The Future of EU Enlargement Policy: Four Scenarios for Enlargement in Wartime Europe
In
This report was jointly developed by the Egmont Institute – Royal Institute for International Relations and the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung (KAS) Europe through a range of interviews with experts and civil society representatives from Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, among others, and a workshop held in Brussels in May 2026 with a dozen leading policy experts and scholars from the Egmont Institute, Carnegie Europe, ETH Zurich, KAS Europe, Ukrainian Prism, SWP (Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik), and the European Policy Center (EPC). We hope that our reflections and insights will inform public and policy debate on the future of EU enlargement that remains unpredictable, with the potential to develop in multiple directions. In this context, our four scenarios serve as generalized frameworks, and their individual elements can co-exist.
Disclaimers
The views expressed in this paper do not necessarily reflect the position of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation.
This paper does not claim to be exhaustive and represents a theoretical exercise that outlines alternative scenarios for the future of enlargement. This paper aims to contribute to the current debate on the future of EU enlargement and spark discussions on possible scenarios of this process.
Acknowledgments
We would like to express our sincere gratitude to the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung (KAS) Europe Office in Brussels for their invaluable support and contribution to this report. We are also very grateful to all the participants of the workshop held at the Egmont Institute in May 2026.
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