The spring of 2004 was momentous in the history of independent Slovakia. On May 1 of that year, the country joined the European Union. Coming as it did less than five weeks after Slovakia joined NATO, this marked the culmination of a long process that was highly uncertain in the 1990′s. A decade later, we can now reflect on what enabled Slovakia to join these European and trans-Atlantic structures, and how the subsequent integration has fared.

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