Emotion as a Factor in Determining Future ‘Europeans’

After the EU’s 2004 enlargement, many have talked about the enlargement ‘fatigue’. With Brexit and the immigration crisis that followed the Eurozone crisis, it is possible even to speak of an integration fatigue. This paper argues that the set of emotions in the European public is set off by the thought of further enlarging the EU bears a determining influence on the EU’s enlargement policy. There is a widespread ‘fear’ for enlargement towards the source and transit regions of migration. There is also ‘resentment’ that the EU integration process did not turn out to be what was promised as signified by the Brexit decision, and exemplified by the alarm of further EU enlargement in the Leave campaign. This paper focuses on these emotions in EU’s enlargement policy, and analyses them not only as a strong input for decisions on the EU’s enlargement policy, but also as justifications of decisions taken in a strong response to rising populism among EU countries. The paper will use three sources of data to present this analysis, public opinion surveys, major publications by EU Institutions like Communications from the Commission and enlargement strategy papers, and eventually speeches by the EU leaders in different settings. Through discourse analysis, the paper aims to contribute to the workshop’s discussion on the relevance of study of emotions while analysing European integration, with the particular case of the enlargement policy area