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Books > Social sciences > Politics & government > International relations > International institutions
An analysis of the 2009 European elections in each of the 27 member
states of the newly enlarged European Union, and assessment of the
European Parliament in 2004-2009. This book looks at the
implications of low turnout for the future of European Union
democracy and accountability.
Based on the research of the EU-6th framework funded research consortium on 'New Modes of Governance in the European Union', this volume explores the roots, execution and applications of new forms of governance and evaluates their success.
This book contributes fresh theoretical and empirical evidence on patterns of regional production structures, specialization, regional disparities, convergence and divergence processes and evaluation of cohesion policies in both current and future European Union (EU) member states in the context of increased integration. These subjects are addressed in both individual and cross-country analyses using innovative methodologies. The book is an essential reading for a large audience including researchers and policy makers working in the fields of economic integration, transition economics and regional development. The thirteen contributions brought together in this book are the result of recent research undertaken in the framework of a larger project initiated and coordinated by the Center for European Integration Studies (ZEI) of the University of Bonn on determinants of regional specialization, growth and convergence in the context of European integration. A number of these papers were presented to a conference on "European integration, regional convergence, location of industrial activity and labour market adjustment" initiated by the Center for European Integration Studies of the University of Bonn and organized jointly with the Center for European Studies of the University "Alexandru Ioan Cuza" of Iasi, Romania. We gratefully acknowledge the financial support from the European Commission Framework Programme and the Center for European Integration Studies of the University of Bonn.
Examining peacebuilding through the intersection of security, development and democracy, Castaneda explores how the European Union has employed civilian tools for supporting peacebuilding in conflict-affected countries by working at the same time with CSOs and government institutions.
The first line of responsibility for children lies with their
parents, but what if the parents fail to look after their children?
Who else is involved, and what should they do? Children in the
International Political Economy examines the moral responsibilities
of different individuals and agencies towards children and argues
that some responsibilities should be codified as concrete legal
duties. If all else fails, children must look to the international
community for help. Thus international agencies should recognize
specific obligations to look after the well-being of children
around the world.
In May 2004, after bringing their legislation into accordance with EU regulations, ten more countries joined the European Union. The contributors to this volume assess the impact of this historical development on gender relations in the new and old EU member states. Instead of focusing on either western or eastern Europe, this book investigates the similarities and differences in diverse parts of Europe. Although initially limited, gender equality was part of the original framework of the European Union, an organization often more open than national governments to feminist demands, as this volume illustrates with case studies from eastern and western Europe. The enlargement process thus provides some important policy instruments for increasing equality between men and women.
Focusing upon the rich interplay between ongoing institutional and technological changes, the dynamics of national industrial systems and the modifications in policy instruments of the new economic framework of the common market and the single currency, European Economies in Transition addresses key issues for growth and convergence. A set of methodologies highlighting the structural aspects and discontinuities in such dynamics reveals new features of transition processes experienced by some of the most advanced Western economies.
Regional Intergovernmental Organizations (REIGOs) have increased in number and importance since World War II and have assumed critical roles in both the economic and the political realms. Indeed, it is difficult--if not impossible--to discuss current economic issues without referring to the European Economic Community or the North American Free Trade Area. Similiarly, political REIGOs, such as NATO, the European Council, and the Organization of American States, are aggressively working to maintain peace and stability on a global scale. In the present volume, sociologist James Hawdon offers a novel approach to understanding the proliferation of these relatively new but increasingly important actors on the world stage.
What do citizens say about Europe? Before the crisis of 2008 citizens in Britain, France and Francophone Belgium were 'overlooking' Europe by ignoring it in favour of globalisation, economic flows, and crises of political corruption. Innovative focus group methods allow analysis of the nature of their reactions and positions, and demonstrate how euroscepticism is a red herring. Instead they articulate indifference to and ambivalence about Europe contrasting with activists who engage in conflict about European issues. The analysis shows national and social differences. French projection contrasts with British exteriorisation and Belgian incorporation. The social gap is not a matter of deficits: workers have real arguments about issues close to home while managers show more concern about European politics.This book is part of the qualitative turn in European studies and both complements and challenges established knowledge on European attitudes.
What major long-term factors will shape the European Community post-1992? Who are the central actors, how will they exert influence on Europe's future, and what are their expectations and intentions?In seeking to answer these questions, The European Challenges Post-1992 offers a multidisciplinary, qualitative approach, throwing new light on the aspirations and preoccupations aroused by the promise of the Community. Centring on socio-political and cultural concerns and their interplay with economic phenomena, this important book combines expert opinion from 12 large European research institutes - each of which provides an analysis of the major factors shaping the future of their own country - with the views of leading industrialists and business leaders. The editors bring together these different views and interpretations to offer a comprehensive assessment of the Community's future. The European Challenge Post-1992 includes contributions by the former Commissaire du Plan (Brussels), the Institute of International Economics and Management (Copenhagen), Commissariat General du Plan (Paris), Kiel Institute of World Economics (Kiel), Foundation of Economic and Industrial Research (Athens), Economic and Social Research Institute (Dublin), Centro Studi Investimenti Sociali (Rome), Institut Universitaire International (Luxembourg), Scientific Council for Government Policy (The Hague), Instituto de Prospectiva (Lisbon), Fundacion Empresa Publica (Madrid), McKinsey & Co. and the Policy Studies Institute (London). The product of a major research project, this distinguished book is an invaluable reference point for all those concerned with the future of the European Community.
Cognisant of the ongoing pandemic and political turmoil across Europe, this timely book examines the growing influence of populist movements in Central and Eastern Europe. Simona Kukovic and Petr Just bring together contributions from experts working in the fields of political science and sociology to study the roots and ramifications of populism in this historically turbulent region. Developing a critical analysis of both left- and right-wing populist movements and notorious populist leaders throughout Central and Eastern Europe, the book explores the ways in which populism has spread through developed and developing countries in both established and more recent democracies. Chapters investigate the origins of nationalist populism in the region, from historical trauma and social and economic instability to the emerging crisis facing traditional parties and institutions. It further considers the progressive impact of social media as a means through which populist leaders can penetrate the political space. Positioning itself in defence of liberal democracy, the book ultimately seeks to uncover what unites and inspires the populist community emerging across Central and Eastern Europe. Contributing to the urgent scholarly debate surrounding the rise of populist leaders, political parties, and movements throughout Central and Eastern Europe, this incisive volume will be an essential read for researchers and academics invested in better understanding why the region is such a hotbed of European populism.
In this significant intervention into the academic and institutional debate on European cultural identity, Monica Sassatelli examines the identity-building intentions and effects of the European Capital of Culture program, and also looks at the work of the Council of Europe and the recent European Landscape Convention.
This book explores one of the central challenges facing the EU today how to reconcile enlargement with the pursuit of a stronger and more effective European Union. While the relationship between widening and deepening has been recognized for years as one of the big questions in the field of European integration, existing theoretical and empirical analyses of this relationship suffer from a variety of shortcomings. This book brings together a group of EU scholars who significantly advance our understanding of the relationship between widening and deepening. The contributors challenge a variety of common wisdoms concerning the relationship between widening and deepening and offer nuanced theoretical and empirical analysis of the relationship between these two vital dimensions of European integration. Collectively, the contributors to this volume offer the most comprehensive picture available to date of the multi-faceted relationship between widening and deepening. This book was published as a special issue of the Journal of European Public Policy."
Selected by Princeton University as Noteworthy Book in Industrial Relations and Labor Economics for 2010. Are immigrants from the new EU member states a threat to the Western welfare state? Do they take jobs away from the natives? And will the source countries suffer from severe brain drain or demographic instability? In a timely and unprecedented contribution, this book integrates what is known about post-enlargement migration and its effects on EU labor markets. Based on rigorous analysis and hard data, it makes a convincing case that there is no evidence that the post-enlargement labor migrants would on aggregate displace native workers or lower their wages, or that they would be more dependent on welfare. While brain drain may be a concern in the source countries, the anticipated brain circulation between EU member states may in fact help to solve their demographic and economic problems, and improve the allocative efficiency in the EU. The lesson is clear: free migration is a solution rather than a foe for labor market woes and cash-strapped social security systems in the EU.
A sophisticated theoretical framework and up-to-date analysis of the Europeanisation of domestic party systems and political parties' policy stances. This book covers a range of contemporary topics: party systems, policy stances of political parties, opposition/co-operation over European integration, cleavage theory of party response to European integration, domestic depoliticisation and EU representation. It presents a sophisticated political analysis of Europe, and an exceptional amount of factual information about European countries and parties.
This, the first volume of a major work, describes the establishment of the United Nations, the controversies and debates within the organization and the political factors surrounding these during the first ten years of its life.
The European Commission is very much at the heart of the European Union. Its wide variety of roles make it the institution most readily identified with the Union's many different activities. Surprisingly, relatively little has been written about this vital European institution. This book makes a major contribution to furthering understanding of the Commission. A broad range of different perspectives based on new research cover all aspects of its nature and functioning.
European Consumer Policy after Maastricht raises both `horizontal' and `vertical' issues of consumer policy in the European Community and associated countries. The work was prompted by three important `constitutional' events in Europe: the completion of the Internal Market on 31 December 1992, the adoption of the Maastricht Treaty on Political Union, and the conclusion of the Agreement on the European Economic Area (EEA). The `horizontal' papers in Part I are concerned both with analyzing the `acquis' of consumer policy in Europe and with new directions as well as obstacles. The keynote paper by Micklitz and Weatherill gives an overall analysis of the political and legal bases of consumer policy from both the Internal Market and the Political Union perspectives. It is followed by two papers on subsidiarity by Gibson and Dahl which take up and clarify a somewhat confusing and irritating discussion in the EC. Lothar Maier is concerned with the function and role of the Consumer's Consultative Council in the EC of which he is the President; Monique Goyens with the opportunities and especially the shortcomings of consumer interest lobbying in the EC by her association, BEUC. The papers by Schmitz, Micklitz, Wilhelmsson and Kramer raise controversial and still unresolved policy and legal issues which go beyond traditional consumer policy via directives, e.g. in commercial marketing, cross-border litigation, contract law matters and conflicts between consumer and conflicts between consumer and environmental policy. Part II is concerned with national perspectives. The individual country reports relate to the EC and EEA countries and to Switzerland. They document the diverse -- sometimes protective, sometimes disturbing -- impact of EC lawmaking on national legislation, court practice and enforcement. They demonstrate that law harmonization is a painstaking process towards the goal of creating a European legal area with common protective standards.
The Europa Directory of International Organizations 2014 serves as an unequalled one-volume guide to the contemporary international system. Within a clear, unique framework the recent activities of all major international organizations are described in detail. Given alongside extensive background information the reader is able to assess the role and evolving functions of these organizations in today's world. The contact details, key personnel and activities of more than 2,000 international and regional entities have again been thoroughly researched and updated for this 16th edition. Highlights in this edition include: - a fully revised Who's Who section with biographical details of the key players in the international system. - the response of the international community to crises and conflicts throughout the world. - efforts to draft a post-2015 sustainable development agenda. - introductory essays, written and updated by experts in their field, which consider topics including global environmental governance, the international criminal justice system, international humanitarian co-operation, and governance of the global economy.
This book examines the role of the European Court of Justice in the regulation of the internal market from a competence perspective. However, rather than focusing on the Court's role in enforcing the limits of EU competence in the EU's political decision making, it explores a related, albeit understudied, question: to what extent does the Court observe the constitutional limits of EU competence and its own institutional powers in the interpretation of EU internal market law laid down in the Treaties? The book provides an answer to this question through the analysis of EU free movement case law in light of the constitutional principles that govern the allocation of competences and powers in the EU: conferral, subsidiarity and proportionality, on the vertical level, and institutional balance, on the horizontal level. Why should the Court be bound by these principles? What do they mean when applied to judicial practice? To what extent are they observed in the free movement case law? The book argues that the Court's observance of the four principles has been inconsistent, thereby creating substantive and constitutional tensions in the EU's relationship with the Member States and upsetting the institutional balance of powers between the EU legislature and judiciary.
The term 'structural adjustment' has been associated with rioting as angry and hungry masses protest food price increases due to subsidy cuts or due to other structural adjustment conditions prescribed by the IMF and the World Bank. Structural adjustment, and the neo-liberal paradigm that underlies it, is now the dominant economics paradigm practised by developing countries. The main purpose of the book is to rely on evidence and to go beyond rhetoric, ideology and anecdotes in assessing structural adjustment in Pakistan and the developing world more generally to examine how reform can be combined with pragmatism and social justice.
This is a practical guide to the legal aspects of the Community Trade Mark, which is an intellectual property right created by an European Council Regulation of December 1993, and which entered into force on 1 April 1996. The main attraction of the Community Trade Mark is that it enables an applicant to obtain and maintain, with only one registration, trade mark protection throughout the 15 Member States of the European Union (rather than having to obtain and maintain the registration of essentially the same trade mark in each of those countries). In other words, the Community Trade Mark offers one-stop-shopping; the proprietor of a Community Trade Mark is able to enjoy exclusive rights of use at a significantly reduced cost in order to enjoy comparable rights simultaneously throughout the European Union pursuant to the traditional country-by-country or international registration systems. The Community Trade Mark system is administered by the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (Trade Marks and Designs) (OHIM), which is an agency of the European Union. The Community Trade Mark system has been surprisingly successful since its inception.
Why, despite their similar goals, do the policy preferences of the
European Union and United States diverge on so many multilateral
issues? To answer that question, "Allies at Odds" thoroughly
examines recent international efforts in arms control,
environmental protection, human rights, and military cooperation.
Evidence from twenty separate cases supports the expectations of
the realist approach to international politics, which focuses on
the role of power above all. Neither cultural factors nor
international institutions have as much influence as some expect.
This finding was as true during the Clinton Presidency as during
the current Bush administration, indicating that focusing on
personalities overlooks more substantial and longer-lasting
differences between the Atlantic allies.
The book discusses five examples of NGO action in four countries -
Indonesia, Philippines, South Africa and Sri Lanka - with
authoritarian regimes. It poses the question of whose interest was
served by these activities, the beneficiary group or the NGOs and
argues that where these coincided, identifiable benefits accrued to
beneficiary groups. This underlines the importance of ensuring that
NGOs are accountable to the communities with which they seek to
work.
Stephen Martin* The fourteen essays that constitute this work provide a coherent review of the past and present of the European Community, and consider some of its possible futures. Werner Abelshauser and Richard Griffiths offer separate perspectives on the precursors of the European Community. Abelshauser argues that comparison of the fates of the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Defense Community demonstrate the dominance of political over economic considerations in the integration process. Griffiths considers the stillborn European Political Community, many of the proposed features of which, somewhat transformed, were embodied in the Treaty of Rome. Both suggest that as a practical matter a coming together of French and German interests has been a precondition for advances in European integration. Stephen Martin and Andrew Evans discuss the development of the Com munity's Structural Funds, first envisaged as tools to smooth the transition from a collection of regional economies to a continent-wide single market, now increasingly seen as devices to guide adjustment to long-term struc tural problems. Stuart Holland emphasizes the role of the Structural Funds as one element in a broad range of strategies to ensure social and economic cohesion as the Maastrict Treaty ushers the European Union into the next stage of its development." |
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