Turkey's Accession to the European Union in terms of impact on the EU's security and defense policies: potential and drawbacks

This study explores the impact of Turkey's likely entry in the European Union (EU) in terms of the EU's foreign, security and defense policies. It reviews Turkish capabilities, namely its military capabilities, which could provide the EU with valuable defense assets. There are differences related to Turkey's relations with the EU, which have increasingly spilled over into the NATO, hindering the development of cooperation over crisis management operations. The article then delves in the implications of Turkey's strategic geographical location to EU policies. It reviews how far the EU and Turkey may have convergent interests in some of the neighboring regions, especially in the Middle East.

Central Europe in the Process of European Integration. A Comparative Study of the Strategies of the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia towards the Deepening and Widening of the European Union

Membership of the European Union U is usually seen as a strategic goal of the associated states of central and eastern Europe. At the beginning of the 1990s central European countries, where the economic and political transformation was relatively advanced, received preferential treatment from the European Community, which was starting to evolve a policy of differentiation. Podraza studied the strategies of four central European countries towards changes under way in the European Union, analysing several aspects for each case: (1) the process of political transformation (2) decision-making structures in the field of foreign policy and European integration (3) integration strategies: (a) main foreign policy priorities (b) application for membership of the European Union (c) the Commission option on each country (d) accession partnership, including a National Programme for the Adoption of the Acquis (NPAA) (e) regular Commission reports (f) accession negotiations

An Academic Medical Center's Expansion to the European Union: A Case Study of UPMC's Joint Projects in Italy and Ireland. Pittsburgh Papers on the European Union Vol. 3, June 2014

This case study examines the expansion of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) to Italy and Ireland in the European Union. The authors use international business theory to help understand why US Academic Medical Centers (AMCs) are beginning to go abroad and, through semistructured interviews with UPMC officials, they examine the market entry issues UPMC faced when expanding to Italy and Ireland. The authors also explain why UPMC’s first successful foreign ventures took place in the European Union. They conclude with comments on several of the strategic issues that AMCs should address if they wish to successfully expand overseas.

Modular framework to assess the risk of African swine fever virus entry into the European Union

BACKGROUND The recent occurrence and spread of African swine fever (ASF) in Eastern Europe is perceived as a serious risk for the pig industry in the European Union (EU). In order to estimate the potential risk of ASF virus (ASFV) entering the EU, several pathways of introduction were previously assessed separately. The present work aimed to integrate five of these assessments (legal imports of pigs, legal imports of products, illegal imports of products, fomites associated with transport and wild boar movements) into a modular tool that facilitates the visualization and comprehension of the relative risk of ASFV introduction into the EU by each analyzed pathway. RESULTS The framework's results indicate that 48% of EU countries are at relatively high risk (risk score 4 or 5 out of 5) for ASFV entry for at least one analyzed pathway. Four of these countries obtained the maximum risk score for one pathway: Bulgaria for legally imported products during the high risk period (HRP); Finland for wild boar; Slovenia and Sweden for legally imported pigs during the HRP. Distribution of risk considerably differed from one pathway to another; for some pathways, the risk was concentrated in a few countries (e.g., transport fomites), whereas other pathways incurred a high risk for 4 or 5 countries (legal pigs, illegal imports and wild boar). CONCLUSIONS The modular framework, developed to estimate the risk of ASFV entry into the EU, is available in a public domain, and is a transparent, easy-to-interpret tool that can be updated and adapted if required. The model's results determine the EU countries at higher risk for each ASFV introduction route, and provide a useful basis to develop a global coordinated program to improve ASFV prevention in the EU.

Evaluation system in the European Commission : DEVCO’S evaluation methodology

Mestrado em Economia e Políticas Públicas

How political parties, rather than member-states, are building the European Union

Political party formation and coalition building in the European Parliament is being a driving force for making governance of the highly pluralistic European Union relatively effective and consensual. In spite of successive enlargements and the very high number of electoral partiesobtaining representation in the European Union institutions, the number of effective European Political Groups in the European Parliament has decreased from the first direct election in 1979 to the fifth in 1999. The formal analysis of national party¹s voting power in different Europeanparty configurations can explain the incentives for national parties to join large European Political Groups instead of forming smaller nationalistic groupings. Empirical evidence shows increasing cohesion of European Political Groups and an increasing role of the European Parliament in EU inter-institutional decision making. As a consequence of this evolution, intergovernmentalism is being replaced with federalizing relations. The analysis can support positive expectations regarding the governability of the European Union after further enlargements provided that new member states have party systems fitting the European PoliticalGroups.

Investigations on the distribution of air transport traffic and CO2 emissions within the European Union

This study analyses the structure of air traffic and its distribution among the different countries in the European Union, as well as traffic with an origin or destination in non-EU countries. Data sources are Eurostat statistics and actual flight information from EUROCONTROL. Relevant variables such as the number of flights, passengers or cargo tonnes and production indicators (RPKs) are used together with fuel consumption and CO2 emissions data. The segmentation of air traffic in terms of distance permits an assessment of air transport competition with surface transport modes. The results show a clear concentration of traffic in the five larger countries (France, Germany, Italy, Spain and UK), in terms of RPKs. In terms of distance the segment between 500 and 1000 km in the EU, has more flights, passengers, RTKs and CO2 emissions than larger distances. On the environmental side, the distribution of CO2 emissions within the EU Member States is presented, together with fuel efficiency parameters. In general, a direct relationship between RPKs and CO2 emissions is observed for all countries and all distance bands. Consideration is given to the uptake of alternative fuels. Segmenting CO2 emissions per distance band and aircraft type reveals which flights contribute the most the overall EU CO2 emissions. Finally, projections for future CO2 emissions are estimated, according to three different air traffic growth and biofuel introduction scenarios.

Europe’s most wanted? Recalibrating Trust in the European Arrest Warrant System. CEPS Paper Liberty and Security in Europe 55/21 March 2013

This paper assesses the uses and misuses in the application of the European Arrest Warrant (EAW) system in the European Union. It examines the main quantitative results of this extradition system achieved between 2005 and 2011 on the basis of the existing statistical knowledge on its implementation at EU official levels. The EAW has been anchored in a high level of ‘mutual trust’ between the participating states’ criminal justice regimes and authorities. This reciprocal confidence, however, has been subject to an increasing number of challenges resulting from its practical application, presenting a dual conundrum: 1. Principle of proportionality: Who are the competent judicial authorities cooperating with each other and ensuring that there are sufficient impartial controls over the necessity and proportionality of the decisions on the issuing and execution of EAWs? 2. Principle of division of powers: How can criminal justice authorities be expected to handle different criminal judicial traditions in what is supposed to constitute a ‘serious’ or ‘minor’ crime in their respective legal settings and ‘who’ is ultimately to determine (divorced from political considerations) when is it duly justified to make the EAW system operational? It is argued that the next generation of the EU’s criminal justice cooperation and the EAW need to recognise and acknowledge that the mutual trust premise upon which the European system has been built so far is no longer viable without devising new EU policy stakeholders’ structures and evaluation mechanisms. These should allow for the recalibration of mutual trust and mistrust in EU justice systems in light of the experiences of the criminal justice actors and practitioners having a stake in putting the EAW into daily effect. Such a ‘bottom-up approach’ should be backed up with the best impartial and objective evaluation, an improved system of statistical collection and an independent qualitative assessment of its implementation. This should be placed as the central axis of a renewed EAW framework which should seek to better ensure the accountability, impartial (EU-led) scrutiny and transparency of member states’ application of the EAW in light of the general principles and fundamental rights constituting the foundations of the European system of criminal justice cooperation.

Independentism and the European Union. EPC Policy Brief, 7 May 2014

Independentism is a live issue in Europe today. In the European Union separatist parties have gained votes in Scotland, Catalonia, Flanders and elsewhere, and referendums are in prospect. In Eastern Europe Crimea’s referendum has led to an international crisis. Graham Avery, senior adviser to the EPC asks in this policy brief: What is the European Union's policy on independentism? Is the division of a member state into two states bad for the EU? And finally, how is the organisational structure of the EU relevant to independentism?

Europejska prespektywa Balkanow Zachodnich. Unia Europejska a Moldawia. Relacje Turcji z Unia Europejska. Prace OSW 13/2004 = European prospects of the Western Balkans. The European Union and Moldova. Relations between Turkey and the European Union. OSW Study 13/2004

The relations between Turkey and the European Union are special for several reasons. Of all candidates, Turkey has been aspiring to EU membership for the longest time. With 70 million citizens, it is the most populous candidate country, and if it were admitted to the EU, around the year 2020 would become the single most populous Member State. It would also be the only UE Member State inhabited almost exclusively by Muslims. Like Cyprus, it lies almost entirely in the Asian continent. Because of the scale of Turkey's internal problems, the country faces much more serious reservations concerning its accession than the remaining candidates. Turkey's membership application meets with the strongest opposition in the European Union. This paper aims to discuss the history of the complex relations between Turkey and the European Union, the main issues that impede Turkey's integration with the Community, including the country's internal problems in particular, and the transformations taking place in Turkey under the influence of Community policy.

Does the European Union create the foundations of an information society for all? Bruges European Economic Policy (BEEP) Briefing 11/2005

In order to increase the use of information and communication technologies (ICT) in the European Union Member States, the European Commission, on the initiative of Commissioner E. Liikannen, launched in December 1999 a bold programme called “eEurope”. Soon after its creation, the eEurope programme was integrated into the so- called Lisbon agenda for Europe to become the “most advanced knowledge based economy” in the world. We try to assess if the programme is successful in achieving its stated objective of promoting a knowledge based economy through the development of an “information society for all”. First, we conclude that eEurope, due to its origins and its procedures, has intrinsic limits both as regards its scope and effectiveness. Second, we show how Member States have adopted different trajectories towards the “knowledge based society”. To identify these heterogeneous paths of growth, we have selected a set of variables that, combined together, represent the institutional arrangements specific to a country or a group of countries. We found sharp differences between two advanced models that we label, respectively, as Scandinavian and Anglo-Saxon. Without asserting the superiority of a model, we propose policy orientations to help Europe overcome those gaps hindering the move towards knowledge economies where information society technologies are widely diffused.

Magyar alkalmazkodás az Európai Unió foglalkoztatás és szociálpolitikájához – tanulságok (The experiences from the Hungarian adaption to the common employment and social policy of the European Union)

A tanulmányban áttekintjük az európai foglalkoztatás- és szociálpolitika kialakulását és történetét, valamint a területen alkalmazott speciális koordinációs módszert. Ezt követően a csatlakozási tárgyalások elemzésével bemutatjuk a hazai politika helyzetét a csatlakozás időpontjában. Az elmúlt időszak foglalkoztatási adatai segítségével megvizsgáljuk a hazai és európai foglalkoztatás- és szociálpolitikai intézkedések hatásait. A cikk zárásaként a magyar EU-elnökség prioritásait és az aktuális közösségi terveket vesszük szemügyre. ______ The article gives a review on the history of the common employment and social policy in the European Union, with special attention to the coordination methods used in the field. The article also analyses the accession negotiations and the domestic policy situation at that time of Hungary's accession to the EU. With the data of recent years, the effects of the Hungarian and common EU measures are also examined. Finally, the priorities of the Hungarian Presidency of the European Council along with the current common policy plans are also demonstrated.

Pragmatic Aspects of Legal Translation in the European Institutions

This paper aims at identifying and describing the current major pragmatic issues of legal translation in the context of the EU. There some facts that provide legal translation in this context with unique features, such as the binding nature of EU law for the 28 Member States and the authenticated versions of the normative acts adopted by the EU institutions. These features have led to several authors talking about a new type of legal translation that should be approached and studied independently. We aim at identifying the reasons for this as well as describing the major translation strategies and theoretical approaches that the authors have proposed in order to help EU translators and lawyerlinguists overcome the translation problems arising from divergences of legal systems and legal traditions within the Member States.

Macroeconomic determinants of contingent protection:the case of the European Union

Contingent Protection has grown to become an important trade restricting device. In the European Union, protection instruments like antidumping are used extensively. This paper analyses whether macroeconomic pressures may contribute to explain the variations in the intensity of antidumping protectionism in the EU. The empirical analysis uses count data models, applying various specification tests to derive the most appropriate specification. Our results suggest that the filing activity is inversely related to the macroeconomic conditions. Moreover, they confirm existing evidence for the US suggesting that domestic macroeconomic pressures are a more important determinant of contingent protection policy than external pressures.