The unpatriotism of the economic constitution? Rights to free movement and their impact on national and European identity

Abstract: Instead of the political reading of the EU Constitution adopted by advocates of constitutional patriotism, this article examines the European economic constitution. The four single market freedoms can be used by the Court of Justice to strike down Member State laws which represent deeply held aspects of national cultural identity. The article examines whether the court does in fact act in this way and proceeds to argue that the issue of identity protection does not stop with the court. In those policy areas where the court is more interventionist, and its case-law is perceived as an identity threat, one is likely to find binding Treaty-based derogations. Where, in contrast, the effect of the court's case-law poses less of a threat, one is more likely to see non-binding declarations. The article examines a number of policy areas in which specific cultural derogations and declarations are to be found, including abortion, property acquisition, football and alcohol control.

Macrophyte community structure and species occurrence in relation to environmental determinants in the ephemeral aquatic habitats of Gavdos, Greece

The aims of this study were to explore the environmental factors that determine the distribution of plant communities in temporary rock pools and provide a quantitative analysis of vegetation-environment relationships for five study sites on the island of Gavdos, southwest of Crete, Greece. Data from 99 rock pools were collected and analysed using Two-Way Indicator Species Analysis (TWINSPAN), Detrended Correspondence Analysis (DCA) and Canonical Correspondence Analysis (CCA) to identify the principal communities and environmental gradients that are linked to community distribution. A total of 46 species belonging to 21 families were recorded within the study area. The dominant families were Labiatae, Gramineae and Compositae while therophytes and chamaephytes were the most frequent life forms. The samples were classified into six community types using TWINSPAN, which were also corroborated by CCA analysis. The principal gradients for vegetation distribution, identified by CCA, were associated with water storage and water retention ability, as expressed by pool perimeter and water depth. Generalised Additive Models (GAMs) were employed to identify responses of four dominant rock pool species to water depth. The resulting species response curves showed niche differentiation in the cases of Callitriche pulchra and Tillaea vaillantii and revealed competition between Zannichellia pedunculata and Chara vulgaris. The use of classification in combination with ordination techniques resulted in a good discrimination between plant communities. Generalised Additive Models are a powerful tool in investigating species response curves to environmental gradients. The methodology adopted can be employed for improving baseline information on plant community ecology and distribution in Mediterranean ephemeral pools.

Evaluation of agri-environmental and forestry schemes with multiple objectives

The evaluation of EU policy in the area of rural land use management often encounters problems of multiple and poorly articulated objectives. Agri-environmental policy has a range of aims, including natural resource protection, biodiversity conservation and the protection and enhancement of landscape quality. Forestry policy, in addition to production and environmental objectives, increasingly has social aims, including enhancement of human health and wellbeing, lifelong learning, and the cultural and amenity value of the landscape. Many of these aims are intangible, making them hard to define and quantify. This article describes two approaches for dealing with such situations, both of which rely on substantial participation by stakeholders. The first is the Agri-Environment Footprint Index, a form of multi-criteria participatory approach. The other, applied here to forestry, has been the development of ‘multi-purpose’ approaches to evaluation, which respond to the diverse needs of stakeholders through the use of mixed methods and a broad suite of indicators, selected through a participatory process. Each makes use of case studies and involves stakeholders in the evaluation process, thereby enhancing their commitment to the programmes and increasing their sustainability. Both also demonstrate more ‘holistic’ approaches to evaluation than the formal methods prescribed in the EU Common Monitoring and Evaluation Framework.

Exposure to environmental oestrogenic chemicals and breast cancer.

The human population is now exposed on a daily basis to a multitude of environmental pollutant chemicals that would not have been present a century ago, and many of these chemicals have been detected in the human breast. The fatty nature of human breast tissue makes it a particular target for lipophilic as well as hydrophilic pollutant chemicals, which may enter the human body through oral, respiratory, or dermal routes. These chemicals possess a range of endocrine-disrupting properties and genotoxic activity, but from a breast cancer perspective the greatest concern has centered around their ability to mimic or interfere with the action of estrogen. The breast is an endocrine target organ and exposure to estrogen is a known risk factor for breast cancer.

Plant and invertebrate resources for farmland birds in pastoral landscapes

On 16 UK livestock holdings within pastoral landscapes, we investigated the provision of plant and invertebrate resources for farmland birds in spring barley and winter wheat cereal-based whole crop silages as alternatives to maize and grass silages. The benefits of low input barley systems were also investigated; barley fields were subjected to two separate herbicide sub-treatments on a split-field design (high input broad-spectrum or low input narrow spectrum herbicides). The abundance of plant resources and invertebrates was assessed for three growing seasons during summer and winter for each crop type. The study clearly demonstrated the value of spring barley for the provision of plant resources when compared to the other silage cropping systems, whilst invertebrate responses were variable. No differences in plant and invertebrate resources were found between the barley treatments. Throughout the year, forage maize afforded the lowest provision of resources for farmland birds, and because it is likely that maize will continue to be grown in pastoral areas, the value of this habitat needs to be improved if farmland birds are to benefit. To provide plant and invertebrate resources for farmland birds in pastoral landscapes we strongly advocate the growing of spring sown barley whole-crop silage followed by over-wintering stubbles. © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Mesolithic to Neolithic and medieval coastal environmental change: intertidal survey at Woolaston, Gloucestershire

At Woolaston on the western shores of the middle Severn Estuary c. 7 km upstream of Chepstow intertidal Holocene sediment exposures have been surveyed and the stratigraphic sequence established by coring and limited excavation. There are two main peats each with a submerged forest. An existing dendrochronological sequence for the Upper Submerged Forest has been extended and the preliminary results of pollen analysis from the peat sequence are summarised. A few flint flakes were found but were not stratified in the mid-Holocene sequence. There is evidence for late Mesolithic / early Neolithic burning episodes which may relate to human activity. Evidence is reported for Medieval activity and the extensive modification of drainage in this period is suggested.

Environmental and ecological economics in the 21st century: an age adjusted citation analysis of the influential articles, journals, authors and institutions

We investigate the influence of articles, authors, journals and institutions in the field of environmental and ecological economics. We depart from studies that investigated the literature until 2001 and include a time period that has witnessed an enormous increase of importance in the field. We adjust for the age effect given the huge impact of the year of an article's publication on its influence and we show that this adjustment does make a substantial difference — especially for disaggregated units of analysis with diverse age characteristics such as articles or authors. We analyse 6597 studies on environmental and ecological economics published between 2000 and 2009. We provide rankings of the influential articles, authors, journals and institutions and find that Ecological Economics, Energy Economics and the Journal of Environmental Economics and Management have the most influential articles, they publish very influential authors and their articles are cited most. The University of Maryland, Resources for the Future, the University of East Anglia and the World Bank appear to be the most influential institutions in the field of environmental and ecological economics.

Analysis of wall plasters and natural sediments from the Neolithic town of Çatalhöyük (Turkey) by a range of analytical techniques

Wall plaster sequences from the Neolithic town of Çatalhöyük have been analysed and compared to three types of natural sediment found in the vicinity of the site, using a range of analytical techniques. Block samples containing the plaster sequences were removed from the walls of several different buildings on the East Mound. Sub-samples were examined by IR spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction and X-ray fluorescence to determine the overall mineralogical and elemental composition, whilst thin sections were studied using optical polarising microscopy, IR Microscopy and Environmental Scanning Electron Microscopy with Energy Dispersive X-ray analysis. The results of this study have shown that there are two types of wall plaster found in the sequences and that the sediments used to produce these were obtained from at least two distinct sources. In particular, the presence of clay, calcite and magnesian calcite in the foundation plasters suggested that these were prepared predominantly from a marl source. On the other hand, the finishing plasters were found to contain dolomite with a small amount of clay and no calcite, revealing that softlime was used in their preparation. Whilst marl is located directly below and around Çatalhöyük, the nearest source of softlime is 6.5 km away, an indication that the latter was important to the Neolithic people, possibly due to the whiter colour (5Y 8/1) of this sediment. Furthermore, the same two plaster types were found on each wall of Building 49, the main building studied in this research, and in all five buildings investigated, suggesting that the use of these sources was an established practice for the inhabitants of several different households across the site.

The Environmental Data Abstraction Library (EDAL): a modular approach to processing and visualising large environmental data

The Environmental Data Abstraction Library provides a modular data management library for bringing new and diverse datatypes together for visualisation within numerous software packages, including the ncWMS viewing service, which already has very wide international uptake. The structure of EDAL is presented along with examples of its use to compare satellite, model and in situ data types within the same visualisation framework. We emphasize the value of this capability for cross calibration of datasets and evaluation of model products against observations, including preparation for data assimilation.