Suchergebnisse

International audience ; In this study, we reexamine the pollution haven hypothesis by a fresh take on both its theoretical and empirical aspects. The originality of our work is twofold. First, we apply an economic geography model with the aim of deriving a rigorous specification for the impact of environmental regulation on firms' location choice. Second, we test a conditional logit model using French firm-level data in an international comparative study. We confirm evidence of a strong pollution haven effect for our pooled sample of countries receiving French direct investments. However, through a sensitivity analysis, we validate this finding for developed countries and most of emerging economies and Central and Eastern European countries, but not for most Commonwealth of Independent States and developing countries, where a more stringent environmental regulation seems to attract investments. Furthermore, we highlight a forward looking behavior of firms, in terms of when deciding to locate in a country.

'In der westlichen Öffentlichkeit gelten islamistische Parteien als Hindernis für eine Demokratisierung im arabischen Raum. Diese Sichtweise wird jedoch durch eine Analyse der Entwicklung jener arabischen Staaten relativiert, die islamistischen Parteien Gelegenheit zur politischen Teilhabe geben. Diese Studie vergleicht staatliche Strategien der Einbindung und Unterdrückung von Islamisten in Algerien, Marokko und Tunesien. Dabei stehen zwei Fragen im Vordergrund: Wie haben sich diese Strategien auf die islamistischen Akteure und deren Agenden ausgewirkt und was bedeuten sie für die von der EU im Rahmen des Barcelonaprozesses und der Europäischen Nachbarschaftspolitik verfolgte Stabilitäts- und Reformpolitik? Die Bilanz der unterschiedlichen Strategien legt nahe, dass die Unterdrückung von Islamisten, wie sie in Tunesien praktiziert wird, den Weg zu profunden politischen Reformen verbaut. Umgekehrt hat die Einbindung von Islamisten, die sich demokratischen Regeln unterwerfen, in Algerien und Marokko in der zweiten Hälfte der 1990er Jahre zu pluralistischeren, repräsentativeren und kompetitiveren Systemen geführt. Zudem sind die Islamisten durch ihre Einbindung kompromissbereiter und pragmatischer geworden. In Algerien hat diese Einbindung stabilisierend, in Marokko nicht merklich destabilisierend gewirkt. Paradoxerweise decken sich die Interessen der EU in wichtigen Politikfeldern - etwa Verfassungs-, Wahlrechts- und Wirtschaftsreformen oder Korruptionsbekämpfung - heute stärker mit denen der Islamisten als mit denen von Teilen der herrschenden Eliten. Eine breite Partizipation von Islamisten, die sich demokratischen Regeln unterwerfen, ist folglich - hinsichtlich der im Barcelonaprozess und in der europäischen Nachbarschaftspolitik verankerte Reformagenda für die Region - im europäischen Interesse.' (Autorenreferat)

SINCE 1952, THAT IS SINCE THE SETTING UP OF THE FIRST European Community for Coal and Steel, there have been two views of European integration: the first regards and continues to regard European integration as the removal of state powers from the national administrations in specific sectors. This deliberately restrictive approach, with its overriding concern for efficiency, considers it is enough to limit the activities of national bureaucracies at European level. The view is that to a large extent one can do without the control and safeguard mechanisms which are usually built into the exercise of state power in all our member states. One eminent proponent of this view, Professor Ispen, an expert on German cotstitutional and European law, has described this form of integration, and the European Community it has produced, as an ad hoc association.The second view is also based on removing the exercise of state power from the national administrations in certain restricted areas. However it is not satisfied with a technocratic and bureaucratic approach but is concerned to preserve hard-won rights in the area of the control and exercise of sovereignty. I am of course thinking here first of all of the democratic element. Those who belong to this school of thought can cite the text of the Treaties establishing the European Communities in support of their view: the Preamble to the ECSC Treaty refers to '… the basis for a broader and deeper Community among peoples …'. The Preamble to the EEC Treaty speaks of laying 'the foundations for an ever-closer union among the peoples of Europe'.

The topics covered in this volume range from classics of the on-going discussion on the economic analysis of international law - such as the issue of legitimacy of customary international law - to more recent topics such as internet privacy, private military contractors, the fight against piracy, the International Criminal Court and the highly topical issue of land grabbing

This book analyzes the shifting global economic architecture, indicating the decentralizing authority in global economic governance since the Cold War and, especially, following the 2008-09 global financial crisis. The author examines recent adjustments to the organizational framework, contestation of policy principles, norms, and practices, and destabilizing actor hierarchies, particularly in global macroeconomic, trade, and development governance. The study's 'analytical eclecticism' includes a core constructivist IR approach, but also incorporates insights from several international relations theories as well as political and economic theory. The book develops a unique 'analytical matrix', which analyzes effects of strategic, political, and cognitive authority in the organizational, policy, and actor contexts of the global economic architecture. It concludes that, despite concerns about potential fragmentation, decentralizing authority has increased the integration of leading developing states and new actors in contemporary global economic governance. Jonathan Luckhurst is Associate Professor of International Relations at the Center for North American Studies of the Pacific Studies Department, University of Guadalajara, Mexico.

This paper analyzes recent free trade arrangements from a positive political economy perspective. In contrast to most other literature, which fails to take into account geographical factors, it is argued here that proximity and transportation costs play an important role in trade arrangements. Another important also largely neglected factor is the degree of social cohesion in terms of labor standards among potential trading partners. Accepting social integration might also be a condition for admitting those countries to the agreement. Changes of trade policy over time can therefore be explained by changes in the relative political influence of the sectors considered. The other important factors are, of course, a change in the degree of retaliation, leading to lower tariffs under higher retaliation, and a leveling of social standards. Redistribution across countries could also considerably change the optimal rate of tariff. The EU with its regional cohesion funds might be a good example of how those are used as a side-payment for diminishing the social divergence in the member countries. Countries with higher standards should only be willing to integrate when others raise their social standards as well. The negotiations about the social protocol in the EU indicate that this is in fact the case. More than 40 years of European integration have led to an habituation of thinking of the European Community as something ideologically neutral, which transcends normal political debate. European issues, it seems, do not fit the structure of the usual right-left ideological controversy. The only open fault-line in European politics is between advocates of "more" and those of "less" integration. The paper explores the potential cognitive and political gains of a change of perspective. It argues that the issue of more or less integration is often not interesting in itself but only to the degree that it influences the content of policies. It further shows that the policies at stake are normally such, that they can be usefully debated in the right-left framework. The decision about the site of policy control - national or European - is often only the guise in which a decision about the redrawing of the boundary between market and state, between the sphere of competitive allocation and the sphere of political coordination, materializes. This paper aimed at stressing the fundamental differences between conventional and contractarian constitutional orders. To achieve it, we have used the concept of common knowledge and have related it to its political philosophy background, especially with regard to communication and induction. The former generates a spontaneous social order - it is an evolutionist view that belongs to the Hume - Menger - Hayek tradition. The latter produces a contractarian vision shared by the Brennan-Buchanan-Tullock tradition. We consider here a basic distinction between institutions and conventions. An institution is considered as a formal, explicit rule, while a convention appears to be a tacit, implicit agreement. The former can be associated with contractarian constitutionalism, whereas the latter is related to evolutionism. In this context, institutions should not be understood as formalized conventions (such as law in Hayek). They are rather the expression of a voluntary and deliberate agreement, of a covenant. The application describes features relevant to the development of a European constitution and the corresponding unified legal system. It requires a clear vision of what a European "state" is meant to be or become. Then, once a constitutional setting is chosen, one must address the question of legal organization, in particular the nature of administrative law. Two different acceptation of law are thus associated with the two concepts of convention and contractarian institution. The former can be regarded as customary rule a kind of common knowledge that emerges from tradition and sympathy. By contrast, the latter is the place of explicitly created common knowledge. If it is to become more integrated, Europe will have to tackle this constitutional question, either in an evolutionary or in a contractarian way.