European Union countries - list

Which countries are part of the European Union? Good question. If a country decides to become part of the European Union, it needs to have the agreement of the EU nowadays. Than, it becomes what they call a 'member state', which is the EU's difficult language for 'EU country'. So here's a map to see the expansion throughout time:

This map is made by Kolja21 with this license.

Actually, European integration began before 1957. In 1951, the six 'founding members' started the European Coal and Steel Community. Basically, Belgium, France, the Netherlands, Italy, Luxembourg and Germany decided 'let's work together on coal and steel!'. The plan was to prevent Germany from arming itself again by creating a common market for coal and steel, which are necessary for producing weapons.

Fun fact: Algeria was part of the European club once, since it wasn't independent yet. You can see it's still part of France in 1957.

The first expansion occurred in 1973, when the United Kingdom, Denmark and Ireland joined. By then, the name had changed into European Communities. Greenland was still part of Denmark at that time, you can see it on the map. In 1981, Greece joined the club, but blocked the accession of Spain and Portugal until 1986.

In 1990 Germany became one, and the Eastern part of Germany got membership as an extra. Two years later, the name changed again in European Union, which Austria, Sweden and Finland joined in 1995. 9 years later, a very large number of new Member States at the East of the EU were welcomed: the Baltic states Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia; Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia and Hungary. 2 islands were joined at the same time: Cyprus and Malta.

In 2007, Bulgaria and Romania joined as well as Croatia in 2013. Which adds up to 28 Member States.

You may wonder: who's next? There's a few official candidates: Albania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Turkey. Bosnia-Herzegovina has applied, but is not an official candidate, meaning the procedure was started to become part of the EU. Norway, Iceland and Switzerland are countries that do not want to be part of the EU. Read more about the candidates here.

EU jobs - employment in the European Union

Fancy a career in the European Union's institutions? There's many advantages: rewarding environment, multicultural teams, interesting pay, important work among many others.

Why not start with a traineeship? Especially for the younger workers, it is a great way to get to know the environment of the European Union. Those traineeships are typically 5 months, and offer you many insights an outsider doesn't have. Furthermore, you get a salary, although not impressive, and it looks great on a cv. Make sure to ask for a cover letter at the end of the traineeship! Tip: check out the websites of the EU agencies to see if they have traineeships available. Some of them do. You can also contact individual Members of the European Parliament to ask for a traineeship in a domain you're interested in.

If you already have some work experience, it may be good to work as an interim. As of 2016, the Commission works with a few interim agencies. Another way to get work as an interim all around Europe is to call the interim agencies around the EU agencies to see if they have contracts available. They're usually not being advertised, so with a few phone calls you can find out easily.

Some specialised vacancies can be found here. For example for EU experts, Junior Professionals in Delegations and freelance linguists. It's important to check these vacancies regularly, because they change a lot.

The central point to apply for open competitions is EPSO. You'll find vacancies for permanent contracts which are very, very competitive. So it might be like winning the lottery to get through that application process. It's much easier if you have already some EU experience, as an interim or trainee. Also check out the job opportunities. These change as well a lot.

For many more jobs and other websites, check out Eurodatum. Euractiv and Eurobrussels (subscribe to the job mail) are references, but as with any reference, they're highly competitive.

European Union's threats: lecture by Prime Minister Gonzalez

What are the European Union's biggest security threats? Is it the radicalisation of young persons, led by hatred? Or is Russia's assertive behaviour in Ukraine the principal worry? Tough question. Another option is the instability in the Middle East.

An interesting lecture on this topic by Felipe González, the longest-serving Prime Minister of Spain and chairman of the European Union’s independent Reflection Group, which was established to help the Union anticipate and meet long-term challenges.