The paper examines the external opportunity structures of the EU's eastern neighbours during times of high security threat. The research investigates when and to what extent opportunities in the neighbourhood affect EU engagement and shape policy-frame alignment. The study introduces the concept of an "immediate" opportunity structure and concludes that the EU's decisions to initiate or alter policy frames towards countries in the Eastern neighbourhood are driven by immediate security-related opportunity structures that exist at the moment of decision-making. Furthermore, the EU's decision to engage depends on whether the security threat in the region and the neighbourhood directly affects the Union's security architecture. As the political environment in the neighborhood becomes more open and concessions towards the EU increase, the EU boosts its engagement, reflected in policy alignment. The paper claims that the EU strategy prioritizes immediate opportunity structures because focusing on immediate opportunities aims to address and create long-term opportunity structures.

The main scientific goal of this proposed paper is to analyse and discuss contemporary political developments in the Western Balkan states (i.e. Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia) in the context of the EU enlargement process. Although the idea of European integration has been one of the main drivers of a number of structural reforms in the Western Balkans, accession negotiations have progressed rather slowly. As of January 2024, none of the countries in the region is yet close to EU membership. Simultaneously, Western Balkans have recently become an area of competition between several external actors (namely China, Russia and Turkey) which are interested in increasing their influence there. Faced with serious security, economic and social concerns, the countries of the region are pursuing cautious and multi-vector policies, while attempting to balance between the EU and non-Western powers.

Adopting a comprehensive research perspective, the proposed paper aims to investigate the impact of international factors on the geopolitical positioning of the Western Balkans in the third decade of the 21st century. Image theory, which provides research tools to examine trends and directions in foreign policies of states, was selected as a theoretical foundation for this study. A wide range of primary sources (official documents, public reports), as well as the literature on the subject (academic publications, policy briefs) were reviewed in order to identify the most relevant events and processes that may affect the future relations of the Western Balkan countries with their external environment. An in-depth analysis of semi-structured expert interviews with related stakeholders from Western Balkan countries (including think tank researchers, NGO activists, academics), conducted as part of fieldwork, was also crucial for this research. By employing qualitative research methods (e.g. content analysis, political discourse analysis, historical methods, process tracing method), this paper attempts to answer the research question on the preferred regional integration model for the Western Balkans. It concludes by presenting and discussing further perspectives on the Western Balkans' relations with the EU, China, Russia and Turkey.

In a resolution of June 2023, the European Parliament has stressed its concerns regarding the attempts of the Serbian Orthodox Church - not only in Serbia, but also in Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina - to contribute to the promotion of an anti-EU agenda, while at the same framing Russia as a protector of true Serbian values. Various reports highlight its close alliance to and support of extremist groups, like Nasi, the People’s Patrol or the Balkan Cossack Army. Orthodoxy is purported as crucial for Serbian national revival, but these values are deemed under attack by a “West”, personified by the far left, liberals, globalism, LGBTQ activists, gender fanatics, and most prominently the European Union. Religious ideas not only connect to understandings of tradition and national(ist) heritage, but are important for processes of inclusion, exclusion, and mobilisation, in particular in settings of social conflict, crises and perceived civilizational confrontations. These narratives easily team up with radical conservatives’ propositions to free Europe from the moral, social and economic decay liberal democracy has wrought in Europe and to re-build a “different Europe”, based on national sovereignty, traditional and religious values, as highlighted at a “cross-continental conservative congress” held in Belgrade in November 2023. Religiously determined “knowledges of belonging” not only frame imagined communities, but also imagined geographies. This challenges the EU’s attempts to condition liberal transformation during accession processes and raises the question about the role of churches and religious institutions in propagating “illiberal” concepts of society. This paper is interested in churches and religious groups as contestants of EU liberalism (understood as neutrality towards normative concepts of “the good life” and consequently secularity) in EU accession candidates. It asks it asks about their contribution to the various “frontlines of contestations”, how they assign meaning to European demands and offers, what strategies they adopt, how identities, ideas and interests are mobilised and which coalitions they build. By building on case studies from Serbia, Bosnia and Hercegovina, Georgia, and Ukraine, it does not limit itself to the role of the orthodox church but broadens the perspective to a variety of religious groups, including Islam.

The paper is part of a larger research project, which maps varieties of contestation of the EU(ropean) liberal project and local patterns of illiberalism in the EU’s immediate vicinity (Western Balkan and Eastern Partnership countries).

The security landscape in Eastern Europe has undergone significant transformations since Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine. The Euromaidan revolution and the conflict in Donbas have compelled EU Member States to focus on stabilizing the situation in Ukraine. Consequently, discussions regarding the future outlook and EU policies toward Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus have taken a backseat. This paper aims to highlight the necessary adjustments in the logic of the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) and the Eastern Partnership (EaP). Given the evolving situations in the southern and eastern neighbourhood, maintaining the status quo in neighbourhood policy renders the EU ineffective in responding to conflicts and the rapidly changing reality. Both the EU and its neighbourhood are in a state of flux, necessitating modifications to the policy of conditionality, which forms the foundation of the ENP, aligning it with the EU’s objectives and interests in the neighbourhood.