Abstract

Initially, in the first half of the 1990s, Russia’s plans to include the countries of the former Eastern bloc within the EU were not seen as a threat to its interests. Furthermore, in the context of NATO’s enlargement, some Russians regarded them as an advantageous alternative. Russia is aware that the EU enlargement with the Central and Eastern European states resulted in a present increase in the number of EU members supporting close trans-Atlantic relations. Moscow’s fears of further EU enlargement were softened due to a dispute that continues to grow within the Union, regarding the rationale and limits of further enlargement, primarily for the Balkan states, Turkey, and the CIS states. Moscow expects that the reluctance of European societies towards further enlargement will inhibit this process.
 The external relations dimension of the European Union's enlargement to Central and Eastern Europe has received surprisingly little attention despite the fact that in the long‐term the issues it raises may be far more important than those currently dominating the debate. Nowhere is this more likely to be correct than about Russia, for which the EU's enlargement poses a risk of increasing isolation from the rest of Europe. The danger of creating a new dividing line across Europe is widely recognised, and the challenge, therefore, is to find ways of ensuring that Russia can be fully integrated with Europe while almost certainly remaining outside the EU Itself. This article focuses on relations between the EU and Russia and addresses three fundamental questions: how Russia has responded to the prospect of the EU's eastern enlargement; the specific issues arising from expansion, and the kind of long‐term relationship that could develop between Russia and an enlarged EU.

Highlights

  • Russia and the EU agreed to form a common economic space and coordinate financial regulations without the establishment of supranational structures back in 2003. In line with this idea, we proposed setting up a harmonised community of economies stretching from Lisbon to Vladivostok, a freetrade zone and even employing more sophisticated integration patterns

  • The key features of this alternative regional integration project include market harmonisation and interest-driven multilateral partnerships often led by Russia, with the consent of other signatories

  • As Dragneva and Wolczuk contend, ‘unlike previous integration regimes, the Eurasian Customs Union (ECU) and single economic space (SES) provision has developed alongside Russia’s accession to the WTO in 2012,... in future agreements to comply with the WTO regime, even in the case of non-WTO members, and for WTO law to prevail over any conflicting ECU provision’ (2014)

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Summary

Introduction

Russia and the EU agreed to form a common economic space and coordinate financial regulations without the establishment of supranational structures back in 2003. In line with this idea, we proposed setting up a harmonised community of economies stretching from Lisbon to Vladivostok, a freetrade zone and even employing more sophisticated integration patterns. We introduced the pursuit of coordinated policies in industry, technology, the energy sector, education, science, and to eventually scrap visas. These proposals have not been left hanging in midair; our European colleagues are discussing them in detail. A better understanding of the potential positive outcomes of this geopolitical and geo-economic dynamic is analytically relevant but could help European countries and Russia to elaborate more effective strategies to develop a more cooperative relationship both among themselves and with other countries of

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