FOUR YEARS FROM THE CANDIDACY STATUS – WHAT HAS BEEN DONE AND WHAT CAN BE EXPECTED? Print

Sonja Risteska 

Abstract

Four years have passed since Macedonia got the candidacy status from the EU and it still waits to start the negotiations for full membership. This period has been full with events which influenced Macedonia’s development and caused the prolonged waiting of the much anticipated negotiations. The events went from a promising start in 2005 with the candidacy status, through acting as a ‘spoiled child’ in 2008 to positive performance and dedication to the reform processes in 2009. The country did not use well the incentive given at the European Summit in 2005 (the candidacy status) and passed the opportunity to get an early date for starting the negotiations with the EU in the following years (2007, 2008). With internal and external pressure, in 2009 the authorities started to work on the reforms. The EC acknowledges this positive trend, having in mind that the reforms are far from over. There are high expectations that the developments will produce positive EC Report this year and that the country will be rewarded with a recommendation of a date for starting the negotiations for full membership. Whether these expectations will materialize it remains to be seen on 14th of October when the report will be published.

 
Key words: negotiations, EC, Greece, reforms
 
Sonja Risteska is research fellow at Analytica, Dame Gruev 7-8/3 Skopje Republic of Macedonia. sristeska(at)analyticamk.org

Cite this article:
Risteska Sonja. Four Years from the Candidacy Status – what has been done and what can be expected?. Innovative Issues and Approaches in Social Sciences, vol.3, no.2:5-23, DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.12959/issn.1855-0541.IIASS-2010-no2-art01

Digital Object Identifier(DOI): http://dx.doi.org/10.12959/issn.1855-0541.IIASS-2010-no2-art01

View full text in pdf: http://www.iiass.com/pdf/IIASS-2010-no2-art01.pdf

 

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