Winds of Change: Long-Term Gas Contracts and Changing Energy Paradigms in the European Union

Author(s):  
Kim Talus
Author(s):  
Yulia S. Chechikova

Digitization of a national cultural and scientific heritage is one of the long-term strategic problems of the European countries’ governments. Member countries of the European Union make major efforts in providing access to their cultural heritage. In the article the process of an access provision is described for Finland.


Author(s):  
Carlota Rigotti ◽  
Júlia Zomignani Barboza

Abstract The return of foreign fighters and their families to the European Union has mostly been considered a security threat by member States, which consequently adopt repressive measures aimed at providing an immediate, short-term response to this perceived threat. In addition to this strong-arm approach, reintegration strategies have also been used to prevent returnees from falling back into terrorism and to break down barriers of hostility between citizens in the long term. Amidst these different strategies, this paper seeks to identify which methods are most desirable for handling returnees.


Author(s):  
Serhii Horopakha

On 1st July 2013, the Republic of Croatia officially became the 28th member of the European Union. This event marked the fulfillment of a foreign policy goal, along with joining NATO in 2009, as a major step forward in the country’s long-term consolidation process. The article therefore analyzes the key events of the Croatia – EU relations in 2007-2008, which moved this Balkan country closer to implementing its Euro-integration course. Particular attention is paid to the peculiarities of the pre-accession negotiations with the European Union, as well as to internal and foreign policy factors that had a direct impact on the Euro-integration dialogue between Croatia and the European Union. In this context, emphasis is placed on problem issues that slowed down the dynamics of the negotiation process to a certain extent, in particular the unilateral application by Croatia of the Ecological and Fisheries Protection Zone, and measures taken by the Croatian authorities to settle them. Significant achievements of Croatia in the negotiation process with the European Union are highlighted, in particular, progress of the country in meeting the European Union criteria as well as a date determination the of pre-accession negotiations completion as an important political sign of the European Union readiness to accept a new member in future.


2015 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. e0104 ◽  
Author(s):  
Raul Serrano ◽  
Nieves García-Casarejos ◽  
Salvador Gil-Pareja ◽  
Rafael Llorca-Vivero ◽  
Vicente Pinilla

<p>The objective of this study was to analyse, from a long-term perspective, the factors determining the process of the internationalisation of the Spanish agrifood industry. The paper concentrates on the empirical verification of the existence of a home market effect in the food and drink industries in Spain and on the effects on trade flows of integration into the European Union. With this aim in mind, we took into account the latest contributions to the estimation of the gravity equation for a sample of export flows from 13 agrifood subsectors between 1970 and 2012, with a destination of 175 markets. From the results of the study the existence of the “home market effect” stands out as the determining factor of the increasing process of internationalisation in the majority of the subsectors of the food industry. On this point, the presence of this effect is remarkable in the most dynamic industries, where the process of restructuring caused by the development of the internal market was more intense. Furthermore, the influence of the process of European integration has been shown by the literature to be a very important factor. Our results qualify in part the results of previous studies, since the positive effect appeared later than expected. The positive effects did not appear until the completion of the process of transition by the dismantling of the barriers established in the treaty of accession to the European Union.</p>


2012 ◽  
Vol 62 (2) ◽  
pp. 161-182 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nenad Stanišić

This paper evaluates income convergence in the European Union, between “old” (EU15) and “new” member states from Central and East Europe (CEE10), and among the countries within these two groups. The GDP per capita convergence should be expected according to the exogenous economic growth model and neoclassical trade theory. The presence of σ-convergence and both absolute and conditional β-convergence is tested for on a sample of 25 European Union countries (EU25). Results confirm the existence of β-convergence of GDP per capita at purchasing power parity among EU25, but not among EU15 and CEE10 countries. σ-convergence has been confirmed among EU25 and CEE10 countries, while GDP per capita has been diverging in the EU15 group of countries. Moreover, the results reveal that recent economic crisis has reversed long-term tendencies and led to income convergence within EU15 and divergence within CEE10. During the crisis, the income differences among the EU25 countries have increased, but the scope and duration of this effect has been limited and has not affected the long term convergence path. However, the obtained long term speed of convergence is significantly lower compared with the previous researches.


Author(s):  
Anand Menon ◽  
Luigi Scazzieri

This chapter examines the history of the United Kingdom’s relationship with the European integration process. The chapter dissects the long-term trends in public opinion and the more contingent, short-term factors that led to the referendum vote to leave the European Union. The UK was a late joiner and therefore unable to shape the early institutional development of the EEC. British political parties and public opinion were always ambiguous about membership and increasingly Eurosceptic from the early 1990s. Yet the UK had a significant impact on the EU’s development, in the development of the single market programme and eastward enlargement. If Brexit goes through, Britain will nevertheless maintain relations with the EU in all policy areas from agriculture to energy and foreign policy. Europeanization will remain a useful theoretical tool to analyse EU–UK relations even if the UK leaves the Union.


Author(s):  
Henry E. Hale ◽  
Robert Orttung

The concluding chapter by Henry Hale and Robert Orttung identifies several common threads running through the chapters in the volume. Among these are the importance of taking into account that formal institutions will not work the same way they do in Western countries thanks to local informal practices, the difference between deeply embedded obstacles to reform and those that are more contingent, the need to focus on long-term solutions, how realistic various reform proposals are in light of the incentives of political actors who have the power to enact them, and the notion that many of the reforms discussed in the volume can reinforce each other. Ultimately, perhaps the single most important driver for change in Ukraine is the European Union.


2018 ◽  
Vol 63 (3) ◽  
pp. 24-39
Author(s):  
Hanna Dudek

The severe material deprivation rate indicates the proportion of the population that cannot fulfil at least four of the nine needs identified as basic ones in the European conditions. The study attempts to identify factors differentiating this indicator in the European Union countries. The parameters for regression beta models were estimated on the basis of data from the European Survey of Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) for 2014. Such models are useful when the value of the dependent variable interval is included between 0 and 1. It was found that severe material deprivation rate is affected by such factors as: type of household, median equalized disposable income, at-risk-of-poverty rate, relative median at-risk-of-poverty gap, inequality of income distribution, long-term unemployment rate, GDP per capita, and share of social protection expenditure in GDP.


2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 265-282
Author(s):  
Tomasz Łachacz ◽  
Sylwester Zagulski

Unemployment is classified today as one of the main threats to society. The phenomenon affects the lives of individuals, the functioning of families and society and development of the state. It is often the source of other social problems such as poverty, violence, or social pathologies. The article presents the scale and nature of unemployment occurring after 1989 in Poland and in selected European Union countries, i.e. the Netherlands, Spain, Slovakia and Latvia. It attempts to show the characteristic trends of the phenomenon over a period of more than two decades. Examples from the European countries analysed show that the situation in the labour market and the approach to employment are radically different. Individual countries are characterised by very different unemployment rates, which reflect their different size, economic and demographic potential, or are associated with the tradition of employment. The existence of differences seems to be normal, but their scale may give rise to concern. A characteristic feature of unemployment in the period analysed is its regional diversity, both in Poland and in the whole of the European community. Important factors that determine the level of unemployment are age, sex, education and people’s qualifications. The effects of long-term unemployment are very painful for the whole of society. Such a situation can lead to, amongst others, poverty, societal antagonism, violence and migration. The latter is an issue that the whole of Europe is currently struggling with. The uncontrolled influx of immigrants, including those migrating for economic reasons, causes fear of losing their job among Europeans, which in turn translates into the radicalisation of society. A role of the state and the EU institutions is to create an effective mechanism for the protection and support of the unemployed. This is a prerequisite for Europeans to continue the project which is a common united Europe.


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