Hoxhaj, Andi;
(2021)
The EU Rule of Law Initiative Towards the Western Balkans.
Hague Journal on the Rule of Law
, 13
(1)
pp. 143-172.
10.1007/s40803-020-00148-w.
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Abstract
The EU adopted a new enlargement strategy for the Western Balkans countries in 2018, provided a time frame for Serbia and Montenegro potentially to join the Union by 2025, and outlined the next steps for accession for Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, and North Macedonia. In March 2020, the EU gave the green light to the opening of accession talks with North Macedonia and Albania, and also introduced a new reformed ‘accession talks’ framework. The strengthening of the rule of law, fighting corruption and organised crime are the cornerstones of the EU-Western Balkans strategy of 2018 and the new accession talks framework of 2020. This article examines the latest enlargement policy developments in 2018–2020 by conceptualising how the EU promotes the rule of law in the Western Balkans thorough its new enlargement policy package. Furthermore, the article offers an in-depth analysis of the case of Albania, where the EU has experimented with some of its latest enlargement-policy ideas in regard to the rule of law. The article also offers some proposals and insights on how the EU rule of law initiative of 2018 can be improved, in order to become more transformative in strengthening the rule of law in countries of the Western Balkans.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | The EU Rule of Law Initiative Towards the Western Balkans |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1007/s40803-020-00148-w |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.1007/s40803-020-00148-w |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. |
| Keywords: | Rule of law, Corruption, Organised crime, Enlargement policy, Open method of co-ordination, Western Balkans |
| UCL classification: | UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of Laws UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH UCL |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10156486 |
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