Necessary borders

How far can EU enlargement go? Six States founded the European Community. Today, after a number of enlargement rounds, the Union includes 27 Countries. Negotiations are under way for adhesion of Croatia and Turkey. Serbia, Kosovo, Albania and Macedonia are EU-membership candidates, while Ukraine, Moldavia and Georgia cherish the ambition of becoming candidate – Member States in the not too distant future. One thing is for sure: until decisions on its borders are taken, the Union will never find its identity. It appears to be broadly acknowledged that sooner or later all Balkan States will have to be granted membership status, provided they comply with the required provisions to this regard. Indeed, EU adhesion provides concrete opportunity for the establishment of political stability and security across the region, but at the same time adhesion would ensure territorial continuity with the Member State Greece. Above all, these Countries are unquestionably marked by European history, tradition and culture and are therefore in the position of claiming full EU membership.However, Turkey’s EU membership request is received with divided opinions. In this case the European Union is confronted with a dilemma. On the one side, it must be said that already in the 1960s Turkey was presented with the possibility – reiterated on various occasions – of entering the Community. While five years ago admission negotiations began. On that circumstance, political and security issues played a major role along with economic and development policy stances. According to the proponents of this stand, Turkey, a loyal and important NATO member country, needs to strengthen its bonds with European positions, while its modernisation process has to be supported also in view of the improvement in economic relations and in order to access its market. On the other, Turkey is culturally distant, too distant for Europeans to be willing to integrate the Turks within their social solidarity and political consensus realms. From some time already the Union is no longer an international organization that operates on the basis of diplomatic rules. Rather, it’s a trans-national institution, which also functions on the basis of democratic rules. In this perspective, the question of cultural compatibility and of the social consensus of its members is crucial for the EU’s future structure. This explains the growing resistance to Turkey’s EU membership and the proposal of offering privileged partnership status to this large and highly populated Country, which compared to the Union’s territorial extension is on the margins, and with extremely unpredictable neighbours. The partnership solution would ensure advantages to both Turkey and the European Union. All considered, Turkey is a test: its admission would overstate the Union, extending its borders way too far and stripping it of its boundaries. At that point, why not grant admission also to Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia, the Maghrebine Countries and so on? But this would entail the end of the European Union understood as a democratic and federal community, as it had been conceived by its founding fathers.