THE EUROPEAN NEIGHBOURHOOD POLICY: THE EUROPEAN UNION'S NEW ENGAGEMENT

Abstract

The European Neighbourhood Policy ENP is the newest foreignpolicy tool and the key geo-political project of the European Union EU after enlargement. The ENP aims to develop a privileged partnership withthe old Southern and the new Eastern neighbours of the enlarged Unionwhich is based on economic integration and security and political cooperationshort of EU membership. Central to this new relationship is the neighbours'commitment to shared liberal values and core EU foreign policy and securityobjectives. Even though the ENP has drawn on the methodology of EUenlargement, it emerges as a new strategy of Europeanization without accession.The lack of strict conditionality, weaker incentives and internal tensions ofthe ENP, however, raises doubts about the Union's ability to spur reformsand transition in wider Europe. The ENP carries the risk of generating anew “capability-expectation gap” in the international relations of the EU

Keywords

• European Neighbourhood Policy, Wider Europe, Stabilization, Transition, Partnership, Shared Values