EU Enlargement of 2004: Ten New Members Join the European Union

The EU enlargement of 2004 was the largest single expansion in the history of the European Union. On 1 May 2004 ten countries joined at once: eight former communist states of Central and Eastern Europe, plus the Mediterranean islands of Malta and Cyprus. Coming only fifteen years after the revolutions of 1989, it was widely celebrated as the reunification of a continent split by the Iron Curtain.

Background: returning to Europe

After the fall of communism, the new democracies of Central and Eastern Europe made “return to Europe” a central political goal. Membership of the European Community, which became the European Union under the Maastricht Treaty, promised prosperity, security and a guarantee that democratic reforms would not be reversed. The Baltic states, which regained independence during the dissolution of the Soviet Union, saw membership as protection against renewed Russian domination.

The EU responded cautiously at first, with trade and association agreements known as “Europe Agreements”. At the Copenhagen European Council in June 1993 leaders declared that the associated countries could join once they met set conditions, the so-called Copenhagen criteria: stable democratic institutions and the rule of law; a functioning market economy able to cope with competition; and the ability to adopt the whole body of EU law, known as the acquis communautaire.

Applications and negotiations

Cyprus and Malta applied in 1990. Hungary and Poland applied in 1994, followed by the other Central and Eastern European states in 1995 and 1996. The European Commission assessed each candidate in detail.

Negotiations opened on 31 March 1998 with a first group of six: Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Poland and Slovenia. At the Helsinki summit in December 1999 the EU decided to open talks with a second group, which began in February 2000 with Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Romania and Slovakia. Several of the slower candidates then caught up with the first group.

The negotiations were divided into 31 chapters, covering everything from competition policy to agriculture and the environment. Candidates had to transform their legal systems, adopting tens of thousands of pages of EU legislation. The hardest chapters concerned money: the size of farm subsidies for new members, regional aid, and the budget. Under a compromise, direct payments to farmers in the new states began at 25 per cent of the level paid in existing members and rose gradually over a decade.

The EU also had to prepare itself. The Treaty of Nice, agreed in December 2000 and in force from February 2003, adjusted voting weights in the Council, the size of the Commission and the distribution of seats in the European Parliament so that the Union could work with many more members. The Commissioner for Enlargement, Günter Verheugen, and Commission President Romano Prodi steered the process.

Agreement and ratification

At the Copenhagen European Council of 12–13 December 2002 the EU concluded negotiations with ten candidates. Bulgaria and Romania were given a target date of 2007. The Treaty of Accession was signed in Athens on 16 April 2003, at a ceremony beneath the Acropolis in the reconstructed Stoa of Attalos.

Nine of the ten held referendums in 2003, and all approved membership. Results ranged from about 54 per cent in Malta to more than 90 per cent in Lithuania and Slovakia. In Poland, the largest candidate, 77 per cent voted yes. Cyprus ratified through its parliament.

The Cyprus question

Cyprus had been divided since 1974, when Turkey intervened following a Greek-backed coup, and the north was under Turkish Cypriot administration. The EU hoped the island would join united. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan presented a detailed reunification plan, and separate referendums were held on 24 April 2004, a week before accession.

Turkish Cypriots accepted the Annan Plan, with about 65 per cent voting yes, but Greek Cypriots rejected it, with about 76 per cent voting no. As a result, the Republic of Cyprus joined the EU as a divided island. EU law applies across the whole island in principle but is suspended in the north, which the Cypriot government does not control.

Malta’s path was also unusual. Its Labour government froze the membership application in 1996, and the Nationalist government revived it in 1998. The 2003 referendum produced a narrow yes, and Labour accepted membership only after the Nationalists won a general election held weeks later.

1 May 2004

Accession was marked by celebrations across the continent. In Dublin, which held the EU presidency, the leaders of the 25 states met for a ceremony at which the flags of the new members were raised. Fireworks and concerts were held in capitals from Tallinn to Valletta.

The enlarged EU had about 455 million inhabitants. The new members increased its population by roughly 20 per cent and its area by nearly a quarter, but its total economic output by only about 5 per cent, a measure of the income gap between east and west.

Consequences

Free movement of workers was the most visible change. Existing members were allowed to restrict access to their labour markets for up to seven years. Only the United Kingdom, Ireland and Sweden opened fully from the start, and hundreds of thousands of workers, especially from Poland and the Baltic states, moved to Britain and Ireland. This migration later became a significant issue in British debates that led to the Brexit referendum of 2016.

The new members experienced strong economic growth, helped by foreign investment and EU structural funds, and average incomes moved closer to the EU average, though the gap remains. Most joined the Schengen area of passport-free travel in December 2007, and seven have since adopted the euro, beginning with Slovenia in 2007.

The enlargement also strained the EU’s institutions and politics. The failed constitutional treaty of 2004–2005 and the later Treaty of Lisbon were partly attempts to make a Union of 25 or more members work effectively. Disputes over the rule of law in some new member states in later years revived debate about how well the Copenhagen criteria can be enforced after accession.

Legacy

The 2004 enlargement is often described as the EU’s most successful foreign policy, using the prospect of membership to encourage democratic and economic reforms. Together with NATO’s expansion into the same region in 1999 and 2004, it reshaped the political map of Europe. Bulgaria and Romania joined in 2007 and Croatia in 2013, bringing the Union to 28 members before Britain’s departure in 2020.

Timeline

• 1993, June: The Copenhagen European Council sets the criteria for membership.
• 1998, 31 March: Accession negotiations open with the first six candidates.
• 1999, December: The Helsinki summit opens talks with a second group of candidates.
• 2002, 13 December: Negotiations with ten candidates are concluded in Copenhagen.
• 2003, March–September: Nine candidate countries approve membership in referendums.
• 2003, 16 April: The Treaty of Accession is signed in Athens.
• 2004, 24 April: Greek Cypriots reject the Annan Plan for reunification.
• 2004, 1 May: Ten new members join the European Union.
• 2007, 1 January: Bulgaria and Romania join.

Why it matters

The 2004 enlargement ended the division of Europe that had lasted since 1945 and tied the former communist states firmly to Western institutions. It transformed the size and character of the European Union and still shapes its politics, economy and patterns of migration.