ISSH Skopje

Student perspective Serbia’s European future cannot be understood only through accession chapters, government negotiations, or technical reforms. For many students in Serbia, the question of Europe is no longer only a question of membership. It is a question of what kind of society we want to live in now. The current EU enlargement process has created a long period of uncertainty. Serbia remains close to the EU, but not inside it. The process continues, but without a clear sense of arrival....

Executive Summary The current EU enlargement process in the Western Balkans increasingly appears less like a clear path toward membership and more like a prolonged condition of political suspension. Candidate countries are asked to reform, align, and wait, while the final political decision on accession remains repeatedly deferred. This creates frustration, democratic fatigue, and a sense of being permanently “close to Europe” without being fully included. The paper “Cycling to Brussels:...

North Macedonia’s EU accession process has generated real frustration. The country has waited for years, accepted difficult compromises, formally opened negotiations, and still faces a blocked path forward. This disappointment is understandable. Nonetheless, frustration should not be transformed into misinformation or used to argue that the European path is humiliating, pointless, or dangerous. A major problem in the public debate is that anti-EU narratives often appear as “reasonable...