Suchergebnisse

This book contains the proceedings of the Workshop "Political, fiscal and Banking Union in the Eurozone?" that was held at the European University Institute in Florence on 25 April 2013. ; The European University Institute (EUI) and the Wharton Financial Institutions Center (FIC, Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania) organised a conference entitled "Political, Fiscal and Banking Union in the Eurozone" at the EUI in Florence, Italy, on 25 April 2013. The event was financed by the Pierre Werner Chair Programme on Monetary Union and a Sloan Foundation grant to the FIC. The conference brought together leading economists, lawyers, political scientists and policy makers to assess the prospects and potential for, as well as obstacles to, the various forms and degrees of integration needed within the Eurozone in order to address the root causes of Europe's current malaise. The aim was for open discussion and debate on the relationships between these different levels of union. Was one type of union achievable without the other? Or would the intractable difficulties of achieving each level of union spill over to lessen the chances of the other ever being a likely practical possibility? ; -- The Contributors vii -- Acknowledgments xix -- PREFACE by Franklin Allen, Elena Carletti & Joanna Gray -- 1 In Spain, the Diabolic Loop is Alive and Well, Luis Garicano -- 2 The Danger of Building a Banking Union on a One-Legged Stool, Richard J. Herring -- 3 Banking Union in the Eurozone? A panel contribution, Jan Pieter Krahnen -- 4 European Banking Union: A Lawyer's Personal Perspective, Philip Wood -- 5 Establishing the Banking Union and repairing the Single Market, Andrea Enria -- 6 Banking Union instead of Fiscal Union? Daniel Gros -- 7 Managing Country Debts in the European Monetary Union: Stronger Rules or Stronger Union?, Robert P. Inman -- 8 No to a Transfer Union, yes to an Economic Justice Union, Mattias Kumm -- 9 Fiscal Union in the Eurozone?, Hélène Rey -- 10 The Evolution of Euro Area Sovereign Debt Contracts: A Preliminary Inquiry, Mitu Gulati -- 11 Political, Fiscal and Banking Union in the Eurozone, Edmond Alphandéry -- 12 The Eurozone Crisis, Institutional Change, and "Political Union", Peter L. Lindseth -- 13 The Crises in Which the Euro-Crisis Resides, Richard Parker -- 14 Speech to the European University Institute, Tony Barber -- POSTSCRIPT -- Monologic Thinking and the Eurozone Crisis, Patrick O'Callaghan -- Conference Program

Transnational social workers' (TSWs) mobility is evident across the globe; however, social work training, qualifications and activities vary widely even within areas of free labour mobility such as the European Economic Area (EEA). The UK continues relying on internationally qualified social workers to fill in shortages. A number of structural challenges exist in relation to the ability of social workers to cross borders; these are presented at different levels of hierarchies, including political, practice, regulatory structures and individual levels. This article seeks to conceptualise different elements of such hierarchies, drawing on two empirical research projects. The first relates to a pan-European data-gathering exercise in relation to regulation and qualification structure of social work in twenty-seven EEA countries and the second reflects the experience and perceptions of sixty-six non-UK-qualified social workers practising in the UK. The analysis suggests that a set of factors operating on the macro, meso and micro levels of hierarchies affects EEA and non-EEA TSWs differently. TSWs' experience is further influenced by the ability to transfer training and skills into the UK cultural context, which in turn is affected by individuals' abilities and structural workplace support.

The 25th anniversary of the Finnish-Soviet FCA-Treaty was celebrated with solemn ceremonies in April, 1973. Referring to the fact that this treaty has been misunderstood frequently in international discussions and, more recently, also in Finnish domestic debate, the author makes an effort to analyze the role the treaty plays in international politics. He notes that the first two articles of the treaty, 'the military articles', are precise and detailed, while the rest of the operative articles, referring to friendship and cooperation between the parties, are general in nature. This is natural since the treaty was designed specifically to provide military security in the situation of 1948. The author maintains that the military role of the FCA-Treaty has not lost its significance even now but that due to the tremendous changes in the European situation during the last 25 years the latter part of the treaty has assumed increasing importance in practice. Thus, while the text of the treaty remains unchanged and the whole treaty is revered by both parties, the operational center of gravity has moved, compared with the situation of 1948, more and more to the articles on friendship and cooperation.

OBJECTIVES: In recent years, new technologies and new approaches to scale up HIV testing have emerged. The objective of this paper was to synthesize the body of recent evidence on strategies aimed at increasing the uptake and coverage of HIV testing outside of health care settings in the European Union (EU)/European Economic Area (EEA). METHODS: Systematic searches to identify studies describing effective HIV testing interventions and barriers to testing were run in five databases (2010–2017) with no language restrictions; the grey literature was searched for similar unpublished studies (2014–2017). Study selection, data extraction and critical appraisal were performed by two independent reviewers following Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta‐Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. RESULTS: Eighty studies on HIV testing in non‐health care settings were identified, the majority set in Northern Europe. Testing was implemented in 65 studies, with men who have sex with men the risk group most often targeted. Testing coverage and positivity/reactivity rates varied widely by setting and population group. However, testing in community and outreach settings was effective at reaching people who had never previously been tested and acceptability of HIV testing, particularly rapid testing, outside of health care settings was found to be high. Other interventions aimed to increase HIV testing identified were: campaigns (n = 8), communication technologies (n = 2), education (n = 3) and community networking (n = 1). CONCLUSIONS: This review has identified several strategies with potential to achieve high HIV testing coverage outside of health care settings. However, the geographical spread of studies was limited, and few intervention studies reported before and after data, making it difficult to evaluate the impact of interventions on test coverage.

El envejecimiento de la población europea alcanza niveles alarmantes y continuará creciendo en las próximas décadas. Además, se observa una concentración espacial de la población mayor de sesenta y cinco años. Por ello se ha despertado la necesidad de articular estrategias, políticas y buenas prácticas destinadas, bien a reducir el ritmo de envejecimiento de ciertas zonas, atrayendo población joven, o bien a adaptar los entornos urbanos y rurales a su realidad demográfica y mejorar la calidad de vida de la población envejecida. Este trabajo propone una revisión panorámica de las experiencias más interesantes realizadas en distintos lugares de la Unión Europea. Las experiencias revisadas, pertenecientes en buena medida a regiones avanzadas del norte de Europa, se han estructurado en cuatro bloques: i) ciudades e infraestructuras para una población envejecida; ii) políticas y buenas prácticas dirigidas a personas de avanzada edad y adaptación al envejecimiento; iii) políticas para la atracción de familias jóvenes, y iv) políticas de dinamización económica. ; The aging population in Europe is reaching alarming ratios and is going to continue growing during the next decades. Furthermore, if we pay attention to the aging spatial distribution we observe a concentration of the older population in the peripheral regions. In this context, the development of strategies, policies and good practices becomes necessary in order to reduce the rate of aging of certain places, attracting young population, or adapting the urban or rural environments to the aging improving in this way, the quality of life of old population. This work proposes a panoramic revision of the most important experiences carried out with that objective in several places in the EU, mainly in northern regions of Europe. The reviewed experiences are organized in four groups: i) cities and infrastructures for the older population; ii) policies and good practices to adapt places to old population; iii) policies to attract young population and iv) policies to ...

Introduction: There is a lack of information regarding factors associated with successful smoking cessation on a population and European Union (EU)-wide level. Our study seeks to explore individual and country-level factors associated with abstinence after a recent smoking cessation attempt across the EU. Methods: We obtained data from the March 2017 Special Eurobarometer 87.1 (n=27901). Regression analysis was performed on a subset of 1472 individuals who made quit attempts in the past 12 months. Sociodemographic, policy and country-level factors were assessed using logistic regression among smokers and ex-smokers who attempted to quit approximately 12 months before the survey date. We defined and examined the Cessation Ratio (ratio of number of recent quitters to those who did not succeed) across 28 EU Member States. Results: In all, 14.9% (n=1018) of current smokers and 8.80% (n=454) of exsmokers attempted to quit in approximately the last 12 months (n=1472). Cessation Ratios ranged from 0.182 (95% CI: 0.045–0.319) in Estonia to 1.060 (95% CI: 0.262–1.860) in Sweden. There is a quadratic, U-shaped relationship between odds of quitting and smoking prevalence. The lowest odds of cessation were observed at a prevalence of 26.3%, with higher odds of cessation observed above and below this point. Respondents who reported financial difficulties were less likely to quit (AOR=0.66; 95% CI: 0.52–0.83). There was no association of likelihood of success with other sociodemographic factors or the Tobacco Control Scale treatment score. Conclusions: These findings highlight a need for exploring reasons behind the variation in likelihood of abstinence following a recent quit attempt, in order to design policies targeted at population groups or countries that need greater support.

Concluding this article, the importance of the rational discourse in modern classes and local forums in contemporary Central Asia should be mentioned again. The liberation of knowledge should be a permanent part of educational initiatives in this region, which is on its long journey from one party autocratic system to the democratic pluralistic one. During this transition some few things should be central. 1. All innovations on education, including the revising role of humanities should be based on the indigenous traditions and the long history of the region including Islamic, Jadid's tradition, but also soviet experiences in the last century (historically inherited German system). Furthermore, the modern international experiences on humanities should be not only superficially implemented from outside, but thoroughly integrated. The development of independent and creative thinking of the learners (students) should be always central for reform initiatives. 2. The revised concept of knowledge and cognitive system has to be based on new epistemology with broader perspective, including all the types of knowledge. These different types of knowledge include not just so called "rationalistic" one, which in fact often serves the interests of ruling classes, but also the experiences of all slices of societies, as well as the cross-civilization approaches, which open the way of dialog and communication with others. 3. It should be suggested to remove the dominating dichotomy type of thinking, escape Manichean dualistic concepts in order develop new bodies and research areas of humanities, based on pluralism (but not on secularism only). Communication and collaboration with the educational and research institutions of developed countries like EU and US would be essential for achievement of the desired goals and implementation of projects. During a conference on higher education in developing countries with focus on Muslim regions organised by the Institute for the Study of Muslim Civilization AKU ISMC in February - March 2005 in London one participant pointed out the importance of mentioning the indigenous Islamic educational heritage like memorization in Central Asian education. Regarding this remark, the questions arises, whether the memorization is the only real indigenous Islamic heritage in education. In this case what is the role of memorization in Muslim philosophy, arts, sciences, other creative professions? Was memorization essential for such Muslim scholars and encyclopaedists from the10th to the15th centuries like Avicenna, Abu Raikhan Biruni, Nasiriddin Tusi and Mirzo Ulughbek, artists like Kamaliddin Behzod or esoteric teachers such as Sufis like Jalaliddin Rumi etc.? Memorizing was not the only learning method in Muslim culture. According to his autobiography, Avicenna read Aristotle´s 'Metaphysics' time, but not only for the sake of memorization, but mostly to find its adequate meaning. Every time time, when he understood the meaning of this book with help of Abu Nasr Farabi´s comments, he celebrated this event by sending charity to the people in mosque. The memorization would be essential, if one accepts Islam only as religion, but not as culture and civilization. Of course, memorization has an important role in education, but only at the beginning, in elementary and secondary schools, but not at the universities. It is a useful tool for teaching and performing of religious rituals, for poetry and other humanities, as well as for medicine (for example, the formulation of the treatments in poetic form as in Urjuza fi-t-tib,Ibn Sina). Memorization in Muslim culture was the way to refer to the other sources, as scholars used to cite by memory, not by direct copying of the sources. It is well-known fact, that humanities have played an important role in Muslim civilisations (Goodman, 2003) and they had a strong impact on other cultures, especially, western European. Many scholars agree with the statement, that Muslim humanistic traditions was transformed by Europeans and served as one of the sources of humanism and renaissance. Recent scientific works on humanities have redefined the disciplinary organization of teaching and research and have introduced wider variety and new areas, such as gender or minoritie issues, studies of cultural diversities etc. However, many American scholars nowadays are worrying about the decline of humanistic research (Kernan, 1997) and about the shift of curriculum from university to "multiversity" and to "demoversity". It is necessary to analyse, rethink and spread the positive experiences of Jadids and AKHP, as well as to motivate and encourage humanities teachers for innovations. Central Asian scientists in humanities have wide field for new research area. There are so many unknown (unthought) slices of culture (formal, informal), which never have become the object of research because of the political correctness, ideology, religious, ethnics or gender superstitions. Central Asian universities need to develop new research programs in humanities, similar to the well-known works by Martha C. Nussbaum (2000, 2004), Peter N. Stearns (1993) and others in USA. However, these kinds of works depend on investments, which cannot be provided by the current central state budget due to corruption, turbulent financial crisis and economic stagnation. Regarding this issue, one should think about new projects for collaboration and integration with EU. The courses in humanities with new approaches in arts, literature, sociology, philosophy, religions, political sciences, research in gender, cultural, religious and minorities issues, as well as analysis of such human behaviour like disgust, shame or hatred are important for liberation of thinking process in order to develop new generation of leaders in the region. Only the modern values, based on indigenous roots can help to build new and good society. However, this should not be implemented artificially. Currently several educational programs organised by EU for Central Asian countries, like Tempus, Erasmus Mundus etc. are working in the region. Last years the majority of Central Asian countries joined Bologna-process of education. The dialog between higher education institutions is important and the communicative ethics (the notion of J. Habermas) play a central role in this exchange. More effective support in form of scholarships, research programs, training projects for teachers and the students will have a very positive influence on Central Asia with regard to the broader mutual understanding and democracy promotion.

Among the greatest contributions made by the European Union to Administrative Law is the development of the notion of Services of General Interest, as well as the normative, jurisprudential and doctrinal classification of Services of General Economic Interest to denote those services in network industries that were liberalized during the 90s. However, these developments left aside other services identified as Non-Economic Services of General Interest or Social Services of General Interest, which are subject to the application of the provisions of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, but whose definition, limits and financial backup is in the hands of the Member States. The economic crisis and the own evolution that the European Union has gone through compels to reconsider the nature of these non-economic services and the need of their modernization. This is the scope of the research directed by Professor de la Quadra, work that proposes a comprehensive review of this category of services and their fundamental mission as a mechanism for social cohesion. ; Entre los grandes aportes realizados por la Unión Europea al derecho administrativo encontramos la aparición de la categoría jurídica de servicios de interés general y el desarrollo normativo, doctrinal y jurisprudencial de la categoría de servicios económicos de interés general, término que comprende aquellas industrias en redes que fueron sometidas a procesos de liberalización y de aplicación de las reglas del derecho de la competencia desde los años noventa, dejando de lado a otro tipo de servicios denominados "servicios no económicos de interés general, o servicios públicos de solidaridad", que están sometidos a la aplicación de lo dispuesto en el Tratado de Funcionamiento de la Unión Europea, pero siendo competencia de cada uno de los Estados miembros su delimitación, alcance y financiación. La crisis económica y la evolución propia que ha sufrido a la Unión Europea trae consigo la necesidad de efectuar una relectura de la naturaleza de estos servicios, atendiendo a la modernización de los servicios sociales como uno de uno de los principales retos europeos actuales y la misión fundamental de ser un mecanismo de cohesión social. Todos estos aspectos son desarrollados en la obra que dirige el profesor De la Quadra, donde se pretende hacer una revisión integral de esta categoría de servicios.

Bu çalışma, Türkiye'de Avrupa Birliği müktesebatı ile uyumlu olacak devlet yardımları mevzuatının kabul edilmesi gerekliliğini ele almakta ve acil olarak devlet yardımları izleme ve denetleme kurumuna duyulan ihtiyacı ortaya koymaktadır. Ayrıca, bu çalışma, Türkiye ve Avrupa Birliği'ndeki devlet yardımları uygulamalarını izah etmeye çalışmakta ve bunlar arasındaki farklar üzerinde durmaktadır.Tez, başlıca altı bölüme ayrılmaktadır. Devlet yardımı tanımını, bunların çeşitlerini ve rekabet politikası ile uyumlarını anlatmaya başlamadan önce ilk bölümde teze kısa bir giriş yapılmaktadır. İkinci bölümde, devlet yardımlarına genel bir bakış açısı ile yaklaşılmakta ve devlet yardımları rekabet politikası ile uyumlaştırılmaktadır. Üçüncü bölümde, Avrupa Birliği'ndeki devlet yardımlarının çeşitleri incelenip değerlendirilirken, Avrupa Birliği'nin devlet yardımları politikası izah edilmektedir. Buna ek olarak, devlet yardımlarının bildirimine ilişkin mevzuat, devlet yardımlarının denetlenmesi ve ilgili diğer konular üzerinde durulmaktadır. Dördüncü bölümde ise, Türkiye'nin teşvik mevzuatı, mevcut devlet yardımları sistemi ele alınmakta ve ayrıca Ortaklık Konseyi Kararı ve Ulusal Program çerçevesinde Türkiye'nin taahhüt ettiği yükümlülükleri ve Türkiye'deki uygulamaların Gümrük Birliği'nin işleyişi ile bağdaşıp bağdaşmayı anlatılmaktadır. En son olarak, beşinci bölümde, devlet yardımları politikasına ilişkin Avrupa Birliği'nde yaşanan son gelişmeler ve bunların Türk teşvik sistemi ile kıyaslaması yapılmakta ve Avrupa Birliği'ne üyelik yolunda Türkiye'nin yapması gereken değişiklikler ve yenilikler ele alınmaktadır.Sonuç olarak, tezimin yazılmasındaki amaç, Avrupa Birliği'nin devlet yardımları politikasının ve devlet yardımlarının denetlenip izlenmesine ilişkin sistemin daha iyi anlaşılmasını sağlamak ve bununla birlikte de Türkiye'nin Avrupa Birliği müktesebatına uyum sürecinde Türkiye'deki devlet yardımları politikasını izah etmektir. Sonuçta, yukarıda belirtilen hususlarla ilgili olarak gerekli bazı açıklamalar yapıldıktan sonra, Türkiye'nin Avrupa Birliği kurallarını benimsemesi ve devlet yardımlarına ilişkin bağımsız bir otorite kurması yolundaki çalışmalarının, bazı eksikler olsa da, doğru bir şekilde ilerlediği gösterilmeye çalışılmaktadır. This study basically emphasizes the urgent need of approving state aid legislation in Turkey which must be compatible with the EU acquis and need of establishment of an independent state aid monitoring and controlling authority. It also focuses on the state aid implementation both in Turkey and EU and comparison between them.My thesis can be separated into six chapters. Before starting to define state aid and determine types of it and mention its consistency with the competition policy, in the first chapter a short introduction has been done. Second chapter is focused on general view of state aids and its relation with the competition. In the third chapter, EU's approach to the state aid policy is explained while considering all types of state aids. In addition, procedural legislation, control of state aids and some other relevant issues are pointed out. In the fourth chapter, Turkey's incentive policy, current state aid system, Turkey's obligations under the Association Council Decision and National Program, and its compatibility with the well-functioning of Customs Union is examined. Finally, by the fifth chapter, recent developments in EU's state aid policy and its comparison with the Turkish incentive system is explained and it is tried to put forward the necessary amendments and modifications will be made in the Turkish legislation towards the membership to the EU.As a result, my thesis aims to gain better understanding of EU's state aid policy and its approach of controlling and monitoring state aids. It is also tried to be understood Turkish state aid policy during the harmonization process. Consequently, after making some explanations in the aforementioned issues, this study shows that Turkey, with a few absent issues, is on the right track in order to adopt its legislation with the EU rules and establish an independent authority for controlling.