The Day After Tomorrow: The Emerging Political Disaster on the EU’s Eastern Borders
The European Union’s efforts to become a global power and to take the responsibility for its direct neighborhood may face a significant challenge. While news headlines remain fixed on Trump’s foreign policy, Russia’s war in Ukraine, and the risks of global crisis, the region of Central and Eastern Europe is slipping into a spiral of political crisis. Between fragmented and polarized parliaments and fragile governmental coalitions, the EU’s borderlands are becoming political minefields. If their respective problems remain unchecked, the crises may impact the EU, paralyze governance, empower ‘sovereigntists’, and destabilize the EU from within. The cases of Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova, and Poland, where systemic instability is the “new normal”, shed the light on the prospects that the whole EU may face in the very near future.