Brussels offers a common market if EU candidate countries are ready

The European Commission has proposed creating a common market for nine candidate countries for membership of the European Union. The market is envisaged in the proposal to change enlargement policy, to which Radio Free Europe has had access, and whose approval or publication is expected on October 6, after the European Commission College’s week-long meeting in Strasbourg.

The common market for candidate countries is described as “the bloc’s most powerful instrument for fostering prosperity and economic convergence”.

Access to this market — the EU’s common space in which goods, services, people and capital move freely — has until now been fully possible only after formal membership.

However, for these proposals, or some of them, to enter into force, the formal approval and agreement of all EU member states is needed.

The document will serve as a basis for strategic discussions among EU leaders at the next summit, to be held on October 15 and 16 in Brussels and dedicated to EU enlargement.

The candidate countries are: Albania, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Turkey, Moldova and Ukraine.

A common market, but with conditions

Access to the common market is not offered automatically, but is clearly linked to concrete progress by candidate countries in the reform process. “Comparable progress should lead to comparable opportunities,” the European Commission’s draft document says, among other things.

According to the document, existing instruments would be gradually expanded, in proportion to the degree to which each country is really ready. The document also envisages safeguard mechanisms against “stalling” in reforms, meaning that access once gained is not necessarily permanent. However, the document contains no precise criteria, timelines or clearly defined circumstances under which access could be suspended.

What is offered and what already exists?

The European Commission’s new proposals envisage early inclusion of candidate countries in selected sectors, especially in critical technologies, industrial ecosystems, financial integration and sustainable supply chains. Participation is also proposed in the “Horizon Europe” programme, the EU’s main programme for funding research and innovation, and in important projects of common European interest.

However, some of the offers in this document are already available to candidate and potential member countries. This applies, among other things, to the single euro payments area (SEPA) and the removal of roaming charges. SEPA is already available to most candidate countries: five countries — Albania, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia — have officially joined SEPA. The situation is similar with the offer on removing roaming charges: Ukraine and Moldova have used this regime since the beginning of this year, while the European Commission plans next year to extend the removal of charges to all Western Balkan countries as well.

What is the benefit of the common market?

The benefits of European integration would come much earlier than membership itself, says Korina Stratulat, deputy director at the European Policy Centre. “However, the offer must be as clear as the conditions: what access candidates secure, when they secure it and what would justify its suspension. Candidates need to know what meeting the conditions will make possible for them, and not only how much failing to meet them may cost them,” Stratulat told Radio Free Europe. “Gradual integration must remain a path towards membership, and not a permanent waiting room,” she stressed.

The offer of access to the common market is also linked to the existing Stabilisation and Association Agreement (SAA) that each candidate country has with the European Union. That agreement constitutes the legal framework for gradually bringing candidate countries closer to the common market. Both systems are based on removing trade barriers, aligning rules and standards with EU rules, and gradually including candidate countries in the European economic space. The SAA thus enables candidate countries, even before full membership, to benefit from part of the economic benefits of integration, while at the same time preparing them for full integration into the common market.

What else is offered?

Access to the common market is only one part of the broad document in which the European Commission presents new proposals, from which it emerges that future member countries, at the moment of membership, will not necessarily enjoy the same rights as current member states. The most sensitive element of the draft relates to limiting the right of veto, which in the document is described symbolically as a “temporary commitment regarding decision-making in the Council of the EU and the European Council”. Under this proposal, future member countries would commit not to oppose Council decisions in fields where unanimity is required. Member states are proposed to move, in a number of fields including enlargement, from unanimous decision-making to qualified-majority decision-making. Under the proposal, decisions on opening or closing negotiating chapters would be taken by qualified majority, while the decision on admitting a new member would continue to be taken unanimously.

Where are the weaknesses of the offer?

In the “imbalance”, Korina Stratulat is convinced. “Strict conditions are set for candidates, while the Union, in general, is offered opportunities and not obligations,” Stratulat stresses. She assesses that better use of existing agreements makes sense, but merely listing instruments is not the same as an obligation that they will be used. “The EU must say what will change, who will implement it and within what timeframe. Otherwise, stricter membership conditions risk becoming a substitute for resolving the Union’s own weaknesses,” she said.