Although many Bulgarians are skeptical of the European Union (EU), their country has undoubtedly benefited from joining the EU, overtaking Serbia both economically and in terms of the rule of law, and a chasm is increasingly emerging in the Balkans between countries that are in the Union and those that are not, writes the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ).
The German daily states that the fact that Bulgaria has benefited from EU membership over the past 18 years can be proven, above all, by comparing it with Serbia, a neighboring country with almost the same population of around 6,7 million.
"When Bulgaria joined the EU in 2007, it was lagging behind Serbia economically. Bulgaria's GDP per capita was around 4.300 euros per year. In Serbia, it was 4.400. And although the Serbian economy was also growing robustly, Bulgaria ran away from its western neighbor. In 2024, GDP per capita was around 16.260 euros, while in Serbia it was 12.640 euros. And according to other indicators, such as average salaries and purchasing power, Bulgaria overtook Serbia," writes FAZ.
There are several reasons for this, the daily assesses. FAZ specifies that Serbia, as a candidate for EU membership, receives accession assistance from Brussels, "but it is incomparably smaller than the structural incentive funds that member states receive."
In addition to these structural funds, writes FAZ, member states also receive money from the Recovery and Resilience Fund, which the European Commission established after the coronavirus epidemic to boost growth and competitiveness, and more than six billion euros have been reserved for Bulgaria in that fund.
FAZ adds that, although the disbursement of these funds is linked to reforms and the rule of law, which is why the payment of tranches to Bulgaria was postponed on several occasions, it was still paid 1,6 billion euros in December. "It is very important that reforms in the area of the rule of law are implemented as a prerequisite for the disbursement of individual tranches from the Reconstruction and Resilience Fund," said Vesela Cherneva, deputy director of the European Council on Foreign Relations in Sofia, FAZ reports.
She added that "every government in Bulgaria knows that there are firm criteria for what constitutes good governance and what does not."
Speaking about the protests that led to the fall of Prime Minister Rosen Zhelyaskov's coalition government in December, Cherneva said that "the protests in Bulgaria have shown that the government barely has any room for maneuver if society and Brussels share the same assessment."
"Unlike Serbia, where mass protests lasting more than a year have been unsuccessful, dissatisfaction in Bulgaria forced the government to resign. This is also due to circumstances: Serbia is not receiving billions of euros worth of EU funds, and the EU has fewer opportunities to exert pressure to implement reforms. One of the consequences is that the level of democracy, rule of law and media freedom in Serbia is below the level that exists in Bulgaria," FAZ assesses.
The daily writes that for Bulgaria, despite all the incentives, belonging to the common European market with its almost 450 million inhabitants is more important.
"This makes the country more attractive to investors and the Bulgarian export economy. Serbia does not have such access to the market. And although Serbia has also made economic progress in recent years, it is noticeable," writes FAZ.
The daily writes that Bulgaria, "which is still spoken of in Serbia today with a somewhat derogatory tone," has surpassed its western neighbor economically, and that Serbia's other neighbor, Romania, also part of the EU, is developing even faster, and that the distance is growing.
"In other words: the EU is functioning - both politically and economically. Commenting on Brexit, Angela Merkel said in 2016 that 'there must and will be a visible difference between whether a country wants to be part of the EU or not.' In the Balkans, the growing gulf between EU members and non-members shows that this difference really does exist," FAZ concludes.
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