The Putin doctrine: The formation of a conceptual framework for Russian dominance in the post-Soviet area. OSW Commentary No. 131, 28.03.2014

The statements made in recent weeks by Russian officials, and especially President Vladimir Putin, in connection with Moscow’s policy towards Ukraine, may suggest that the emergence of a certain doctrine of Russian foreign and security policy is at hand, especially in relation to the post-Soviet area. Most of the arguments at the core of this doctrine are not new, but recently they have been formulated more openly and in more radical terms. Those arguments concern the role of Russia as the defender of Russian-speaking communities abroad and the guarantor of their rights, as well as specifically understood good neighbourly relations (meaning in fact limited sovereignty) as a precondition that must be met in order for Moscow to recognise the independence and territorial integrity of post-Soviet states. However, the new doctrine also includes arguments which have not been raised before, or have hitherto only been formulated on rare occasions, and which may indicate the future evolution of Russia’s policy. Specifically, this refers to Russia’s use of extralegal categories, such as national interest, truth and justice, to justify its policy, and its recognition of military force as a legitimate instrument to defend its compatriots abroad. This doctrine is effectively an outline of the conceptual foundation for Russian dominance in the post-Soviet area. It offers a justification for the efforts to restore the unity of the ‘Russian nation’ (or more broadly, the Russian-speaking community), within a bloc pursuing close integration (the Eurasian Economic Union), or even within a single state encompassing at least parts of that area. As such, it poses a challenge for the West, which Moscow sees as the main opponent of Russia’s plans to build a new order in Europe (Eurasia) that would undermine the post-Cold War order.

The EU essential facilities doctrine. Research Papers in Law, 6/2006

Introduction. The essential facilities doctrine may be seen as the ‘extra weight’ which is put onto the balance, in order to give precedence to the maintenance of competition over the complete contractual freedom of undertakings controlling an important and unique facility. The main purpose of the doctrine is to impose upon such ‘dominant’ undertakings the duty to negotiate and/or give access to the facility, against a reasonable fee, to other undertakings, which cannot pursue their own activity (and therefore will perish) without access to such a facility. This very simple description of the content of the doctrine underlines its limitations: through the imposition of a duty to negotiate or contractual obligations, the rule tends to compensate for the weaknesses of the competitive structure of a market, which are due to the existence of some essential facility. In other words, the doctrine does not by itself provide a definitive solution to the lack of competition, but tends to contractually maintain or even create some competition.1 The doctrine of essential facilities originates in the US antitrust case law of the Circuit and District Courts, but has never been officially acknowledged by the Supreme Court. It has been further developed and hotly debated by scholars in the US, both from a legal and from an economic viewpoint. In the EU, the essential facilities doctrine was openly introduced by the Commission during the early 1990s, but has received only limited and indirect support by the Court of First Instance (the CFI) and the European Court of Justice (the ECJ). It also indirectly inspired the legislation concerning the deregulation of traditional ‘natural’ monopolies. The judicial origin of the doctrine, combined with the hesitant application by the appeal courts, both in the US and the EU, cast uncertainty not only on the precise scope of the doctrine, but also on the issue of its very existence. These questions receive a particular light within the EU context, where the doctrine is called upon to play a different role from its US counterpart. In order to address the above issues, we will first pretend that an EU essential facility doctrine does indeed exist and we shall try to identify the scope and content thereof, through its main applications (Section 1). Subsequently, we will try to answer the question whether such a doctrine should exist at all in the EU (Section 2).

The devil is in the details. Information warfare in the light of Russia's military doctrine. OSW Point of View 50, May 2015

By highlighting informational threats and giving them a military dimension, the authors of the Russian Federation's military doctrine have outlined the concept of information warfare. It is a kind of combat conducted by both conventional and indirect methods, open and concealed, using military and civilian structures. It has two dimensions: broader ("non-nuclear containment", i.e. combat waged on various levels - political, economic, diplomatic, humanitarian, military) and narrower (as an element supporting of action). An analysis of these issues enables us to identify several rising trends over the period 2000-2014 in Russian security policy. These boil down to a blurring of the boundaries between internal and external threats, introducing non-military methods and organisational structures to armed combat, and conferring an ideological character on this combat. This leads to a blurring of the contours of inter-state conflicts, which allows Russia to take part in armed conflicts in which it is not officially a party.

The new bail-in doctrine: A recipe for banking crises and depression in the eurozone. CEPS Commentary

This Commentary argues that the failure to recognise shared responsibility for the banking crisis in Cyprus has led to the imposition of a bail-in template that increases the risk of banking crises and economic depression in the eurozone.

Discretion and Accountability: The ESMA Judgment and the Meroni Doctrine. Bruges European Economic Research (BEER) Papers 30/2014

This paper assesses the effectiveness of the Meroni doctrine in the light of the recent judgment in the ESMA case. The first part explains in detail the problem of delegation of powers in the EU from the perspective of the principal-agent theory and complements it with the analysis of the trade-off between different levels of independence and accountability of agencies. A simple economic model is developed to illustrated the relationship between the independence and accountability of an agency. It shows that it is the accountability mechanism that induces the agent to act, rather than the extent of his independence. The paper also explains the inter-temporal interactions between the principal and the agent on the basis of the incentives in place for the different players. The second part is devoted to analysis of the functioning of ESMA in the context of its delegated powers. After the presentation of main aspects of the regulatory framework establishing ESMA, the paper continuous with an analysis and interpretation of the discretionary powers of ESMA. The rather rigid position of the Court of Justice in relation to the Meroni doctrine seems to be unsuitable to delegation of complex regulatory tasks. This is particularly evident in the case of financial markets. Finally, the judgment does not examine in any detail whether and how the principals - i.e. the EU and Member States - are best able to evaluate the quality of ESMA decisions and regulations and whether there are different but more effective accountability mechanisms.