In March 2015, the EU launched a review process of the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP). In the interest of supporting this urgently needed review, the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung requested six position papers from experts in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine – the countries of the EU’s Eastern Partnership (EaP).The Perspective reveals the Eastern Partnership’s catch-22: The EU is regarded as a major – if not the sole – hope for bringing about sustainable democratic and economic change in EaP countries. However, there are considerable discrepancies between expectations about the EU’s role within the cooperation and its financial possibilities, as well as its willingness to commit.