Conclusion

Abstract

The 2004 and 2007 enlargements not only resulted in new European neighbours for the EU but also produced new dynamics in neighbourhood relations. From the early l990s until 2004, enlargement itself was the EU’s main foreign policy approach in dealing with the post- communist world, a tool for spreading European norms and governance relations beyond its eastern perimeter. In the aftermath of the big expansion of 2004, the EU sought to fashion a new policy, the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP), which would achieve these same goals without the enlargement prospect being clearly articulated. Only in its relations with the western Balkan countries was membership clearly on the agenda, at an undefined time in the future.