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In this paper the author analyses the possibility of 'creating' a European political people and forming a European political identity and a European political community. In the first, theoretical part of the paper, the author defines two concepts of people -- demos and ethnos -- and describes problems in identity building on purely political grounds of people as demos. By examining the references on a European political people in the EU legal foundations, the author illustrates dual premises of legitimacy for the Union and the Union's identity referents which are generally of a universalist nature. In the second, empirical part of the paper, the author presents how the European identity is formed, in line with classic distinction between 'civic' and 'ethnic' identity. Since the Eurobarometer survey showed a low level of European identification of EU member states' citizens, the author presents concepts which aim to overcome the low level of European afiliation. In the final part of the paper the question which is examined is whether the existence of a European political people is necessary for the future of the European integration. To this end, the author uses various theoretical approaches to the 'creation' of a European political people: economic/market approach, communitarian/ statist approach, 'constitutional patriotism' of Habermas, Weiler's 'multiple demoi' and pluralism/particularism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Being one of the theoretical approaches to the study of the EU, the goal of the analysis of policy networks is to identify the policy process actors, both governmental and non-governmental, and the structure of their interaction in order to describe, explain and predict the outcomes of the European public policy. Many authors claim that the exceptionally rapid development of this approach in the last thirty years (and its intensive EU application since the 1990s) can be attributed to the changes in the contemporary practice of governance. Namely, although public policy is above all related to the accountability of authorities in securing public goods, the tasks are increasingly allocated to a growing number of non-governmental actors, especially in the EU. In its analysis of policy networks the paper offers the typology of the actors and an array of the concepts which define the structuring of their interaction (in the policy literature the term policy network is used generically and also when referring to the EU). It also outlines the continuum of the types of EU policy networks which as independent variables affect the outcomes of the European public policy. The paper identifies which approach within the analysis of policy networks the application to the EU belongs to. In the EU research policy networks are understood as an instrument of the policy analysis that explains the decisions shaping public policy at the subsystem level of decision-making, which makes it necessary to combine it with other theoretical approaches for the other levels of decision-making and for the other types of decisions to grasp the entirety of the manner in which public policy in the EU is shaped. The policy network analysis contributes most to improving the understanding of everyday events in the process of creating European public policy, the events that change the environment in which key decisions are made as well as the actors' perceptions of their own interests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Responding to criticisms and discussions about the non-existence of European Union's human rights policy, the article claims that this policy exists although it has been developing inconsistently both at the level of the Union's internal affairs and at the level of its relations with third countries. The second key hypothesis of the article refers to the institutional implementation mechanisms of the Union's human rights policy which, according to the author, require new positioning and better coordination. The article firstly analyses the development of the human rights policy in the Union's internal affairs from the Stauder Case in 1969 to recent discussions on the legal force of the Union's Charter of Fundamental Rights and the accession of the Union to the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. The second part of the article gives an overview of human rights policy development in the Union's external relations from the Fourth Lomé Convention to the European Neighbourhood Policy. The paper ends with an analysis of the features common to the Union's human rights policy implementation mechanisms focusing on the role of the Commission, the Parliament and the Council of the Union. The article points to the lack of institutional harmonisation using the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights as an example and sees in the establishment of the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights the need to introduce changes in the implementation of the human rights policy. In a conclusion, the author identifies the complexity and fragmentation of the Union as a system on the one hand and, on the other hand, the omnipresence of human rights protection and promotion in the Union's public policies as the key factors encumbering the control over the human rights policy implementation and the cause of its perceived deficit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The processes of Europeization have invaded the public policy sphere and introduced into it, among other things, the altered views of the roles of policy players and their relationships in the processes of the formation and the implementation of public policy. As soon as these new developments had been detected, numerous political science debates understandably ensued about the changed roles and competences of the actors who operate at different political levels in the European Union. The paper begins with the definition of the policy actor in the research of the EU policy process. The usability of the traditional and the contemporary understanding of the policy actor in the EU policy system is looked into by means of the indicators of (non)statehood and the existing view of the role of the state, thereby articulating the dilemmas and the prospects for the potential new taxonomies of policy actors that might emerge as a consequence of the policy activity at the EU level, since the newly identified features breed suspicion in the unequivocal adequacy of the existing taxonomy of the actors. Also, the appropriateness of the categorization of the players according to their political level or to the structuralfunctional character of their activities is discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The turmoils in international relations following the fall of the Berlin wall represented a serious challenge for the overall concept of European political unity. In its first international assignment outside the context of the Cold war, traditional national interests and animosities surfaced, and they demonstrated rather precisely all the complexity of the project promulgated by the Maastricht Agreement. At the time there was no common European approach to the solution of the crisis on the territory of the former Yugoslavia and no consent regarding the key issues, such as the recognition of the former Yugoslav republics as sovereign entities i.e. defining the criteria for their recognition. The paper focuses on this very specificity of the new approach to this problem, since it has increasingly been a subject of discretionary political decisions rather than the issue of international law in the traditional sense of meeting certain criteria for state recognition. And finally, concerning the degree of encroaching upon national sovereignty, there is a marked difference between the nature of the process of shaping a common foreign and security policy and shaping policies in other areas (e.g. transport, science and education, and so on). Also, the importance of developing an awareness of this difference as the main precondition for the realization of the project of the EU political integration is pointed out. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the fall of the Berlin wall, the foreign policy priorities of the former socialist countries have been the EU and the NATO rapprochement as a guarantee of their economic, military, and political stability. The least progress has been made by the countries of Europe's south-east due to that region's specific circumstances. The combination of unresolved national issues, historical grievances and, above all, the bloodshed and the war crimes committed on the territory of the former Yugoslavia have pushed this region further from the European integrations. Incoherent policies of international actors, and particularly the disunited Europe, have not helped to resolve the conflicts besetting this region. After the cessation of the armed hostilities, the international community and especially the EU, wishing to stabilize the region, have designed a plethora of aid programs; they have also promoted the rapprochement with the European integrations. This paper provides a detailed analysis of the stabilizational frameworks for the region as well as their success in the promotion of regional cooperation and the process of reform in all areas, as well as in accelerating the overall progress of the countries of this region on their way to the full EU membership. The authors also dwell on the necessity of resolving the other crucial problems (especially the statutory issues between Serbia and Montenegro and in Bosnia-Herzegovina) in this decisive moment for the future of this region, and the key role and responsibility of the EU thereof. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]