WESTERN BALKANS AS EU PERIPHERY: IS IT TIME FOR CHANGES?

Abstract

This paper emphasizes an importance of the EU and its periphery and asks a question about the position of Western Balkan? Where the borders of the EU and what are is its periphery [8]? What is today’s perspective of region with 18 million inhabitants and joint GDP of USD 89.1 billion equal with half of Portugal’s [12]? Precise answer to these questions is no, but based on Eurostat data for 2011 the EU has 507 million inhabitants, and 504 million neighbours. They live on the perimeter of the Arctic to Algeria, the four partially related entities. The" Centre" of the entire region is the Western Balkans or South-Eastern Europe (1), the" East" is represented by the countries of the former Soviet Union without the republics of Central Asia (2), the "South" is the Afro-Asian Mediterranean area (3), and the "North" are Faeroe Islands and Greenland; Norway and Iceland are the part of EFTA (there are even Switzerland and Liechtenstein) and are not considered peripherals. The EU periphery is diverse in all respects: economic, social, cultural and natural geographic and Western Balkans is an atypical space EU periphery on two grounds. – As a region with the highest level of multiculturalism it has always been a meeting point or a clash of civilizations (Orthodoxy, Catholicism and Islam), and at the same time (as opposed to other regions) has no energy resources. The question then arises as to of all the Western Balkan countries with a view to extending the conditions for admission to the EU or is this only extended time without the sincere wish that this region becomes a part of the EU?