Vom „ring of friends“ zum „ring of fire“ – Die Europäische Nachbarschaftspolitik auf dem Prüfstand anlässlich der ENP Review 2015

According to Art. 8 TEU the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) aims at an area of prosperity and good neighbourliness founded on the values of the Union and characterized by close and peaceful relations based on cooperation. It is addressed to those neighbouring countries which will not be considered as candidate countries (at least for the time being), but which shall be brought closer to the European Union. Until now the ENP was characterized by two leading principles: the differentiation corresponding to the needs and interests of the partner countries as well as the conditionality corresponding to their willingness to reform. Yet the implementation of the policy has not proven to be very effective so far – not least because of lacking consistency in the mentioned principles, but also due to the reason, that the EU was not able to provide enough incentive for the neighbouring states. As a result of the considerable change in the neighbourhood since the launch of the ENP in 2004 the policy was revised several times, most recently by the 2015 ENP Review – it remains to be seen whether it is now an adequate response to the current conditions and interests.