In the aftermath of the French rejection of the European Union constitution, on the eve of the Dutch referendum and amid political uncertainty in Germany, there is a growing risk that the EU will start to backtrack on its commitment to continued enlargement.

Yet, in recent years, Europe has prided itself on the perceived success of its so-called "soft power".Indeed, there is no way to explain the swift and smooth transformation of societies from Estonia to Bulgaria without referring to both the magnetism of the EU and the model it was able to provide. Hard power can certainly bring down regimes, as Iraq demonstrated, but in order to build new regimes, soft power is largely required.