Written by Mario Damen.
Future relations between the EU and Ukraine will depend on much more than financial and military aid or complying with European legislation. They will involve developing a new security architecture for Europe, new relations with Russia and Belarus, the economic and social recovery of Ukraine, and a common vision – amongst both EU and Ukrainian citizens – of an enlarged European Union that people want to live in.
These topics were discussed at the online policy round table ‘EU‑Ukraine 2035, foresight beyond the war’ held on 16 November 2023. The round table was the closing event of a conversation between more than 50 experts, who from June 2022 to June 2023 discussed the future of the EU and Ukraine using foresight methodology and scenario building.
Presenting the project and its final report, Wolfgang Hiller, Director for Impact Assessment and Foresight at the European Parliamentary Research Service (EPRS), emphasised the importance of foresight in analysing the possible consequences of complex high-impact developments, such as the war in Ukraine.
Member of the European Parliament Michael Gahler (EPP, Germany), Rapporteur on Ukraine in the Committee on Foreign Affairs, highlighted that, in the first year following the Russian invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022, Parliament adopted no less than 24 resolutions related to Ukraine. These called for financial and military support for Ukraine, the opening of accession negotiations and support for Ukraine’s recovery and reconstruction.
Moderator Mario Damen of EPRS underscored that the scenarios represent possible futures that can help policy makers in taking the right decisions today.
In the lively panel discussion, four of the experts gave their views on the future EU‑Ukraine relationship. Ruth Deyermond from King’s College London considered escalation of the war beyond Ukraine rather unlikely in view of weakened Russian conventional forces and the possibility of retaliation. However, she made a plea, supported by Michael Gahler and other panellists, that EU countries and the United Kingdom increase their efforts to cooperate on defence matters. Jana Juzová from the EUROPEUM Institute for European Policy in Prague was of the opinion that it is less likely today that whole groups of countries might achieve EU accession than it was in 2004, when the Visegrad countries (Poland, Czechia, Slovakia and Hungary) and six other central and southern European states joined the EU at the same time. The variety in development and policy approaches between the current candidate countries (those in the Western Balkans, as well as Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine) is much greater than in 2004. Nicolai von Ondarza from Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik in Berlin pointed to proposals made by a Franco‑German working group for EU reform in view of enlargement. He reasoned that an enlarged EU would inevitably require more flexible cooperation arrangements. Ievgen Kylymnyk from the United Nations Development Programme stated that decentralisation would be key to overcoming the many challenges Ukraine will face in its reconstruction and recovery, as highlighted in a report on scenarios for Ukraine up to 2040. Because the EU accession process can take a decade or more, Michael Gahler and the experts called to combine the high ambitions and expectations with honest and realistic communication in the candidate countries, to meet all the challenges ahead.
For more, please see the video:
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