Joining a society of some kind requires the fulfillment of certain standards. In international society, states acknowledge the need for certain collective standards of international conduct if international order is to be maintained. The first truly global application of international norms took place during the nineteenth century through the process of the expansion of the European society of states and its gradual transformation to the contemporary global international society. In this process, the standard of ‘civilization’ played an essential role in determining which states would join the expanding European society and which ones would not. Despite the major changes that have occurred, the standard of ‘civilization’ has remained an international practice as well as a benchmark against which the attitudes and policies of states are assessed. Nowhere can this be seen more clearly than in the EU policy of ‘membership conditionality’. Although many explanations for EU expansion have been put forward rath...