| This study's thesis is that European Union expansion to Central and Eastern Europe makes EU institutional changes and revisions essential. The European Union faces the challenges of providing assistance to the candidate states in a number of areas, and structuring policies to accommodate the accession of these new states.;European Union expansion, in whatever form and timeline, will only further confirm the EU's central place in Europe, and the costs and required patience to overcome expansion challenges are worth enduring if the result is lasting peace and economic growth for a united Europe.;However, opportunities to expand the European Union must be planned carefully---as the first expansion into Central and Eastern Europe---but European leaders must recognize that people from the former Soviet bloc are no less European and no less entitled to the services and programs of the European Union than Western Europeans. |
