The race to the bottom within the frames of the EU Eastern Enlargement

Abstract

The European Eastern Enlargement has brought major challenges to both EU as a supra national organisation and to each national state member. This paper deals with what the literature named race to the bottom tendency that exists in the old EU members’ social policies shortly before and after the Enlargement. The paper is divided in three sections which deal with the circumstances and the possible causes of such a trend that affects both old states and member states alike. The first section explains why there is no distinct EUropean social model and issues that arise from not having a common social policy. The second section deals with the attempts made towards a common social policy and its challenges and the last one deals in particular with the race to the bottom phenomena as a sign of the members states weaknesses and fears.