Poland's Accession To The Eu example essay topic

Poland is one of five countries from the former Eastern European Communist Block that is preparing for accession to the EU. Although the integration process requires a lot of compromises and many western policies and practices will have to be adopted, most Polish citizens are prepared to go through those changes. The majority of Poles are looking forward to the accession, which is frequently seen as quite a symbolic cut-off from Poland's communist past. The accession means serious changes of lifestyle in Poland as well as the perception of Poles in the world, and especially in the West. This means that Poland, as a post-communist country will finally get rid of its inferiority complex. Throughout the decades the citizens of this country, trapped between the political and economic powers of East and West, developed a sense of lesser importance and ability to coexist on the international area.

Poland's accession to the EU is the process from which not only the country as a political unit will profit considerably, but also its individual citizens. However this enlargement of the EU will have consequences for the UK, current members and those that are planning to join, therefore bringing along a fair share of advantages and disadvantages: The positive changes from which Poland as a country will benefit include a common job market, leading to the free movement of labour and capital allowing polish workers to migrate to more prosperous areas. There will also be free trade and tourist movement, new educational opportunities as well as the development of the Polish military forces. Since 1989 the Polish job market has suffered from rapidly growing privatisation which in turn was one of the major causes of high unemployment. With the accession to the EU Polish employees will have the ability to work in other states of the Community, which will allow them to gain and develop their qualifications. What follows the free movement of labour is the free movement of tourists and the advantages connected with open borders.

The idea of free trade and common economic policy requires effective laws that would prevent the practices of black market. With the introduction of the common European currency, the Euro, the stabilisation of the economy is the main issue and it will definitely be one of the greatest advantages to Poland as they will also be able to appreciate the benefits of using a single currency. As for Polish educational institutions and the Polish military, they too will benefit significantly from the accession thanks to subsidies. The move will generally also give Poland the opportunity to move politically towards democracy and freer trade, aswell as increased economic activity in general. There will also be positive knock-on effects for existing EU members too.

By enlarging the EU there will be greater export potential and new commercial opportunities due to the larger market and greater size of customs union. This also gives new opportunities for foreign direct investment into accession countries such as retailing, hotels and banks (providing a new net flow of interest profits and dividends). Companies will be able to exploit greater economies of scale by supplying to a larger market, increasing productive efficiency. A new diverse European labour market will be created allowing UK businesses to import lower cost skilled labour where there are large labour shortages. Aswell as providing the EU population with the chance to travel, work and live in Central, Eastern and Western Europe. Enlargement could lead to a cleaner environment as all accession countries, such as Poland, will have spent huge sums of money on improvements to air and water quality to meet strict EU standards, creating positive externalities as there will be less cross border pollution.

Finally enlargement may act as the starting point for further economic reform in the EU. It may cause CAP reforms and furthermore spur on other countries into reforming their labour markets due to possible competition from accession countries. However, with the positive factors there are bound to be negative factors for existing EU members too. There are firstly the issues of the costs to public finances and the budgetary costs for the EU as accession will surely increase the budgetary contributions of existing members.

The EU budget may have to be doubled even though the tax payers wont want to pay for it. This may lead to countries like Greece and Portugal (seen as relatively poor members) no longer receiving the EU assistance that the need. The standards of living for European regions will fall, resulting in regions such as Cornwall loosing out on structural funding. The costs of the labour market disruption may be great as structural unemployment may be increased among the accession countries (which is already way above EU averages) leading to large economic and social costs and putting pressure on fiscal policies due to rising budget deficits. There are also worries over wage competition and the problem of organised crime and illegal immigration, from former Eastern Europe, over weak European borders.

There must also be some negative consequences for Poland too. To begin with Poland's income is less than half that of the Western countries. Unemployment stands at above 18 percent and economic growth is very slow. Therefore an integration with the larger European economy will mean a difficult transition for workers at archaic factories, farmers particularly and pensioners whose incomes are likely to shrink. All these problems do is simply increase Poland's income disparities.

In the short run it may seem as though income disparities between countries will be reduced for Poland as the labour market becomes freer and foreign direct investment appears to become more popular. There will be initial benefits such as greater economic growth, massive assistance from the EU to improve their economic performance and living standards further. There may also be improvements in the stability of democracy leading to guaranteed rules of law, human rights and protection of minorities. However in the long run the disparities are only going to worsen due to the fears faced by the Polish farmers at present.

Poland has a huge and inefficient farming sector, which is heading the worries over having to compete with the French and the Germans. As Poland joins the EU the ownership of land may be passed onto wealthy Germans and other Western agribusiness's who will end up driving local farmers off the land. Multinational businesses will start to command the growing terms for farmers which the small scale Polish farmers wont be able to meet leading to bankruptcy as they will no longer make any money. This is an issue that affects all EU accession candidates, but more so for Poland as around 26 percent of its population is employed in agriculture. It is therefore predicted that only 600 000 out of Poland's 2 million farms will actually be able to carry on functioning after Poland has joined the EU. All this can do is widen the income disparities as Germany will simply gain from the situation (being Poland's largest export and import partner) whilst Poland suffers from mass unemployment and negative economic growth.

Nevertheless I believe that the minister should support Poland's application of entry into the EU as I think it would generally benefit Poland's economy and population as a whole. For the individual citizen, membership in the EU is a greatly positive factor. Although there have been people condemning the approach towards the EU, the positives still outgrow the negatives in the common perception. Most people especially see EU accession as the chance for increased opportunities in the areas of employment, tourism and education.

The free movement of labour within Europe will be most significant for those who are presently still at school. They will be the first ones who, thanks to their own hard work, will be given chances their parents could only have dream about. Poland's accession to the EU is commonly perceived as an advantageous move which, many Poles hope, will finally consign that sense of inferiority which some Poles have experienced. Given the same opportunities as its Western neighbours, Poland will finally have a chance to develop its potential and perhaps become greater trading partners for exports such as machinery, transport equipment, foodstuffs and chemicals.