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Under what conditions can challenger parties disrupt mainstream party dominance in democratic institutions? While extant work describes the cultural and economic developments that benefit challengers and parties’ programmatic responses to these, I demonstrate when and how challengers exploit these conditions in their political communication. Theoretically, I posit that challenger parties have relatively stronger vote-seeking incentives than mainstream parties. These collective incentives affect individual parliamentarians’ cost–benefit calculations. Challenger parliamentarians will engage in anti-establishment rhetoric and issue-entrepreneurship when these signals are more likely to reach the voting public and pay-off electorally. I test this theory by analysing parliamentary debates from the European Parliament (1999–2016) through a novel combination of word embeddings and bespoke dictionaries. I find that challenger parties indeed pursue different communication strategies than mainstream parties. Challenger parliamentarians engage in anti-establishment rhetoric in the run-up to elections and issue-entrepreneurship during crises. This is because these factors make speeches more likely to be transmitted to voters. These results demonstrate that challengers adjust their political communication in opportune moments giving them a competitive advantage over less flexible mainstream parties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of the prevalence of anti-gender politics in Europe, political institutions such as parliaments have become arenas of political struggles around gender and gender equality. While feminist scholarship has studied anti-gender politics, less attention has been paid to feminist responses to such opposition. The contribution of this article is to conceptualize feminist responses to anti-gender politics within political institutions, which we name feminist institutional responses. This conceptualization entails proposing a set of analytical categories for capturing forms of feminist institutional responses – namely, knowledge, coalition building, rule making, and everyday pragmatic engagement. We analyze 50 plenary debates on gender equality and two plenary debates on the State of the Union, as well as 135 interviews with members of the European Parliament and political staff during two terms that witnessed a rise in anti-gender politics, 2014–2019 and 2019–2024. The conceptualization of feminist institutional responses to anti-gender politics in parliaments is important for identifying how institutional actors are countering the destructive potential of anti-gender politics and safeguarding parliaments as democratic sites for the advancement of gender equality policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Europe, the multiplication of elections makes the election calendar a decisive issue given the decreasing participatory trend. Turnout is expected to be higher in simultaneous elections, while it lessens if several elections are held over a short period. The saliency of the preceding ballot may also affect participation in the next one. In this article, we argue that these temporal effects are crucial for European Parliament elections due to their second-order nature. We analyse how the position, frequency and nature of domestic ballots affect European Parliament elections turnout since 1979. Our results indicate that the participation level is less affected by the timing of elections than by their overall frequency. The type of preceding election also matters, although not the second-order nature per se. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The uniqueness of the European Parliament, as well as the magnitude of impact its decisions wield over member states, are elements that capture researchers' attention. However, several of this institution's particularities have made broad analysis of the textual content it produces difficult. This research note presents Vitrine Démocratique, a new, publicly accessible, and centralized database structuring interventions made in the European Parliament starting in 2014, both in their original languages and translated to English. The process by which this high-velocity database was created is presented, as well as a descriptive overview of the contents of this data source, which is continuously updated on a daily basis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European Parliament (EP) constitutes a prime site of contemporary party politics in Europe. Its seven political groups represent political interests and ideologies beyond specific national interests. Within the groups, national delegations exert considerable power. The research objective of this article is to generate new knowledge about the role of national delegations within political groups. The research material consists of 140 elite interviews with MEPs and staff. The data allow the article to analyse the construction of the role and the importance of national delegations and to focus not just on formal institutions, but also on informal ones which are often outside the reach of quantitative methods and data. The findings suggest that political groups can be divided into different categories. The role and influence of national delegations are strongly governed by informal institutions, in particular when it comes to distribution of leadership positions and policy making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rise of Euroscepticism has shifted the structure of political conflict in the European Parliament (EP) towards an increasingly dominant pro-/anti-EU divide. Focusing on the hard case of EU enlargement, this article examines changes in MEPs' discursive and voting patterns over the past two EP mandates. It combines two original datasets containing MEP statements during plenary debates and subsequent roll-call votes to examine the polarisation, cohesion, and consistency of legislative behaviour across different European Political Groups. The findings show that soft Eurosceptics drive a deepening of the pro-/anti-EU divide by radicalising in both discourse and vote to join hard Eurosceptics in their firm rejection of further enlargement. Pro-European MEPs, in contrast, show discursive accommodation of Eurosceptic concerns, with a growing inconsistency between sceptical discourse and continued vote-based support for enlargement-related initiatives. A case study of Turkey illustrates these two mechanisms. The findings shed light on the changing dynamics of political competition in the EP and the impact of rising Euroscepticism upon MEPs' legislative behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On 12 March 2024, the European Parliament adopted the text for revising the current Product Liability Directive (revised PLD), which was implemented in 1985. The revised PLD adapted the rules for the damage caused by defective products for the challenges from digitalisation, the circular economy and international supply chains. In particular, the new rules aim to ensure that new technologies, such as AI, could be well reflected, so that residents in the European Union could be effectively protected. Conventionally, a law and economics analysis has played a crucial role in shaping product liability. The objective of this paper is to discuss the major changes in the revised PLD via the lens of insights of law and economics. In specific, we focus on the influence of these changes on multiple key elements, including deterrence effect, risk-shifting and local preferences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On 12 March 2024, the European Parliament adopted in first reading the Product Liability Directive, adding substantial amendments to the European Commission's proposal of 2022. The aim of the reform is to adapt the famous 1985 Product Liability Directive to the digital age and make it easier for consumers to enforce their rights in court. It notably introduces a duty of disclosure and various alleviations of the burden of proof. The present paper describes the proposed rules on disclosure of evidence and presumptions, charts the changes between the Commission's proposal in 2022 and the Parliament's adoption in 2024, and attempts to assess whether the new product liability regime will meet the challenges of its time and be a game changer in helping consumers enforce their rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on enforcing compliance with the European Union's (EU's) rule of law value has focused on the roles of the European Commission, the European Parliament and the Court of Justice of the EU. However, the Council of the EU has attracted less attention. Existing scholarship has convincingly established that the rotating Presidency can crucially influence the functioning of the Council, and, accordingly, this paper examines the discretionary impact the Presidencies have towards Art.7 procedures. Drawing on official documents and statements, this paper compares how the various Presidencies from 2018 to 2022 have used their privileged position on the Council's agenda to decide whether to move forward with hearings. In doing so, they selected appropriate agenda‐shaping strategies, shaped the Commission's perceived opportunities to exercise its agenda prerogatives, avoided compromises on the trios' agendas and, sometimes, benefited from not dealing with Art.7 to pursue other agenda priorities. The Presidency's wide room for manoeuvre hinders the Council's activity in scrutinising backsliding governments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Euroscepticism has become prominent across the European Union, also in countries that were originally seen as pro‐integrationist such as the Netherlands. Based on a qualitative analysis of claims in three major Dutch newspapers, I examine the mainstreaming of Euroscepticism in the Netherlands in the context of the 2009, 2014 and 2019 European Parliament elections. Mainstreaming refers to a process in which an idea becomes an integral part of debates in the public sphere. I examine the mainstreaming of Euroscepticism through a two‐part analysis that centres around a fourfold typology, which distinguishes between supportive, Euroalternative, soft Eurosceptic and hard Eurosceptic claims. I find that Euroscepticism has indeed become mainstream, in debates revolving around arguments for and against the European Union. Furthermore, Euroscepticism has not just become more prominent but has also moved from an outsider to an insider perspective. Yet, it often remains unclear what Euroscepticism actually entails. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adoption of the new regulation 2024/573 of the European Parliament and of the Council, due to the increase in global warming, commercial refrigeration adapts, together with the reduction of the possibility of using refrigerants with a GWP greater than 150 units starting from 2025. In this way, the transition to refrigerants with GWP less than 150 units becomes mandatory for manufacturers of stationary refrigeration equipment. Refrigerants with GWP below 150 units are from category A2L (slightly flammable refrigerants) and A3L (flammable refrigerants) and this implies greater safety measures in installation and service than in the case of refrigerants from category A1L (nonflammable refrigerants) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Doing justice to their families and the political mandate is especially difficult for MEPs. Parents struggle to balance family obligations and work, particularly when the children are young. They undertake extensive journeys between their home constituencies and Brussels or Strasbourg. This taxing routine is further compounded by prolonged working hours, often devoid of leisurely weekends. In combination with the absence of a comprehensive parental leave policy, these challenges disproportionately affect parents of young children, particularly mothers, influencing the diversity and representation within the European Parliament. This study critically examines the existing conditions that shape the working environment of MEPs who are parents. It explores recent endeavors to reform these conditions and the underlying obstacles that hinder the progress of these reformative initiatives. Referring to relevant documents, this study first outlines formal regulations governing parental rights in the European Parliament. We then address informal rules and recent reform proposals using insight from MEP interviews. This examination investigates how parent MEPs assess working conditions and balance competing demands. Despite expectations, the European Parliament falls short of being as family-friendly as anticipated. Nevertheless, recent times have witnessed increased attention to the topic and various reform proposals. The obstacles posed by diverse national legacies and variant conceptions of MEP mandates and statuses for reform are highlighted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the narratives of the European Council, European Commission, and European Parliament regarding the European refugee crisis. Although the relevant scholarly research suggests that the EU Institutions held different perspectives about the refugee crisis, this paper argues that there was no such a clash of perspectives. This paper builds on the Copenhagen School's securitization framework as complemented with subsequent methodological tools to support the author's arguments. The findings suggest that despite the similarity in the views held by the main EU Institutions considering the refugees' influx, there was a variation in the intensity of their securitizing narratives. Theoretically, this study develops an understanding of the importance of the securitization narratives' intensity. Methodologically, this study introduces the Securitization Narratives Continuum, a research tool that facilitates the assessment of securitization. Empirically, this is the first study to interview and take into account the opinions of the securitizing actors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the wake of the pervasive digitalisation of industry, the disruption of global supply chains during the COVID-19 pandemic, and a geopolitical race for the development of artificial intelligence models, the European Union has pivoted towards promoting 'digital sovereignty' across the technological stack. The paper looks more specifically at the cloud layer and analyses the draft European Union Cloud Services Scheme (EUCS) launched by the European Union Agency for Cybersecurity in December 2020. While EUCS is a highly technical scheme, the attempt to include digital sovereignty provisions in it provoked unexpected controversies around who pushes for 'digital sovereignty', why, and how feasible it is. The paper argues, first, that distributive conflicts between member states have led to strong objections towards including digital sovereignty provisions in EUCS. Second, diverging national preferences have also played out in horizontal inter-institutional conflicts around competences between the European Commission and the European Parliament. All in all, the paper makes a novel empirical contribution by studying the overlooked case of EUCS. Theoretically, it bridges the growing literature on digital sovereignty with classic theories of EU integration to identify key factors hindering the translation of digital sovereignty discourses into policy within a broader context of limited technological capabilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent studies show that, when salience is high, 'heterogeneous lobbying coalitions' uniting business and civil society groups are more successful in achieving their lobbying objectives than homogeneous coalitions. It is therefore surprising that a coalition of tech firms and civil society activists failed to prevent the adoption of the EU's contested 2019 Copyright Directive, which constitutes a significant shift in the Union's approach to online content regulation. This article argues that proponents of the policy change successfully undermined the lobbying coalition by invoking notions of 'digital sovereignty' and by delegitimizing activists as Silicon Valley's 'useful idiots'. Combining process-tracing of the lobbying processes and content analysis of European Parliament debates, the article shows how legislators employed delegitimation and sovereignty claims to justify their non-responsiveness to public protests. The article contributes to the interest group literature and debates on 'digital sovereignty' by demonstrating its strategic use in the policy-making process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European Parliament influenced policy, and was a forum for the airing and sharing of a wide array of views and approaches to forms of European integration. Often conflicted and divided, members of the British Labour Group, comprising of the elected Labour Party representatives to the European Parliament, viewed the European Economic Community as a key platform and means through which workers' rights could be supported. And many Labour Party Members of the European Parliament (MEPs), including sceptics, enthusiasts and those whose views changed, played a part in shaping the European Economic Community. This was particularly so with workers' rights, an area which was central to the Labour Party, the European Parliament and the European Economic Community in the 1980s. The European Parliament was an instrumental institution in terms of building ties across borders and shaping and changing perspectives on key policy areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the 2024 European Parliament elections in Spain as an element of national and European political pro-cess. The purpose of the study is to reveal key factors that in-fluenced voting outcome in Spain, as well as its possible im-plications for national political development and country’s role in the European Union. The research is based on the of-ficial data on the election results in Spain and the European Union, Spanish national statistics, Russian and Spanish think tanks’ and news agencies’ publications. The factors that shaped the campaign course and election results include spe-cific features of Spain's administrative territorial structure; na-tional rules for the European Parliament elections; character-istics of the Spanish party system and national political pro-cess dynamics. The voting results were also influenced by the growing political appeal of national-conservative ideas and candidates’ reliance on unconventional methods of campaign-ing. The political and ideological balance among Spanish members of the newly-elected European Parliament reflects stronger presence of the right-wing, including far-right politi-cal forces, which is in line with general European trends. However, the traditional political competitors, the center-left Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party and the center-right People’s Party, which consistently take a pro-European stance, have retained their leading positions. This draws a conclusion about the probable continuity of Spain's course in the new European legislature and its further pursuit of greater integration.

According to Laurent Pech, the rule of law was described as a "'buzzword' by [Hungary's] justice minister; a fiction by a Fidesz MP; and a 'magic word' by the Fidesz-KDNP Delegation to the European Parliament. Not to be undone, a judge from Hungary's (captured) constitutional court, has presented the rule of law 'as a normative yardstick' which is little more than an empty nineteenth century ideal and a political joker [sic] for all purposes" (Pech, Hague J Rule Law 14(2–3): 107-138, 2022 128). In contrast, the English historian, E.P. Thompson, notoriously and controversially called the rule of law 'a cultural achievement of universal significance.' With small amendments, I agree with Thompson. Each word in that phrase, I seek to demonstrate, deserves emphasis and respect. However, it makes a huge difference what one takes the rule of law to be about. What is universal is the notion and realisation of a state of affairs in which power is reliably tempered so as not to be available for arbitrary abuse. It is that which is a cultural achievement of universal significance. It is a mistake to identify it, as so many do, with any allegedly canonical arrangement of forms and institutions and rules that are enlisted or assumed to embody it. Many people make that mistake. Some do so, because they naively think that installation of familiar institutions they associate with 'the rule of law' is the same as generating the ideal itself. The disappointing history of rule of law promotion around the world shows that is not the case. On the other hand, modern illiberal, often populist, regimes are happy to endorse such a mistake and pretend that they are committed to the rule of law by making a show of conformity to legal forms, while systematically subverting and abusing the rule of law itself. Both the naïve and the malicious interpretations should be rejected. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Citizens' ability to hold corrupt politicians accountable is a key feature of democratic political systems. Particularly in the European Union (EU), such accountability mechanisms are often argued to malfunction due to the EU's complicated and opaque institutional structure, which could compromise voters' basic abilities to detect political malpractice in Brussels. Putting EU voters' attentiveness to the test, we provide quasi‐experimental evidence of the causal effect of a recent corruption scandal in the European Parliament. Leveraging an 'Unexpected Event during Survey Design' identification strategy in France and Germany, we document a sizeable negative effect of the so‐called Qatargate scandal on public trust in the European Parliament. This provides causal evidence on the presence of attentiveness to EU politics within these electorates. Given the EU's complex institutional structure, we derive two alternative implications from this finding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the different discourses adopted concerning the climate change-migration nexus within the European Parliament (EP). It uses a critical discourse analysis approach to analyse a specific motion for resolution report, its amendments, and plenary debates, as well as an expert interview with the rapporteur to gain further insights into the political dynamics and challenges involved in the process. An own-initiative report is chosen for the analysis to reveal conflicting discourse-making processes between various political groups within the EP and to better understand the role of the EP in the legislative branch of the European Union. It is found that political ideology plays an influential role. Even though political groups agree on the aims of the report, they constantly debate and use amendments to change content and extent. Therefore, we claimed that political discourses in a parliamentary setting should be analysed by specifically evaluating diagnostic, prognostic, and motivational arguments of discourses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By focusing on Cyprus’ constitutional and political system in light of the most recent European elections, this article explores and empirically analyses the second-order election theory and the European salience theory. The study applies these theories to identify key trends in Cypriot voters’ electoral behavior, including their attitudes toward European integration. The contribution starts with a brief preliminary section on the country’s historical background, geopolitical profile, and political landscape. It then provides insights on Cyprus’ electoral system, the political parties’ campaigns, and election results. The findings seek to unveil voter attitudes and political trends in Cyprus, feeding public discussion and academic dialogue on the issue in anticipation of the upcoming 2024 European election. The article aims to clarify the European South’s attitudes toward voting and what to expect in the upcoming 2024 elections, considering challenges, threats, and volatility.1

The article assesses the 2019 elections to the European Parliament (EP) in Lithuania and their theoretical relevance. The analysis presents the political stances of parties and the electorate towards the EU. The focus then shifts to information and political campaigns, the parties participating in the EP elections, and the electoral results. These aspects serve to evaluate the theoretical relevance of Second-order election theory and the Europe salience theory, revealing the absence of Eurosceptic, protest, populist, and postmaterial mood in the 2019 EP elections in Lithuania.

Social relations have the potential to shape who assumes policy leadership positions in legislative politics. Applying a relational event modeling framework, this paper investigates if homophily and reciprocity predict patterns of collaboration between lawmakers as they negotiate proposed legislation. Specifically, it examines if members of the European Parliament (EP) who serve as rapporteurs or shadow rapporteurs are more likely to select into working with colleagues who share their personal attributes or with whom they have previously collaborated. It conceives of EP policy‐making as an evolving two‐mode network comprised of legislators and jointly produced policy documents as nodes, and (shadow‐) rapporteurships as ties. Conditional logistic regression analyses confirm that previous collaboration, shared native language and gender, as well as policy expertise, increase the likelihood of MEPs becoming (shadow‐)rapporteurs. In contrast, party loyalty shows no clear, unambiguous effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Green Claims Directive (GCD),1 currently a Commission draft, represents the future legal framework for advertising with environmental claims, so-called green claims. The GCD is closely linked to the UCP Amending Directive 2024/825,2 which was published in the Official Journal of the European Union on 6 March 2024. The two directives are intended to form a coherent framework and are therefore considered together in this article. In particular, reference is made to relevant changes of the UCP Amending Directive 2024/825 in the text adopted by the European Parliament on 17 January 2024.3 On 12 March 2024, the EU Parliament voted on the draft GCD at first reading and adopted it with 146 amendments. On 17 June 2024 the European Council adopted its position ('generic approach') and made some significant changes to the draft. The most important amendments are presented in section V. News & Outlook. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study discusses the significant role of the European Parliament, particularly with the rise of right-wing parties in the 2024 elections. It reveals that shaping effective policy-making and actual decisions related to the EU's foreign affairs is different from the missions of this parliament. It emphasizes that foreign political decision-making and position-taking on international developments are primarily expressed by the European Council, the meetings of European foreign ministers, and the European Commission or European External Policy Commissioner. The study suggests that while issues such as immigration to Europe, maintaining energy supplies, and resolving internal crises will likely be the European Parliament's primary concerns, the results of the 2024 elections could still lead to significant changes in the EU's relations and positions towards the Arab world and the Palestinian issue. It would be clearer if these results affected the political elections in the EU member states. As such, it is more likely to affect the shaping of the EU's foreign policy through its executive bodies. The potential for an expanded scope of confrontation at the regional level in the Middle East necessitates the EU to adopt certain common positions, and the EU parliament would play some role in that situation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

EFSA was asked by the European Parliament to provide a scientific opinion on the analysis by the French Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health & Safety (ANSES) of Annex I of the European Commission proposal for a regulation 'on plants obtained by certain new genomic techniques (NGTs) and their food and feed, and amending regulation (EU) 2017/625'. The Panel on genetically modified organisms (GMO) assessed the opinion published by ANSES, which focuses on (i) the need to clarify the definitions and scope, (ii) the scientific basis for the equivalence criteria and (iii) the need to take potential risks from category 1 NGT plants into account. The EFSA GMO Panel considered the ANSES analysis and comments on various terms used in the criteria in Annex I of the European Commission proposal and discussed definitions based on previous EFSA GMO Panel opinions. The EFSA GMO Panel concluded that the available scientific literature shows that plants containing the types and numbers of genetic modifications used as criteria to identify category 1 NGT plants in the European Commission proposal do exist as the result of spontaneous mutations or random mutagenesis. Therefore, it is scientifically justified to consider category 1 NGT plants as equivalent to conventionally bred plants with respect to the similarity of genetic modifications and the similarity of potential risks. The EFSA GMO Panel did not identify any additional hazards and risks associated with the use of NGTs compared to conventional breeding techniques in its previous Opinions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With growing public distrust toward European institutions, Eurosceptic populist radical-right parties make up almost a third of MEPs in the current European Parliament. As part of the larger scholarly debate on populist parties' success, this article examines intra-party selection logic for the 'perfect' populist radical-right MEP candidate. Using original data from participant observation and interviews with Alternative for Germany delegates during the 2018/2019 European Election Assembly, this study suggests that party members were more likely to be selected as candidates if they (1) possessed extensive network with right-wing social movements to strengthen their electoral mobilization; (2) and showed strong commitment to party cohesion and good reputation to fend off accusations of racism and Nazism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite bioenergy playing an important role in producing a significant amount of renewable energy in the EU, there are several differing views of its future role, as illustrated in the European Parliament and society more generally. The aim of this paper is to investigate the barriers to advancing bioenergy use and prospects for the future of bioenergy in the EU. Whereas previous studies have focused on specific aspects of EU bioenergy, such as market structure, technological considerations, and individual forms of bioenergy, this study provides results from a survey analyzing several factors that are inhibiting overall bioenergy development throughout the EU. The results show that, in general, the growth of bioenergy use in the EU can be expected to continue, although there are many issues that need to be addressed by society and through policy implementation. The most important of these issues include the relationship between the future role of the fossil fuel using industry and bioenergy, addressing the inadequate and currently confusing level of policy support, and responding to the perception of low public acceptance, reflected by pressure from some nongovernmental organizations to reduce the use of bioenergy. The study shows that biomass is not always the best option in economic terms, and other options such as heat pumps powered by green electricity or natural gas can be more financially attractive. To ensure the continuing development of the bioenergy field in the EU, it is important to increase local policy support for bioenergy, decrease imports of fossil fuels from non‐EU countries, increase investment in the bioenergy sector, and engage in effective and fact‐based education about, and promotion of, bioenergy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition is a research institute within the Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science. The Institute is committed to fundamental legal and economic research on processes of innovation and competition and their regulation. Its research focus is on the incentives, determinants and implications of innovation. The Institute informs and guides legal and economic discourse on an impartial basis. It hereby presents its position on the European Commission's proposal of 27 April 2023 for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on standard essential patents and amending Regulation (EU) 2017/1001. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Conference on the Future of Europe, launched by the European Union in 2021, aimed to engage citizens in a dialogue and serve as a key platform for EU institutions to discuss the future direction of the European Union. Hungary actively participated in the process, and the objective of our study is to shed light on the contributions of Hungarian citizens and the conclusions drawn from them. The study also explores the post-Conference landscape, tracing the evolution of the proposals arising directly or indirectly from the debates on the future of Europe, with a reflection to their possible implications on the revision of the EU Treaties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the discursive articulations of populism with egalitarianism in the parties of the Greek Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA) and the German The Left Party (Die Linke). I draw on tools of political discourse analysis and use a discursive-analytical perspective to develop an analytical framework for examining egalitarianism and populism as separate yet interconnected concepts in the examined cases. My data is drawn from speeches and interviews of each party’s leadership during the national and European Parliament elections from 2009 to 2019. The aim is to make an argument for the analytical utility of ‘the elite’ term and its importance within each party’s socio-political context to separate egalitarian from populist elements in each party’s discourse and offer a renewed understanding of the distinction between egalitarianism and populism as two concepts that are often conflated in radical left parties. The analysis showed that there was a distinction between egalitarian and populist discursive elements in both parties’ discourses, with each party employing them on different levels depending on their respective contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aims to unravel the connection between the representation of Eurosceptic MEPs and the EP's position on Preferential Trade Agreements. As a result of the growing importance of the EU's trade policy and the uneven contestation thereof in public space, this question seems of great importance. By zooming into the EP's INTA Committee, this article shows how the increasing representation of Eurosceptic MEPs shapes their mobilization on PTAs. More specifically, the article examines INTA's Own Initiative Procedure reports in the EP's 6th, 7th, and 8th legislative terms. Using a facet of the Post-Functionalist framework, it retraces the evolution of Eurosceptic MEPs' mobilization at the Committee and plenary levels, and points to the impact thereof on the EP's position on PTAs. In terms of results, the article finds that while Eurosceptic MEPs remain unable to substantially shape the EP's position, Eurosceptic MEPs can increasingly build contesting coalitions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

External shocks and policy spillovers have facilitated a gradual shift away from the exceptionalism (exclusive role of agricultural interests) in the EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). This article argues that post-Lisbon decision-making rules and procedures, against some of the expectations, slowed this process. First, the parallel veto-based negotiations on the bloc's finances gave status quo actors the opportunity to influence the CAP indirectly (by blocking the redistribution of CAP funds) and directly (through package deals). Second, the co-decision procedure allowed the ministers of agriculture and the European Parliament's Committee of agriculture to change the proposals of the more reform-minded Commission more easily. The argument is supported by the case of the CAP 2023–2027 reform, which resulted in limited changes given the Brexit-related cut in CAP funding (external shock) and the inclusion of environmental targets as part of the European Green Deal (policy spillover effects). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of this research is to explore the political discourse of West European right-wing populist leaders in the perspective of pernicious polarization, focusing on their positions and argumentation styles. To achieve this, over 50,000 tweets from right-wing populist leaders in Western Europe (Italy, France and Spain) were collected for a period spanning from 2 July 2019, which marks the beginning of the 9th legislature of the European Parliament, to 2 July 2023. Employing Text Mining and Topic Modeling techniques, this research will reconstruct and comparatively analyze the topics addressed by the leaders from different countries and the dynamics of polarization discourse proposing an exploratory study aiming to locate the words of pernicious polarization used by each leader. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research contributes to the study of populist radical right parties' (PRRPs) role in gendered democratic backsliding by analyzing their articulation and symbolic representation of gender issues. We compare the politicization of gender issues across three European PRRPs, examining how context-specific gendered opportunity structures – the level of contestation of gender issues in their country, the resonance of antigenderism among their electorate, and their issue repertoire and historical trajectory – shape the extent and ways in which the German AfD, the Italian Lega and the Sweden Democrats politicize gender issues. We conduct a quantitative content analysis of PRRPs' framing of gender issues and construct topic networks based on the parties' Facebook and Twitter posts during the European Parliament election campaign 2019. We analyze the salience of gender issues, the broader topical context in which they are embedded, the specific gender issues addressed, and the parties' positions on these issues. Our results show how context-specific gendered opportunities shape PRRPs' national gender discourses: A low level of contestation, evidenced by a high public recognition and legal protection of gender and sexual equality, seems to foster a femonationalist framing, while antigenderist discourse is less pronounced in such a context. Instead, a higher level of contestation, expressed in a lower public recognition and legal protection of gender and sexual equality, seems to foster antigenderist discourse. A transnational femonationalist framing, shared by all analyzed parties, relates to a common nativist ideological core. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European Commission has presented a draft for a comprehensive reform of pharmaceutical law in order to promote innovation and access to medicines. However, the reform is facing criticism from the innovative pharmaceutical industry, which is concerned that the new rules could jeopardize Europe's competitiveness as a research location. In particular, the planned weakening of data protection is seen as innovation-hostile. The European Parliament has adopted its position on the EU Pharma Package and partially withdrawn some planned changes, but industry criticism remains. The article deals with the European Commission's proposal to shorten data protection for medicines. The proposal suggests shortening data protection from six to two years, followed by a two-year market protection. Critics argue that it is not possible in many countries to obtain a decision on the reimbursement eligibility of a medicine within two years. The European Parliament proposes a data protection period of seven and a half years, followed by a two-year market protection. The extension of data protection for products marketed in all member states is seen as an insurmountable hurdle for many companies. There is also discussion of extending data protection by six months for medicines that fill a medical supply gap. However, critics argue that the definition of "medical supply gap" is too narrow. The article describes the proposed changes in EU pharmaceutical law. The European Parliament has proposed extending data protection for medicines by twelve months, while market protection can only be granted once. It is also proposed to shorten market exclusivity for medicines for rare diseases from ten to nine years, with the possibility of an extension to eleven years in the case of a "major medical supply gap". Measures to address medicine shortages are also proposed, such as the introduction of an EU-wide list of critical medicines and the tightening of obligations for marketing authorization holders and wholesalers. The Parliament has largely supported the Commission's proposal but has tightened the obligations related to supply shortages. The article describes the proposed regulations for addressing medicine shortages in the EU. Marketing authorization holders must explain reasons for interruptions or suspensions of supply and report them at least six months in advance. Wholesalers must report shortages and provide information on available stocks. The European Commission has proposed measures to strengthen supply chains and minimize supply interruptions. An alliance for critical medicines is also being created to develop coordinated actions against the shortage of critical medicines. The industry has positively evaluated the proposed measures. [Extracted from the article]

This paper examines the role of the European Parliament as an international moral tribune for the promotion of human rights through a qualitative case-study design. It focuses on the emblematic Ayotzinapa case, which involved the enforced disappearance of 43 young rural students and the killing of other six civilians in Mexico in September 2014. The paper innovatively analyses the parliamentary diplomacy activity of four Members and their respective political groups: Franziska 'Ska' Keller (Greens/EFA, Germany), Josep-Maria Terricabras i Nogueras (Greens/EFA, Spain), Estefanía Torres Martínez (GUE/NGL, Spain) and Teresa Jiménez-Becerril Barrio (EPP, Spain), during the 8th parliamentary term (2014–2019). It addresses: How does the European Parliament, acting as an international moral tribune, exercise its role in promoting human rights in practice? Importantly, how do individual members and their political groups contribute to fulfilling this role? The research findings reveal that the phenomenon of parliamentary diplomacy on human rights is highly complex, challenging the mainstream notion that the European Parliament is a monolithic player acting as a moral tribune in international relations. Results also provide important insight for understanding the (micro-)processes of parliamentary diplomacy and their relevance for human rights advocacy within the European Union's external relations and its Member States'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The emergence of increasingly capable artificial intelligence (AI) systems has raised concerns about the potential extreme risks associated with them. The issue has drawn substantial attention in academic literature and compelled legislators of regulatory frameworks like the European Union AI Act (AIA) to readapt them to the new paradigm. This paper examines whether the European Parliament's draft of the AIA constitutes an appropriate approach to address the risks derived from frontier models. In particular, we discuss whether the AIA reflects the policy needs diagnosed by recent literature and determine if the requirements falling on providers of foundation models are appropriate, sufficient, and durable. We find that the provisions are generally adequate, but insufficiently defined in some areas and lacking in others. Finally, the AIA is characterized as an evolving framework whose durability will depend on the institutions' ability to adapt to future progress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last decade, the European Union has faced multiple crises that have affected the direction and the nature of the integration process. This study focuses on the challenges posed by the Belarusian-EU border crisis (2021) and the proposed travel restrictions towards Russian citizens (2022) in the context of the Nordic-Baltic EU member states. The study addresses their impact through the double prisms of regionality and level of governance. The study looks at how national elite narratives on borders and the movement of people travel to the supranational context, in this case the European Parliament. While the Parliament is often overlooked in favour of the Council or the Commission, this study regards it as an effective analytical bridge between domestic and supranational decision-making levels. To achieve its empirical goals the study relies on governments' official communiques, while the parliamentary analysis is based on pre-vote debates and Parliament's roll-call votes. The article finds that, while the national narratives highlight a growing convergence of governmental narratives in adopting or justifying restrictive bordering measures, the EP debates and votes highlight the relevance of ideology and partisanship when it comes to the issue and the growing significance of the gap between mainstream and non-mainstream forces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the last 20 years, the European Union has been mired in crisis after crisis. At the same time, the number of infringement procedures, the formal requests from the European Commission to member states for compliance, decreased dramatically, despite the addition of 10 member states in 2004. Yet, the link between crises and Commission enforcement activity has not been systematically examined. In this article, I theorize about the role of time, and demonstrate that crises limit the Commission's ability to act as guardian of the treaties. However, crises are not deterministic in nature – the European Parliament and European Union citizens can alter the costs of Commission enforcement. I find that as Euroscepticism increases, the Commission's demand for compliance decreases, in part due to the steep reputational costs to the Commission when member states refuse compliance, especially after sanctions. The number of infringements is also positively correlated with European Parliament action, suggesting that even without formal sanctioning power, the European Parliament plays a role in European Union law enforcement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The European Parliament and the Council (EU) on October 23, 2019 adopted Directive 2019/1937 on the protection of persons reporting violations of EU law. It aims to improve the enforcement of EU laws and policies by increasing the ability to effectively detect violations of the regulations. The means to achieve this goal is to guarantee the protection of individuals who, because of their work (sensu largo), have information that proves a violation of EU law and is thus harmful to the public interest, and report these violations or disclose them to the public (whistleblowers). What is more, the Directive shifts public administration duties to the individuals. The article is an attempt to answer the question of whether the regulation of the protection of whistleblowers finds legal and social justification as well as to indicate the benefits and risks of granting whistleblowers special legal protection. The article ends with an assessment of the importance and implementability of the discussed regulation at both the social and economic levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Act of 5 July 2018 on the National Cybersecurity System and its accompanying executive regulations have introduced into Polish law the provisions of the Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council of 6 July 2016 concerning measures for a high common level of security of network and information systems across the Union (UE) 2016/1148. The fundamental reason for these regulations was to establish a coherent system to ensure the cyber security of the Republic of Poland with accordance to standards adopted for European Union Member States. This paper presents the legal situation of operators of essential services and digital service providers that was created by the provisions of the ANCS. The ANCS not only identifies operators of essential services, digital service providers, and their assigned obligations, but also addresses the competent authorities' tasks of supervising, inspecting and imposing penalties within the cyber security system. The findings, assessments and conclusions presented here are based on the interpretation of the provisions of the ANCS and are supported by prominent claims of academic representatives. The analyses contained within this paper aim to show that despite the comprehensible and contemporary ratio legis -- which falls within the framework of pursuing the state of digital safety -- the provisions of the ANCS require adjustments that acknowledge the legal situation of operators of essential services and digital service providers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the natural consequences of the development of technology is that an entrepreneur's confidential information, including trade secrets, is commonly stored in electronic files. This form of information storage inevitably entails challenges in the area of its protection. The coronavirus pandemic has drastically accelerated the process of dissemination of new models of employment, in particular remote (distance) work and cloud working, and has made the protection of an entrepreneur's secrets against unauthorised use even more complicated. This is due to the fact that in such models of employment, employees obtain access to their employer's data remotely, which may decrease the employer's level of control. To remedy this, employers may undertake various steps aimed at ensuring that their secrets are well protected; however, such actions may affect the free movement and mobility of workers. The purpose of this article is to verify how, in these circumstances, the measures provided for in EU law face the challenges of protecting an employer's secrets against unauthorised use by employees and how they define the scope to which they can be applied without the abuse of employees' rights and unjustified restrictions on their mobility. For that purpose, the author analyses in particular Directive (EU) 2016/943 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 8 June 2016 on the Protection of Undisclosed Know-How and Business Information (Trade Secrets) against Their Unlawful Acquisition, Use and Disclosure. This research is based mainly on the dogmatic method of analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]