2004 Event

The big bang enlargement

Name: The big bang enlargement
Start: 2004

Ten states, eight of them formerly communist, join the Union: the continent’s division ends.

What leads to what

Declared chains of causation — debatable, like any reading of history.

Upstream

leads to Fall of the Berlin Wall 1989 Quinze ans entre la brèche et l’adhésion de dix États.

Meanwhile, elsewhere

Within twenty-five years of 2004 — the context national timelines leave out.

2 years later Independence referendum Montenegro
4 years later Declaration of independence Kosovo
5 years earlier NATO intervention Kosovo
6 years earlier Good Friday Agreement Ireland
9 years later Euromaidan Ukraine
9 years earlier Dayton Accords Bosnia and Herzegovina
11 years earlier Democratic constitution of Andorra Andorra
12 years earlier Maastricht Treaty

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Which long period

Periods overlap: they are landmarks, not boxes.

European integration 1950 – 2030 From coal and steel to a Union of twenty-seven.

Countries involved

Explore around

What was written of it

A day will come when all of you, nations of the continent, without losing your distinct qualities and your glorious individuality, will merge closely into a higher unity, and will form the European brotherhood.

Victor Hugo 1849

Opening address to the Peace Congress, Paris

Translated by the site, not by the author.