On May, 1st, 2004, the European Union welcomed ten new member states. This enlargement, unprecedented considering its scale and its consequences, is both a chance and a challenge for the building of the European Union. It leads the Union to question its future and its very signification: what is from now on the common project driving the member states, and what are the means they are willing to put to the task? The institutional means have been the subject of a lengthy negotiation that ended with the adoption of a constitutional treaty.

Another essential negotiation is now under way: the one about the financial means of the European Union (the "financial perspectives 2007-2013"). The European budget is of a major import: it conditions the level of the ambitions of the common policies the enlarged European Union wants to implement and the solidarity it is willing to show to both its members and the rest of the world.

This study, led by the Centre des études européennes de Strasbourg (CESS) in partnership with the Institut français des relations internationales (Ifri), was carried out by a working party co-ordinated by Maxime Lefebvre, who was in charge with the European Affairs at Ifri. It analyses the stakes in the budgetary negotiation, offers news reflections on the future of common policies and on the deepening of the European Union building policy, and develops various scenarios for the future European budget in 2013.

Nicolas-Jean Brehon is a Teacher of European Finances at Paris I Sorbonne University.

Patrice Cardot is Assistant for European Affairs of the President of the General Studies Section at the "Conseil général de l'armement".

Stefan Collignon is a Professor of European Political Economy at the London School of Economics.

Jacques Le Cacheux is a Teacher at the Université de Pau et des Pays de l'Adour and Director of the Research Department at the Observatoire français des conjonctures économiques (OFCE).

Maxime Lefebvre is Head of European Affairs, Ifri Paris.

Magdalena Werpachowska has a Master of Roman Philology from the Warsaw University and a Master of the Institut d'études politiques (IEP) de Paris.

Hugo Zsolt de Sousa is a Research Fellow at the Research Policy Group "Notre Europe", Paris.

This content is published in French : Quel budget européen à l'horizon 2013 ? Moyens et politiques d'une Union élargie