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The rise of liberal market economies, propagated by neoliberal free market thought, has created a vacant responsibility for public interests in the market order of society. This development has been critiqued by Catholic social teaching (CST), forcefully arguing that governments and businesses should be directed to the common good. In this debate, no attention has yet been given to the Reformational tradition and its principle of sphere sovereignty, which provides guidelines on the responsibilities of governments and companies for the public interest of society. This article analyzes the differences and similarities between CST and the Reformational philosophy in their critiques of the neoliberal free market perspective of Hayek. We apply the three perspectives to the case of orphan drugs in the pharmaceutical industry and show that CST and the Reformational philosophy offer valuable insights in correction to Hayek's views on the responsibilities of governments and companies for public health interests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the constitutional and legal foundations of the territorial integrity of the federal states, focusing on historical and contemporary examples. The authors examine cases of successful and unsuccessful secession, as well as legal mechanisms used to prevent separatism. We take Spain, the USA, Canada, India, and Germany, as the examples to analyze the role of constitutional provisions in maintaining state unity. A key aspect of the study is the distribution of competencies between federal structures and federation subjects, which ensures a balance of interests and prevents internal conflicts. A great attention is paid to the principle of subsidiarity and the role of federation subjects in governance, contributing to the preservation of territorial integrity. The authors emphasize the importance of integration mechanisms and constitutional guarantees in maintaining the stability of the federal states. The article establishes that the territorial integrity of federal states is ensured through a set of constitutional and legal norms that regulate the relations between federal authorities and the subjects of the federation. These norms include a clear distribution of competencies, where federal authorities are responsible for national issues such as defense and foreign relations, while the subjects of the federation have powers in local governance. The principle of subsidiarity involves the participation of the federation’s subjects in state governance, ensuring a balance of interests and preventing internal conflicts. Additionally, the supreme legal authority of the federal constitution, mechanisms of federal intervention in case of threats to integrity, and the unity of the economic space all contribute to the stability and unity of the federal state, effectively countering separatist movements. It is determined that the participation of federation subjects in the process of constitutional amendments guarantees their representation and protection of interests, preventing unilateral changes in the state structure. The state language plays an important role, promoting national unity and preventing ethnic conflicts, which is critical for multinational federations. Furthermore, the representation of federation subjects in the national parliament ensures their influence on key decision-making, promoting more balanced policies and strengthening ties between the central government and the regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human rights bodies formulate highly specific orders to minimize the risk of State non-compliance. However, specificity comes at a cost, reducing State autonomy when local agents implement measures on the ground. This article develops the concept of specificity in human rights reparations and analyses the specificity formulas deployed by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in structural measures as a form of positive subsidiarity. We employ qualitative data analysis software to process 322 measures of non-repetition ordered by the Inter-American Court through to the end of 2020. This analysis identifies two modes of specificity: process-based, which defines procedures for compliance, and outcome-based, which sets the goals for the State. After coding over 800 segments of text from Court decisions, we outline an exhaustive legal framework with 26 process-based categories and 2 outcome-based forms of specificity. We conclude that outcome-based specificity can help courts balance positive subsidiarity and State autonomy in the design of reparations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This conceptual essay extends decolonisation debates to the broader context of decoloniality of praxis. It acknowledges the significance of epistemological and pedagogical decolonisation but argues that these do not fully engage with the entrenched coloniality in tourism in Africa. The essay problematises the conventional explanations for Africa's underperformance in international tourism and its erasure of Africans as tourists. It proffers pragmatic arguments for decolonising tourism in Africa, given the unprecedented decline in international tourism during the Covid-19 pandemic, the historically contradictory images of Africa, the latent demand for domestic and regional tourism, the youthful population of Africa, and the possibility of Africa-wide freedom of movement emanating from implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area. The article emphasizes the need for concomitant representivity of Africans as producers and consumers of tourism experiences from within the continent, partly facilitated through principles of subsidiarity, although potential resistance to such a pursuit is acknowledged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The cognitive mobilisation thesis suggests that increasing knowledge on the European Union (EU) would lead to increased support for the institution. We test this with a strategic case whereby we provide information on the EU's subsidiarity principle to the citizenry of a small member state and examine whether it mitigates negative EU attitudes. In an original, pre-registered, population-based survey experiment conducted with members of a panel representative of the Dutch population, respondents were assigned randomly to a control group or a treatment: a professionally produced information video mimicking EU communications. Along with estimating the overall treatment effects, based on extant literature we assess whether these effects are moderated by the respondents' prior EU knowledge and level of populist attitudes. Consistent with the information deficit theory, we find that information provision decreases negative attitudes among the least knowledgeable. We discuss the implications of our findings and provide suggestions for further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Ireland access to instrumental music education (IME) largely operates through the private market. Unlike other European countries Ireland does not have a music school law or policy position. The purpose of this article is to examine how a long-established history of subsidiarity which is enshrined in the Irish Constitution together with the ideology of choice, has underpinned the provision of IME. This has led to the growth of a market-led system of provision that promotes inequalities. The data suggests that parents seeking IME for their children are compelled to act as customers and competitive citizens and that the private choices of those who can pay to play, masks the dearth of state-supported universal IME provision. In conclusion, it is argued that by continuing to adopt the principles of subsidiarity, the State is both exonerated from being fully responsible and accountable for the adequate provision of IME and is complicit in perpetuating structural inequalities that favour access to capitals-rich families, be in the state-supported IME, or IME in the private education market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Member States of the ECHR are complex entities made up of many levels. The subsidiarity principle is grounded in this social reality. However, the ECHR, just like general international law, treats its States as unitary entities: local authorities are procedurally and institutionally inexistent in the ECHR system, although they play important roles as protectors and violators of human rights. I show that the codification of the subsidiarity principle in the ECHR preamble was not intended to strengthen the role of local and regional authorities. Protocol No. 15 was only concerned with reinforcing 'the' States role vis-à-vis the Court. I explain this with the state's role as the bearer of political sovereignty and the fact that sovereignty is a pre-condition for a functioning political democracy and, therefore, a democratically legitimate human rights system. Finally, the paper enquires into whether the subsidiarity principle of the ECHR might be read as an interpretative principle, which contributes to determining the scope and content of the human rights that the Strasbourg Court must guarantee, and whether this might benefit local and regional associations. I answer in the negative. Such a reading would be contrary to Protocol No. 15, as it would further empower the Court. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Logos: A Journal, of Religion, Philosophy Comparative Cultural Studies & Art (08687692) is the property of Logos 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.)

Europe is the winner of the Cohesion Policy. It is vital that the model of shared management, multi-level governance, and partnership remains the guiding principle of the Cohesion Policy beyond 2027. Subsidiarity and a place-based approach are crucial; we can't afford to lose the territorial dimension. There is no future for this policy without a strong role of cities and regions. If you try to replace it with a centralized instrument as a top-down Recovery and Resilience Facility, you will destroy the very essence of the Cohesion Policy. The Cohesion Policy is working on the ground, and it must be maintained, in a modernized way. The Cohesion Policy must continue to be the single policy to address the challenges inherent to cohesion in Europe. That includes supporting a just transition in all regions and supporting all territories so that they can take advantage of the single market. That includes supporting all regions so that the EU can be more competitive at a global level. Cohesion Policy is a solution, not a problem!. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

E. F. Schumacher's Small is Beautiful is one of the most succinct elaborations of Catholic social teaching (CST) and 'distributism' – construed as an alternative to both capitalism and socialism. Extending the logic of Polanyi, both market and state, and their right- and left-wing ideological expressions, are shown to be contending forms of collectivism – in that both aggregate the agency of disembedded 'billiard ball' individuals. Schumacher's socio-economic vision is rooted in Livelihood and is orthogonal to both left and right, creating an opportunity for an alternative to modernity involving patterns of embedded production, consumption and reproduction (family, household and place-bound community). 'Smallness' and 'localness' speak to forms of embedded social capital that are 'sticky', viscous and relational, more ascriptive and less fluid. But for precisely this reason, the political agenda implicit in Schumacher's vision is not only post-liberal, but explicitly both covenantal and Christian. It requires the ontology of sovereign, self-actualizing individuals to be reconnected and constrained through a transcendent relationality with God. Small is Beautiful is shown to be diametrically opposed to the eco-modernist, gnostic and sometimes even transhumanist worldview of global environmentalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cohesion Policy—the European Union's (EU) policy platform for regional and local development—represents a major yet often neglected instance of Social Europe. In this article we inquire into the delivery of Cohesion Policy projects concerned with social policy objectives. Specifically, we ask: how are these projects delivered? Building on the literature of subsidiarisation in social policy, we theorise that the interaction of two processes—vertical subsidiarisation across territorial levels and horizontal subisidiarisation across sectoral levels—generates different spaces of subsidiarity, with major implications for policy outputs and outcomes. Empirically, we explore the emergence of spaces of subsidiarity in over 800 Cohesion Policy projects for quality employment and labour mobility delivered in Italy, Portugal, and Spain, during the 2010s. We show that, despite common rules, the governance framework through which the social agenda of Cohesion Policy is implemented is not a constant but a variable, one that may be leveraged by future research to explain the heterogeneous impact of Cohesion Policy across the EU. Our contribution is relevant to research on Social Europe, research on the territorial dimension of post‐industrial welfare systems as well as research on Cohesion Policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides an account of the structure of property law based on the principle of subsidiarity. This principle holds that more centralized organizations, including governments, should fulfil a subsidiary role in relation to the individuals and groups of which they are comprised. While subsidiarity has been highly influential in the areas of public law, constitutional law, and international law, its relevance to property law has been underappreciated. Property rights distribute decision-making authority over resources to non-state parties. This promotes a number of interrelated benefits associated with subsidiarity, including the qualitatively distinct contributions made by individuals and groups to the common good, the instrumental benefits of decentralized decision-making, the intrinsic benefits of involvement in actions and decisions affecting oneself, and the development of virtues. However, the principle of subsidiarity also suggests important roles for public authorities, including assuring an appropriate distribution of resources in society and intervening where the private authority of owners fails to uphold the common good. In this respect, subsidiarity offers a distinctive understanding of the divide between private and public law. Private law doctrine appropriately provides owners with a significant sphere of presumptive authority, yet this is subject to broad powers of public authorities to alter the baseline where, in their judgment, the common good requires it. This article argues that the concept of subsidiarity can help to bridge the divide between progressive property theory and theoretical approaches that emphasize the authority of owners. It can also contribute to an understanding of the concept of property, public access rights to private property, property-based community governance, and legal protections for property rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The history of the institutionalised cooperation in Europe now looks back to more than seven decades. What differentiates this cooperation from other international organisations is the common heritage and destiny the European countries share and the community they have found in a high level of integration. However, since the very beginning of this cooperation, there have been debates about the best method and way to express common European positions. Part of this debate is the question of the democratic legitimacy of the Union institutions. As it is set out in Article 2 of the Treaty of the European Union, democracy is not only a fundamental value of the Member States, but also an expectation towards the European Union. Even though the institutional setting of the European democracy has gone a long way in the past seven decades, the question of democratic legitimacy is still being one of the key subjects and future challenges within the framework of the currently ongoing discussions on the future of Europe. There is no shortage of reform proposals, nevertheless, the main debate has been rather one-sided as it envisions only one avenue to decrease the so-called “democratic deficit” and strengthen the European policy space. What is the function of democracy in the context of the European integration and how can it represent a European position or serve as a check over the Union institutions? What institutions could be able to create a bridge between the peoples of the Member States and the European institutions? This paper seeks to outline the different responses to these questions. To this end, it outlines the theoretical background and institutional evolution of democratic legitimacy in the European integration while seeks to evaluate the current proposals and envision the alternative ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The principle of subsidiarity, which also appeared in antiquity, was refined and perfected by the Catholic Church. The essence of the principle of subsidiarity is to ensure that decision-making takes place as close as possible to the individuals, thus avoiding unnecessary centralisation and encouraging effective decentralisation. The rationale behind this principle is the recognition that higher levels of government do not always have an adequate level of insight or understanding of local realities, and that decision-making should therefore be taken at the lowest possible level of authority to achieve the best quality of governance. The principle of subsidiarity is a fundamental principle of the European Union’s decision-making system. A return to subsidiarity can play an important role in the constitutional disputes that have been revived in recent years between national constitutional courts and the Court of Justice of the European Union. This paper analyses the evolution of the subsidiarity principle in EU decision-making and the institutions and procedures that are supposed to guarantee its application. By examining the political and legal enforceability of the principle of subsidiarity, the paper draws conclusions on the present state of the enforcement of the principle and makes some proposals for the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The introduction of the subsidiarity principle by the Maastricht Treaty was intended to strike a balance between the Member States and the supranational level in terms of non-exclusive competences. However, the principle of subsidiarity in the current EU structure is Janus-faced: although it was theoretically included in the founding treaty to protect the lower levels, its modus operandi is actually aimed at demonstrating the supranational level’s capacity to act. Perhaps this is why the enshrinement of the subsidiarity principle in the Treaty has not lived up to expectations, and the relevant Treaty provisions have largely remained dead letters. At the same time, the need represented by the principle of subsidiarity, namely the protection of the autonomy of the Member States, remained present in European integration, which finally emerged in the concept of constitutional identity, linked to the redefined identity clause after the Lisbon Treaty. In this sense, the identity clause in Article 4(2) TEU has become the legal device or standard that is able to transfer the constitutional needs of the Member States to the level of EU law and provide the possibility for their recognition at EU level. For this to work, a cooperative approach by national constitutional courts seems essential. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Against the background of the inveterate politicization and polarization of synodical practice, this article aims to reclaim synodality as a spiritual pathway, in the spirit of Pope Francis's current initiative. It argues that participation in synodality is the birthright of Christians and that the widest consultation is mandated. Synodality calls for an organic model of the church that is inimical to hierarchy and top-down forms of leadership. Synodality, so understood, has the potential to revitalize the church, not least in evangelization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores when constitutional damages can and should be awarded in South African law. The history of the divergence between common-law damages and constitutional damages (and the uncertainty that might arise about which type of damages a victim of an injury ought to pursue) is explored. Thereafter, a critical and constructive interpretation of the case law on constitutional damages is provided, which sets the scene for a precedent-inspired three-step approach to constitutional damages adjudication. This approach is then defended as a transformative constitutional one which squares easily against the notion of constitutional adjudicative subsidiarity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses a recent decision by the Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic regarding noise protection. The court rejected a proposal to repeal certain provisions of a government regulation that increased noise limits in protected outdoor areas. The court upheld the authority of the government to set noise limits through regulations and emphasized the need to balance public health with the necessity of noise in modern society. The article also mentions that international organizations like the World Health Organization and the European Union do not set binding noise limits, leaving it up to individual countries to determine their own limits. The court concluded that increased noise limits do not necessarily violate constitutional rights and that the goal of the law is still to protect public health and reduce noise. [Extracted from the article]

In the context of adoption, subsidiarity is the principle that children should remain with their birth families whenever possible, and whenever not possible, that in-country placements should take precedence over intercountry adoption. This Comment looks at the specific meaning of subsidiarity in the Hague Convention on Protection of Children and Co-operation in Respect of Intercountry Adoption. It highlights that the convention does not require intercountry adoption be a last resort, but rather that "due consideration" be given to placements "within the State of origin." Then, the Comment looks at the domestic law of India, Colombia, and South Korea, three of the main sending countries in intercountry adoption, as case studies to see how these countries have implemented subsidiarity over time. It reveals a broad trend of these countries implementing stricter and stricter conceptions of subsidiarity over time and concludes that presently all three countries go far beyond what the convention requires, potentially in ways that undermine the best interests of the child. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides an account of the structure of property law based on the principle of subsidiarity. This principle holds that more centralized organizations, including governments, should fulfil a subsidiary role in relation to the individuals and groups of which they are comprised. While subsidiarity has been highly influential in the areas of public law, constitutional law, and international law, its relevance to property law has been underappreciated. Property rights distribute decision-making authority over resources to non-state parties. This promotes a number of interrelated benefits associated with subsidiarity, including the qualitatively distinct contributions made by individuals and groups to the common good, the instrumental benefits of decentralized decision-making, the intrinsic benefits of involvement in actions and decisions affecting oneself, and the development of virtues. However, the principle of subsidiarity also suggests important roles for public authorities, including assuring an appropriate distribution of resources in society and intervening where the private authority of owners fails to uphold the common good. In this respect, subsidiarity offers a distinctive understanding of the divide between private and public law. Private law doctrine appropriately provides owners with a significant sphere of presumptive authority, yet this is subject to broad powers of public authorities to alter the baseline where, in their judgment, the common good requires it. This article argues that the concept of subsidiarity can help to bridge the divide between progressive property theory and theoretical approaches that emphasize the authority of owners. It can also contribute to an understanding of the concept of property, public access rights to private property, property-based community governance, and legal protections for property rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this article is to argue that institutionalisation of executive political leadership in South Africa's state democratic governance desecrated state-society subsidiarity and stateness, exposing people to security contortions. Theoretically, the state is privileged with causal power, which involves the exercise of statehood for the security of the nation. However, stateness resides in the legitimacy of exercising such power within the state-society subsidiarity principle. The state is not independent; instead, it remains vulnerable to fascist manoeuvres. This article holds that the crisis of stateness relating to disorder, illegality, and instability manifests when the state, a potent, omnipresent teacher, breeds contempt for the law. A literature survey demonstrates that African states' democratic governance has for years become case studies that anchor analyses of institutionalisation of executive political leadership and desecration of state-society subsidiarity with real-world situations about greed, corruption, economic misery, uneven development, and collapsing modern state and governance power relations inequities. South Africa is not an exception to the norm. Beside the decade-long state capture, South Africa's parliamentary conduct in the Nkandla and PhalaPhala scandals points to entrenched executive political leadership and the disintegration of stateness. The article concludes that de-institutionalisation of people, attendant to suppressing criticism, denigrating accountability, undermining rule of law, decimating state-idea, and political corruption, is the opposite side of the institutionalisation of presidential godfatherism, desecration of state-society subsidiarity, and erosion of stateness in South Africa's state democratic governance. The article recommends that South Africa's democratic governance needs to restore the balance of power relations in the state-society subsidiarity in order that the state may only be strong enough to serve and protect people's interests, and people strong enough to maintain sovereign control over the state, as entailed in the concept of nation-state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The subject of the article are the executive acts of passive and active bribery under the Bulgarian Criminal Code. The author examines the issue if the forms of these acts are found in a subsidiarity ratio. This question is of determining importance both for the need of differentiation of criminal responsibility and for legal qualification of the criminal activity in case the bribery is committed with more than one act. The subject of the article are the executive acts of passive and active bribery under the Bulgarian Criminal Code. The author examines the issue if the forms of these acts are found in a subsidiarity ratio. This question is of determining importance both for the need of differentiation of criminal responsibility and for legal qualification of the criminal activity in case the bribery is committed with more than one act. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the current state of devolution in England and proposes principles for a more effective and inclusive approach. It highlights the limitations of the current devolution policy, which has been characterized by bilateral deals and a lack of funding for local government. The article argues for a shift towards subsidiarity, inclusivity, and participation in decision-making, with decision-making power allocated to the level closest to those affected. It also emphasizes the need for devolution to address social and environmental outcomes, as well as democratic renewal through increased public participation. The article concludes by calling for a more dynamic and impactful system of governance that can address the complex challenges of the mid-2020s. [Extracted from the article]

The reform of the decentralization of power in Ukraine, which was initiated 10 years ago with the adoption of the Concept of Reforming Local Self-Government and Territorial Organization of Power in Ukraine, was not only not curtailed in connection with the Russian military aggression, which has been going on for the third year in a row, but on the contrary, it has been intensified. Certain evidence of this is the final stage of work in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine and the Ministry of Development of Communities, Territories and Infrastructure of Ukraine on the new edition of the Law of Ukraine "On Local State Administrations". The reorganization of the administrative-territorial system at the sub-regional level in Ukraine and the formation of 136 consolidated districts instead of 490 districts became the basis for improving the organization and activities of local state authorities. In addition, the deprivation of powers of the prosecutor's office to exercise general supervision over compliance with the law in the state has created a certain vacuum in terms of administrative supervision of local self-government bodies and an imbalance of the system of checks and balances in relations between the state and local selfgovernment. As a result, there was a need to improve the mechanism of such interaction by preparing changes and additions to the current legislation. The proposal for the establishment of local state administrations (hereinafter referred to as local state administrations) of the prefecture type (before appropriate amendments to the Constitution of Ukraine) is, according to the legislators, one of the options for legal settlement of the above-mentioned problems. The purpose of the article is to analyze changes and additions, first of all, to the Law of Ukraine "On Local State Administrations" and to outline individual proposals aimed at improving the legal mechanism of interaction between state authorities and local self-government bodies in modern socio-political and financial-economic realities. It was established that the problems of decentralization of power, administrative-territorial organization, implementation of their own powers by local self-government bodies and their interaction with state authorities in Ukraine were studied by well-known scientists and researchers: P. Lyubchenko, V. Mamonova, S. Seryogina, T. Yehorova-Lutsenko, I. Bodrova, V. Negoda, V. Kuybida, S. Chernov, Yu. Hanushchak, A. Tkachuk, V. Kozina and others, but these issues still require additional study and justification. The authors come to the conclusion that the prefecturalization of MDA can put an end to the definition of the modern role and place of MDA in the structure of state authorities (before amendments to the Basic Law) and exclude Ukraine from the list of European countries that do not have a mechanism of administrative supervision over the activities of local councils. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The subsidiarity principle divides competences between the European Union and its Member States. The Lisbon Treaty suggests a connection between ex ante and ex post subsidiarity review. Ex ante, national parliaments were given a role via the early warning system (EWS). Ex post, legislation is subject to review by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU). More than 10 years after Lisbon, this article is the first to theorize and evaluate whether there is indeed a connection. Our theory predicts a conditional connection. Quantitatively, we provide a two‐way classification of Member States based on their use of the EWS and CJEU subsidiarity cases. Qualitatively, we look back from court cases to the Council stage and analyse the Advocate General's opinions in subsidiarity cases. We find a weak conditional connection. A key explanation appears to be the Court's limited willingness to enforce subsidiarity and hence the limited incentives to go to court. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the relationship between the principle of subsidiarity and the sovereignty of the State, questioning whether intermediate organizations can challenge the authority of higher political powers. It emphasizes the importance of understanding the exclusionary capacity of higher political authority in certain areas, with roots in ancient Greek and Jewish traditions. The political consequences of Jewish beliefs in divine authority are mentioned, including conflicts that led to the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem and the expulsion of Jews from the city. The Church promoted the idea of subsidiarity to strengthen its autonomy against worldly powers, with examples from the political and religious evolution of Constantine as Roman emperor. [Extracted from the article]

The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) case law on cross-border surrogacy establishes that a 'general and absolute impossibility' of obtaining recognition of the relationship, legally established in another country, between a surrogate-born child and their intended parents will violate the child's right to respect for private life. This approach requires States to accommodate familial bonds created through cross-border surrogacy and limits the margin of appreciation available to States to determine their national response. In recent case law, the ECtHR has adopted an interventionist approach in respect of national decision-making and has gone further than might be expected under the principle of subsidiarity. Examination of the emerging body of jurisprudence on cross-border surrogacy, however, reveals a preference for 'traditional' family formations, with the ECtHR tending to adopt a less interventionist and more deferential approach to national decision-making where the family at the centre of the case deviates from the structure of the family reflected in the seminal cross-border surrogacy case of Mennesson v France App no 65192/11 (ECtHR, 26 June 2014). This approach leads to inconsistency in the cross-border surrogacy case law as it creates something of a moving target for the vindication of children's rights in 'less traditional' family forms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Successful applications of artificial intelligence (AI), such as ChatGPT, have been prompting regulators to speed up the related regulation processes. China and the EU have been particularly ambitious in this regard. The EU AI Act has been swiftly progressing through the institutions and is expected to be officially adopted in spring 2024. This article argues that its overall approach is wrong, that it extends EU regulation into policy areas which come under national competences and that it will hurt European AI innovation in particular and society in general. Instead of regulating AI per se, the EU or the member states should regulate the use of AI in specific sectors or, better still, regulate it in technologically independent ways—by specifying what is allowed or prohibited, regardless of the technology used. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the federalism reform in 2006, the German Länder gained the competence to deviate from the nationwide standard legislation in various areas. In this study, we focus on nature conservation policies and see that some Länder are raising their regulative standards while others are lowering them. Based on an original dataset that measures this direction of policy change, our empirical analysis shows that the party-political composition of the state governments, and particularly the presence/absence of Green parties, plays a crucial role in explaining the variation. Moreover, we find that the strength of nature conservation associations and geographical conditions are relevant, too. In sum, our findings contribute to the growing literature on both the policy effects of the German federalism reform and the partisan effects on public policies, as well as the question of responsive decision-making in multilevel settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European Union and the Council of Europe were supposed to create continent-wide standards and rule for governance, commerce, and human rights. Yet subsidiarity remains an important principle respecting state-specific policy. Occasionally Pan-Europeanism and subsidiarity conflict and this is the case with LGBTQ and transgender rights. This Article examines the legal tensions surrounding the protection of human rights as it addresses transgender individuals and members of the LGBTQ community. It argues that the current framework of law supporting subsidiarity is inconsistent with the broader goals of non-discrimination at the heart of the values of both the European Union and the Council of Europe.

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The African Union Border Programme (AUBP) was established in 2007 as part of African Union’s efforts to strengthen the structural conflict prevention capacities of its Member States. The main objective of the AUBP is the promotion of peace, security and stability through: delimitation and demarcation of borders, cross-border cooperation, and capacity building. The Program is implemented on three levels: national, subregional and continental, based on the principle of subsidiarity. In implementing the Programme, the AU Commission cooperates both with African organisations (primarily regional economic communities) and the United Nations, European states (especially Germany) and European organisations of cross-border cooperation (for example AEBR and MOT). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines cases of conflicting decisions between the ECHR and State Courts. I argue for 'discordant adjudicative parity.' According to discordant adjudicative parity, there are compelling non-instrumental reasons for having both international adjudicative institutions and state adjudicative institutions that can make binding, conflicting decisions. Binding decisions by international adjudicative institutions embody the understanding that human rights are duties rather than decisions that are voluntarily undertaken. State Courts facilitate deliberative engagement on the part of citizens as, ultimately, the citizens are in charge of States' courts. I use this analysis to justify the principle of subsidiarity in European law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is often the case that local government, its roles and responsibilities, and the challenges it encounters in its effort to fulfill its mandate are often derided, disparaged and conviniently minimalised. For purposes of contributing towards the debate on policy review and knowledge generation, the article focuses the spotlight on local government in Zimbabwe, particularly its efforts to marshall communities for socioeconomic progress through local public service delivery. In doing so, it turns to the principle of subsidiarity, the theory of local self-governance and document analysis to engage the challenges confronted by local government in Zimbabwe from an evidence-based vantage point, much of it drawn, developed and synthesized from the perspectives of a few representative nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) historically supporting local government regeneration in its various forms in the country. The article finds that the lack of resources and capacity in some local governments to effectively deliver services, the risk of central imposition in local government decision-making and the dearth of public participation processes are some of the challenges limiting the local units of government in Zimbabwe to fulfill their assigned mandate of local public service delivery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Romanian Case Law Review / Revista Română de Jurisprudenţă is the property of Universul Juridic Publishing House 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 Informationswissenschaft: Theorie, Methode & Praxis / Sciences de l’information: Théorie, Méthode & Pratique is the property of University Library of Bern 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.)

The elite emerges through a focus on quantitative measures of individual achievement, coupled with a comprehensive understanding of societal dynamics, viewed through the principles of solidarity and subsidiarity. Consequently, the elite evolves into an open system, where admission is achieved by capitalizing one’s own strengths and by valuing/acknowledging the strenths of others. The concept of „elite” is comprehended through its diverse expressions of power and influence within society: political, intellectual, economic, cultural. Defining the elite is important in adopting an attitude about its role. Misinterpreting the true nature of the elite, solely linking it to the exercise of power and disregarding other stratification criteria, was a contributing factor to the collapse of communism. This misunderstanding led to violent purges targeting the traditionally structured elites during the 1950s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of modern democratic states implies respect for the principle of subsidiarity, which means bringing down decisions and their execution to the local level. The decisions regarding the use of agrarian potential in the Republic of Serbia are still under the jurisdiction of the central government authorities, which contributes inadequately to the overall stability and development of agriculture in modern geopolitical correlations. The goal of this paper is to point out to the necessity of understanding the need to enable as much as possible the authorities at the local self-government level of the Republic of Serbia to implement the strategic goals of agrarian policy while improving permanently their agricultural capacities. Based on the research on the opinions of relevant state and local authorities and on empirical and theoretical arguments, the authors support this claim and provide a new perspective for the content of agrarian policy, as well as the development of the rich agricultural potential that the Republic of Serbia has at its disposal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of FinanzRundschau is the property of De Gruyter 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 Journal of Soochow University Law Edition is the property of Soochow University 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.)

The provisions of the Treaty of Lisbon increase both the role of the European Parliament and the national parliaments in the decision-making mechanism of the European Union. This process, by which greater importance is given to the competences of the European Parliament, is viewed, both by Eurosceptic, but also by those who support the theory of the dissolution of the concept of sovereignty in the process of European integration, through the lens of scenarios inconsistent with legal reality. The present study aims to argue, starting from the principles of organization and operation of the European Union, as they are codified by the provisions of the Treaty of Lisbon, that the integration process not only does not diminish the importance of national parliaments, but brings nuances and advances regulations to ensure efficient and effective democratic control in the European integration process and also to propose appropriate solutions to overcome said issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of KritV, CritQ, RCrit. Kritische Vierteljahresschrift für Gesetzgebung und Rechtswissenschaft / Critical Quarterly for Legislation & Law / Revue critique trimestrielle de jurisprudence et de législation is the property of Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG 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.)

The article tries to describe and explain the change in the involvement of national parliaments in the process of reforming the EU’s migration, asylum and bord control policies in the years 2015-2020. The research continues the threads that author have presented in the article entitled The involvement of national parliaments in 2015–2017 in actions to overcome the immigration crisis in the EU published in 2018. However, this analysis was mainly exploratory and descriptive. Therefore, by using a hypothetico-deductive method and drawing from observations about the activity of parliaments in using the treaty and non-treaty tools available to them, as well as from the conclusions about their involvement in the reform of migration, asylum and border control policies in 2015-2016, two hypotheses are tested: H1. The instrument of political dialogue was used more frequently by national parliaments during the 2020 reform than during the 2015- 2016 reform; H2. Those parliaments that actively used treaty-based instruments in 2015-2016 were more likely to submit opinions on documents regarding the reform of asylum and migration policy after 2020. The results obtained show a decline in the involvement of parliaments measured by the number of political dialogue opinions sent to the EU institutions and the intensity of discussions in interparliamentary cooperation bodies. Nevertheless, the relatively large number of reasoned opinions under the subsidiarity control procedures, as well as the fact that new parliaments, which were not involved in issuing opinions on solutions regarding migration, asylum and border control policies in 2015-2016, allow us to ask new interesting research questions requiring further analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]