This article examines the economic aspects of European Union (EU) policy toward its eastern neighbors in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).  This region was long considered less important for the EU in comparison with Central and Eastern Europe, which was the subject of far-reaching economic and political integration during the two EU eastern enlargements (2004, 2007).  However, moving the EU's geographical frontier further to the east and southeast increased the importance of the CIS region as a potential partner of the enlarged EU.  In 2004, Eastern European and Caucasus countries were invited to participate in the European Neighborhood Policy (ENP), a new EU external framework that also addressed the southern Mediterranean countries.  Russia has been attempting to build a strategic political and economic partnership with the EU outside the ENP framework but the content of this relationship is, in fact, very similar to the ENP.

A general weakness of the ENP is that there is a lack of balance between far-reaching expectations with respect to neighbors' policies and reforms, and limited and distant rewards that can potentially be offered.  Thus, making this cooperation framework more effective requires a serious enhancement of the rewards using, to the extent possible, the positive experience of previous EU enlargements.  The nature of contemporary economic relations in the globalized world calls for taking a more complex package-type approach to economic integration rather than limiting cooperation to some narrow fields.