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Nowadays public policies are insufficiently ambitious in order to reverse the environmental damage generated by man. Most of the literature that analyses policy changes tends to explain the incentives but do not give clear explanations about the limitation factors. We develop in this paper a reflection on policy change from the notion of transaction costs. Following a review of the three main approaches --sustainable development, ecological modernization and democratization-- we expose ten theses on the role of transaction costs in the policy change from the case of the Common Fisheries Policy of the European Union. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Currently, there is an important consensus regarding the fact that regions have lost their attraction in terms of European studies. This leads us to the following paradox: while the metaphor "Europe of the Regions" that had such great resonance in the 1990s has become discredited, the degree of regional commitment with the EU has been constantly rising. Nowadays, the EU is enmeshed in a crisis that is not only of an economic and financial nature, but also a crisis of democracy. In this context, it seems appropriate to 'recover' this study on the role of regions in the European system of governance. This paper alms, on the one hand, to review the evolution of the role of regions in the European system of governance, and on the other, to explore the way in which this role has been dealt with in the European integration literature. Its ultimate goal is to understand what the future prospects are for regions within the integration process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some processes of integration include a parliamentary body in their institutional structures. This paper combines basic premises of neofunctionalism and intergovernmentalism to address the origin and further evolution of regional parliaments, including the necessary precautions when applying European approaches of integration to other regions. With these postulates in mind, we outline an explanation of the way in which two regional parliaments, the European Parliament and the Mercosur Parliament, emerged and developed. The combination of approaches allows us to affirm that States are important and powerful actors, but the role of regional institutions and transnational actors cannot be ignored. However, comparative analysis shows that while in Europe the dynamics of the process of integration has feedback mechanisms beyond the control of States, in the Mercosur the influence of national Governments is overwhelming and prevents any "self-reinforcing" dynamics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper, which deals with the relationship between the juridical statutes of churches and fundamental rights within the European Union, is divided into two parts. The first part describes the protection of fundamental rights within the EU; and the second addresses the three key questions that arose regarding a subject discussed during the European Convention held to draft the so-called European Constitution, the failure of which led to the Treaty of Lisbon: (1) the relationship between church statutes and Article 10 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (concerning freedom of thought, conscience and religion); (2) the role of fundamental rights as parameters protecting churches in EU treaties; and (3) the guarantee of the juridical statute of churches under the terms of the Charter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Trans-European Transport Networks (TEN-T) contribute to improve the competitiveness of the international markets within the European Union, EU, and strengthen the economic and social development of its countries. The aim of this paper is to analyze the infrastructure policy promoted by the EU. To that end, we describe and assess both the planning process of the TEN-T, and the financial instruments implemented by the EU to foster them. In the last decades some steps have been conducted to improve the EU infrastructure policy. However, these measures have not been sufficient to ensure the development of such infrastructures. In order to solve this problem, in the future, the EU should play a greater role in developing cross-border infrastructure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although national European governments prefer to manage orderly, legal migration flows, the presence of irregular immigrants on European territory is evident. Although Southern- European countries are, for various reasons, the ones with most such irregular inmigrants, the rest of Europe must also come to grips with the same phenomenon. The goal of this paper is to analyse the mechanisms and instruments implemented through the years in order to deal with immigration irregularities in the different European countries. We will pay special attention to year 2005, in which the European Union has began to build up a common framework within which to discuss the political answers needed to manage irregular immigration in Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the community employment policy of the European Union (EU) through the execution and results of the so-called European Employment Strategy (EES), created in 1997, as a response to the problems raised by labour and employment transformations. The EES is supported by four fundamental pillars: employability, enterpreneurship, equal opportunities and adaptability. The last pillar is intended to reconcile the different flexibilizing options for employment with the security of labour force protection (flexisecurity) in order to achieve a certain balance in the economy and reach social cohesion. The massive extension of atypical or non-traditional forms of employment, persistent unemployment, particularly long-lasting unemployment, and some workers' collectives (youth, women and the elderly); demographic changes, including ageing of the population as well as the regional disparities among EU member countries, represent serious challenges to achieving the EES aims of reaching full employment, competitiveness and social cohesion, as is evident in the balances performed up to now by its own institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]