PRISTINA – “The Single Market is more than a market, it is full European citizenship – not being an immigrant in your own European Union. This is why I have advocated the Single Market as a flagship of the EU enlargement”, said Enrico Letta in his keynote speech today at the Civil Society Forum in Pristina.
Letta, President of the Jacques Delors Institute and former Italian Prime Minister, is the author of the 2024 report on the future of the Single Market.
“I see today in Brussels the sense of the fact the Single Market and enlargement can be married. The Single Market can become a part of the daily life of people in the candidate countries before the formal and final accession. Because, in the end, the Single Market consists of four freedoms – freedom of movement for people, goods, services and capital, and I also propose the fifth freedom, freedom of movement of knowledge”, Letta said.
He added that there is momentum for achieving this and that “we have to work together”.
Earlier in the speech, Letta assessed that this period is similar, in terms of the level of disruption, to that of 1989.
“We are again at the end of another 30 years of process in international relations, economic relations and world politics”, Letta said.
What is happening today, he added, is obliging Europe to deal with new fundamental challenges.
“We knew for many years that we needed to have our own security system, but we did nothing. We knew that there was technological disruption, but we did not do anything to act. We knew that we lacked financial independence because financial services were not integrated, and we have 27 financial markets”, said Letta.
The biggest European bank 12 years ago was half to the size of the biggest American bank. Today the relationship is 1 to 8.
“We were losing ground in the past years because of fragmentation”, Letta said.
He added, however, that things finally started moving this year to make Europe more independent, stronger and more resilient. Last year, 2025, was “lost” in that sense, since the EU leaders were looking into how to adapt to the second Trump presidency.
Letta reminded that in April EU leaders adopted the policy agreement “One Europe, one market”, consisting of 42 measures. Further integration of the EU countries will enable them to remain protected without losing their identities, just as was the case with the introduction of the Euro, he assessed.
“We are all small countries, so the only possibility for us is to integrate”, Letta said.
