The weakness of the Copenhagen criteria and the lack of their application after accession caused a discrepancy between EU accession conditions and membership obligations, which might be one of the reasons for non-compliance after accession in some of the new Member States. The other reason is...

The so called Fiscal Compact signed by 25 out of 27 EU member states requires the states to transpose the treaty's rules that limit the annual structural deficit and the general government debt “through provisions of binding force and permanent character, preferably constitutional” (Art. 3,...