Regional coordination of European environmental policies

Over the last years the European Union (EU) has implemented ambitious climate and energy targets for 2020, i.e. the 2020 Climate and Energy Package (Package), to become a highly efficient, low carbon economy. The Package assigns binding renewable energy sources (RES) target for each EU member countries. Indeed costs to reach Package's targets vary among EU countries, given heterogeneity among regions and different instruments implemented to spur RES deployment. The aim of our paper is to provide a policy tool for EU policy makers in the negotiation process that assigns achievable quantitative targets according to which countries are not inclined to deviate from the agreement.We compute potential extra costs that may arise when some EU countries fail to reach the assigned objective within the Package with reference to RES target. More generally, our simulation model is an instrument that allows EU policy makers to assess incentives that countries might have to participate or not to the environmental agreements. Our analysis shows that partial participation to the Package produces inefficiencies by rising costs for other participating countries to the environmental agreement. Finally, we propose a new policy mechanism based on progressive sanctions for countries that do not meet their national targets, which are proportional to the monetary value of the penalty they impose to the rest of the EU countries with their opportunistic behavior.     

An Evaluation of Progress Toward European Monetary Union Using Fuzzy Analysis

European Monetary Union (EMU) is scheduled to commence by the end of the century. Currently, Europeans are engaged in a grand debate over EMU. The controversy is not only over the timetable and stringency of criteria for macroeconomic convergence between member countries, but also over the desirability of the whole EMU enterprise. The European Union (EU) has three choices, to abandon the idea of EMU and opt for independent national monetary policy for each member, to venture the unknown by adopting the EMU regardless of the conditions of its members, or to measure and monitor the fulfillment of EMU preconditions carefully and take the final step when there is a consensus that convergence is reasonably attained. Our paper is a contribution to a systematic quantification and measurement of the fulfillment of the EMU preconditions. We provide a general framework for policy evaluation based on fuzzy logic. We use fuzzy analysis to assess the degree to which each goal is attained, to evaluate the performance of different countries, and to determine the overall progress of the EU in meeting the Maastricht criteria.     

Portability of Supplementary Pension Rights in the European Union

European Union (EU) legislation on portability of supplementary pension rights accrued by private-sector migrant workers is at an early stage. The recent directive on this topic, aiming to preserve accrued pension rights at least at the level guaranteed in the case of within-borders mobility, emphasizes the role of country-specific legislation on pension portability issues. This paper analyses EU as well as national pension portability regulation for a representative sample of EU countries, in the light of recent empirical evidence outlining the role of occupational pensions in individual job mobility choices in these countries.     

State Aid and Partisan Government in the European Union*

Objective. I explore the effects of the partisan composition of government on industrial aid disbursement in 14 EU member states during the period 1992–2004. Methods. Predictions are tested controlling for the impact of international economic integration, the European Commission, domestic institutions, and macroeconomic conditions, using Prais‐Winsten coefficients with panel‐corrected standard errors, a random effects specification, and two‐stage least squares analysis with GLS random effects. Results. Contrary to conventional wisdom, right‐wing governments systematically give out more total and sectoral aid than left‐wing governments. Conclusion. Partisan politics tempers national enthusiasm for a single European market, exposing market reforms to a range of restraining domestic political issues.     

Free provision of services and cross-border labour recruitment

This article identifies how the use of the European Union (EU) mobility rules, as formulated by the EU's Posting Directive, has been linked to the temporary provision of services in practice. It demonstrates how this linkage, legitimised by European Court rulings, undermines the Directive's original intent to provide rights-based regulation of labour mobility in the Union. In the assessment of posting practices, striking findings of two studies co-conducted by the author in 2003 and 2010 are discussed. In the first section, the origins of the Directive are described, followed by sections that contextualise the posting rules in the framework of the fundamental economic freedoms of EU Treaties, and discuss the problems related to implementation and enforcement. Based on the Directive's definition of posting, three issues of governance and practice are raised: (a) regulation of the employment relationship, (b) application of labour conditions and (c) respect for collective agreements. A final section offers policy recommendations in order to deal with the ways in which posting governance and practices currently impede any vision of rights-based mobility in the EU. It is argued that current minimalist interpretation of the posting rules can neither guarantee equal treatment nor protect the rights of temporary migrant workers.     

The European flexicurity concept and the Dutch and Danish flexicurity models: How have they managed the Great Recession?

In the mid‐2000s, the flexicurity concept was developed into a key EU policy concept. It drew its inspiration from the Danish and Dutch practices to combine labor market flexibility and security. However, the crisis' focus on bringing down national deficits and debts left little room to advance the concept. Lately, more emphasis has been placed on the need to take into consideration the social aspect of economic policy‐making. Current EU level documents see flexicurity as a guidance for structural reforms. However, the European flexicurity initiatives seem never to have had much impact in Denmark and the Netherlands. There are few accounts of the recent adjustment to the flexicurity models, be it at the EU or at national levels. Therefore, this article assesses the fate of flexicurity by scrutinizing its (adjusted) use as a political concept as well as a socio‐economic model. Although the Danish flexicurity model resembles the European flexicurity concept to a large extent, recent reforms have, overall, weakened rather than strengthened the flexicurity model. The Dutch flexicurity model has a narrower focus on normalizing atypical work, while recent reforms support this narrow flexicurity model. Meanwhile, the EU level concept has been changing every year, encompassing a growing number of issues.     

The impact of the European Youth Guarantee on active labour market policies: A convergence analysis

The European Union’s (EU) Youth Guarantee aims to improve the labour market situation of young people. Rather than prescribing a uniform policy model, it acknowledges that supportive measures need to align with national, regional and local circumstances. It thus seeks to promote mutual policy learning through the open method of coordination. As an innovative measure, the EU has deployed funding programmes to support the domestic measures related to the Youth Guarantee. We therefore examined in this study whether this mix of recommendations and financial incentives has entailed a convergence of member state policies. Our analysis of policy outputs for the period 2007?2014 yields a mixed empirical picture. There is catching‐up convergence regarding policies’ sectoral coverage but increasing divergence concerning the number of adopted policy instruments. The first two years of financial incentives did not produce any effect on enhancing policy experimentation among less active member states. We offer an optimistic and a pessimistic interpretation of these findings.     

Fear of Others: Social Exclusion and the European Crisis of Solidarity

In recent years a major challenge for the EU has emerged around social issues and collective identities. With the emergence of a European political community that has diminished national sovereignty at a time when global forces are also undermining nation states, both Europe and migration become linked as sources of instability. Anxieties about Europe and migration are linked with fears of a clash of civilizations and anxieties about social securities. Social discontent, fuelled by socio‐economic changes, has undermined the traditional sources of identity around class and the nation, releasing xenophobic and nationalistic currents. Fear of others and anxieties about the future have emerged as potent social forces in contemporary society. The result is a crisis of European solidarity, along with a wider crisis of collective purpose. To combat such developments it is essential that the European project gives greater attention to issues of social justice and inclusive forms of social solidarity.     

A Social-symbiotic Approach? EU Industrial Policy and the Pharmaceutical Industry in the EU

The purpose of this paper is to develop the debate about a symbiotic approach to industrial policy with respect to the pharmaceutical industry in the EU. The EU has an increasingly important role to play in European markets but it seems, at best, to be following a fragmented industrial strategy. There is a real and growing danger that this strategy becomes worse for everyone than no strategy at all. Thus the EU can either go for a comprehensive and comprehensible strategy or let the industry fend for itself amongst disparate health care systems amongst member states. Alternatively it can continue to stumble along with a pastiche of policies. There are signs of some debate about a more holistic approach to industry. In the European Union for example DG (Directorate General) V and DG III produced a communication arguing that “the [European Union] Community policy in favour of the pharmaceutical industry must take notice of [the] twofold context of public health and social security” (Com(93)718:3). This paper identifies current fragments of EU pharmaceutical industrial policy and indicates what a social-symbiotic approach is. Whether or not the industry in the EU continues to decline with respect to the industry elsewhere Asia and America in particular, the sick people of the EU will still need medication: a symbiotic approach to industrial policy can help stem the relative decline in the EU and indeed could reverse it.     

Towards a convergence of European social models?

The European Union (EU) has chosen to construct itself through its currency. The social dimension has been left at a secondary level, based on the principle that economic progress will end up "pulling" social models "upwards" This optimism now looks somewhat misplaced. For a whole series of reasons, European social protection systems are threatened by regression: the emergence of liberal economic ideas, the need to be competitive, the implementation of the Stability and Growth Pact, the fact that the differences in the levels of remuneration and social benefits in Euroland are more evident owing to the single currency and, as a result, the harsher social and fiscal competition. If Europe wishes to avoid the risks of social fragmentation due to the "leveling down" of social protection, it will have to organize a minimum threshold of EU solidarity.     

Fostering inter-European cooperation: Technological collaboration among nations of the European Union

This article examines the reasons for the technology gap between Europe and its Japanese and U.S. counterparts, and assesses the EU's effort towards reducing this gap. The EU considers technological collaboration the best way to reduce the gap, and we assess it for technologies: (1) High Definition Television (HDTV) and (2) telecommunications. These catch up efforts have been only partly successful. The HDTV program did not make much progress, and the worldwide switch from analogue to digital technology has hobbled the European attempt. Telecom manufacturers have cleverly adapted to a number of niche markets, such as Nokia in portable telephones, but the industry remains fragmented and poorly equipped to compete against global rivals such as AT&T. Application of pure research to industrial and commercial uses has been spotty, only half-heartedly been implemented by European states or the EU Commission. Even so, the EU Commission continues to promote a wider European perspective. Future technology policies could usefully promote greater entrepreneurial activity and national technical specialization.     

Strategic contextualisation: free movement,labour migration policies and the governance of foreign workers in Europe

Heightened levels of internal labour mobility since the European Union (EU)'s Eastern enlargements in 2004 and 2007 have shifted the context for member state policies geared towards the admission of non-EU workers. This article contends that the strategic use of the internal mobility regime by member states, as a justification for selective recruitment of labour from outside the EU, deserves more analytical attention. This contribution examines how labour migration policies (LMP) in the United Kingdom, France and Germany make use of the EU free-movement framework in current legislation, and how associated policy rationales are justified. In an interpretive policy analysis of legislative documents and decision-makers' meaning-making, as related in semi-structured interviews, the article identifies the logics, tools and rationales which link LMP to EU free movement. These links are shown to be highly selective and they serve common as well as nationally distinct governance goals. Across all three cases LMPs ascribe various degrees of relevance to EU internal labour supply, depending on the different skill levels of migrants targeted in respective policies. This shared pattern of economic coordination of LMP by skill level – in which the EU common labour market plays the role of delimiting additional migration in the skilled and especially low-skilled segments – is conflated with national migration control agendas. Member states draw on EU free movement to justify migration restrictions targeted at specific sending countries. As a result, the governance of the foreign workforce produces skills- and origin-based privileges rather than granting rights to mobile migrant workers in Europe.     

Transition Countries of Central Europe Entering the European Union: Some Social Protection Issues

A brief overview of essential choices facing the transition countries of central Europe with regard to social security policy precedes the discussion of some selected issues related to their entry into the European Union (EU). While not much weight is given to the idea of these countries bringing in yet another social model, the problem of social dumping is considered more seriously, particularly in view of the continuing impact of neoliberal ideology. The central issue of maintaining equilibrium between economic and social development is then examined in the context of current preparations for accession, and attention is drawn to the inherent weakness of the present EU policy, which deals with economic aspects of social protection only and fails to give the populations concerned a clear vision of attainable social goals for the future.     

Social protection in Europe: A European trade union perspective

Governments and social partners in the European Union (EU) look for ways and means to adapt welfare systems to new needs, to keep expenditure under control, and to find alternative and supplementary financial resources in order to cope with future financial commitments. The EU is actively involved in the search for solutions to these common problems. It becomes more and more evident that only an active economic, budgetary, taxation and social policy mix can provide a solid base for safeguarding social systems. The author presents the most recent figures relating to actual and future social protection expenditure in the EU, disaggregated according to function and showing significant differences between gross and net figures. Attention is also paid to coverage and replacement rates of social benefits and to the availability of social infrastructures. The article then shows the shifts in implicit tax rates on labour in comparison with the rate on other factors. The conclusion outlines a European trade union view on the future of social protection in Europe and suggests possible issues for social benchmarking.     

Lessons from the American federal-state unemployment insurance system for a European unemployment benefits system

This article reviews practices in the United States (US) federal-state unemployment insurance (UI) system regarding applicant eligibility, benefit generosity, benefit financing and emergency measures with the aim of revealing lessons for a possible European unemployment benefit system (EUBS) for European Union (EU) Member States. We overview the US system for UI and examine important areas of federal leadership. While the US system offers some good ideas for setting up an EUBS, there are also lessons in some shortcomings of the US experience. We overview existing national UI systems in the EU and review the debate on an EUBS in the EU. We identify areas of risk for individual and institutional moral hazard in a multi-tiered UI system and give examples of monitoring methods and incentives to ameliorate such risks. We suggest approaches for gradual system development, encouraging lower-tier behaviour, benefit financing, and responses to regional and system-wide labour market crises.     

Social protection in the European Community: Towards a convergence of policies

Systems of social protection in the member states of the European Community differ not only in organization but also occasionally in their conception. Nevertheless, on closer examination this diversity proves to be less significant than it seems. Those systems have, moreover, a series of common problems to confront. Furthermore, the establishment of the single European market will entail a growing and varied mobility of persons and increase the need to move towards standardization of social protection levels. The Community therefore proposes to promote the convergence of member states'policies, while recognizing and respecting the diversity and autonomy of systems. The approach would be essentially flexible and multiform, and based on the principle of subsidiarity.     

Mobility,migration and rights in the European Union: critical reflections on policy and practice

This article assesses developments in European Union (EU) migration policy and practice and their implications for rights regulation in the Union, as revealed in this special issue and the wider literature. It identifies how rights are constituted in the complex and multivalent policy-making field of the EU. The article views rights as constituted in the process of migration governance. This governance analysis puts centre stage an assessment of the links between policy, policy-making and policy's social and political ordering effects. The article argues that the significance of the Union needs to be analysed against different aspects of rights regulation. The article adopts an analytical framework which discriminates between the discursive framing of migrants' rights, the specification of such rights in Union and member state policy, and the shaping of rights by actors in context at the local level. The article concludes that, first, the Union has begun to play a significant role in regulating mobility rights across its territory in ways which can undermine the substantive or normative rights accessible to migrants in practice. Second, its policy and legal role are politically significant as it asserts the role of the EU as a source of regulatory authority over the distribution of rights for citizens and non-citizens within its territory.     

Market potential, European Union and growth

The successive enlargements of the European Union have implied an important increase of the market where European firms can supply their products. In this paper we analyze the influence of this process on the economic growth of EU members by including the market potential as a scale indicator in a Solow-type model. The main results are: first, the integration in the EU, specially for new members, explain a substantial fraction of subsequent growth (between 15% and 40%); second, this effect diminishes over time; third, the GDP of new members appears to have a greater positive influence than its population; and fourth, peripheral countries and those less open to trade are in a worse position to appropriate such benefits.     

Social assistance and minimum income benefits in old and new EU democracies

Nelson K. Social assistance and minimum income benefits in old and new EU democracies Int J Soc Welfare 2010: 19: 367–378 © 2009 The Author, Journal compilation © 2009 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and the International Journal of Social Welfare. In this article, social assistance developments are analysed in a large number of European Union (EU) member states, including European transition countries and the new democracies of southern Europe. The empirical analysis is based on the unique and recently established SaMip Dataset, which provides social assistance benefit levels for 27 countries from 1990 to 2005. It is shown that social assistance benefits have had a less favourable development than that of unemployment provision. Hardly any of the investigated countries provide social assistance benefits above the EU near‐poverty threshold. Social assistance benefit levels have not converged in Europe. Instead, divergence can be observed, which is due mainly to lagging developments in eastern and southern Europe.     

The Deinstitutionalization of Children in Bulgaria – The Role of the EU

In this article, the role of the EU as a key factor for the development of the deinstitutionalization of children is explored. A series of hypotheses concerning EU funding, policies and politics are addressed with regards to how the EU as a whole has affected the deinstitutionalization of children. The article explains the presence of association between instigation of public interest and civil mobilization and the launch of a nationwide reform – in particular how advocacy both at national and EU level led to the adoption of a national reform strategy in Bulgaria. Further, the association between the availability of an innovative approach to spending the EU funds and the decision generally to reform the system for institutional care for children is presented. The article explains the difference that €107.6 million will make for Bulgaria's abandoned children if the European structural funds are realized with their full potential. On the other hand, it reveals the challenges that the process is facing. A great deal of non‐governmental organization (NGO) experience concerning EU involvement in the process has been generalized and construed in order to achieve the best possible understanding of the whole process, the key players and the fundamental issues.