The CARDS programme, of Community Assistance for Reconstruction, Development and Stabilisation, is the EU's main instrument of financial assistance to the Western Balkans, covering specifically the countries of Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Kosovo and Albania.
The programme is the main financial instrument of EU's Stabilisation and Association process (SAp).
However, after an early focus on post-war and post-communist reconstruction much of the programme's attention has shifted to institution building projects.
Its specified objectives are: The responsibility for the programme has been transferred in 2005 from the External Relations to the Enlargement Directorate General.
It has a dual management system as the part of the programme covering Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia is operated by the Thessaloniki based European Agency for Reconstruction (EAR) while the rest of support follows a deconcentrated system as it is managed by the Commission's delegations to Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Albania.