The Future of European Integration Process and Turkey (original) (raw)

In the EU-27, the mainstream view that EU widening has promoted deepening has reached its limits. The Union should complete the post-accession adjustment process and elaborate a new and differentiated membership policy, better reflecting varying levels of capacity and desire for integration both inside and outside. A new accession policy without granting full membership will enable the Union to postpone indefinitely its final borders. However, a precondition for this policy is the increasing internal differentiation within the Union. For integrationists, the risk is that as the EU becomes more diverse, its sense of common identity will weaken. The double challenge of consolidation and enlargement creates a new context for relations with Turkey. In the narrow sense, the integration of Turkey as a would-be member constitutes a challenge to widening only. In broad terms, Turkey is a unique challenge to EU enlargement for reconciling deepening and widening. The uniqueness of Turkey stems from the fact that while it is largely seen as an obstacle to the EU’s internal capacity building which discredits full membership, it is highly regarded as an asset for the international actorness of the Union which brings in strategic partnership as an alternative to full membersip.