4 March 2022
When Visegrad Insight started the preparation of this report — The Future Of the Western Balkans: Five Scenarios for 2030 — with a series of scenario-building workshops, nobody could imagine how dramatically the situation in Europe would change in a matter of only several months. Despite our mutual efforts to reflect on the future, no one anticipated the blatant violation of all basic principles of the international order committed by Putin’s Russia.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has sent shockwaves around the continent and the world. An act of aggression unseen since World War II, which was meant to happen ‘never again’, made Europe realise that it is not just the future of Ukraine but also its own which is on the line. This has resulted in unprecedented unity across the continent and proved that Europe has the ability to consolidate in the face of imminent danger to its security and stability.
The focus of this report is the Western Balkans region that includes Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo*, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia. The stagnating years-long EU accession process did not eliminate the simmering instability in the region after the 1990s’ Balkan wars, and the EU has acknowledged this state of affairs directly: the Union has nearly doubled the size of its peacekeeping force in Bosnia after the Russian attack on Ukraine. This has been imposed as a precautionary measure in case of any destabilising efforts from internal and external agents.
Although the Western Balkan’s EU integration process has taken years now, challenging questions remain and new ones arise as to the future of this region. The five scenarios presented in this report were developed prior to the events in Ukraine; nevertheless, we still believe that they reflect pertinent trends. The contributors to this publication have shared their assessments as well as recommendations for improving the situation on the ground.
For the period up until 2030, this report identifies five possible scenarios that evolve around further integration between the Western Balkans and the EU (Forced Hand), the continuation of the unsatisfactory and potentially explosive status quo (Dark Future), countries’ uniting around global challenges (Banding Together), everlasting EU accession negotiation process (Elusive Europeanisation) and robust economic cooperation between the countries that nearly erases past grievances towards each other (Defragmenting the Western Balkans). All of the scenarios were developed through extensive collaboration with a variety of institutions, academics, policy experts and key stakeholders.
The purpose of this publication is to instigate discourse about the future of the Western Balkans and place attention on the trends that the cooperating experts defined as critical.
This publication was developed by Visegrad Insight through workshops and collaboration with over thirty extraordinary minds — analysts, journalists, policymakers, civic activists, experts — from the Western Balkans and the Visegrad Group countries. Our project partners have immensely contributed to this publication, too: Albanian Institute for International Studies (Albania), EUROTHINK – Center for European Strategies (North Macedonia), Foundation BFPE for a Responsible Society (Serbia), Institute for Foreign Affairs and Trade (Hungary), Prague Security Studies Institute (Czechia), Slovak Foreign Policy Association (Slovakia).
Thank you to the International Visegrad Fund and the National Endowment for Democracy for their support and faith in us.
Together, we hope that this report will enrich the debate and facilitate policymakers with new insights on this key European region.
Written by Spasimir Domaradzki and Tetiana Poliak-Grujić.
