Influence of Religious Institutions in the Creation and Implementation of Public Policy: The Case of Roman Catholic Argentina and Secular Uruguay

The strong presence of religious institutions in Latin America, especially the Roman Catholic Church, and their participation in the creation and implementation of public policy within a sovereign state can be counter-productive for the social development and progress of that specific country. Argentina and Uruguay and the social controversy of social issues of abortion and same-sex marriage are used as examples to establish the accuracy of the above statement. Historical, statistical, and legislative information about both topics in both countries show that the political power that the Roman Catholic Church has in the region is more an outdated influence than a reality, and the principle of secularization appears to be the most stabilizing philosophy for modern nations.

Seeding a Profession: The Intersection of the State, International Interests, and the Early Development of Brazilian Nursing

State and international entities can have profound effects on the development of a country’s nursing profession. Through a global health governance lens, this paper explores the development of nursing in Brazil during the early twentieth century, and its intersections with national and international interests. Accordingly, we will show how state policies established an environment that fostered the institutionalization of nursing as a profession in Brazil and supported it as a means to increase the presence of females in nation building processes. The State focused on recruiting elite women for nursing, in part due to the Rockefeller Foundation’s involvement in the country. Nurses who worked for Rockefeller came from well-educated classes within US society with specific ideas about who should be a nurse and the roles of nurses in a healthcare system. These women served as the primary vehicles for interacting with Brazilian health authorities responsible for health system development. Their early efforts did not, however, ensure a system capable of producing nursing human resources at a rate that, in present day Brazil, could meet the health needs of the country. Findings from this paper offer new avenues for historians to explore the early roots of professional nursing through a global health governance lens, improve the understanding of the intersection between international politics and professionalization, and highlight how these factors may impact nursing human resources production in the long term.

Mali: Another European Intervention without the EU? Security Policy Brief No. 42, January 2013

As French forces are engaged in combat operations in Mali, even belated EU involvement remains crucial, to ensure that the intervention fits in with the political end-state that the EU rightly pursues.

A realistic bridge towards European banking union. Bruegel Policy Contribution 2013/09, June 2013

New obstacles to the European banking union have emerged over the last year, but a successful transition remains both necessary and possible. The key next step will be in the second half of 2014, when the European Central Bank (ECB) will gain supervisory authority over most of Europe’s banking system. This needs to be preceded by a rigorous balance sheet assessment that is likely to trigger significant bank restructuring, for which preparation has barely started. It will be much more significant than current discussions about a bank resolution directive and bank recapitalisation by the European Stability Mechanism (ESM). The 2014 handover, and a subsequent change in the European treaties that will establish the robust legal basis needed for a sustainable banking union, together define the policy sequence as a bridge that can allow Europe to cross the choppy waters that separate it from a steady-state banking policy framework.

Assessing Needs of Care in European Nations. ENEPRI Policy Brief No. 14, 28 December 2012

This Policy Brief presents the research questions, main results and policy implications and recommendations of the seven Work Packages that formed the basis of the ANCIEN research project, financed under the 7th EU Research Framework Programme of the European Commission. Carried out over a 44-month period and involving 20 partners from EU member states, the project principally concerns the future of long-term care (LTC) for the elderly in Europe and addresses two questions in particular: How will need, demand, supply and use of LTC develop? How do different systems of LTC perform?

Accords d’association = Association Agreements [to develop relations with a third state]. Research Papers in Law, 1/2004

No abstract.

The European Central Bank in the age of banking union. Bruegel Policy Contribution 2013/13, 1 October 2013

During the crisis the European Central Bank’s roles have been greatly extended beyond its price stability mandate. In addition to the primary objective of price stability and the secondary objective of supporting EU economic policies, we identify ten new tasks related to monetary policy and financial stability. We argue that there are three main constraints on monetary policy: fiscal dominance, financial repercussions and regional divergences. By assessing the ECB’s tasks in light of these constraints, we highlight a number of synergies between these tasks and the ECB’s primary mandate of price stability. But we highlight major conflicts of interest related to the ECB’s participation in financial assistance programmes. We also underline that the ECB’s government bond purchasing programmes have introduced the concept of ‘monetary policy under conditionality’, which involves major dilemmas. A solution would be a major change towards a US-style system, in which state public debts are small, there are no federal bail-outs for states, the central bank does not purchase state debt and banks do not hold state debt. Such a change is unrealistic in the foreseeable future.

The Criminalisation of Migration in Europe: A State-of-the-Art of the Academic Literature and Research. CEPS Liberty and Security in Europe No. 61, October 2013

In the last 30 years, a clear trend has come to define modern immigration law and policy. A set of seemingly disparate developments concerning the constant reinforcement of border controls, tightening of conditions of entry, expanding capacities for detention and deportation and the proliferation of criminal sanctions for migration offences, accompanied by an anxiety on the part of the press, public and political establishment regarding migrant criminality can now be seen to form a definitive shift in the European Union towards the so-called ‘criminalisation of migration’. This paper aims to provide an overview of the ‘state-of-the-art’ in the academic literature and EU research on criminalisation of migration in Europe. It analyses three key manifestations of the so-called ‘crimmigration’ trend: discursive criminalisation; the use of criminal law for migration management; and immigrant detention, focusing both on developments in domestic legislation of EU member states but also the increasing conflation of mobility, crime and security which has accompanied EU integration. By identifying the trends, synergies and gaps in the scholarly approaches dealing with the criminalisation of migration, the paper seeks to provide a framework for on-going research under Work Package 8 of the FIDUCIA project.

The Asset Quality Review and Capital Needs: Why re-capitalise banks with public money? CEPS Policy Brief No. 311, 19 December 2013

It is generally assumed that any capital needs discovered by the Asset Quality Review the ECB is scheduled to finish by the end of 2014 should be filled by public funding (= fiscal backstop). This assumption is wrong, however. Banks that do not have enough capital should be asked to obtain it from the market; or be restructured using the procedures and rules recently agreed. The Directorate-General for Competition at the European Commission should be particularly vigilant to ensure that no further state aid flows to an already oversized European banking system. The case for a public backstop was strong when the entire euro area banking system was under stress, but this is no longer the case. Banks with a viable business model can find capital; those without should be closed because any public-sector re-capitalisation would likely mean throwing good money after bad.

A Proper Yield Curve for Greece to Kick-Start Financial Intermediation. ECMI Policy Brief No. 21, 10 December 2013

At present, the market is severely mispricing Greece’s sovereign risk relative to the country’s fundamentals. As a result of the mispricing, financial intermediation in Greece has become dysfunctional and the privatisation of state-owned assets has stalled. This mispricing is partially due to an illiquid and fragmented government yield curve. A well-designed public liability management exercise can lead to a more efficient pricing of Greece’s government bonds and thereby help restore stable and affordable financing for the country’s private sector, which is imperative in order to overcome Greece’s deep recession. This paper proposes three measures to enhance the functioning of the Greek government debt market: i) Greece should issue a new five-year bond, ii) it should consolidate the 20 individual series of government bonds into four liquid securities and iii) it should offer investors a swap of these newly created bonds into dollar-denominated securities. Each of these measures would be beneficial to the Hellenic Republic, since the government would be able to reduce the face value and the net present value of its debt stock. Furthermore, this exercise would facilitate the resumption of market access, which is a necessary condition for continuous multilateral disbursements to Greece.

Supervisory transparency in the European banking union. Bruegel Policy Contribution 2014/01, 3 January 2004

Bank supervisors should provide publicly accessible, timely and consistent data on the banks under their jurisdiction. Such transparency increases democratic accountability and leads to greater market efficiency. There is greater supervisory transparency in the United States compared to the member states of the European Union. The US supervisors publish data quarterly and update fairly detailed information on bank balance sheets within a week. By contrast, based on an attempt to locate similar data in every EU country, in only 11 member states is this data at least partially available from supervisors, and in no member state is the level of transparency as high as in the US. Current and planned European Union requirements on bank transparency are either insufficient or could be easily sidestepped by supervisors. A banking union in Europe needs to include requirements for greater supervisory transparency.

The Judicial Dimension of the European Neighbourhood Policy. EU Diplomacy Paper 08/2013, November 2013

In this paper, the expression “neighbourhood policy” of the European Union (EU) is understood in a broad way which includes the members of the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) contracting parties to the European Economic Area (EEA), the EFTA State Switzerland, candidate states, the countries of the European Neighbour-hood Policy (ENP), and Russia. The European Court of Justice (ECJ) is the centre of gravity in the judicial dimension of this policy. The innermost circle of integration after the EU itself comprises the EFTA States who are party to the European Economic Area. With the EFTA Court, they have their own common court. The existence of two courts – the ECJ and the EFTA Court – raises the question of homogeneity of the case law. The EEA homogeneity rules resemble the ones of the Lugano Convention. The EFTA Court is basically obliged to follow or take into account relevant ECJ case law. But even if the ECJ has gone first, there may be constellations where the EFTA Court comes to the conclusion that it must go its own way. Such constellations may be given if there is new scientific evidence, if the ECJ has left certain questions open, where there is relevant case law of the European Court of Human Rights or where, in light of the specific circumstances of the case, there is room for “creative homogeneity”. However, in the majority of its cases the EFTA Court is faced with novel legal questions. In such cases, the ECJ, its Advocates General and the Court of First Instance make reference to the EFTA Court’s case law. The question may be posed whether the EEA could serve as a model for other regional associations. For the ENP states, candidate States and Russia this is hard to imagine. Their courts will to varying degrees look to the ECJ when giving interpretation to the relevant agreements. The Swiss Government is – at least for the time being – unwilling to make a second attempt to join the EEA. The European Commission has therefore proposed to the Swiss to dock their sectoral agreements with the EU to the institutions of the EFTA pillar, the EFTA Surveillance Authority (ESA) and the EFTA Court. Switzerland would then negotiate the right to nominate a member of the ESA College and of the EFTA Court. The Swiss Government has, however, opted for another model. Swiss courts would continue to look to the ECJ, as they did in the past, and conflicts should also in the future be resolved by diplomatic means. But the ECJ would play a decisive role in dispute settlement. It would, upon unilateral request of one side, give an “authoritative” interpretation of EU law as incorporated into the relevant bilateral agreement. In a “Non-Paper” which was drafted by the chief negotiators, the interpretations of the ECJ are even characterised as binding. The decision-making power would, however, remain with the Joint Committees where Switzerland could say no. The Swiss Government assumes that after a negative decision by the ECJ it would be able to negotiate a compromise solution with the Commission without the ECJ being able to express itself on the outcome. The Government has therefore not tried to emphasise that the ECJ would not be a foreign court. Whether the ECJ would accept its intended role, is an open question. And if it would, the Swiss Government would have to explain to its voters that Switzerland retains the freedom to disregard such a binding decision and that for this reason the ECJ is not only no foreign court, but no adjudicating court at all.

The State of Defence in Europe: State of Emergency? Egmont Paper No. 62, November 2013

None.

What role for migration policy in the Ukraine crisis? CEPS Commentaries, 27 March 2014

While the geopolitics of the Ukraine crisis have dominated headlines, little attention has been paid to the potential challenges arising from the movement of people from the region to the EU. Yet recent history should tell us this could be a grave oversight. As we witnessed during the Arab Spring in 2011, political upheaval can result in people fleeing their state in fear of persecution or seeking to leave their state in search of new horizons and economic opportunities. The EU would do well to learn from that experience and the policy failures that resulted from the Union’s response of closing its borders and returning people to Africa. This Commentary argues that it is critical that – independently of the still uncertain outcome of the Ukraine crisis – the EU formulates and implements a credible policy strategy addressing the potential impact and benefits of mobility between Ukraine and the EU.

EU-Turkey Relations: Turning vicious circles into virtuous ones. CEPS Policy Brief No. 317, 26 March 2014

The coming weeks and months will be decisive for the general tenor of politics in Turkey. The country faces local elections this March, presidential elections in August and general elections next June, while top-level political scandals compound the deterioration in the state of democracy and rule of law. At the same time, stagnation in Turkey’s accession process continues to sour relations with the EU. In this new Policy Brief, Steven Blockmans puts forward a number of recommendations to help drive the EU accession process forward, namely the early opening of negotiation chapters 23 (judiciary and fundamental rights) and 24 (justice, freedom and security), in line with the EU’s so-called New Approach. In that way reform could not just be assured on paper, but a track record in implementation could be established throughout the process. To achieve this, member states, and Cyprus in particular, need to be persuaded to end their opposition to formulating benchmarks for the opening of accession negotiating chapters 23 and 24.