Albanias challenging Path to EU Integration in the 21st Century

It is more than a quarter of a century that Albania has abandoned self-isolation and embarked on a quasi Europeanization pathway. While significant progress has already been achieved on many fronts, considerable roadblocks have been faced and others still lie ahead. Indeed, a multifaceted array of problems among which, a distorted democratization panorama, a divisive political environment, fragile institutions, and a lagging economy, are noticed along transition years while the country is still hobbling on the weary road to EU. Albanias application for membership to the European Union nearly a decade ago was a major landmark for its future aspirations, but the long awaiting question that needs to be addressed is whether Albania can meet minimum EU accession requirements in the context of persisting domestic gaps and deficiencies that characterize the environment where its integration mode operates. In the above context, this paper focuses on the trails of Albanias journey towards the EU membership goal especially during the 21st century. Given the slow pace of integration encountered so far, where internal and external factors share their own pieces of responsibility, the paper aims to analyse and assess certain critical junctures which deem to have had more impact on Albanias delayed EU prospect, as well as underline some of the challenging issues that still need to be faced.