The Commission’s new safeguard for future members buys the Union time. It should use that time to close its own enforcement gap.
The European Commission wants stronger safeguards against democratic backsliding after enlargement. It has good reasons. But its proposed institutional safeguard, lasting fifteen years after accession, raises a question that reaches beyond the next entrants: If the Union’s ordinary enforcement mechanisms need supplementing when a country joins, what will make them sufficient fifteen years later?
The Commission’s communication Preparing for a wider Union sets out the additional protection, but leaves open how ordinary enforcement will become sufficient when it expires. Future accession treaties should include a temporary institutional safeguard addressing serious breaches of EU values and of the principle of sincere cooperation. In particularly serious cases, measures could extend to suspending voting rights in the Council. They would be deemed adopted unless the Council rejected them by qualified majority. The Commission intends to apply this approach first to Montenegro’s accession arrangements.
This is a significant proposal. Its reverse-majority procedure reflects the approach I advocated in February. It would make action against newcomers far less dependent on the political majorities required under Article 7: four-fifths of member states to establish a clear risk, and unanimity to establish a serious and persistent breach. The Commission itself acknowledges that these thresholds, and the absence of set timeframes, can hamper timely action. For future members, it proposes a route around that difficulty. For Article 7 itself, however, it proposes exploring procedural improvements within the existing Treaties, leaving those thresholds intact.
There is a persuasive case for additional protection after accession. Reforms adopted during negotiations need to survive changes of government, political pressure and the disappearance of the membership incentive. Credible remedies can reassure existing members and make ratification politically possible. They can also protect citizens in new member states against governments dismantling the institutions strengthened during accession. Rejecting safeguards because they distinguish old from new members would miss their purpose.
Nor does the Commission propose unlimited discretion. The communication requires clear grounds for activation, objective evidence, proportionate measures, judicial scrutiny and regular review. Measures should be amended or lifted when their justification disappears. These are important protections. The question is how precisely they will be written into accession treaties and applied when political pressure rises.
One set of obligations, two levels of enforcement
Procedural safeguards do not resolve the wider inconsistency. The obligations at stake are common to all members. The capacity to enforce them would differ according to when a country joined. A serious breach by a newcomer could face a mechanism designed to overcome political obstruction. Existing members would remain subject to the ordinary EU instruments. Suspending their Council voting rights through Article 7 would still require a prior unanimous determination by the European Council, excluding the member state concerned, of a serious and persistent breach. That distinction matters for the legitimacy of enlargement itself.
Some asymmetry can be justified during the transition to membership. Fifteen years, however, extends well beyond an initial adjustment period. The Cooperation and Verification Mechanism for Bulgaria and Romania was also meant to be transitional; it ran for sixteen years. More importantly, the passage of time does not itself protect democratic institutions. Backsliding is not confined to recent entrants.
The Commission says the safeguard would complement Article 7, which would retain its central role. But complementing a weak mechanism for a defined group does not repair it for everyone. When the special clause expires, the underlying weakness may remain. The safeguard buys time. Whether it also builds a more resilient Union depends on what the EU does with that time.
Using the fifteen years
The answer should not be to delay enlargement until every enforcement problem has been solved. That would turn internal reform into another moving condition for accession. Nor should safeguards simply become permanent: that would entrench different enforcement regimes for members bound by the same obligations.
Instead, accession safeguards should accompany a credible programme to strengthen enforcement across the Union. The improvements to Article 7 procedures that the Commission suggests exploring should be pursued, with clear responsibilities and deadlines. The test should be whether common instruments can secure timely action against serious breaches in any member state, including where governments shield one another. Where those obstacles cannot be overcome within the existing framework, Treaty reform must remain a practical option, not a general expression of support.
That programme should begin now, alongside Montenegro’s accession arrangements, not as the first safeguards approach expiry. Regular reviews should ask both whether the safeguards remain justified and whether common instruments are ready to take over. Success would mean less need for exceptional treatment because common protection has become stronger, not simply because fifteen years have elapsed.
This would turn enlargement into an occasion to address a vulnerability already inside the Union, and affirm that protection against democratic backsliding depends on the seriousness of the breach, not the date on which a country joined.
Stronger safeguards can help the EU enlarge. They should also force it to confront why those safeguards are needed. When the exceptional regime ends, the common system must be ready to do its job.
Corina Stratulat is Associate Director and Head of the European Politics and Institutions Programme.
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