THE EUROPEAN UNION'S EXPERIENCE AS A CRUCIAL FOUNDATION FOR CENTRAL ASIAN INTEGRATION

Аннотация

When studying the phenomenon of integration, it is necessary to rely on the foundations of state and public life, the system of international relations, and general political patterns. Political integration is an objective process that allows participating entities to achieve mutually beneficial results at low costs. But integration requires careful preparation from the entities, as well as the desire and ability to manage them. With the emergence and establishment of new integration political processes, old procedures and institutional difficulties are eliminated. The article scientifically analyzes the issues of studying and effectively using the experience of theEuropean Union in Central Asian integration at thisstage ofhistorical development. Keywords: European Union, Central Asia, integration, political processes, social reforms, intergovernmental cooperation, publicdiplomacy. Today, the modern system of international relations is evolving in terms of quality, becoming enriched with new laws and factors. One of these is related to the formation and development of political integration models. Across different corners of our planet, various intergovernmental organizations and alliances are emerging. Although the trends in the formation and development oftheseunions may vary, common integrational principles are still evident. Although integration processes are taking place in almost all regions of the world in one form or another, efforts to deepen and activate these integration processes face certain challenges and lead to very limited results. In this context, the European integration experience that led to the creationof theEuropean Union can beconsidered a uniqueexperiment forus. It is well known that throughout history, economic processes have always developed in close connection with political factors. Therefore, alongside entering into financial and economic cooperation, the issue of forming a political union has been a pressing concern for the ideologists andpoliticians ofEuropean integration. The idea of cooperation among European countries and uniting into a single socio-political system emerged long before the signing of the Rome Treaties. In the early 20th century, serious discussions were held about the creation of the United States of Europe (USE). One of the founders of the Pan-European movement, Austrian C. Kalergi, proposed the idea of the USE in 1923. This initiative and idea were based on historical experiences such as the formation of the Swiss Confederation in 1848, the creation of the German Empire in 1871, and the independence gained by the United States in 1776.[1] Shortly after, on September 5, 1929, French Foreign Minister A. Briand delivered his famous speech at the League of Nations Assembly in Geneva. With the support of his German counterpart G. Stresemann, he proposed the establishment of a European Union under the auspices of the League of Nations. Although the spread of fascism in Europe and the outbreak of World War II hindered the implementation of this idea, it was not 115 Volume 4, issue 4, 2025 entirely abandoned. In 1941,exiled onthe island ofVentotene, A. Spinelliand E. Rossi managed to prepare and distribute the Federalism Manifesto. They called for the creation of a European Federation, where, in order to prevent international anarchy and preserve freedom in Europe, the sovereign rights of participating states would be partially transferred to the federal level, taking intoaccount theinterests of all peoples ofthe region.[2] After World War II, Europe was effectively divided into two blocs: Western Europe, politically inclined towards the United States, and Eastern Europe, which became part of thesocialist camp. Germany was also divided. The Second World War, in turn, was replaced by the Cold War, a political and ideological conflict between socialism and capitalism, which was dominated by the SovietUnion andthe United States, respectively. In such a situation, the desire for political integration in Western Europe grew stronger. The integration process after the war developed based on the principle of "Atlantic unity." Its main directions were: firstly, this unity trend was shaped based on the ideological slogan "never again." During the first half of the 20th century, Europe became the theater ofmilitary operations intwo world wars, which severely damaged the economic and political potential of individual countries and the entire region. The peoples and societies of Europe were exhausted by the wars and no longer wished for the region to serve as a battlefield. In this process, the idea of "fatigue" (exhaustion from war) becamedominant; secondly, with the emergence of two superpowers on the world stage — the USA and the USSR — European countries realized that their geo-economic and geo-political potential was steadily diminishing. This weakness further intensified Europe's economic and political fragmentation, andcontemporary researchers of thetimecompared this