This year we celebrate 20 years since the historic fall of the Berlin wall, the fifth anniversary of the biggest enlargement of the European Union, European Parliament elections, the establishment of a new composition of the European Commission, and we expect completion of negotiations on the Croatian accession to the EU. Therefore, the participants at the conference, organized by the Center for European Studies at the Faculty of Political Science in Zagreb, commented on current events in the EU and the development of its policies with special emphasis on the challenges of the implications of those policies in Croatia.

In his introductory speech, Head of EC Delegation in Croatia Vincent Degert said that the European Union is not a confederation nor a federation, but a sui generis organization in which every member state shares its sovereignty. The European Union is not only a common market based on the free movement of goods, services, people and capital, but also has a strong solidarity mechanism in the form of cohesion policy, common currency, the Schengen area without internal frontiers, and an intensive cooperation in justice and home affairs.

When speaking about the Europeanization of Croatian politics, Professor Damir Grubiša, Head of the Centre for European Studies, said that the process of Europeanization of new EU members and of those wishing to become one leads to radical changes not only in the model of political decision-making but also in the development of a new political culture that requires an adaptation to a more evolved model of democracy for which there is no traditional base nor the political culture in transition countries in which the marginalization of political pathologies such as demagogy, political manipulation and corruption could succeed.

"Since the Croatian politics suffers from additional negative elements that impede rapid Europeanization (the consequences of wars, the culture of violence and conflict, nationalist populism, the consequences of corrupt conversion and the negative selection of political and economic elites), the process will run more slowly than in countries in transition, in which after the membership occurs the phenomenon of regression and the inertial return to a non-democratic policy-making model such as in Bulgaria and Romania“, said Professor Grubiša.
Stabilization of the countries of Southeastern Europe and their integration into the EU is a political goal of the region and of the EU, said Professor Branko Caratan, president of the Council of CES.
The Center for European Studies at the Faculty of Political Science in Zagreb is the leading academic organization for political research of the European Union in Croatia. This is the first scientific research center at a university level that is dedicated to scientific and applied researche of political processes, participants, institutions and values within the European Union and the countries that are in the process of joining the Union.

More information at:

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Delegation of the European Union to the Republic of Croatia

Ministry of Foreign Affairs and European Integration

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