Documents EU reform 31 results

"Die Untersuchung beschäftigt sich mit den infolge der Wirtschaftskrise in der Europäischen Union ergriffenen Strukturmaßnahmen, indem sie diese am Maßstab des Unions- und deutschen Verfassungsrechts analysiert. Dabei kommen die klassischen juristischen Auslegungsmethoden zur Anwendung.



Im Ergebnis stellt sich der „permanente Rettungsmechanismus“ ESM als rechtmäßig dar. Kritisch ist hier insbesondere die Organleihe an der Europäischen Kommission, die jedoch im Einvernehmen aller Mitgliedstaaten erfolgt. Das sixpack besteht aus fünf Verordnungen und einer Richtlinie und soll die multilaterale Überwachung sowie das Defizitverfahren zusätzlich mit Sanktionen bewehren. Insoweit ist das sixpack jedoch rechtswidrig, da hierfür keine Rechtsgrundlage in den Verträgen vorhanden ist. Der Fiskalvertrag ist überwiegend rechtmäßig, lediglich die Organleihe an der Kommission verstößt mangels Einvernehmens aller Mitgliedstaaten hierzu gegen das Unionsrecht."

"The twenty years since the signing of the Maastricht Treaty have been marked by an integration paradox: although the scope of European Union (EU) activity has increased at an unprecedented pace, this increase has largely taken place in the absence of significant new transfers of power to supranational institutions along traditional lines. Conventional theories of European integration struggle to explain this paradox because they equate integration with the empowerment of specific supranational institutions under the traditional Community method. New governance scholars, meanwhile, have not filled this intellectual void, preferring instead to focus on specific deviations from the Community method rather than theorizing about the evolving nature of the European project. The New Intergovernmentalism challenges established assumptions about how member states behave, what supranational institutions want, and where the dividing line between high and low politics is located, and develops a new theoretical framework known as the new intergovernmentalism. The fifteen chapters in this volume by leading political scientists, political economists, and legal scholars explore the scope and limits of the new intergovernmentalism as a theory of post-Maastricht integration and draw conclusions about the profound state of political disequilibrium in which the EU operates. This book is of relevance to EU specialists seeking new ways of thinking about European integration and policy-making, and general readers who wish to understand what has happened to the EU in the two troubled decades since 1992."

"The sustainability of European economic and monetary union (EMU) has been questioned over the last few years. Criticism has focused on the missing democratic dimension behind recent governance reforms, and the lack of compensating output legitimacy. The paper considers the seriousness of this legitimacy problem. It starts by revisiting the classic division between 'input' and 'output' legitimacy in the context of EMU and finds that, given a lack of will to commit to deeper integration, governance needs to accommodate the diversity of expectations and situations of euro countries. The paper then assesses the way governance works in practice by analysing the interaction between the EU and national democracies on three similar cases: the 2011 labour market reform in Italy, the 2013 pension reform in France, and the 2014 minimum wage decision in Germany. Each of these cases is reflective of a reform related (directly or not) to a recommendation by the EU and conducted under its supervision. The analysis tends to confirm the existence of patterns of legitimation specific to EU economic governance. It suggests that the 'legitimacy problem' is manageable as long as national governments and parliaments are resolute in dealing collectively with their differences. This implies that deepening the ‘transnational' attributes of economic governance could be envisaged as a serious alternative to the remote prospect of a federal Eurozone."

"Much contemporary analysis has concluded that the recent financial crisis and bank failures were, among other things, the result of a breakdown in corporate governance regimes and market discipline. In this context, new regulations advocate such market-based remedies as tighter investor monitoring and greater control over executives' remuneration, in order to safeguard financial stability. We argue that this approach largely ignores three very important aspects of modern financial markets that cannot be constrained through market discipline: (i) socio-psychological phenomena; (ii) the epistemological properties of financial market innovation; and (iii) the inherent inability of market participants to predict uncertain risk correlations. Therefore, this article argues that excessive EU focus on corporate governance reforms as a means to improve financial stability detracts attention from much more significant concerns, chiefly, the issue of optimal bank structure."

"Following the failure of all Member States to ratify the 2004 Treaty Establishing a Constitution for Europe, and a 'reflection period' to consider the fate of the treaty, the German EU Presidency in the first half of 2007 relaunched the debate on the future of Europe. It held confidential talks with Member State governments and drew up a Draft Mandate for an Intergovernmental Conference (IGC). The European Council on 21-22 June 2007 agreed the Draft IGC Mandate and the Portuguese Presidency opened the IGC on 23 July, with a view to concluding a new Reform Treaty in October 2007. Many of the Mandate's amendments are articles from the 2004 constitutional text, while others are new and reflect the particular concerns of Member States. When a final amending treaty has been concluded, the ratification process will begin in the 27 Member States. Most Member States will ratify the new treaty by a parliamentary method, although it is likely that those holding a referendum will include Ireland and Denmark. "