This chapter explores the role of enforcement networks in the governance of EU Internal Market policy. It looks closer at the structure and performance of two enforcement networks at the centre of the European integration project, the European Competition Network and the Consumer Protection Cooperation Network. The chapter studies the institutional dynamics within the networks, tracing the interaction, horizontally, between national enforcement bodies within each network, as well as vertically, between the Commission and constitutive national entities. This dynamic is then analysed along four parameters: effectiveness, participation, horizontal empowerment and vertical empowerment (centralization). Transnational networks have been hailed as a governance arrangement countervailing the shift of power to the supranational level and preserving the link to democratically elected national institutions. Their advantage is seen to lie in offering possibilities for experimentation and learning from difference. The chapter puts these expectations to the test. Importantly, it highlights the ambiguous place of institutional diversity, viewed, at once, as a source for creative institutional experimentation and as an undesired impediment to coherence and efficiency. The overarching task is to critically evaluate the effectiveness and legitimacy of enforcement networks and their influence on the distribution of power in the multi-level institutional landscape of the Union.

In the first chapter, the authors review the evolution of borders throughout European history. The modern concept of borders as dividing lines is a fairly recent phenomenon and constitutes somewhat of a paradox in a historical perspective. It evolved as political orders started to use borders to demarcate the boundaries of their power. In that vein, the modern nation-state was premised on the control over a specific territory whose political system, wealth, and culture had to be defended against enemies, often to the detriment of peaceful inter-state relations in Europe. After World War II, European integration was pursued with the aim of forming a political union challenging the traditional notion of borders as the economic, political, and social boundaries between the EU member states were gradually removed. In the process, however, borders as demarcation lines towards countries not (yet) members of the Union rose in significance. Consequently, the EU has been in almost constant enlargement since its inception, increasing its membership from six to 28 and then 27, because of Brexit. The chapter concludes by presenting the varying perspectives of borders in contemporary Europe as they appear in the ensuing chapters of the book.

In the last chapter, the authors take stock of the challenges which are besetting the European Union’s (EU) internal and external borders from the perspective of contemporary events and crises, and evaluate them in the context of a changing international environment. They consider what can be learned from past experiences concerning the internal borders which in the last decades were lifted only to be reinstated again, and the hardening of the EU’s external borders in order to keep unwanted pressure from irregular immigration at bay while facing off hybrid security threats, terrorism and organized crime. The chapter analyzes the geopolitical shift from the perspective of the EU’s quest to protect internal policy progress, such as the greening of the economy, against political actors which challenge the principles of the rules-based international order. The chapter concludes by discussing the implications of the war in Ukraine on the European security architecture, and the prospect of a future enlargement to Ukraine, Moldova, and the candidate countries on the Balkan Peninsula.

The question of respect for the rule of law in the member states of the European Union (EU) has come up high on the agenda of EU institutions. The background is well known and relates to the disturbing political trend of nationalist and populist forces either rising to power, or gaining increasing political influence across the European continent. While this trend can be discerned in a number of EU member states such as Italy, France, Finland and recently even Sweden, it has been most prominently visible in the ascent of self-proclaimed ‘illiberal democracies’ in Hungary and Poland.