Suchergebnisse

L'avvicinamento del Regno Unito alle Comunità europee è stato lungo e graduale. Si è passati da un iniziale rifiuto alla consapevolezza di aver commesso un errore di valutazione a non partecipare e, infine, alla richiesta di adesione. Quando si pensa a questo percorso, tuttavia, raramente ci si sofferma sulle motivazioni che ne hanno comportato lunghezza e problemi. Il Regno Unito, infatti, per ragioni di politica interna e internazionale, subito dopo l'adesione avrà un ripensamento rispetto alla collocazione del paese nel progetto comunitario. I problemi sottesi sono, in definitiva, quelli che avevano causato un processo di ammissione così lungo e che, non risolti, sono poi riaffiorati, portando Londra a chiedere di rivedere i termini di accesso proprio per quei punti controversi che si stagliano ancora prepotentemente sulla scena: il bilancio, i rapporti con il Commonwealth e la Politica Agricola Comune. Le diatribe di politica interna contribuiscono a deteriorare il quadro politico e conducono a un referendum sulla permanenza o meno nella Cee. Una consultazione che andrà spiegata ai cittadini e ai partner europei e internazionali. I negoziati si concludono, i britannici votano per rimanere nella Comunità, ma i problemi di fondo vengono risolti solo in parte. E il referendum non mette la parola fine all'indecisione britannica sul suo posto in Europa.

L'8 dicembre 2017 l'Unione Europea e il Regno Unito hanno chiuso dopo estenuanti negoziati un accordo preliminare per l'uscita dall'Unione. L'accordo ha riguardato, tra le altre cose, i tre aspetti più importanti su cui accordarsi per una futura convivenza: lo status dei cittadini europei e britannici, l'accordo sull'Irlanda del Nord, anche in riferimento all'Accordi di Belfast del 1998, e le regolamentazioni finanziarie sul conto che il Regno Unito dovrà pagare all'Unione per onorare il rispetto dei trattati firmati in precedenza. ; On December 8th, 2017 the European Union and the United Kingdom signed a tiring negotiation that is preliminary to the exit of the UK from the Union. The Agreement has settled, among other things, three peculiar aspects for a future peaceful and cooperative coexistence: the status of the European and British citizens, the agreement on Northern Ireland, also with respect to Belfast Agreement of 1998, and the financial regulations on the exit bill that the United Kingdom agreed to pay due to the treaties signed in the past.

The Mediterranean Programme The Mediterranean Programme was set up at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies of the European University Institute in 1998. The Programme focuses on research that concerns the Euro- Mediterranean area, thus embracing Southern Europe, the Balkans, the Middle East and North Africa, including the countries involved in the Barcelona Process. As a part of the Mediterranean Programme, the annual Mediterranean Research Meeting (MRM) brings together scholars from across the region. The MRM has been organised annually since March 2000. It has become one of the major gatherings in Europe of social and political scientists, economists, lawyers and historians working on topics related to the Middle East & North Africa, and recently also to Southern & South-Eastern Europe, their mutual relationships and their relations with Europe. The Mediterranean Programme and its activities have been financed by: Banca d'Italia, Capitalia, Compagnia di San Paolo, Comune di Firenze, Eni S.p.A., European Investment Bank, Fondazione Monte dei Paschi di Siena, Ministero degli Affari Esteri, Ente Cassa di Risparmio di Firenze, the European Commission, and Regione Toscana. ; Political stability in the Middle East seems an illusion, particularly in Palestine. This paper compares three variables (religious, political and international interests) that, through a four-period partition (the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the millet system, the British Mandate, the partition plans and the constitutional forms proposed, and the system adopted afterwards), led Palestine to the present situation. With the creation of the Mandate in 1922, the primary task of the British Government was to find a convenient solution to lead Palestine to independence with a constitutional structure and later with a convenient partition between Arabs and Jews. An impossible task due to the conflicting interests of the two communities, of the other international actors and to the outbreak of the Second World War. ; (Product of workshop No. 5 at the 11th MRM 2010)

The article argues that the Chinese party-state's most pressing question in 2017 continued to be its quest for legitimacy. In the period under review the party-state's main strategic answer to the legitimacy crisis was its effort to strengthen Chinese nationalism and build an ideology based on Chinese exceptionalism. This was accompanied by concrete political economic measures directed at radically transforming the Chinese economic development model from an export-driven one to an innovation-driven one in an attempt to rebuild the waning social consensus. In order to proceed with this complex transition, China needed not only to deepen its already profound integration with the global economic and political system but also to regulate it according to its national interests. The Belt and Road Initiative, launched in 2013, was effectively meant to serve this purpose. At the same time, it was promoted world-wide as an opportunity for the improvement of the social, economic and political conditions of all countries involved, in particular developing countries. In a specular way, China projected itself as a political and economic responsible stakeholder, while, at the same time, trying to demonstrate that its ability to behave as a responsible state in the international arena was due to its adherence to its own system of peculiarly Chinese social and political values.