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3741. Sovereign Bankruptcy in the European Union in the Comparative Perspective

Author:
Leszek Balcerowicz
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Peterson Institute for International Economics
Abstract:
This paper distinguishes four alternative sovereign debt resolution mechanisms: pure market solutions, modified market solutions, crisis lending by the IMF and other institutions, and the proposed Sovereign Debt Restructuring Mechanism (SDRM). It is hard to find—at the general level of analysis—the unique advantages of SDRM. The assessment of the European Stabilization Mechanism will ultimately depend on its operation, especially whether it will be a tool of subsidizing countries in debt distress or an instrument of fiscal crisis lending. The present fiscal problems in the eurozone are due to the erosion of fiscal discipline and not to the lack of strong compensatory transfers within the eurozone. The right model to look at the conditions for the stability of the eurozone is not a single state but the gold standard–type system, a system of sovereign states with a (de facto) single currency. Based on this analogy and considering modern developments, three types of measures are needed to safeguard the stability of the eurozone: (1) measures that would reduce the procyclicality of the macroeconomic policies and of the economy; (2) reforms that would help the eurozone economies grow out of increased public debt; and (3) steps to increase the flexibility of the economy so that it can deal with the future shocks in a better way.
Topic:
Debt, Economics, Markets, Monetary Policy, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
Europe

3742. The European External Action Service: Implications and Challenges

Author:
Gustav Lindstrom
Publication Date:
11-2010
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
Abstract:
The 2009 Lisbon Treaty is considered by many a turning point for the EU as it encourages a more coherent and effective use of existing civilian, military, economic, and military instruments. Among its better known innovations is the new post of President of the European Council (currently Mr. Herman van Rompuy) and modified post of High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy/Vice-President of the European Commission (presently Baroness Catherine Ashton).
Topic:
International Organization and Regional Cooperation
Political Geography:
Europe

3743. The Kosovo Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice and its Political Consequences

Author:
Pál Dunay and Steven Haines
Publication Date:
10-2010
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
Abstract:
Ever since NATO's Operation Allied Force in 1999 resulted in a withdrawal of Serb forces from Kosovo and the establishment of governance arrangements for the province that included an important external presence (with UN, EU, NATO and OSCE missions) as well as Kosovo's own Provisional Institutions of Self Government, the precise future status of Kosovo has been in doubt. Two extreme options were favoured by Serbia and Kosovo, respectively: either for Kosovo to continue as a part of Serbia or for it to achieve independent status (most likely by attaining statehood). On 17 February 2008, a group of Kosovo leaders issued a Declaration of Independence. Serbia responded with a request that the UN General Assembly seek an opinion on the legality of Kosovo's action from the International Court of Justice (ICJ). The Court delivered its Opinion on 22 July 2010. What did the Court say and what are the political consequences of its Opinion?
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, International Law, and Sovereignty
Political Geography:
Europe, Kosovo, United Nations, and Balkans

3744. Building Partnerships in Peace Operations: The Limits of the Global/Regional Approach

Author:
Thierry Tardy
Publication Date:
05-2010
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
Abstract:
A consensus seems to exist on the need to tackle contemporary intra-state conflicts through a multiplicity of actors who display different comparative advantages and levels of expertise. For the United Nations as well as for the regional organisations that, since the end of the Cold War, have emerged as crisis management actors, working together is the way forward. The UN and the EU run or have run simultaneous operations in Africa (Democratic Republic of the Congo and Chad) and Kosovo and have largely institutionalised their cooperation; the UN took over operations initially deployed by the African Union in West Africa and in Burundi and the two institutions have created a hybrid UN-AU mission in Darfur; the EU is assisting the AU in the building-up of its Stand-by Force and finances AU operations; the EU, the OSCE and NATO have for some time shared the burden of security management in the Balkans. As noted in a UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO) document, “reinforcing interoperability with key partners […] can enhance cooperation and ensure that we maximise finite global peacekeeping resources”. Indeed, given the scope of crisis management needs, not least the UN overstretch, burden-sharing has become an imperative and its corollary, inter-institutional partnerships, equally central. Yet, the establishment of partnerships among international institutions is facing important political and technical difficulties that make the prospect for an interlocking system unlikely.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention, Globalization, International Cooperation, Peace Studies, Regional Cooperation, and Peacekeeping
Political Geography:
Africa, Europe, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kosovo, and United Nations

3745. Russia's Strategic Choice

Author:
Graeme P. Herd
Publication Date:
05-2010
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
Abstract:
In the wake of the global financial crisis, a debate over necessary policy responses morphed into something much more profound and fundamental – the sustainability of Russia's current governance model and its preferred longer-term modernization paradigm. On 10 September 2009 President Medvedev published a remarkably frank article entitled 'Russia, Forward!' This article noted that Russia's governance model appeared to be failing, proving vulnerable in the face of the global financial crisis. President Medvedev himself criticized Russia's 'humiliating' dependence on raw materials, as well as its 'inefficient economy, a semi-Soviet social sphere, an immature democracy, negative demographic trends, unstable Caucasus.' In his 12 November 2009 Message to the Federal Assembly, Medvedev elaborated further on this theme: Russia could either modernize or deteriorate; modernization would provide a touchstone for 'how we can overcome our chronic backwardness, dependence on raw materials exports, and corruption'. On 3 February 2010, the Institute for Contemporary Development (INSOR) published a report that received widespread coverage entitled 21st Century Russia: The Image of Tomorrow We Want. As President Medvedev had created INSOR in 2008 to give him independent advice on economic and foreign policy and sat as a trustee on its board, this report received widespread publicity. Such publicity was magnified as the report touched just about every exposed nerve by advocating that Russia should join NATO, end censorship, abolish the state security service, and adopt a Western-style democracy, entailing the separation of the courts from the state, of the legislative branch from the executive, horizontal modernization (characterized as the debureaucratization of the vertical top-down corrupt, over-regulated economic process)3. Without change, Russia faced a strategic cul de sac that leads to slow and steady strategic marginalization: 'In a few years, when it turns out that Russia has nothing to boast about except export supplies of raw materials at prices that are dictated to us, we will be exporting people. And, not only the cleverest like now, but any workers, who are in demand in Europe, as is happening today in Latvia, for example. I frankly do not know what Russia should do in this situation. This problem will be one of the main ones for the president who is elected in 2012
Topic:
Democratization, Global Recession, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, and Latvia

3746. Turkey and Europeanization of Foreign Policy?

Author:
Tarik Oguzlu
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Political Science Quarterly
Institution:
Academy of Political Science
Abstract:
TARIK OGUZLU argues that even though Turkish foreign policy has in recent years become Europeanized, the driving force of this Europeanization has not been Turkey's accession process with the European Union or its desire to prove its European identity.
Topic:
Foreign Policy
Political Geography:
Europe and Turkey

3747. Russia's Oil Exports: Economic Rationale Versus Strategic Gains

Author:
Adnan Vatansever
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
Russia, the world's largest oil producer, is vigorously promoting the development of new outlets for oil exports. While the recent launch of a long-awaited cross-border oil pipeline between Russia and China has received most of the publicity, it is a part of a much larger Russian initiative aimed at developing new oil export infrastructure in almost every possible direction: Asia, the Baltic Sea region, the Black Sea region, and the Arctic. This export strategy will have considerable policy and economic implications for Eastern and Central Europe and even the United States.
Topic:
Economics, Energy Policy, Markets, and Oil
Political Geography:
United States and Europe

3748. A Place in the Sun or Fifteen Minutes of Fame? Understanding Turkey's New Foreign Policy

Author:
Sinan Ülgen
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
Turkey's vote against additional UN Security Council sanctions on Iran this year was viewed by many observers as a sign that Turkey is drifting away from the West. In reality, Ankara's relationship with the United States and the EU is much more complicated. Turkey's ambitious foreign policy and growing influence present the West with an opportunity to demand that Turkey play a more constructive role in the international community.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, and Power Politics
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, Iran, Central Asia, and Turkey

3749. Editorial: Dispatch from the Euro Titanic: And the Orchestra Played On Snippets From the Mail Box of the Editor: Poaching Masthead Changes In this Issue

Publication Date:
11-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
These are challenging times for the European Union. Internally, important, even fundamental, decisions are on the agenda as the Union struggles with the Euro crisis and its underlying economic fissures. (Mercifully, the scapegoating of the USA as an escape from facing Europe's very own breathtaking governmental and private-sector financial and fiscal irresponsibility has all but disappeared – mercifully, since facing reality unflinchingly is a necessary condition for dealing with it effectively.) What is subprime in Europe is the decisional structure of the Union: the European Politburo – President of the Commission, newly-minted President of the Council, tired-old-more-senseless-than-ever rotating Member State Presidency, recycled High Representative answerable to two bosses and thus to none – has proven at best irrelevant to the real actors in you know where (Berlin, Paris, the formidable Merkel, the erratic Sarkozy), at worst distracting – was the able President of the Council's productive moves really helped by the forced tango with his opposite number at the Commission? About a year after the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon, it is clear that at least some of the principal objectives intended by the new decisional structure at the top are turning out to be as ineffective (some claim laughable) as critics anticipated.
Political Geography:
Europe and Lisbon

3750. The Role of Atypical Acts in EU External Trade and Intellectual Property Policy

Author:
Henning Grosse Ruse-Khan, Thomas Jaeger, and Robert Kordic
Publication Date:
11-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
This article discusses atypical acts of the European Union (EU) concerning intellectual property (IP) protection within the EU's internal legal order and its external relations. Internally, atypical acts are used in IP for flexible pre- and post-regulation purposes or for soft guidance and steering. Yet in IP and elsewhere, those flexibilities come at the cost of deficits in democratic legitimacy, legality, and legal certainty. Atypical acts are also common in the external trade relations of the EU. Like more formal conduct of trade relations by means of international agreements, they focus on the enforcement of IP rights. The less formal (and legal) character of these acts often allows them to be more policy-driven and so makes it easier to address key political concerns relevant for EU external trade relations in a more flexible and current manner. Some of these policies are subsequently turned into 'hard' law –for example in the course of the negotiations over the controversial Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA). Based on the comparative analysis of the role of atypical acts in the EU's internal legislation for IP vis-à-vis their role in external action, this article explores possibilities of limiting the drawbacks while preserving the benefits of a use of atypical acts in external policies.
Political Geography:
Europe