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Switzerland's major contribution to the shaping of neutrality as an institution of international law lies in its centuries-old practice & its international recognition. However, Swiss neutrality still conforms to the classical military/political conflict, since in the past, it proved to be a successful security/political instrument in the protection of independence & territorial integrity. In the contemporary international/global constellation, there is almost no room for a neutral stance due to the global interdependence within the international community & the collective security, on the one hand, & the new threats & dangers lacking a classical military dimension, on the other. All this is conducive to the solidarity & cooperation whose purpose is protection, which requires international security/political efforts in securing peace. The Swiss government is of the opinion that participation in a collective security system such as the UN does not run counter to its permanent neutrality, since the UN Charter forbids war & does not recognize it as a means of the international regulation of conflicts. Also, the UN Charter does not oblige member countries to participate in any coercive military measure. Finally, by the admittance of the permanently neutral Austria into the UN, the practice has proved that neutrality & the collective security are compatible. On several occasions, the Swiss have raised the issue of UN membership; in the 1986 referendum, the Swiss citizens voted against this proposal, while on 3 Mar 2000, they voted in favor of it; the only other country besides Switzerland not in the UN is the Vatican. 32 References. Adapted from the source document.

In this text the author deals with the analysis of the fundamental legal texts regulating local self-government & administration in the Republic of Croatia & to what extent they are 'the fall guys' to be blamed for the state the systems of local self-government & administration are in. He concludes that these laws are a major generator (though not the only one) of the crisis of local self-government & administration in the Republic of Croatia. 16 References. Adapted from the source document.

The author criticizes the universalism of democracy as a world model. He argues that WWI has been insufficiently explored from the perspective of the clash of two democratic concepts. The outcome of that war heralded the long-term victory of the Franco-American universalist concept of democracy over the traditional British concept of democracy. This has greatly influenced the political & philosophical understanding of democracy as the universalist elements of democratic constitutions have prevailed, while awareness of the historically evolved institutions of democracy has been suppressed. The author shows that the emergence of fundamental rights had nothing to do with their universalist natural-law version, since in England & Germany, there were pre-forms rooted in the specific legal traditions of those countries or regions. Since the creation of a world democratic state is not feasible, there is no genuine significance of the universalist democracy. In his conclusion, the author promotes the acceptance of the traditional concept of democracy modeled after British democracy, which would strengthen the UN & international law. This would be particularly important in today's circumstances & conducive to the acknowledgment of various traditions &, consequently, to a variety of systems of government. Adapted from the source document.

The author looks into the notion of the rule of law from the functional/logical, & not historical standpoint: he starts from the hypothesis that there is the functional logic of managing social behavior & social developments by means of legal norms. This logic, with some preconditions, creates certain institutions. The recognition of members of a society as free & equal is the fundamental assumption. It means that government agencies have the right of independent action but are at the same time also disempowered. This requires the quality of laws to be evaluated on the basis of rationality & normativity. The second part of the text lists the institutional conditions for the rule of law: division of power, legal restrictions of all government institutions & independent judiciary. A guarantee of basic right must be included in these functional elements. The author thinks that our future is to be marked by social pluralization, the need for security & the concurrent processes of globalization, & individualization. These processes are surely going to affect the institutions of the state of law. 43 References. Adapted from the source document.

The author's starting assumption is that globalization institutionalizes new forms of governance, but that this does not diminish the significance of the national state. On the contrary, globalization forces the advanced industrial societies to find a new balance between calls for economic efficacy & expectations regarding social security. On the other hand, national states have avoided the impact of globalization primarily owing to the (1) institutional acclimatizing reserve of modern democracies, (2) development & application of new political governing instruments, & (3) intelligent usage of international cooperational pressures in favor of national political innovations. However, all this does not mean that the national state has gone through globalization unscathed. A new architecture of political governance has emerged, called by the author the transnational regimes of politics. They include, besides national states, international organizations such as the WTO, regional integrations (EU, NAFTA), as well as a variety of national & transnational interest groups & movements. The author concludes that the efficacy of the new forms of governance must not be overrated. Also, the basic problem today is the expansion of the areas lacking functional markets, successful national states, or global forms of governance. 45 References. Adapted from the source document.

Using The White Paper (by which the EU has been trying to help the CEEC countries to bring their legislative activities in line with the EU regulation), the author looks into the regulation of genetically modified (GM) products & the ways in which risks from GM products can be minimized. The essay includes a review of the existing regulations & an analysis of the changes in the political & economic circumstances that require the corresponding changes in the existing by-laws. The prime movers in the arena in which the GM products policy is designed are scattered intercontinentally: the multinational corporations of the US agro-industrial complex, the individual farmers & their associations on both sides of the Atlantic, & the European agro-industrial businesses & governments. The disagreement among these protagonists was made apparent during the process preceding the adoption of the Protocol on Bio-Security, envisaged as the framework for the new regulation. The communique of the EU Commission as a sequel to the Cartagena Protocol on Bio-Security illustrates the EU's approach to the application of the caution principle, which is particularly appropriate in the situations in which science is not able to take in all the risks connected with the GM products. The process of the modification of the EU regulation on GM products is an indication of the complexity of the interests involved. This is the reason the process has not been completed. However, this does not justify the delay in the launching of this process in Croatia, which could use the regulation of other countries, briefly summarized at the end of the essay. Adapted from the source document.

The author outlines constitutional & legal provisions regulating the rights of ethnic minorities in the Republic of Croatia as well as the site-based policy of the protection of minority rights. The major areas in which the Croatian government has been supporting the activities of minority group organizations are publishing, cultural societies, libraries, minority curricula, preservation of the minority cultural heritage, & research projects. Between 1992 & 1997, the government earmarked 22 million DEM for minorities' activities. The author concludes that ethnic minorities in Croatia, despite some political & economic hardships, have enjoyed a high degree of minority rights & freedoms. Adapted from the source document.

In the wake of the end of the Cold War, NATO has pursued the promotion of peace & stability on the European continent by: (1) creating the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council (EAPC) in 1997, (2) launching the Partnership for Peace (PfP) program in Brussels in 1994, (3) entering into cooperation treaties with Russia & the Ukraine, & (4) pursuing a "Mediterranean Dialog." The PfP program is presented in more detail, outlining its objectives & mentioning the intentions of the Defense Capabilities Initiative & Membership Action Plan, among others. Croatia's membership in PfP is addressed, clarifying what this program is not (eg, it is not a security organization or a waiting room for membership in NATO) & cautioning the government against neglecting other security policies & arrangement on behalf of PfP. Z. Dubiel

Created in 1994, the Partnership for Peace (PfP) is an ambitious initiative launched by NATO to promote cooperation between this organization & nonmember states. The cooperation principles on which the PfP program is based are outlined, & the Southeast Europe Initiatives & Membership Action Plan, launched in 1997 within PfP, is described. PfP objectives & the basic elements of its program are presented. Croatia became a member of PfP in 2000, & the question of what the country can & should expect from cooperating with NATO within PfP is addressed, investigating the possible convergence of interests between the two parties. It is pointed out that the ultimate goal of Croatia's presence in PfP is the country's acceptance as a NATO member, & the government needs to develop strategies targeting this objective. Z. Dubiel

This research deals with the stages of development of the political order of Florence, focusing on the changes of the republican order. Starting from Machiavelli's Florentine Histories, which set forth a criticism of the first period of republican government until the establishment of the Medici seigniory, the author also analyses the other two stages of republican government in Florence. He thus puts together a periodization of three republican models of Florence during the Renaissance, which he refers to as the First, Second & Third Republics. The period of the First Republic stretches from 1250 to 1434, until the establishment of the first Medici seigniory. The period of the Second Republic, which lasted from 1498 to 1512, is assessed here as the period of a mature republic, which also witnessed a clear-cut defining of the theory of civil republicanism, primarily through the works of Machiavelli & Guicciardini. The Second Republic ended with the Medici restauration, when the republican government was once again suspended, & the republican institutions were abolished, although the state formally retained the designation of republic. After the fall of Rome in 1527, the Medici rule in Florence also collapsed, & the period of the Third Republic began; it lasted from 1527 to 1530. This short stretch of time saw a radicalization of the Florentine republicanism, but the social antagonism within the city-state was also radicalized. For this reason, the Third Republic did not manage to withstand the internal tensions & conflicts, & thus to face a deteriorated international state of affairs. The republican government collapsed again & made way for the second Medici restauration. The author describes & analyses in the text the republican institutions & their metamorphoses from the First Republic to the Third Republic, as well as the attempts to stabilize the republican government & realize Machiavelli's theory of the mixed form of government. The Florentine political order is therefore outlined as a development from communal democracy to civil republicanism with strong democratic elements, which, as a result of historical circumstances, was superseded by oligarchic forms of government. Adapted from the source document.

The author considers basic controversies surrounding the constitutional model & reality of Croatian parliamentarism. He contends that all these issues can be summarized in one debatable question: Is it a fair assessment that the Croatian political system & Croatian parliamentarism are marred by the concentration of power wielded by the upper echelon of the government, especially the President of the Republic, while the parliament is powerless & marginalized. The author challenges this assumption by systematically dividing basic characteristics of parliamentary governments & semipresidential systems into specific examples of both foreign policy & majority & consensus decision making; while emphasizing the influence of the party system on constitutional government. He believes that a change from a semipresidential system to a purely parliamentary system would not significantly affect the relationship between the law-making & executive arms of government. Adapted from the source document.

Mixed government, which is commonly regarded as a distinctly medieval form of government, is relevant also to contemporary constitutional states. It is the best form of government, since the aristocratic element is a continuous source of virtue, especially of justice, & a check not only on the executive, as the monarchical element which is the seat of political power, & the legislature, as the democratic element which expresses the will of the majority, but also groups & institutions that have the might & will to impose themselves as oligarchies. Mixed government is also the form of government that is practiced by most developed contemporary constitutional states: US, UK, France, Switzerland, Germany, etc. European nobility is the original aristocratic institution, by virtue of the fact that it was a system for the transfer of both virtue & general conditions of life. Three institutions that emerged in the late Middle Ages assumed structures & functions of the nobility. The first is the clergy. When, as a result of the differentiation of feudal society ethical & intellectual virtues of the nobility could no longer maintain general conditions of life, the clergy, by virtue of their abstract knowledge that ranged from philosophy & theology to law & medicine, became a class of new experts in generalities & thereby a new aristocracy. The second modern aristocratic institution is the judiciary, which has a structure & function similar to earlier aristocracies. The task of judges is to establish the highest virtue of constitutionalism. It is justice by law, which regulates general conditions of life in the state & society. What qualifies judges for the task is expertise in the new generality. The expertise includes not only education & experience in law but also impeccable private life & demonstrated professional ethics. The third modern aristocratic institution is the profession, whose most important instance is the legal profession. It shares its structure & function partly with the judiciary & partly with other professions. It seems that modern professions are degenerating. In the key area of data processing, due to rapid changes of technology, professions as systems of the transfer of virtue do not even seem to be possible. Professional aristocracies are replaced increasingly by oligarchies of capitalists & technocrats. Adapted from the source document.

The goals of NATO to secure peace in Europe after the end of the Cold War & promote peaceful cooperation between all states on the continent, spelled out in the documents issued at the closing of the London summit in 1990 & Rome meeting in 1991, are listed. Two organizations created to achieve these objectives are presented: (1) the North Atlantic Cooperation Council (NACC), formed in Brussels in 1991, & replaced by the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council (EAPC), formed in 1997; & (2) the Partnership for Peace Program (PfP) created in 1994. The objectives of PfP are listed, & the participation of the Republic of Slovenia in this program since its very inception is discussed, identifying both positive & negative outcomes of this cooperation. The Slovenian government is criticized for failing to perform a cost-benefit analysis & provide adequate information to the public on how the interests of the country & PfP converge. Z. Dubiel