(Transcript from World News Australia Radio)
We're talking about the European Union.
But the economic and political bloc has been scarred by years of financial crisis, as government indebtedness and unemployment grow despite massive public sector cutbacks and financial bailouts.
It's driving public discontent across the continent, and even talk of dissolution.
Yet, as Kristina Kukolja reports, in 2013 the E-U dared to embark on a new -- its seventh -- wave of enlargement.
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Midnight struck on July the 1st and to Beethoven's Ode to Joy, Croatia formally became the 28th member state of the European Union.
Almost a decade since embarking on the journey, the ex-Communist nation is the first new addition to the EU since Romania and Bulgaria joined six years ealier.
And while Slovenia entered the bloc in 2004, Croatia is the first of the recently war-torn old Yugoslav states to be welcomed into the European fold.
The honour -- on a warm summer evening in the capital Zagreb -- fell to the President of the European Council, Herman Van Rompuy.
"As midnight struck your country crossed an important threshold. It will change the life of this nation for good. You have always been Europeans, and you are now members of the European Union."
Croatia's President Ivo Josipovic used the occasion to remind that membership of the European Union has long been part of the young nation's vision for the future.
"Freedom includes equality of large and small, majority and minority, people and states that are mutually different, but respect one another and protect freedom of others. Freedom includes solidarity among people. For us, Europe is a community of peace and security. Our history was difficult, often tragic. We join Europe to ensure peace and stability for ourselves and forthcoming generations. The accession to the European Union has aroused new hopes among our people. It is up to us to turn these hopes to reality."
Those hopes are mainly centred around the potential for foreign investment in Croatia, and future employment prospects in the European area.
But various surveys of public attitudes to accession reveal some concern among Croats about how prepared their country's economy was to enter the EU, as well as the stability of the single currency community.
Unemployment and sovereign debt hit record levels in the eurozone this year, and although growth has been forecast for 2014, the rate has now been revised down.
There were signs that enthusiasm for the politics of togetherness was fading elsewhere, too.
After the recovery of its economy from a banking crisis in 2009, Iceland's government this year suspended membership talks with the EU and dissolved its negotiations team, announcing it would strengthen ties with the Union without becoming a member.
Unlike Georgia and Moldova, the former Soviet state Ukraine in November rejected a political and free-trade agreement with the EU, sparking massive anti-government demonstrations in the capital Kiev.
Thousands took to the streets in Portugal and Spain, too, but it was to protest against austerity measures, as it was in Greece, where leaders assured it would not become the first country to leave the eurozone.
The most recent state to receive a bailout, Cyprus, saw public outrage over its decision to enforced drastic public sector pay cuts, and the taxing of deposited funds in exchange for monetary intervention.
But it's in Britain that the political debate is heating up, with Prime Minister David Cameron vowing to target migration flows from poorer member states, and promising a referendum on EU membership.
Nigel Farage of the right-wing UK Independence Party is a leading advocate for withdrawal.
Addressing the European Parliament, where he's previously been fined for verbally attacking the EU president, Mr Farage took aim once again.
"And if we look at countries like Spain, where business bankruptcies are up 45 per cent year on year, we can see what your plan is to deal with the other bailouts as they come. I must say the message this sends out to investors is very loud and clear: get your money out of the eurozone before they come for you. What you've done in Cyprus is you've actually sounded the death knell of the euro. Nobody in the international community will have confidence in leaving their money there. And how ironic to see the Russian Prime Minister Dimitri Medvedev compare your actions and say I can only compare it to some of the decisions taken by the Soviet authorities. This European Union is the new Communism."
Nonetheless, the European Union leadership is determined that expansion should continue and it has its sights firmly fixed on eastern Europe.
In June the European Council approved opening accession talks with Serbia.
In his annual report, European Enlargement Commissioner Stefan Fule said the momentum of reforms there had been reinvigorated, citing progress in normalisation talks with Kosovo, also a potential candidate.
Relations with the breakaway region are one of the main determinants of Serbia's progress towards EU membership.
Speaking through an interpreter to the BBC, Serbia's Prime Minister Ivica Dacic said it's a matter that'll need time to resolve.
"We would like relations to be normalised. We'd like to reach a final solution and in all the talks we're conducting in Brussels we've always made it clear that we cannot and will not bring our problems with us into the European Union. this is also another reason why we're conducting this open dialogue, in order to normalise relations and solve our problems before accession. But this does not mean a change of policy when it comes to the question of recognising sovereignty, which is an answer we will leave for the future."
One issue the EU is keen to see resolved is the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia's naming dispute with neighbouring Greece, which also has a province sharing the same name.
Greece is blocking accession talks with the Macedonian republic until an outcome is achieved, and that's despite several recommendations from the European Commission that they begin.
Negotiations with Montenegro were opened in 2012, and Enlargement Commissioner Fule says more policy chapters now need to be opened.
But he has told Bosnia and Herzegovina its progress remains below expectations.
According to Commissioner Fule's annual report, Bosnia's relations with the EU are at a standstill and substantial efforts are needed to meet the conditions for credible membership.
Delaying the process are talks to implement a European Court of Human Rights ruling demanding constitutional changes that would allow members of all ethnic groups, not only the main three -- Bosniak, Croat, and Serb -- to stand for election in the country's tripartite presidency.
Martin Raguz, a Croatian politician in Bosnia, has told Al Jazeera seeing the Balkans moving closer to the EU would signal a new era for the divided country.
"Speaking in a positive sense, nothing would ever be the same. Inside Bosnia and Herzegovina a new culture of political dialogue and agreement would be created, as an advantage and not a weakness. Some want to present agreement as defeat, consideration of others as a weakness, dialogue as a poor mechanism. But dialogue, positive political compromise and taking the European path, they must win. It's an opportunity no-one should let pass them by."
It's expected that in the coming weeks European governments will decide whether to take up the European Commission's recommendation to grant Albania candidacy status.
According to the Enlargement Commissioner, several policy areas stand between Albania and accession talks -- among them are organised crime, corruption and human rights.
Albania's Prime Minister Edi Rama has told online news service Euronews his country will follow the lead of those who've gone before.
"It's very clear that they who got in, got in through a path of modernisation. So, we need to modernise. We need to modernise our institutions. We need to modernise our services. We need to modernise our ways of communicating, and we are ready to do it and we'll do it."
But perhaps the most unexpected of the EU's decisions in 2013 was to revive membership talks with Turkey after a three-year break.
Objections from some members states, such as Germany and France, have previously stalled progress, as has Turkey's position on Cyprus, the north of which it has occupied since the early 1970s.
More recently, Turkey's government has come under fire from the E-U over its violent response to public demonstrations in Istanbul, and human rights issues more broadly.
Some residents of the city wonder whether what could become the first majority Muslim country to join the E-U should, in fact, still be chasing the dream.
[Woman] "I believe that they are evolved enough to accept us to this union because it's actually not about religion. It's about having the unity and removing all the borders and having advantages for humankind."
[Man] "I support the idea of joining the EU. We don't need them economically, but for the development of democracy and human rights in Turkey."
[Woman] "I don't believe we need to join the EU. They are afraid the Turkish youths will go to Europe and increase their unemployment figures. We may be a danger for them, but if we make the best use of our younger generation, I believe we will be stronger and more successful."
