Socio-economic conditions of refugees' settlement in Bulgaria in the 1920s.The influx of immigrants into Bulgaria during the first two decades of 20th century was aresult of the two lost armed conflicts and border shifts between 1913 and 1918. These changesin turn resulted in disruption of the socio-political and economic situation within the country.The government was unable to efficiently overcome the consequences of high immigration,which aggravated the already present social and economic difficulties and threatened the internal stability of the state. On the other hand, in spite of the grave political and economiccrisis, certain measures were undertaken to counter the negative tendencies, with state supportfor the agricultural settlement. The partial success of the above was possible due to theagriculture reform introduced in 1924 and financial credits from abroad (1926, 1928). Theoutcome was sufficient for the Bulgarian government to deem the settlement action a success, an enhancement of the country's internal stability and appeasement of the general public. Nevertheless, a number of pressing issues remained, resulting mostly from a lack of systemic support to the immigrants and their families. The refugee integration process was hindered bythe lack of a secure economic foundation and the differences among the particular socialgroups. ; The influx of immigrants into Bulgaria during the first two decades of 20th century was aresult of the two lost armed conflicts and border shifts between 1913 and 1918. These changesin turn resulted in disruption of the socio-political and economic situation within the country.The government was unable to efficiently overcome the consequences of high immigration,which aggravated the already present social and economic difficulties and threatened the internal stability of the state. On the other hand, in spite of the grave political and economiccrisis, certain measures were undertaken to counter the negative tendencies, with state supportfor the agricultural settlement. The partial success of the above was possible due to theagriculture reform introduced in 1924 and financial credits from abroad (1926, 1928). Theoutcome was sufficient for the Bulgarian government to deem the settlement action a success, an enhancement of the country's internal stability and appeasement of the general public. Nevertheless, a number of pressing issues remained, resulting mostly from a lack of systemic support to the immigrants and their families. The refugee integration process was hindered bythe lack of a secure economic foundation and the differences among the particular socialgroups.
Delegitimization of the political system could be a strong factor leading to disruptions of the social and political order, including political violence. In order to measure the potential of this phenomenon an original measurement tool was created. The tool is based on the concept of ideal types and empirical types introduced by Max Weber and Georg Jellinek. Quantitative empirical data was provided by the Polish General Election Study (2011). Using this data, analyses of intergroup differences of selected sociodemographic and psychographic variables were carried out. The following groups emerged from the analyses: legitimizing the political system, ambivalent towards the political system, delegitimizing the political system (completely or incompletely), and several groups of moderate potential to delegitimize (for instance people rejecting democracy, but expressing satisfaction with the institutional aspects of its functioning in political practice). The gathered results confirm a moderate but noticeable potential for delegitimization of the Polish democracy; several extracted social categories may be a potential threat to internal security.
Delegitimization of the political system could be a strong factor leading to disruptions of the social and political order, including political violence. In order to measure the potential of this phenomenon an original measurement tool was created. The tool is based on the concept of ideal types and empirical types introduced by Max Weber and Georg Jellinek. Quantitative empirical data was provided by the Polish General Election Study (2011). Using this data, analyses of intergroup differences of selected sociodemographic and psychographic variables were carried out. The following groups emerged from the analyses: legitimizing the political system, ambivalent towards the political system, delegitimizing the political system (completely or incompletely), and several groups of moderate potential to delegitimize (for instance people rejecting democracy, but expressing satisfaction with the institutional aspects of its functioning in political practice). The gathered results confirm a moderate but noticeable potential for delegitimization of the Polish democracy; several extracted social categories may be a potential threat to internal security.
The uncontrollable outbreak of piracy attacks off the Somali coast has lately made the East African coast the area where the majority of all global maritime crimes occur. Located in East Africa, Somalia borders one of the most important maritime communication routes on Earth: the Suez Canal – the Red Sea – the Gulf of Aden. EU states could be acutely affected by the disruption of sea trade in this area, therefore they have become actively involved in fighting piracy off the Somali coast. As a result of political, organizational and legal activity, the Council of the EU established the first maritime military operation under the auspices of the European Union – EUNAVFOR Somalia – Operation Atalanta. The efficient operation of EU naval forces, hundreds of miles from European shores would not have been possible had it not been for an extensive and comprehensive maritime policy. Not only has its implementation enabled the EU to chase pirates in the Somali basin, or helped bring any criminals detained before the courts, but is has also influenced countries outside the European Union.
The uncontrollable outbreak of piracy attacks off the Somali coast has lately made the East African coast the area where the majority of all global maritime crimes occur. Located in East Africa, Somalia borders one of the most important maritime communication routes on Earth: the Suez Canal – the Red Sea – the Gulf of Aden. EU states could be acutely affected by the disruption of sea trade in this area, therefore they have become actively involved in fighting piracy off the Somali coast. As a result of political, organizational and legal activity, the Council of the EU established the first maritime military operation under the auspices of the European Union – EUNAVFOR Somalia – Operation Atalanta. The efficient operation of EU naval forces, hundreds of miles from European shores would not have been possible had it not been for an extensive and comprehensive maritime policy. Not only has its implementation enabled the EU to chase pirates in the Somali basin, or helped bring any criminals detained before the courts, but is has also influenced countries outside the European Union.
Ensuring security in the civil aviation sector is a priority activity for many aviation organizations. This is confirmed by numerous documents regulating civil aviation security problems, issued not only at the level of national and EU law, but also in conventions of international scope. The risk of security disruption in civil aviation is enormous because there are many risks that can contribute to the loss of security. There are attempts to counteract them, however, if they are be effective, it is necessary to be aware of the dangers and their potential consequences. They may have a military, non-military background, or come from an internal or external environment of a given aviation organization. Various possible threats originating from these sources have been presented and described in the article. ; Zapewnienie bezpieczeństwa w sektorze lotnictwa cywilnego jest priorytetowym działaniem wielu organizacji lotniczych. Potwierdzeniem tego są liczne dokumenty regulujące kwestie ochrony lotnictwa cywilnego, wydane nie tylko na szczeblu prawa krajowego i unijnego, ale również w konwencjach o zasięgu międzynarodowym. Ryzyko zaburzenia bezpieczeństwa w lotnictwie cywilnym jest ogromne, ponieważ istnieje wiele zagrożeń, które mogą przyczynić się do jego utracenia. Dąży się do przeciwdziałania im, jednak aby były one skuteczne niezbędna jest świadomość istnienia zagrożeń i ich potencjalnych skutków. Mogą one posiadać podłoże militarne, nie militarne, bądź też pochodzić z otoczenia wewnętrznego lub zewnętrznego danej organizacji lotniczej. Różne możliwe zagrożenia pochodzące właśnie z tych źródeł, zostały przedstawione i opisane w tym opracowaniu.
Yersinia pestis (formerly Pasteurella pestis) is a type of bacterium. It is believed to have been responsible for plagues of the early 1300s. More accurately, it is a Gram-negative rod-shaped coccobacillus. It is a facultative anaerobe that can infect humans and other animals. Human Y. pestis infection takes three main forms: pneumonic, septicemic, and bubonic plagues. All three forms are widely believed to have been responsible for a number of high-mortality epidemics throughout human history, including the Justinianic Plague of the sixth century and the Black Death that accounted for the death of at least one-third of the European population between 1347 and 1353. It has now been shown conclusively that these plagues originated in rodent populations in China. More recently, Y. pestis has gained attention as a possible biological warfare agent and the CDC has classified it as a category A pathogen requiring preparation for a possible terrorist attack. Every year, thousands of cases of plague are still reported to the World Health Organization, although, with proper treatment, the prognosis for victims is now much better. A five- to six-fold increase in cases occurred in Asia during the time of the Vietnam war, possibly due to the disruption of ecosystems and closer proximity between people and animals. Plague also has a detrimental effect on non-human mammals. In the United States of America, animals such as the black-tailed prairie dog and the endangered black-footed ferret are under threat from the disease.
Starting from 18 October 2018, public procurement procedures with a value equal to and exceeding the amounts specified in the secondary legislation issued pursuant to Article 11 (8) of the Public Procurement Law (i.e. above the so-called EU thresholds) are covered by the obligation of full electronic communication between the contracting authority and economic operators. Currently, a tender (or an application to participate in the procedure) in a procedure above the EU thresholds, to be valid, must be submitted only in electronic form (and not in paper form) and signed with a qualified electronic signature. The new legal situation resulted in the need to employ, both by economic operators and contracting authorities, new IT tools allowing them to achieve compliance in this regard. Meanwhile, many economic operators, especially medium and small ones, have not had sufficient IT infrastructure (especially software) as well as sufficient knowledge of the ways and methods of electronic preparation and implementation of public procurement processes. A provisional way to implement new solutions is to provide the miniPortal for e-Procurement, which allows for the safe submission of a tender or application for participation in proceedings and statements, including a European Single Procurement Document compliant with the requirements laid down in both the EU law and national law. However, this tool poses many technical problems, causing a number of disruptions in the public procurement process. The publication contains information stemming from the author's and other practitioners' direct observation of the communication between parties in the public procurement process. ; Począwszy od 18 października 2018 r. w postępowaniach o zamówienie publiczne o wartości równej i przekraczającej kwoty określone w przepisach wykonawczych, wydawanych na podstawie art. 11 ust. 8 Prawa zamówień publicznych (czyli powyżej tzw. progów unijnych), obowiązuje pełna elektroniczna komunikacja pomiędzy zamawiającym a wykonawcami. Obecnie ofertę (lub wniosek o dopuszczenie do udziału w postępowaniu) w postępowaniu o wartości powyżej progów unijnych składa się, pod rygorem nieważności, wyłącznie w postaci elektronicznej (a nie papierowej) i opatruje kwalifikowanym podpisem elektronicznym. Nowy stan prawny spowodował konieczność skorzystania przez wykonawców, lecz także zamawiających, z nowych narzędzi informatycznych umożliwiających spełnienie wymogów w tym zakresie. Tymczasem wielu wykonawców, zwłaszcza tych średnich i małych, nie posiadało i nadal nie posiada dostatecznej infrastruktury informatycznej (zwłaszcza oprogramowania) oraz wystarczającej wiedzy o sposobach i metodach elektronicznego przygotowania i realizacji zamówień publicznych. Doraźnym sposobem służącym wdrożeniu nowych rozwiązań jest udostępnienie miniPortalu e-Zamówień, pozwalającego na bezpieczne złożenie oferty lub wniosku o dopuszczenie do udziału w postępowaniu oraz oświadczeń (w tym jednolitego europejskiego dokumentu zamówienia) zgodnych z wymogami przewidzianymi w prawie zarówno unijnym, jak i krajowym. Narzędzie to sprawia jednak wiele problemów natury technicznej, co powoduje szereg perturbacji w procesie zamówień publicznych. Niniejsze opracowanie zawiera informacje wynikające z bezpośredniej obserwacji komunikowania się stron w zamówieniach publicznych dokonanej przez autora oraz innych praktyków w tej dziedzinie.
The book contains a thorough analysis of the European Union institutional system as a specific, sui generis international organisation, in the context of its legitimization (its validity and legitimacy). The book is mainly theoretical. Primarily, the author aims at presenting a reliable depiction of the EU institutional system legitimization through the prism of the theoretical output concerning legitimization of the political power, including and accentuating the indicated specificity of the EU as a distinct international organisation. Secondly, he took into consideration the changes introduced into the legal foundations of the EU functioning, pursuant to the Lisbon Treaty – the latest treaty reforming the structures of the Union. In the context of the main theme of the present study, these changes are important not only in terms of the EU institutions themselves, i.e. their competences and reciprocal relations, but also with regard to the fundamental change of the legal character of the EU, and the alterations introduced into the individual Union politics. Thirdly, the author attempts to present the problem of the EU institutional system legitimization in the special circumstances, i.e. in the situation of the most profound economic crisis that the EU members have faced since the beginning of the integration process. The EU is regarded as a specific structure, being neither a state nor a typical international organisation. Such an approach was the starting point for the main premise of the present book – the idea that the thesis about the deficiency of democracy in the EU, formulated in the literature on the subject and in the public debate, is a certain simplification, and the characteristic features of the EU and its institutions, which provoked the formulation of such a thesis, should be considered in a broader context, such as the problem of the EU institutional system legitimization and, alternatively, the deficiency of that legitimization. For the direct democratic legitimization is only one of many sources of legitimacy of the EU institutional system and of the Union as a specific international organisation in general – an extremely important source, perhaps the most important, yet not the only one. Thus, the legitimization of the EU and its institutions should be analysed in a broader perspective, which also includes other sources of legitimization – as it is done in case of every political power which, striving for its legitimization to be as strong as possible, attempts to derive it from the largest number of sources. According to the author of the book, to base the EU institutional system legitimization only on the grounds of the direct democratic legitimization characteristic of a democratic state, would be tantamount to a certain disruption of the right order. It would rather be a symptom of too advanced an integration on the "institutional" level in comparison to the extent of the "material" integration. Until the EU is a structure sui generis, in which case it is a combination of features characteristic of an intergovernmental, international organisation, a supranational organisation or a state, the nature of legitimization of this structure should also be specific. The most important role should be played by the democratic legitimization, which should be completed with other sources, owing to which the functioning of the EU institutional system, and the whole EU, could be recognised as legally valid. Apart from the main thesis also other theses and hypotheses are posed in the book. The first chapter is a certain theoretical introduction and a basis to the deliberations presented in the further parts of this study. In the first subsection, with reference to the literature on the subject, the problem of legitimization (legitimacy) of the political power, i.e. the concept, classifications and sources of legitimization (legitimacy) of the political power, have been synthetically depicted. In another part of chapter one, the author attempts to relate the problem of legitimization to the EU as a specific international organisation and to formulate his own definition of legitimization deficiency with regard to EU institutional system. Bearing in mind that the problem of legitimization deficiency in the EU (EC) has not been discussed on a larger scale until certain stage of development of integration process was reached, in 1.3. subsection, the author raises some questions concerning: the sufficiency of legitimization of the integration process during the first few decades after the Second World War, the grounds for that legitimization and the reasons why, at a certain stage of the EU (EC) development the legitimization of the Union's institutional system started to be considered insufficient, which was manifested in the opinions acknowledging the democracy and legitimization deficiency. The first chapter ends with a passage devoted to the importance of the EU institutional system legitimization, whereas the significance of legitimization to the political power and political institutions in general, consitutes its reference point. The second chapter (subsections 2.3.–2.8.) presents a synthesis of the evolution of the EU (EC) institutional system in the context of its legitimization, from the moment of the EC founding treaties ratification, till the time the changes pursuant to the Lisbon Treaty were introduced. The author focused here mainly on the competences of the particular EC (EU) institutions and their reciprocal relations, which should make it possible to observe two main tendencies in the dynamics of changes taking place in this field, and present its specificity and distinctiveness in comparison to the systems of democratic states. At the beginning of this chapter, a thesis has been formulated (simultaneously, becoming an extension of the attempt to determine why, at a certain stage of the integration process, the issue of democracy/legitimization deficiency started to be discussed – a question that was raised in the first chapter), which states that the legitimization of the EU institutional system will be sufficient, if the law regulations and political practice of their functioning are convergent with the level of advancement of the integration process in various spheres of social life; in other words, the "institutional" integration should correspond with the "material" integration (that is the Union politics). To that end, the author made an attempt to present, in a synthetized form, the development of the "material" integration (subsection 2.1.), which he completed with an analogical endeavour to illustrate the evolution of the EU (EC) institutional system in the context of its legitimization (subsection 2.9). For in accordance with the increasingly common approach, the EU institutions are treated as a system, the concept and principles of which have been presented in 2.2. subsection. In the third chapter, the author presents the EU institutional system in its current form, that is with the changes introduced under the Lisbon Treaty. Here, the selected aspects regarding competences and functioning of the particular EU institutions have been depicted, as well as the relations between them in the context of legitimization. Additionally, three selected problems regarding the EU institutional system have been raised, which are especially important in the context of its legitimization (the relation between the EU institutional system and the institutions of the EU member states, the question of transparency in the functioning of the EU institutions, as well as the Union budgets in the consecutive years). In the last subsection (3.9.) the specific features of the EU institutional system, significant in the context of its legitimization, have been identified. The fourth chapter is devoted to the functioning of the EU institutional system in the perspective of four basic sources of its legitimization, i.e. indirect and technocratic, direct and democratic, utilitarian, and one consisting of "values". The chapter ends with a conclusion outlining the specificity of the EU and its institutional system with regard to the sources of its legitimization, which is especially important in the context of the book's main thesis. The fifth chapter concerns the problem of legitimization of the EU institutions in the context of the economic crisis, which the EU member states struggle with since around the year 2008. The sixth chapter, in turn, regards the so called subjective (empirical, social) dimension of the EU institutions' legitimization, that is, the way this problem is perceived by the citizens of the EU member states. It has been based on the results of opinion polls conducted for the use of Eurobarometer, from among which these questions and answers were selected, which could be applied to illustrate the way the EU citizens perceive the Union institutions in the context of their legitimization. The closing remarks include the most important conclusions drawn from the conducted analyses and the potential reforms and modifications of the EU institutional system, which may allow for the reinforcement of its legitimization, primarily in its democratic aspect. The bibliography contains a list of sources which were cited and referred to in the book.
