Would you be on board with THIS European Union? (Poll)

No thanks.

The UK don't want back, they voted on it and wanted out. It doesn't matter if a certain portion of people on the internet and the media aren't happy about it.

Why would Switzerland, Norway and Iceland join, it wouldn't benefit them from their current positions.

Why would African countries be accepted into the EU, shouldn't they be joining the African Union?

The EU adding Turkey will destroy the EU if and when it happens. Wide open borders with the entire middle east and a distinct lack of interest from any of the ruling class to control the flows of tens of millions of economic migrants.

I'm fine with helping less well off countries and spreading liberal ideas... it would help take some pressure off immigration into the EU. By encouraging the establishment of stable economies and also stable societies in other nations, they would become attractive to immigrants as a destination, more suited to their religious or cultural desires.

We need to have solid and successful economies, along with stable societies ourselves if we wish to retain our liberal ideals. I do wonder if people are aware of just how weak Western economies are right now.. and have been for the last decade. In spite of claims of boom periods, debt has been increasing substantially across most industries and government supported agencies, such as educational organisations. Importing the low skilled workers that are common in African and M.Eastern (or simply low end economies such as the Balkans), means increasing an overall strain on our economies.. since these people will need to be provided for whenever the economy dips significantly.

Opening up Europe to Africa or the M.East would swamp us with low skilled workers... in spite of the fact that we already have a sizable unemployed population in Italy/Spain already. It's simply suicidal for the purpose of short term virtue signals, and likely will result in the end of our liberal ideals anyway.

If anything, I think after Brexit, you’re looking at the EU probably being a lot more cautious about expansion. It’s not about territorial expansion. Rather, it’s been about friendly cooperation, peace and stability. Ultimately it’s a European post WWII peace and stability project, that expanded its remit and also plugged in the countries that had been caught behind the Iron Curtain. Going beyond that is probably way further than it could function as common political basis for it starts to become a bit of a stretch. It isn’t just an economic project and never was.

I could see the EU looking at growing cooperation agreements, but without membership being the sole objective.

There are a lot of basic tenants of membership which need to be met and in some cases aren’t even being met by several of the countries that joined in the last accession rounds - such as actually wanting a stable democracy, rule of law, adhering to the European Declaration of Human Rights, having met economic criteria, etc etc.

Ironically, it was often the UK that was often one of the biggest proponents of rapid EU expansion. It was also one of the few serious enthusiasts for Turkish membership, long after a lot of people had gone cold on the idea as Turkish politics had begun to swing towards authoritarianism and strongman leadership, and seemed to be abandoning what had been an era of secularism and relatively liberal, democratic values.

I’m not sure what the UK officialdom view of the EU’s future was, but I don’t think it’s one that was necessarily shared on the continent by the original members. Seemed the UK view of it was largely economic and about a looser, shallower and bigger union, rather than a more cautious, deeper union which seems to be the core membership vision for it.

I strongly suspect we’re headed for a smaller core EU, probably focused on the Eurozone members cooperating more deeply, and periphery of members who might be left to move at their own pace. I don’t see the likes of Hungary, Poland and Romania having the same outlook as the rest for a long time to come and I also don’t see a scenario where those countries will be just let stymie the development of the EU either, so it will end up going at two speeds.