The Staged Accession Model, an initiative jointly devised by CEP and the Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS) from Brussels, has emerged as a focal point for discussions regarding the future of EU enlargement policy. Initially introduced in October 2021, the Model underwent substantial enhancements in August 2023, bolstered by support from the Open Society Foundation (OSF), which facilitated the production of 14 issue papers, serving as the foundation to develop Template 2.0 for Staged Accession Model.

This project aims to maximise the impact of Template 2.0 and inform the enlargement-related decisions of the December 2023 and March 2024 European Council summits, and ahead of the upcoming elections for the European Parliament. The enlargement goal has become even more important since the beginning of Russian aggression against Ukraine, which has further emphasised the need for the EU to admit the Western Balkans and strengthen its geopolitical influence in the region.

The project enables CEP to conduct advocacy missions to EU member states, strategically timed before and after the European Council meeting held in December 2023, which is crucial as the Growth Plan for the Western Balkans, also a form of gradual integration, was adopted at the meeting. The missions encompass a wide spectrum of activities, both one-on-one and group meetings with key representatives from mid- to high-level positions within pertinent ministries, specifically those responsible for foreign and European affairs. Furthermore, apart from the foreign ministries, CEP also targets representatives from legislative bodies and civil society organisations to build as wide a consensus as possible. Each mission and even individual meetings follow tailor-made agendas according to the unique concerns of the member states involved. It is also important to note that CEP has leveraged a robust and well-connected network of contacts within the member states slated for visitation to ensure that each visit yields maximum impact and effectiveness in advancing CEP’s advocacy objectives.

Due to the unanimous decision-making required for any enlargement policy decision, the project covers a broad range of EU member states as part of the advocacy campaign. It includes traditionally influential member states in enlargement policy and those perceived to have a disproportionately significant impact relative to their size. Careful consideration is given to avoid duplicating efforts in countries where CEP had already established thorough contacts through alternative channels. Finally, the list of the visited countries includes:

• Belgium
• Denmark
• Estonia
• Finland
• Germany
• Greece
• Ireland
• Italy
• Luxembourg
• the Netherlands
• Poland
• Portugal
• Spain
• Sweden

Contact person: Ljubica Kovačević, Project Manager (ljubica.kovacevic@cep.org.rs)

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The essence of the Project was focusing on operationalising the Model of staged accession, co-designed by CEP Belgrade and CEPS Brussels. Originally announced in July 2021, published in October of the same year and further clarified in a follow-up paper in January 2022, the Model has so far inspired numerous cross-European debates, and gained support from various members of the expert community as well as policymakers. Although it has had a promising start, it has yet to receive recognition from the EU institutions and wider support from the EU member states. Finding consensus on such an out-of-the-box solution becomes all the more warranted at the time when the Russian invasion of Ukraine has additionally highlighted the imperative for the EU to fully embrace the Western Balkans and cement its geopolitical footprint on the region. In order to make a breakthrough and overcome the status quo, this Project aimed to further contribute to developing a fully robust and operational model of staged accession to the EU. In order to achieve the set goal, the Project supported the research and analysis needed to develop a series of 14 issue papers tackling the issues determined as weak points and gaps in the Model, based on the feedback obtained from stakeholders during the first advocacy efforts conducted by the partner organisations that designed the Model. Therefore, the following issue papers developed:

• Six (6) issue papers on potential application of the staged accession model in each of the countries in the region, with a focus on the political and economic specificities of each WB country, the potential implementation dynamics at national level, the stakeholder analysis, as well as the analysis of opportunities and risks that should be considered in the context of the potential model application.
• Analysis and a visual presentation of how the new model fits with the revised (2020) EU enlargement methodology.
• An issue paper on legal implications and requirements for the implementation of the staged accession model.
• An issue paper on options, opportunities and implications of introducing elements of advanced policy integration (how it combines with the staged accession model).
• An issue paper on financial implications of the staged accession model on the EU budget, as well as on the on acceding countries’ budgets.
• An issue paper on funding instruments, arrangements, capacities and conditionalities to be applied.
• An issue paper on the staged accession model in relation to the regional cooperation initiatives (primarily with regard to the Berlin Process and the Common Regional Market, as well as links with the Open Balkans initiative).

• An issue paper on the governance of the new model, with focus on reversibility mechanisms.

• An issue paper on the management of bilateral disputes between EU member states and acceding countries and on the role of regional reconciliation in the application of the new model.

The development of issue papers was a key part of the project, which should enable the full elaboration of the Staged Accession Model 2.0 and showcase its application in practice.

During its implementation, the core team also counted on the valuable expertise of prominent regional researchers, as well as individual members of the Think for Europe Network (TEN), such as the European Policy Institute (EPI – Skopje), Institute Alternative (IA – Podgorica), and Foreign Policy Initiative Bosnia and Herzegovina (FPI BH – Sarajevo).

The Project was funded by the Open Society Foundations (OSF).

Contact person: Ljubica Kovačević, Project Manager (ljubica.kovacevic@cep.org.rs)

All publications published within the project you can find on special page The Initiative for a Staged accession to the EU.

Events held within the project:

1. Workshop on Staged accession model

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Under this project, TEN will strengthen cooperation with renowned think tanks from Germany, France, the Netherlands, Italy and Finland, in order to improve the quality of communication on the EU enlargement in the broader framework of the forthcoming re-definition of the EU and its future. Our approach in this project is to advocate not for the plain EU accession but rather for the WB as an entirety that has been going through numerous improvements in the democratic governance and rule of law structures, improvement of the economic governance processes as well as ambitious reform agendas for public administration.

Apart from reaching out to the influential European capitals and engaging with the EU policy scene, TEN will, thanks to the support of this grant, conduct activities to improve our research, communication and advocacy skills. By further increasing our internal capacities, TEN ultimate goal is to make Western Balkan countries substantially involved in the debates and policy solutions pertinent to the future of Europe.

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Thanks  to the Think Tank Young Professional Development Programme of the Open Society Foundations, Researcher Katarina Kosmina had joined the CEP team. As part of her research, she focused on researching how civil society can advocate for open government data as well as utilizing it for research and monitoring purposes.

The Think Tank Young Professional Development Programme intends  to help  independent research centres from Central and Eastern Europe to draw in recent graduate and post-graduate students in social sciences, giving them an opportunity to attain firsthand experience in policy research.

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Both research studies analysed the relevant EU and Serbian legislation as well as provide certain case studies, mostly by studying the ways how some of the most recent Member States have dealt with these relevant issues.

As human capital is the biggest asset of any think tank, OSF’s TTF Think Tank Young Professional Development Program aims to help think tanks from the Central and Eastern Europe to attract recent graduates of MA and PhD programs in the social sciences and humanities by giving them an opportunity to gain first-hand policy research and advocacy experience. The program enables participating think tanks to recruit young researchers originally from the region who recently graduated from universities in the OECD countries and depending on a research topic finance individual programs at hosting organizations, lasting up to 6 months.

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