Lithuania restored her independence, after half a century of Soviet occupation, in the immediate aftermath of the failed Moscow coup in August 1991. As the multi-national Soviet state disintegrated, Lithuania evolved, without war or violence, from a communist state and a command economy to a liberal democracy, a free market, and a society guaranteeing human and minority rights. Lithuania therefore offers a notable example of peaceful transition, all the more impressive in the light of the bloody conflict elsewhere in the former Soviet Union of Yugoslavia, where the aspirations to independence of the constituent republics were either violently resisted or dissolved into inter-ethnic violence. Equally remarkable has been Lithuania's determination to 'return to Europe' after half a century of separation, even at the price of submerging its recently restored sovereign rights in the supranational European Union. The cost of membership in western economic and security organizations are judged to be worth paying to prevent Lithuania's being drawn once again into a putative Russian sphere of influence. On the threshold of a new millennium therefore, Lithuania has made a pragmatic accommodation to the demands of becoming a modern European state, whilst vigorously resisting the dilution of her rich cultural and historical traditions. These twin themes of accommodation and resistance are Lithuania's historical legacy to the current generations of Lithuanians as they integrate into European institutions and continue the modernization process.

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How have women used global institutions and the networking possible through them to assure women's emergence on the world stage? How successful have women been at the United Nations and at international conferences over the years in their pressures for equality and for a full partnership with men? To what extent have women gained a foothold in the political arena internationally, and have they been able to exert their influence and to improve their situation? Expert participants and scholars give varying perspectives and insights about the history of women's worldwide efforts through governmental and nongovernmental organizations. They trace the role of the UN Commission on the Status of Women and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. They analyze the politics of the three world women's conferences in the 1970s and the 1980s, the evolution of institutions set up as catalysts to resolve key issues in developing countries, and the changing conditions for women in the UN Secretariat and specialized agencies. These unusual appraisals and a lengthy bibliography are for interdisciplinary audiences of women and men around the world--essential background to understanding the 1995 UN conference in Beijing.

This book is devoted to the analysis of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and its role in international and national policy making. On its 50th anniversary, the OECD enjoys widely acknowledged international standing. Despite this, it has so far remained a rarely researched and analyzed organization. Mechanisms of OECD Governance is thus a pioneering work: it fills a long-overdue gap in presenting a theoretically guided and empirically rich analysis of the OECD as a political actor, and explores its role in political processes through various case studies in a variety of policy fields. By conceptualizing the contributions to this volume around the concept of mechanisms of governance, the book explores how and to what extent the OECD provides international incentives for national policy making.
The volume collects a set of ten contributions on the OECD and its activities in core fields of its commitment as an 'economic organization', such as economic and labor market policy, tax issues, finance or financial crime, but also in complementary fields in which the organization is active today despite its original economic focus, such as education, biotechnology, health, family issues, and migration. The case studies presented in this volume are an interdisciplinary collection from different academic perspectives, including political science, international relations, law, and organization studies. Mechanisms of OECD Governance provides a current and wide-ranging analysis of this organization including its constraints and opportunities in policy making.

This book analyses Germany's role in the euro crisis. Based on the perception of Berlin as the emerging capital of the European Union, the author investigates three interrelated issues: Did the German policy approach of imposing austerity programs on countries in the middle of a deep recession contribute to the successful management of the euro crisis? Does Germany extend its sway over its European partners by forcing them to surrender to the German diktat of fiscal Disziplin and economic efficiency? Is the stubborn insistence on rigid fiscal adjustment another ominous sign of the Berlin Republic moving away from the country's traditional European vocation toward an imperial leadership role? The book's main argument is that Germany's role in and responses to the euro crisis can best be explained by different concepts of self, historical memory, and institutional practices.

This important sequel to Nordic Social Policy (Routledge 1999) compares welfare state development over the last twenty years in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden with that of Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and other Western European countries. Topics covered include:
* income distribution, health inequalities and gender equality
* gender policies, health and social care services and policy reaction to family changes
* social security and employment policies
* financing of welfare states.
In the context of globalisation, ageing populations, changing employment patterns and rising inequalities, Nordic Welfare States in the European Context offers an empirical analysis of welfare adaptations and a lively discussion of the historical development of European social policy. It finds a greater ambiguity regarding variation and trends than is commonly suggested. Contrary to expectation, there is little evidence of the Europeanisation of Nordic welfare states, rather the reverse. The comparable and empirical data used in this study make it a unique contribution to understanding current trends in European social policy.

This important sequel to Nordic Social Policy (Routledge 1999) compares welfare state development over the last twenty years in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden with that of Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and other Western European countries. Topics covered include:
* income distribution, health inequalities and gender equality
* gender policies, health and social care services and policy reaction to family changes
* social security and employment policies
* financing of welfare states.
In the context of globalisation, ageing populations, changing employment patterns and rising inequalities, Nordic Welfare States in the European Context offers an empirical analysis of welfare adaptations and a lively discussion of the historical development of European social policy. It finds a greater ambiguity regarding variation and trends than is commonly suggested. Contrary to expectation, there is little evidence of the Europeanisation of Nordic welfare states, rather the reverse. The comparable and empirical data used in this study make it a unique contribution to understanding current trends in European social policy.

This book examines the manner in which the EU affects employee relations systems in economically peripheral European countries, specifically Ireland and Hungary. It asks whether the EU offers peripheral countries the opportunity to modernize their industrial relations. Emer O'Hagan argues that the EU implements an unofficial development policy which it pressures states to adopt. These initiatives amount to the frequently referred to European Social Model (ESM), which, she argues, can cause difficulty for policy makers because it is ill-defined, vague and contradictory.

It is now widely accepted that transport is becoming increasingly unsustainable and that strong policy intervention is required to reduce both the growth in transport demand and the environmental costs of transport. This book challenges conventional approaches to transport by moving away from trend based analysis towards the use of scenarios to identify alternative sustainable transport futures. It both summaries the development of EU transport policy and presents a critique. The policy context is widened to include the global changes taking place in economics, society and technology. It develops new methodologies for policy making for the next 25 years.

The Eastern Enlargement of the EU identifies the major fiscal challenges facing Central European countries on the road to European Union accession. The Introduction and three other chapters are on broad macro-economic issues, and four sectoral' chapters follow these on such questions as the fiscal impact of pensions, health reform, taxation and agricultural policies. A comprehensive analysis of tax systems and of the major elements of public social expenditures (pensions and health care systems) is presented. This analysis helps to identify the key factors determining the present size of governments and the need for, and prospects of, fiscal adjustment. In addition, a comparison of fiscal policy is carried out, followed by a long-term fiscal projection until year 2010. The book is relevant to academics in macroeconomics, European studies and transition economics, as well as in public finance and public policy sciences. It should also appeal to a significant professional audience. Policy makers and economists interested in the accession process in EU countries - at ministries, National Banks, research departments of banks, international organizations (the EU Commission, World Bank, IMF, OECD) - will have a strong interest in this book.

Conflict resolution and peacekeeping are not only closely related conceptually, they were also "inventions" of the same historical period. Peacekeeping was first defined under the Hammarskjold Principles of 1956, while we can date the formal institutionalization of conflict resolution to the founding of the "Journal of Conflict Resolution" in 1957. However, it is in the 1990s that conflict resolution theorists turned to the perspectives of conflict theory in an effort to develop more effective practices of peacekeeping. This book is about the ways in which conflict resolution theory has become relevant to the various challenges faced by the United Nations peacekeeping forces as efforts are made to learn from the traumatic and devastating impact of the many civil wars that have erupted in the 1990s.

Contents:
1. Introduction: aims and objectives Karl Cordell
2. Contemporary government attitudes towards the European Union Teresa Los-Nowak
3. Polish perceptions of the European Union in the 1990s Elzbieta Stadtmüller
4. Emergent democratic citizenship in Poland: a study of changing value patterns Kazimierz Dziubka
5. Political competition in Poland: traditionalisation or westernisation? Andrzej Antoszewski
6. Parties and the Polish party system: the process of structuring the political space Ryszard Herbut
7. The marketing of political parties in the 1990s: a comparative study Robert Wiszniowski
8. The Europeanisation of government in Poland in the 1990s Andrzej W. Jablonski
9. The reform of Polish local government, and the Europe of the regions Wieslaw Bokajlo
10. Poland, die Vertriebenen, and the road to integration with the European Union Tadeusz Lebioda
11. The European Union and Ukrainian-Polish relations Andrzej Dybczynski
12. Conclusion Karl Cordell

The first examination of the importance of NATO's Mediterranean Initiative for the security and stability of the Euro-Mediterranean area, this book discusses the challenges, risks, and possible threats to NATO member states which may stem from the southern and eastern Mediterranean.

A fully documented text which addresses a key issue of EU decision-making which is surfacing again in proposed institutional reforms. It looks at the role of smaller states, deals with the important criteria of distribution and redistribution of EU budgetary expenditures in the key areas of agriculture and structural funds and explains how smaller states promote their interest more effectively than larger states. It focuses on the administrations of small states, their relations with the Commission and their negotiation tactics in the Council. This is the first attempt to empirically test Peter Katzenstein's thesis on the role of smaller states in international relations by making important recommendations on how the core assumptions of Katzenstein need to be modified, especially when applied to the EU context. This work is a good supplementary text book for courses on European studies, comparative politics and international relations. It is particularly suitable for advanced undergraduates and graduate students.

Legal theory has been much occupied with understanding legal systems and analysing the concept of legal system. This has usually been done on the tacit or explicit assumption that legal systems and states are co-terminous. But since the Rome Treaty there has grown up in Europe a `new legal order', neither national law nor international law, and under its sway older conceptions of state sovereignty have been rendered obsolete. At the same time, it has been doubted whether the `European Union' that has grown out of the original `European Communities' has a satisfactory constitution or any constitution at all. What kind of legal and political entity is this `Union' and how does it relate juridically and politically to its member states? Further, the activity of construing or constructing `legal system' and legal knowledge becomes visibly problematic in this context. These essays wrestle with the above problems.

This book investigates relations between Israel, the Palestinian territories and the European Union by considering them as interlinked entities, with relations between any two of the three parties affecting the other side. The contributors to this edited volume explore different aspects of Israeli-Palestinian-European Union interconnectedness.

Charting the evolution of Britain's leading role in the formation of NATO, the book provides a balanced assessment of British foreign and defence policies as the Cold War gathered momentum and a new system of European security was forged in the aftermath of World War II. The author argues that, despite the obvious differences between the periods, there are important lessons to be learned from post-war diplomacy by today's statesmen as they struggle to build another system of European security in the post-Cold War era. The book is based on a wide range of British, American and Canadian archives. Other published works by the author include "British Defence Policy in a Changing World", "Soviet Strategy" (with G. Segal), "Alternative Approaches to British Defence Policy", "Anglo-American Defence Relations 1939-84", "Contemporary Strategy Vols I and II" (with G. Segal, J. Garnett and P. Williams), "Nuclear War and Nuclear Peace" (with G. Segal, E. Moreton and L. Freedman), "Britain, NATO and Nuclear Weapons" (with K. Booth), "British Defence Policy: Striking the Right Balance", "Makers of Nuclear Strategy" (with J. Garnett) and "Dilemmas of World Politics" (with N. Rengger).

Explores how much and what the World Bank and the United Nations can really be expected to achieve. The text begins with a detailed account of the evolution of the two organizations as multilateral development institutions and then focuses on the functions that the World Bank and the UN carry out, and the governing structures that underlie their activities. The authors then go on to question what need there is for these two multilateral institutions in the next century and which tasks they can undertake in promoting world development. Both the United Nations (UN) and the World Bank have repeatedly proclaimed their solemn ambitions to improve the lot of humankind. Dinosaurs or Dynamos? explores how much, and what, they can really be expected to do. Both have extended their functions far beyond their original mandates, while their decision-making structures have remained basically unaltered despite recent adaptations on the part of the World Bank. Such expansions have created serious strains on both organizations. The UN has ambitions to perform tasks, such as the search for 'good governance' and 'sustainable development', for which it is ill equipped. The World Bank has taken on normative functions - 'the premier development institution' - that are incompatible with its traditional structures. The authors ask, what need is there for these two multilateral development institutions in the next century? Which tasks in promoting world development can they undertake that others cannot? To whom are these institutions politically accountable, who sets their agendas and are they credible given financial constraints? Dinosaurs or Dynamos? is an essential guide for those working within the international community, non-governmental organizations, governments and students of development, economics, politics and international relations.

Feminising the Market discusses the role of the European Community, in particular the Single European Market, and shows how it is having an important impact on women's working lives. As well as documenting women's employment throughout Europe, the book addresses issues of key importance for women in Europe. These include how the European Community has developed policies that positively benefit women, the way that women are influencing change at the European level, and the impact that this is having at the national level.

This volume looks at the process of enlargment which the European Union is currently undertaking, focusing on both the economic and political dimensions of the subject. The volume examines how enlargment has evolved and looks at the roles and relations of the different actors - member states, applicant states and EU institutions. With contributors coming from different disciplinary backgrounds, the volume offers an unusually rich array of perspectives on one of the most significant political developments of recent years.

This book offers an analytical overview of schools of thought on European integration which offer useful insights into EU social politics. Building on this framework, the chapters then examine in detail pre-Maastricht social policy and the 'social partners', the innovations of the Treaty itself, and where EU social policy stands at the end of the 1990s. Case studies of European Works Councils, parental leave, and atypical work, are included to highlight the day-to-day processes at work in social policy formation and the major interest groups and EU institutions involved. This is an up-to-date and accessible study which finds the social policy-making environment in the EU has become increasingly corporatist in the 1990s.

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This text contributes to the continuing debate surrounding the European Integration process. Drawing on a wealth of material, including the 1996 Intergovernmental Conference and budgetary negotiations, the contributors develop insights and theories about the nature of the integrative process. This collection brings together leading academics and practitioners in the field and should be useful to students, teachers, practitioners and anyone interested in the evolution of European unity.

What is the form of government of the European Union (EU)? And how is the institutional governance of the Eurozone evolving? These questions have become pressing during the last few years. On the one hand, the Euro-crisis and the legal and institutional responses to it have had major implications on the constitutional architecture of the EU and the Eurozone. On the other hand, the May 2014 elections for the European Parliament and the ensuing struggle to form the European Commission have brought to the fore new tensions in the EU political system. The purpose of this book, which brings together the contributions of EU lawyers, comparative constitutional lawyers and political scientists, from all over Europe and the United States, is to offer a new look at the form of government of the EU and the Eurozone and consider its potential for future development. While offering a plurality of perspectives on the form of government of the EU and the Eurozone, this book emphasises how the Euro-crisis represents a watershed in the process of European integration, makes the case for a more legitimate and effective form of government for the EU and the Eurozone, and identifies possible windows of opportunity for future treaty reforms. The volume will provide food for thought for scholars, policy-makers and the public at large as they continue debating the most apt form of government for the EU and the Eurozone.

This book is about law, but it is not a law book. It is aimed at all interested contemporaries, lawyers and non-lawyers alike. Richly seasoned with personal memories and anecdotes, it offers unique insights into how European courts actually work. It is generally assumed that independence is part and parcel of the role and function of a judge. Nevertheless, European judges sometimes face difficulties in this regard. Owing to their being nominated by a government, their limited term of appointment, and the possibility of being reappointed or not, their judicial independence can be jeopardized. Certain governments have a track record of choosing candidates who they believe they can keep on a leash. When this happens, private parties are at risk of losing out. The EFTA Court is under even more pressure, since the EEA/EFTA states Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway essentially constitute a pond with one big fish (Norway) and two minnows. For quite some time now, certain Norwegian protagonists have sought to effectively transform the EEA into a bilateral agreement with the EU. This attitude has led to political implications that have affected the author himself. The independence of the EFTA Court is also endangered by the fact that it operates alongside a large sister court, the Court of Justice of the European Union. And yet the EFTA Court has established its own line of jurisprudence and its own judicial style. It has remained faithful to specific EFTA values, such as the belief in free trade and open markets, efficiency, and a modern view of mankind. During the first 24 years of its existence, it has even had an over-proportionate influence on ECJ case law. Since EEA Single Market law is economic law, the importance of economics, an often-overlooked aspect, is also addressed. In closing, the book explores Switzerland's complicated relationship with, and Britain's impending departure from, the EU. In this regard, it argues that the EFTA pillar should be expanded into a second European structure under British leadership and with Swiss participation.

The Rio Summit has pointed to the urgency for the development of an international conservation policy, and the post-Maastricht debates in Europe have highlighted the need for the EU to reassess structural funding in nature conservation, as well as the influences on policy and practice. This text is a "route map" through the legislative and policy frameworks and explains how conservation works in Europe. It goes through the policies for nature conservation in the European Community and its constituent member states and sets out the mechanisms for delivering this policy. Practitioners in the fields of countryside, conservation and general land management should find this text a useful guide to the working of the EU, as well as helpful in appreciating their local role within the wider community objectives.