Contestation of the EU Enlargement Policy in the European Parliament

Many scholars and practitioners have deemed the EU enlargement policy as one of the greatest successes of European Foreign Policy. It has transformed the EU15 neighbourhood completely and rendered it secure both economically as well as politically. The past success of 2004, 2007 and 2013 enlargements does not however guarantee same outcomes in the future. This concerns the prolonged process of integrating the Western Balkan countries (Croatia being an exception) and especially Turkey. Due to various economic, political, security and cultural considerations, future membership of the candidate countries is being contested. This paper will deal with analysing the patterns of this contestation among the members of the European Parliament during the last decade (2004-2014). Our main aim will be to scrutinise how and why the formulation and implementation of the EU enlargement policy is contested on the European level (in the European Parliament debates). A special emphasis in the analysis will be put on political claims concerning the EU enlargement policy voiced by MPs representing the eurosceptical and euroreject parties. We want to investigate and present the most common arguments and discourse practices that were used while debating future enlargement of the EU in the European Parliament.