integration and influential expansion of the EU, accelerated largely by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. While EU expansion is gaining significant momentum, challenges remain. Whether the EU and its hopeful candidates can overcome these hurdles depends on how well the candidates can continue with their reforms, as well as the EU’s ability to remain united and modernize to accommodate new members. Whether every aforementioned candidate will make it into the EU or not remains uncertain. What is certain, however, is that enlargement, despite the brief pause in the last decade, has returned as a primary European geostrategy. Now it seems, it’s not a question of whether the EU will expand or not, but a question of how fast it can expand.
Sources: