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451. CERI: Public Administrations and Modes of Government in the Face of Europeanization: A Comparison between Southern Europe and Eastern Europe

Author:
Béatrice Hibou and François Bafoil
Publication Date:
12-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Internationales
Abstract:
Enlargement today is a priority on the European agenda. Examining Portugal and Greece from a comparative perspective with respect to Poland, this Study analyzes the original and specific paths each of these national configurations have taken as regards administrative and institutional changes, particularly through the regional dimension, policy reorientations and modes of government. Given the large body of acquis communautaire that must be integrated, the nature of Commission involvement and the highly regulatory nature of European directives, this dimension emerges as the most significant in the process of Europeanization: public administration acts as a filter in this dynamic and nation-states are paradoxically strengthened by European integration. This comparison is an opportunity to underscore the importance of innovations and the singularity of modes of government, suggesting that certain arrangements put into practice in cohesion countries may provide sources of inspiration for the new entrants, which are faced with similar problems of administrative competence, bureaucratic blockages and political and state legacies that are remote from the European model of public administration, civil service organization and rules. With the effect of European constraints, a threefold dynamic is at work: a dynamic of delegation, or privatization, through the creation of agencies, offices and institutes, a dynamic of politicized (re)centralization, and a dynamic of political, institutional and social innovation. Thus components of these models are constantly borrowed and reshaped, hybrid constructions are formed and configurations take shape that are no less European than what can be found in the "heart" of Europe.
Topic:
International Relations, Development, and Government
Political Geography:
Europe

452. Some remarks on Trans-Atlantic Convergences and Divergences

Author:
Bronislaw Geremek
Publication Date:
11-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Transatlantic Relations
Abstract:
Only a few short years have passed since we bade farewell to the 20th century and ushered in a new millennium. Generalised assessments always include the question of whether the glass is half empty or half full; and so there have been differing evaluations put forth on the outcomes of the passing century and the prospects of the new one. However, we can quite safely say that we bid farewell to the 20th century - the century of two world conflicts, totalitarian ideologies and systems, of the holocaust, concentration camps, the gulag-with a sense of relief. The cold war came to an end, the Soviet empire collapsed, and the spread of democracy and freedom around the globe seemed to justify proclamations of the advent of a Hegelian "end of history". The United Nations Millennium Declaration announced the undertaking of new and effective action that would liberate the world's population from the plagues of hunger, poverty and fear.
Topic:
International Relations, NATO, and United Nations
Political Geography:
United States and Europe

453. Addressing the Threat of Weapons of Mass Destruction: A moment of opportunity for the EU?

Author:
Ian Anthony
Publication Date:
04-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
EastWest Institute
Abstract:
A free market that controlled the number and type of arms available to states and to non-state actors on the basis of their financial means and technological capacity would breed insecurity and stimulate un-necessary military spending. Rules are needed to regulate military capacities, but questions abound. What kinds of rules are needed? How should these rules be applied? As is the case with the provisions of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) and the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BTWC), these rules could apply equally to all parties, and be universal and uniform in their application.
Topic:
International Relations, Human Welfare, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
Europe

454. Toward a European Strategy for Iraq

Author:
Giacomo Luciani and Felix Neugart
Publication Date:
03-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
The Iraq crisis has been a disaster for the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) of the European Union (EU). Member countries are very visibly split in their position towards the war against the regime in Baghdad. EU institutions have been unable to agree on more than the unconditional implementation of the relevant United Nations resolutions leaving the door open for widely diverging interpretations. The challenge of the Iraq crisis does not bode well for the future of a cohesive European Foreign Policy, and the CFSP requires a fresh approach.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, and War
Political Geography:
Iraq, Europe, Middle East, Arabia, and United Nations

455. Constructivism and the Role of Institutions in International Relations

Author:
Stefano Guzzini
Publication Date:
03-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Danish Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
Although Italy, in comparison to its Northern neighbours, is not a country of constructivists (Lucarelli and Menotti 2002), many of the themes crucial to constructivism are common currency in Italian academia. For constructivism stands for a series of debates in social theory which made a perhaps late yet virulent intrusion into the discipline of International Relations. Its content is probably best understood as the focus which bundles recent discussions on epistemology and the sociology of knowledge, on the agent-structure debate and the ontological status of social facts, and on the reciprocal relationship between these two.
Topic:
International Relations
Political Geography:
Europe

456. A Europe without Divides? The EU-Russia Partnership and the Case of Virtual Borders

Author:
Tarja Cronberg
Publication Date:
01-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Danish Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
This paper is about a partnership, the aim of which is to create a Europe without divides. A partnership where the vision is to transcend the divide between membership and non-membership and to create co-operation in trade, in stability and security, and in democracy on all levels. The paper examines the implementation of the EU-Russia partnership and its strategy not only on the rhetorical level but also in a micro-perspective seen from a border region (mostly from the EU-side), from a space where the divides whether economic, social or of any other kind are most clearly manifested. As borders manifest social conflict a study of the implementation of the partnership agreement on this micro-level will make visible not only the taken-for-granted assumptions and practices but also new and emerging divides. As a concrete case the creation of a European information society is studied. Will the partners be united in virtual space without divides? Conclusions are drawn on the nature of the partnership, the relationship between the partners and the perspective of a Europe without divides.
Topic:
International Relations
Political Geography:
Russia and Europe

457. EU and Ukraine: a turning point in 2004?

Author:
Taras Kuzio
Publication Date:
11-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
European Union Institute for Security Studies
Abstract:
EU enlargement raises important questions: How much further can the EU enlarge? Should the EU encompass geographic 'Europe' or stop at the western border of the CIS? Article 49 of the Treaty on European Union (TEU) clearly allows any geographically based European state to apply for membership. Is Ukraine then eligible? On 15 March 2001, the European Parliament supported Ukraine's future membership; in contrast, the EU continues to fudge any answer to this question. The difficulty in answering these questions lies with the criteria that should be used to formulate a response. Whatever the answer, with enlargement it has become a matter of urgency for the EU to engage strategically with its new neighbours in Eastern Europe. In particular, the EU must develop a realistic strategy for Ukraine, its largest new neighbour within Europe. Of these neighbours only two – Ukraine and Moldova – seek EU membership. One reason why Ukraine needs greater attention on the part of the EU is geopolitical. European Commission President Romano Prodi and Swedish Prime Minister Goran Persson wrote: 'Any political instability, regressive economic development or fragmentary reform in these countries would threaten to create a new discontinuity in Europe – a political, economic and social divide – in the wake of EU enlargement.' 1 Ukraine borders three, and soon to be four, new EU members. All four of these are or will soon be NATO members. With enlargement, Ukraine's geostrategic importance becomes an issue that the EU must address. This Occasional Paper discusses critical issues in the EU-Ukrainian relationship and provides a number of policy recommendations that could contribute towards fashioning an EU strategy towards Ukraine. At the heart of the current stalemate in relations are virtual policies adopted by the EU and Ukraine towards each other. 2 The EU has never adopted a clear strategy towards Ukraine and other western CIS states that seek EU membership, and in general has paid far too little attention to the region. Ukraine straddles the Central and East European-Eurasian divide. This makes it all the more imperative that the EU devise a strategy that would support a potential shift within Ukraine towards a more Central and East European identity. This potential is more present in Ukraine than in other CIS states. The most effective manner to support Ukraine's 'European choice' may be by offering it an 'open-door' policy. The 2004 elections will have a decisive impact upon Ukraine's 'European choice'. If the front-runner in polls since 2000, Viktor Yushchenko, won the elections, the EU would be forced to change its 'closed-door' approach. Yushchenko would no longer continue a virtual 'European choice' strategy and the EU would be forced to drop its own virtual policy towards Ukraine. The policy proposals developed in this Occasional Paper outline a possible EU strategy towards Ukraine.
Topic:
International Relations and Politics
Political Geography:
Europe and Ukraine

458. EU-Russian security dimensions

Author:
Dov Lynch
Publication Date:
07-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
European Union Institute for Security Studies
Abstract:
EU-Russian security cooperation remains nascent, but some important ground has been cleared since 2000. Yet, the dialogue is neither without ambiguity or problems. It is replete with both. This Occasional Paper examines three facets of EU-Russia security relations. The first chapter, by Hiski Haukkala, compares EU and Russian perceptions of the other in security terms. Haukkala traces the evolution of EU thinking on Russia throughout the 1990s, highlighting the obstacles that held up the development of a strategic vision of the 'partnership'. Following an analysis of how Russia views the EU, he concludes that both have different visions of the other which lie at the source of problems of perception and expectation. In the second chapter, Thomas Gomart concentrates on a single aspect of the EU's Common Strategy on Russia (1999), that of preventive diplomacy, examined through the cases of Belarus and Macedonia. Gomart notes the absence of coordination between the EU and Russia in the former Soviet Union and the Balkans, and stresses the need for greater effort. Gomart notes also the danger of blurring the lines between the 'preventive' and the 'pre-emptive', particularly with regard to counter-terrorism. Anaïs Marin concludes this Occasional Paper with an examination of the Northern Dimension. Marin notes the unique utility of the 'dimensionalist' approach to EU- Russian relations, which takes in a wide range of subjects and different types of actors within a flexible framework. In conclusion, she rejects calls for a greater institutionalisation of the Northern Dimension, arguing that flexibility and 'lightness' are its strength.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, and Politics
Political Geography:
Russia and Europe

459. Partners and neighbours: a CFSP for a wider Europe

Author:
Dov Lynch, Antonio Missiroli, Martin Ortega, Dimitrios Triantaphyllou, and Judy Batt
Publication Date:
09-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
European Union Institute for Security Studies
Abstract:
This Chaillot Paper is the product of collegial reflection by the EUISS research team. As the current enlargement process moves towards its culmination with the accession of ten new member states in May 2004, its effects are already making themselves felt not only on the internal but also the external policies of the widening Union. New borders and neighbours bring new challenges while reconfiguring old ones. This new reality requires more than just additions to already existing policies. The entire neighbourhood, or proximity, policy of the enlarged EU will have to be reassessed and reformulated.
Topic:
International Relations, International Cooperation, and Politics
Political Geography:
Europe

460. Europe between Brussels and Byzantium: Some Thoughts on European Integration

Author:
Niall Ferguson
Publication Date:
11-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute of European Studies
Abstract:
There is, in theory, a plausible role for the European Union as the partner of a militarily assertive United States: the peacekeeper that follows in the wake of the peacemaker. The war in Iraq, however, has raised the possibility of a diametrically different role for Europe: as a potential imperial rival to the United States. There is no need to invoke the memory of either Rome or Byzantium to make the case that Europe is capable of spoiling America's unipolar party. The successful conclusion of accession agreements with ten new member countries – not to mention the sustained appreciation of the euro against the dollar since Kennedy's article appeared – have seemingly vindicated this analysis. So too, in the eyes of some commentators, has the vociferous and not wholly ineffectual opposition of at least some E.U. member states to American policy in Iraq. If the U.S. has an imperial rival today, then the E.U. appears to be it.
Topic:
International Relations and War
Political Geography:
United States, Iraq, Europe, Rome, and Brussels