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Examining the competitiveness of public transport plays an important role because through public transport, the transport of passengers to schools, public healthcare establishments and work is ensured. In addition, transportation for vulnerable groups of passengers (students, seniors) is provided. On the other hand, public transport constitutes a financial burden on public budgets. The aim of this paper is to point out that public transport does not have an equal status in the transport market within the European Union. In the states of Central and Eastern Europe, public transport had a dominant position in the transport market in the 90s. Nowadays, the market share is declining, particularly in the bus transport, with the rising costs for public budgets regarding an increase in individual motoring. The aim of this paper is to highlight the possibilities of increasing the competitiveness of public transport by integrating different components of public transport. Another aim is to define the possibilities of financing public transport. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European Union's uniqueness is very much related to its ever-changing nature. Now, when the European project is facing one of the biggest crisis in its history, it is inevitable that some changes will and shall occur. We are at a crucial phase of the development of the European Union. At a time of multiple global, economic, environmental and societal transformations and challenges European citizens expect the European Union to make a concrete difference in addressing the biggest of them. The author believes that the main objective shall be bringing back the awareness and trust of the European citizens in the European project, in improving the accountability mechanisms of the European institutions, which are the key legitimizing factor of the EU decision-making process. The European Parliament, together with the national parliaments shall play a central role in this process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nutritional values of different foodstuffs have been examined in various studies on a number of occasions. However, so far, little attention has been paid to the legal aspects of introducing edible insects in the European Union. Yet, the rearing of this mini-livestock for food and feed has a potential of developing into a new agricultural sector, which is sustainable, unlike the breeding of the traditional livestock. The aim of this paper is to provide a comprehensive overview of the legal background of authorizing edible insects in the European Union, taking into account the environmental impacts thereof. At present, the Member States are free to regulate this field, however, only until the transitional period established by the European Union (EU) rules has expired, since the EU wide regulation for authorizing edible insects is to be introduced as of 1st January 2018. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes a simple and tractable method for identifying equivalence scales that reflect the value judgements implicit in a tax and transfer system. The approach depends on two identifying assumptions and a functional description for transfer payments that can be estimated using common publicly available data sources. We use this approach to evaluate tax implicit equivalence scales for the tax-transfer systems of 12 European countries that applied in 2012. Cross-country averages for the tax implicit scales generate a surprising set of stylised results: at low incomes, each additional household member increases the tax implicit scale by approximately 0.5, relative to 1.0 for the first adult; at high incomes, the average tax implicit scales describe variation that is remarkably similar to the modified OECD scale. However, substantial cross-country variation underlies these average scales, suggesting important differences in value judgements implicit in the respective tax-transfer systems; differences that can otherwise be difficult to discern when systems are complex and opaque. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper deals with the environmental aspects of combustor modification on Nuovo Pignone gas turbines. The mentioned company is engaged in the transport of natural gas to the Slovak Republic and further to other European markets. Legislation considering emissions is getting stricter every year. Original Nuovo Pignone gas turbines would not be able to meet the required emission limits for NOx and COr determined by legislation. Therefore, the company decided to modify seven gas turbines. Due to this reason, the combustion sections had to be replaced with a dry low emission system. These modifications were aimed at improvement of impacts of temperature on the emissions of NOx, since the NOx emissions are defined as thermal (there is an increase in emissions with the increase in temperature). Emissions were monitored continuously by an emission monitoring system (these data are continuously sent to the Office of Environment) and manually by a HORIBA PG-250 analyser. Gas delivery point is located in the flue pipeline, and data was processed by means of PC after reaching this point. The results lead us to conclusion that modification was an efficient and good solution in terms of economy, because this solution reduced emissions (from 300 mg·m-3 to 50 mg·m-3) and contributed to meeting of the stricter emission limits (from 370 mg·m-3 to 100 mg·m-3). Monitoring of the impacts of growing performance of equipment on emissions represents a possibility for further development of science in this field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Regulators' stress tests on banks further stimulated an academic debate over systemic risk measures and their predictive content. Focusing on marked based measures, Acharya et al. (Rev Financ Stud 30(1):2-47, 2017) provide a theoretical background to use marginal expected shortfall (MES) for predicting the stress test results, and verify it on the 2009 Supervisory Capital Assessment Program of the US banking system. The aim of this paper is to further test the goodness of MES as a predictive measure, by analysing it in relation to the results of the 2014 European stress tests exercise conducted by the European Banking Authority. Our results underscore the importance of choosing the appropriate index to capture the systemic distress event. In fact MES based on a global market index does not show association with the stress test results, in contrast to Financial MES, which is based on a financial market index, and has a significant information and predictive power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to study connections between interest rate risk and credit risk and investigate the inter-risk diversification benefit due to the joint consideration of these risks in the banking book containing sovereign debt.Design/methodology/approach The paper develops the historical derivative-based value at risk (VaR) for assessing the downside risk of a sovereign debt portfolio through the integrated treatment of interest rate and credit risks. The credit default swaps spreads and the fixed-leg rates of interest rate swap are used as proxies for credit risk and interest rate risk, respectively.Findings The proposed methodology is applied to the decade-long history of emerging markets sovereign debt. The empirical analysis demonstrates that the diversified VaR benefits from imperfect correlation between the risk factors. Sovereign risks of non-core emu states and oil producing countries are discussed through the prism of VaR metrics.Practical implications The proposed approach offers a clue for improving risk management in regards to banking books containing government bonds. It could be applied to access the riskiness of investment portfolios containing the wider spectrum of assets beyond the sovereign debt. The approach represents a useful tool for investigating interest rate and credit risk interrelation.Originality/value The proposed enhancement of the traditional historical VaR is twofold: usage of derivative instruments’ quotes and simultaneous consideration of the interest rate and credit risk factors to construct the hypothetical liquidity-free bond yield, which allows to distil liquidity premium. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper analyses the fiscal decentralization effects on economic growth in unitary countries of European Union for the period 2005-2014. The empirical analysis was based on the multiple regression method. The fixed effect panel model was used as framework for the analysis. In order to examine the different impact of fiscal decentralization, the same analysis was applied to subsets of countries categorized into two groups according to countries' level of economic development. This further analysis found that there is positive relationship between fiscal decentralization and economic growth in low level of economically developing countries and no relationship in high level of economically developed countries. These results suggested that fiscal decentralization is not always instrument for promotion of economic growth, which means that country's economic development level is an important factor when introducing reform of fiscal decentralization. The originality of this article - new fiscal decentralization index and evaluated fiscal decentralization level influence for countries economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to the Digital Agenda 2020, the European Union is achieving various activities and projects such as DIGCOMP, New Skills Agenda for Europe. At the European level, in all sectors of the economic and social life, there are vacant jobs due to the lack of persons holding digital competences. As estimated by the European Commission, in 2020, almost 756,000 jobs in the ICT sector will not be occupied due to the lack of persons with digital competences. Thus, the digital transformation represents a great opportunity for job creation. The paper presents an analysis concerning the digital skills in information, communication, problem-solving, content-creation of the EU population. The paper concludes with the need to develop the digital competences in all the EU Member States, and especially in Romania by smart education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The first rural development projects were agrarian reforms, which aimed in particular the prosperity of the peasants in the state land or in the ownership of those who owned more land. At the level of the European Union, about 60% of the population lives in the countryside and covers over 90% of the territory (Study 2014-2020). The main rural development regulations in the European Union are contained in Regulation (EU) 1305/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council on support for rural development by the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD). Rural development projects management tools are LEADER +, supporting and encouraging rural economic actors and local action groups (LAGs) through the development and implementation of local development plans. The present paper aims an analysis of the scientific knowledge of project management and rural development, presenting its main characteristics and the evolution of concepts in time, related to the scientific literature in this field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The subject of this paper is an attempt to assess the level of convergence of government health spending in the European Union countries. The ever-increasing level of life expectancy, demographic changes, including the aging of society in many European countries and the development of medical technologies are a growing challenge for modern nations. The similarities in the changes taking place in the EU states lead to considering whether there are similar transformations in health spending? Ensuring access to primary healthcare is one of the tasks of the welfare state and it can be assumed to be a public good. Accepting these reasons, the authors set out to investigate the phenomenon of sigma and beta unconditional convergence for the level of government spending on health care in the EU countries. The answer to the question has been sought: does participation in the EU leads to convergence in government spending on health care? The study uses selected dispersion measures for sigma convergence calculations and econometric modelling for beta convergence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The moment resistance of beam-to-column connections is frequently utilised in steel structures. Eurocode 3 suggests the component method to analyse such connections, and it implements the equivalent T-stub method to determine the resistance of the end plate of the beam. The latter method requires tedious and concentrated work. A simplified method is suggested to reduce the number of calculations and enable the designer to focus on construction aspects in the pre-design phase, or in education. The resistance of the T-stub covers three possible failure modes: the yield of the plate, the failure of the of the bolt and simultaneous yield. The yield of the plate and simultaneous yield depend on numerous parameters, and they are verified by multiple equations. The failure of the bolts are more easily checked. In the present paper, requirements for geometric ratios are defined for the widely used steel sections to assure failure of the bolts at a lower level of the load than the yield of the plate. These parameters facilitate the simple calculation of the resistance of the bolts instead of the tedious work needed for the end plate resistance. The paper presents a proper explanation for the design rules and the effect of the geometric parameters on the resistance of the end plate. Geometric parameters are suggested for the widely used hot rolled and typical welded beam sections. All the parameters fulfil the requirements of the equivalent T-stub method of Eurocode 3. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Local governments in the EU play a major role in the development of local public policies. Local governments provide public services in the public interest, funding them for public resources. The paper deals with the role of the local public sector and the comparison of competences of sub-national governments (local, intermediate, regional) in EU countries and the financial dimension of local and regional governments for development of services. The areas assessed include spending capabilities of local governments in 28 EU countries, with a particular focus on total expenditures of local and regional governments, fiscal decentralisation of expenditures, and local government expenditures by selected function (social protection, health, education, culture and recreation), including the rate of their decentralisation of expenditures. The empirical research renders a comparison of spending capabilities of local and regional governments by selected function in EU countries, making use of cluster analysis and the evaluation of similarities and differences in the individual countries. The most marked differences in EU countries were observed in expenditures of the local public sector on health. Conversely, the least marked differences in all countries are seen in the expenditures of the local public sector on recreation and culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Considering conceptual changes in by now not-so-new Criminal Procedure Code, the authors analyze relations between the prosecutor and police from the angle of law provisions but also in their implementation in practice. The paper is divided in two main parts. After introductory remarks, the authors consider a number of theoretical issues related to fair trial in the context of balancing roles, competences and powers of various procedural subjects with focus on relations and cooperation between police and the public prosecutor. The second part of the paper includes presentation of the results arising from empirical research dedicated to implementation of the novelties in the Serbian Criminal Procedure Code related to cooperation between prosecutors and the police. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The question of what effectt the subsidies have on the productivity of farms in the EU has been studied by many authors, but has not yet been answered. A further research is thus required both in relation to the period since the decoupling reform, and in relation to the new member countries in the EU 28. In the paper, it is suggested that the productivity of resources in agriculture is not affected by the total amounts of subsidies, but by their structure. A three-stage spatial analysis was made of an EUFADN representative sample in the years 2007-2012: in the firts stage, clusters of regions with significantly different agricultural support models were identified; in the second, it was determined whether the structure of the political rent, reflecting the different support models in the EU 28, is a significant determinant of the productivity of capital, land and labour on farms when subsidies are excluded and when they are included in the analysis. In the third stage, a robust model has been estimated (employing GLS) to relate the factors productivity to the EUFADN subsidies and to the location variables identified by the cluster analysis. The analysis confirmed that the qualitative predictor, i.e. "a structure of agricultural support", was a significant factor influencing the capital productivity over the whole of the period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides novel evidence on the role of the macroeconomic environment for households' choice between fixed-interest-rate and adjustable-interest-rate mortgages (ARMs) in the euro area. We find that relatively more ARMs are taken out when economic growth is strong, the interest rate spread is high, or unemployment shows low volatility. A simulation exercise shows that a reduction in mortgage rates as witnessed during the monetary easing in the course of the global financial crisis produces a substantial decline in debt burdens among mortgage-holding households, especially in countries where households have higher debt burdens and a larger share of ARMs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

EU Member States, particularly in the Euro Area, have been pushed to adopt more extensive and intrusive fiscal rules, but what is the evidence that the rules are succeeding? The EU level Stability and Growth Pact (SGP) has been – and remains – the most visible rule-book, but it has been complemented by a profusion of national rules and by new provisions on other sources of macroeconomic imbalance. Much of the analysis of rules has concentrated on their technical merits, but tends to neglect the political economy of compliance. This paper examines the latter, looking at compliance with fiscal rules at EU and Member State levels and at the rules-based mechanisms for curbing other macroeconomic imbalances. It concludes that politically driven implementation and enforcement shortcomings have been given too little attention, putting at risk the integrity and effectiveness of the rules. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Management Issues / Problemy Zarządzania is the property of Problemy Zarzadzania and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Management Issues / Problemy Zarządzania is the property of Problemy Zarzadzania and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Management Issues / Problemy Zarządzania is the property of Problemy Zarzadzania and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Objective: The objective of this paper is to evaluate the welfare state models in the EU countries and to start the discussion if the new member states (NMS), i.e. those EU member states that joined the EU in 2004/2007, fit the Sapir typology (Nordic model, Continental model, Anglo-Saxon model, Mediterranean model). The second objective is to examine the labour market situation, reduction of poverty and social inequalities in the EU countries. The third one is to open the issue if the public spending can be managed both justly and effectively. Research Design & Methods: The linear regression function and correlation has been used to present effectiveness of social expenditures to reduce poverty, as well as evidence that public spending can be managed both justly and effectively. Findings: This paper demonstrates more similarities can be drawn across the NMS and the EU-15 than within the NMS and EU-15, respectively. The typology of welfare state models is applied to the NMS and their effectiveness is tested. Accordingly, we classify the Czech Republic, Slovenia and Cyprus as countries of the Nordic model; Hungary, Slovakia and Malta as the Continental model; Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia as the Anglo-Saxon model and, finally, Poland, Croatia, Romania and Bulgaria as the Mediterranean model. Implications & Recommendations: Recent data suggest that the global crisis has caused an increase in the level of poverty and social spending in the EU countries. However, this is just a temporary situation and it does reflect the solutions of models. Contribution & Value Added: The NMS tend to be examined as a separate group of countries that -- as the literature suggests -- depict different qualities of the welfare models than those pursued in the EU-15. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our paper aims at analysing the development of retail electronic commerce in the selected countries focusing on its key features and prospects in a world in which connectivity via the Internet offers both sellers and buyers the platform for exchanging information on goods and services better enabling safer transactions in line with technological progress. For the selected states our paper assesses the dynamic of the main e-tail indicators (sales, share in total retail sales, the rankings, the relevant stimuli and the main players). We based our research on the available statistics, literature and specialised online platforms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of EMPIRIA: Revista de Metodología de Ciencias Sociales is the property of Editorial UNED and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Contemporary legal norms regulating the transference of property often consider children as the major beneficiaries. The transference can be done under Hereditary Law, Trust Law or a mere donation. The Trust Law occupies an outstanding position in the contemporary juridical domain, because it deals with the lifelong (inter vivos) and after-death (testamentary) activities. Testators intentionally turn into trustors via transferring their property to trustees for the benefit of minor beneficiaries. The latter acquire protection, assets and a caretaker. An outstanding usefulness of a trust mechanism stipulates its popularity via the emergence of an increasing number of the European trust-like devices. However, popularization and a worldwide spread facilitate the occurrence of some problems related to the construction of the innovative trust-like mechanisms and their terminological naming. The given paper deals with the entrusting relationships of the modern European law. A special emphasis is put on the problems related to the lexical naming of the newly-emerged concepts. Certain suggestions are made regarding the "perfect" "flawless" formation of the terminological landscape. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The following paper concentrates on the detention of minors, especially what concerns the international legal provisions regarding pre-trial detention. It is very important to ensure that no one should be deprived of his liberty in an arbitrary fashion, this also refers to children as well. Deprivation of liberty may take numerous other forms besides arrest of conviction, these forms differ in degree or intensity and this is why courts and domestic authorities have to have a clear view to be able to undertake an autonomous assessment of the situation. While detention occurs in various circumstance, I would like to focus on children in contact with the criminal justice system. Article 5 para. 1 (d) provides that "No one shall be deprived of his liberty save the following cases and in accordance with a procedure prescribed by law: (d) the detention of a minor by lawful order for the purpose of educational supervision or his lawful detention for the purpose of bringing him before the competent legal authority." This notion of a minor encompasses persons under the age of 18 in the light of European Standards and Resolutions of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe (Commission decision of 14 December 1979). This law text excerpt is not only a provision which permits the detention of a minor, but also contains a specific, but not exhaustive, example of circumstances in which minors might be detained, namely for the purpose of their educational supervision or bringing them before a competent legal authority. In this present paper I would also like to include a case presentation: Nart v. Turkey, where the ECHR found a violation of Article 5 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On November 25th, 2016, EU Commissioner Vera Jourova announced that the 2016 International day for the elimination of violence against women (IDEVAW) would mark the start of 'a focused year of action to combat violence against women'. The campaign was accompanied by an official Twitter hashtag: #SayNoStopVAW. This paper aims at exploring a sample of just over 2,000 tweets gathered in the first month of the campaign through multimodal analysis. Results are as follows. The number of users involved in the campaign remained remarkably limited. Despite assertive language, the campaign mostly revolved around awareness raising. Furthermore, the actual message of the campaign often 'bent' the fight for the elimination of violence against women to make it fit other purposes, most prominently economic growth. Support for the cause because of its intrinsic value remained marginal throughout the campaign. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For an energy-efficient future, the EU needs to step up its efforts to maximize energy savings. In this context, the paper addresses the steps needed to establish energy efficiency measures and proposes effective measures to reduce consumption by recovering large amounts of energy lost to industrial consumers. The points with the highest recoverable energy potential have been identified and it is proposed to install the heat recovery systems on the flue gas exhaust circuits and polluted air from Industrial Technological Equipment (ITE) such as dyeing/ drying cabins (DDC). Therefore, whenever possible and as small as energy saving, energy recovery solutions at any level, but especially at local level, need to be applied. In conclusion, by concentrating all the energy-saving efforts that are still being wasted, Europe can contribute, by saving energy, to ensuring a sustainable energy future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper estimates a multi-country demand-led growth model for the EU15. A decrease in the share of wages in national income in isolation leads to lower growth in Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom, whereas it stimulates growth in Austria, Belgium, Denmark and Ireland. However, a simultaneous decline in the wage share leads to an overall decline in EU15 GDP; hence, the EU15 as a whole is a wage-led economy. Furthermore, Austria and Ireland also experience a decline in growth when they decrease their wage share along with their trading partners. The results indicate that the decline in the wage share had significant negative effects on growth in the EU15 and supports the case for wage coordination. We present different wage-led recovery scenarios and the effects on prices, investment and net exports. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and objective: Adherence to treatment in patients with psoriasis is often poor. An investigation of patient preferences and satisfaction with treatment may be important, based on the expected correlation with therapy compliance. This paper aims to examine and describe the current literature on patient preferences, satisfaction and adherence to treatment for psoriasis in the European Union (EU). Methods: Electronic searches were conducted using PubMed, ISI Web of Knowledge, Scopus, Spanish databases and Google Scholar. European studies published in English or Spanish between January 1, 2009 and December 31, 2014 regarding patient-reported outcomes in psoriatic patients were included. Studies conducted in non-EU countries, letters to the editor, editorials, experts' opinions, case studies, congress proceedings, publications that did not differentiate between patients with psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis or studies related to specific treatment were excluded. Results: A total of 1,769 titles were identified, of which 1,636 were excluded as they were duplicates or did not provide any relevant information. After a full-text reading and application of the inclusion/exclusion criteria, 46 publications were included. This paper will describe publications on adherence (n=4), preferences (n=5) and satisfaction with treatment (n=7). Results related to health-related quality of life articles (n=30) have been published elsewhere. Adherence rates are generally low in psoriasis patients regardless of the type of treatment, severity of disease or methods used to measure adherence. Biologic therapy is associated with greater clinical improvement. There is a direct association between physician recommendations, patient preferences and several domains of treatment satisfaction. Conclusion: The results of this review support the conclusion that adherence rates in patients with psoriasis are suboptimal and highlight the need to improve patient compliance and satisfaction with treatment. Patients' preferences should be taken into account in the treatment decision-making process in order to improve patients' clinical outcomes by ensuring satisfaction and adherence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper assesses the contribution of key drivers of external imbalances in the Eurozone through the estimation of a panel-data Vector Autoregressive model over 1975-2011. Growth fluctuations, initially associated with demand booms triggered by unusually low interest rates, and later with demand contractions resulting from the crisis and policy adjustments, have played an important role in current account balance fluctuations. Changes in real exchange rates or unit labor costs have played a less important role. Demand shocks have contributed more to current account balance dynamics in the Eurozone periphery than in the core, whereas competitiveness has been a less prominent factor in the periphery but relatively more important in the core. Some broad policy implications of the findings for demand management in a currency union are discussed, including for fiscal policy coordination and macroprudential policies when union members face asymmetric shocks. The role of internal devaluation policies as a means of correcting external imbalances is also reassessed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper answers two questions: which innovation capabilities most strongly differentiate CEECs and highly developed European economies and to what extent CEECs’ performance within each of the innovation capabilities has changed over a decade. The research method is based on construction of composite indicators describing national performance within five innovation capabilities in two periods: 1998–2000 and 2010–2012 as well as regression analysis in order to test the accuracy of the main findings. The study has allowed to arrive at a conclusion that CEECs have been able to catch up to highly developed European economies with respect to absorptive capacity related to the existence and use of technological infrastructure as well as participation in inward technology transfer in the form of FDI and capital goods imports. There is, however, a lingering performance gap in new knowledge and innovation creation capabilities and R&D effort. Continuation of this trend and lack of considerable improvement also in terms of absorptive capacity related to the quality of human resources might result in CEECs’ permanent inability to catch up to their highly developed European counterparts. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The aim of this paper is to highlight the main aspects regarding the rational choice theory in neo-institutionalism, and the role the EU Neighbourhood Policy has nowadays. The protagonist of the rational choice theory in the new institutionalism remains homo-economicus. The theory of rational choice institutionalism challenges the perfect rationality of the individual, rather than the principle of rational choice itself. ENP is a framework for consolidating the Union's relations with neighbouring countries and aims therefore intensifying cooperation with them in order to establish a zone of prosperity, good neighbourliness, stability and security. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The paper discusses issues associated with using funds that support the development of entrepreneurship -- the purpose of the paper is to answer questions regarding the purposefulness and effectiveness of financial instruments from EU funds aimed at the development of emerging businesses (startups). Methodology: The paper analyzes previously conducted research studies in the field of the discussed topic, it systematizes and describes the financial instruments from EU funds supporting self-employment and startups in their early stages of activity. It also provides an overview of evaluation reports concerning these instruments. The paper also contains a case study: an analysis of the effectiveness of a selected project supporting the development of entrepreneurship (co-financed from EU funds), in which the method of evaluating the net effect of the support in the short term has been used. Findings: An analysis of previously conducted research studies has shown that properly designed State aid targeted at those starting up their own business is sensible, as it provides them with seed capital and it helps them survive the most difficult period of the so-called "startup". However, there is a lack of comprehensive studies to confirm the positive impact of business support interventions carried out using EU funds. The methodology of evaluating the net effect used by the Author in the conducted study has made it possible to identify the actual size of the -- positive -- impact of the selected project on the growth of self-employment. Limitations: The study revealed some limitations -- the method and time of the study allow to capture the phenomenon on a micro-scale, in the short term. The institutions that are involved in the process of allocating funds should develop a comprehensive methodology that implements the idea of evaluating the net effect, allowing to assess the effectiveness of the support at regional and national level in the long term. Originality: The originality of the paper consists in applying the theories and results of previous studies to the Polish practice of supporting businesses at their early stages of development as well as applying the method of evaluating the net effect, which allows to determine the actual impact of the intervention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to contribute to a larger research agenda concerning the possibility of meaningful transatlantic dialogue about private-law reform. Both the European Union and the United States regulate private autonomy extensively. In spite of contextual similarities, however, there are several barriers making dialogue among legal scholars difficult. In particular, the conversation about social justice--by now an important element of private-law reform within the European Union--is less prominent in American contract law scholarship. In U.S. legal academia, social justice is a matter for moral philosophers, development economists, and constitutionalists, and also provides normative frameworks for current property and torts debates, but its impact on contracts scholarship has declined over the past few years, and efficiency discourse has often replaced social justice parlance. Against this background, this paper takes a close look at a recent transatlantic exchange in matters of private-law reform--a Chicago Law School conference on a proposed Common European Sales Law-- and identifies a few counter-intuitive points of convergence between U.S. and European scholarship. Along the way, the paper also highlights structural and discursive incompatibilities, but concludes that the dialogue is, as a whole, valuable and should be kept alive. In designing post-national rules for private autonomy, Europe may draw better lessons from U.S. regulatory experiences if it first deconstructs the wholesale pro-market rhetoric of otherwise relevant literature. When this is done, the payoffs of American commentaries become more appreciable. Taking the lead from some Chicagoan insights, this paper recommends customizing the empirical investigation of EU markets so as to factor socio-economic asymmetries into the equation of private-law reform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the declaration of Kosovo's independence, The European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo - EULEX - has been deployed under the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP). EULEX mission, as one of the largest ESDP Missions, has induced considerable academic and policy debate within political science and security studies, as well. The mission as such is characterised with highly complex political state of affairs. Consequently, this plethora of the mission's complexity has resulted first of all in a number of difficulties, initially in its deployment then it was followed by evident inconsistencies in its profile within the CSDP framework. Nonetheless, from the security point of view, the paper tends to underline the importance of the EULEX Mission as an ultimate regional stability and security factor. Given that, not only Kosovo but all Western Balkan countries aspire European Integration, the EU perspective should not to be perceived only as a diplomatic and rhetorical discourse; from this end, a stable Kosovo would ultimately mean a stable region. Thus, taking into consideration EU's increased involvement in providing security as derives from CSDP, the paper tries to highlight the importance of the successful implementation of EULEX Mission by employing the Regional Security Complex theory. The paper tries to demonstrate the fact that the successful completion of EULEX mission will certainly have a crucial impact in the security dynamics of the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tourism is an industry that gained much attention in the past years, both from the media as well as from the business environment, policy makers and civil society. In this context, tourism has been subject to various strategies, plans and policies, at national, regional and local level. But to what degree have these documents been implemented? This paper aims at determining the effectiveness with which tourism development priorities set by regional and local development strategies in the Centre Region have been achieved through projects financed under the Regional Operational Programme 2007-2013, one of the seven operational programmes financed from structural funds in Romania. The analysis offers an insight into the degree to which tourism development and promotion strategies are taken into consideration when writing and submitting applications for EU-funded projects. Thus, the paper poses significant implications both for policy makers and for beneficiaries and potential beneficiaries of projects financed through ROP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the last global financial crisis, the unemployment rate grew significantly, reaching dramatic accents among youth. Unemployment phenomenon hit various segments of population with different levels of education, but especially those without an upper secondary education. This paper examines how the latest global financial crisis has influenced major developments in education and training, using, on the one hand, indicators that reflect the general economic picture in EU countries, and, on the other hand, indicators that reflect aspects of the education sector. Also, the paper analyzes the relationship between financial and the non-financial sides of education and training sector. The following indicators were included in the analysis: Participation rate in education, Early leavers from education and training, Total public expenditure on education, General Government Deficit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper characterizes the time-series properties of debt:GDP ratios in 10 EU countries over 1982-2009 and measures the size and source of the permanent effects of shocks as they evolve over time. The analysis shows debt dynamics in the EU10 are complicated, involving important intercountry interactions and protracted adjustment periods of about 10 years. We find evidence of asymmetries in the effects of different forms of 'fiscal consolidation,' with unanticipated reductions in government spending having a more permanent effect than unanticipated increases in government revenue. Unanticipated business cycle fluctuations also have important long-term effects on the ratio. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The migration in the European Union is an effect of the income differences between member states, but also a result of the globalization trend. Still, in the Western-European countries not all the citizens that migrate generate the brain drain phenomenon and many of them are just recognized as cheap workforce and are considered providers for jobs with the lowest level of qualifications. This paper aims to create a classification of EU-15 countries based on the level of education of the immigrants and analyse the remittances sent by Romanian immigrants. Based on data provided by OECD, Eurostat, World Bank, the paper's findings provides valuable information regarding the exchange of workforce in the EU. The main methods of refining data are Principal Component Analysis and the multiple regression. The paper's results can be considered a good start point for a wider vision over migration's social reasons in the EU. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2010, EU adopted a new growth strategy which includes three growth priorities and five headline targets to be reached by 2020. The aim of this paper is to investigate the current performance of the EU member and candidate states in achieving these growth priorities and the overall strategy target by allocating the headline targets into the priorities and the priorities into the strategy by the use of a composite indicator methodology. The paper determines how far away each member and candidate state is from the targeted levels of the priorities and the strategy by making a distinction between EU 15 and relatively new member states as well. The developed composite indices enable the observation of the performances of the member and candidate states in a single indicator for the overall strategy and each growth priority. The results of the strategy index and three growth priority indices show that Nordic states possess the highest index scores already having reached many of the targets; many new member states performed as good as EU 15 and some EU 15 states are placed at the bottom of the ranking with quite poor performance in reaching the EU 2020 strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper undertakes a textual and documentary analysis of the Advanced Therapy Medicinal Products Regulation, which was passed into law in the European Union (EU) in 2007. This law is significant for the development of regenerative medicine in the EU and globally. Regulatory texts such as this one provide significant material for addressing key concerns in recent theorising about innovative technologies in socio-legal studies, innovation studies, and science and technology studies. These concerns include expectations about future technologies and economic sector-building. By revisiting philosopher J.L. Austin’s well-known work on How to Do Things with Words, this paper deploys his concepts of performative utterances to inform its analysis. Pursuing Austin’s and later commentators’ analysis of performatives in language use, and drawing on Lindsay Prior’s application of actor-network theory to documents, the analysis shows two different types of performativity at work in and through the document. These are termed ‘generative’ and ‘enactive’ performativity. The ‘enactive’ type includes ‘legislative’ and ‘social’ forms. In addition, a more conventional content analysis reveals a range of actions, both legislative and discursive, in the regulatory document. The analysis shows a tension between standardisation and imprecision in the conceptual detailing of the document. Legislative texts produced through established politico-legal conventions are a special class of document that should be accorded a more prominent place in understanding the role of political governance processes in shaping emergent technoscientific fields and sectors. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

At present the Euro Area is confronted with the persistence of the sovereign debt crisis. Despite the amount of measures implemented by the policymakers over the past years, the adjustment process is tough and seems impossible in several countries (for instance Greece, where the GDP contracted for the 17th quarter in row). In fact, these economies risk becoming permanent asymmetric shocks at the Monetary Union level. In this paper I estimate the evolution of the potential GDP in Greece during the period 1996-2011 by employing the Cobb-Douglas methodology. According to the results, the potential GDP of Greece turned negative after the shock of the 2008 global liquidity crisis. This indicator deteriorated severely afterwards, as the capital investment contracted, with negative impact for the total factor productivity. One can draw an important conclusion from this analysis: the European policymakers should take active measures for the relaunch of the investment flows in Greece in other Southern economies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper tries to identify employment patterns in the EU countries, taking into consideration the educational intensity of employment. Using EUROSTAT data, the paper presents a descriptive analysis of the distribution of skills (measured by educational attainment) and employment share by skills levels (from high to low) and by 10 groups of occupations for the EU countries. Differences in distribution of employment across occupations are analysed across EU countries and an evidence of changes in educational intensity of employment over 2000-2011 is provided. The possible patterns of employment are identified by comparing the skill distribution of jobs in each country with the basic shape of distribution in the EU as a whole. There are 4 different patterns of employment by educational level found among the european countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European Central Bank (ECB) assigns greater weight to the role of money in its monetary policy strategy than most, if not all, other major central banks. Nevertheless, reflecting the view that the demand for money became unstable in the early 2000s, some commentators have reported that the ECB has "downgraded" the role of money demand functions in its strategy. This paper explains the ECB's monetary policy strategy and shows the considerable influence of Milton Friedman's contributions on the formulation of that strategy. The paper also provides new evidence on the stability of euro area money demand. Following a conjecture made by Friedman (1956), the authors assign a role to uncertainty in the money demand function. They find that although uncertainty is nonstationary and subject to wide swings, it is nonetheless mean reverting and has substantial effects on the demand for money. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background. Although the burden of stroke in terms of mortality and disability has been well documented in previous years, data after 2000 are limited. Therefore, the aim of this paper was to identify the epidemiology of stroke in the US and EU5 nations from data published in 2000 and later. Methods. Data from literature databases and online sources were collated to identify information relating to the incidence, prevalence, and mortality of stroke from the year 2000 onwards. Results and Conclusions. Twenty-three data sources were identified. The incidence of andmortality due to stroke both increase with age and are greater in males compared to females. Stroke is a common problem and likely to worsen in the US and EU5 as their populations age. However, pre-2000 trends of decreasing stroke mortality over time have continued after 2000, reflecting a consistent improvement in the treatment and care of patients with stroke. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background Germany has been identified as one of a few high-income countries that opposed a strong Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), the WHO's first global public health treaty. This paper examines whether the tobacco industry had influenced the German position on the FCTC. Methods Analysis of previously confidential tobacco industry documents. Results The tobacco industry has identified Germany as a key target within its global strategy against the FCTC. Building on an already supportive base, the industry appears to have successfully lobbied the German government, influencing Germany's position and argumentation on key aspects of the FCTC. It then used Germany in its efforts to weaken the FCTC. The evidence suggests that the industry enjoyed success in undermining the Federal Health Ministry's position and using Germany to limit the European Union negotiating mandate. The tactics used by the tobacco industry included the creation of controversy between the financial, trade and other ministries on one side and the health ministry on the other side, the use of business associations and other front groups to lobby on the industry's behalf and securing industry access to the FCTC negotiations via the International Standardization Organization. Conclusion The evidence suggests that Germany played a major role in the tobacco industry's efforts to undermine the FCTC. Germany's position consistently served to protect industry interests and was used to influence and constrain other countries. Germany thus contributed significantly to attempts to weaken an international treaty and, in doing so, failed in its responsibility to advance global health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]