Europe in 2000

The map of Europe remained unchanged, but 1989 was a year of revolutions, sweeping away Communist rule in Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria and Romania. Later, borders would change, with German reunification in 1990, and the disintegration of Yugoslavia: after a decade of war in the 1990s, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo would win their independence. In 1991, the Soviet Union itself was dissolved, creating a slew of newly independent states on Europe’s eastern borders, from the Baltic to the Caucasus. The European Economic Community was transformed into the European Union by the Maastricht Treaty (1992) and strove to seize the moment created by events in the east. New aspirations (democratic government, free market economy, impartial judiciary etc) were established as membership criteria. Austria, Finland and Sweden acceded to the Union in 1995, with eight Eastern European countries following in 2004, together with Malta and Cyprus. Bulgaria and Romania would join the EU in 2007.

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