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The COVID-19 pandemic has changed life in Europe and globally. The pandemic affects both individuals and the broader society across many domains, including physical and psychological health, the economy and general welfare. The measures taken to counteract the pandemic have significantly altered daily life and, along with the threat of contracting the coronavirus and uncertainties surrounding future developments, created a complex system of stressors with a negative impact on public mental health. This paper aims to outline the ESTSS strategy to address mental health issues related to COVID-19 and focuses on (1) trauma-informed policies, (2) capacity building, (3) collaborative research and (4) knowledge-exchange. To facilitate implementation of a trauma-informed approach and appropriate measures, ESTSS has developed a toolkit of recommendations on mental health and psychosocial assistance to be provided during the different phases of crisis and its aftermath. To promote capacity building, ESTSS offers a certification programme based on a curriculum in psychotraumatology and corresponding on-line training to the European community of mental health professionals. To assure evidence-based approaches and methods tailored to current circumstances, ESTSS has initiated a pan-European research project with international cooperation aimed at studying the mental health consequences of the pandemic, with a focus on psychological trauma and other stress-related reactions. To foster knowledge-exchange, the European Journal of Psychotraumatology (EJPT), the official journal of ESTSS, is publishing a special issue on COVID-19. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to analyze the development of rural tourism in Europe and the tourist specifics of countries with renowned destinations, focusing on the impact of COVID-19 from 2019 to 2022 and its influence on tourism trends. By utilizing data and documentation from the pandemic period, we aim to identify emerging trends in Europe and evaluate the sector's ability to recover to pre-pandemic levels. The analysis and conclusions are inevitably shaped by the COVID-19 pandemic period, with its effects compared against specified parameters. The statistical analysis, utilizing specific indices, shows that the pandemic had a negative impact on tourism activities, resulting in significant declines and underscoring the sector's vulnerability during crises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 2024 European Quality of Government Index (EQI) collects the opinions of 135,227 respondents in a total of 210 NUTS 1 and NUTS 2 regions in all EU 27 member state countries. This paper, first, presents the 2024 data and highlights some of the main results of this effort to understand citizens' perceptions, and personal experiences, of regional quality of government. Second, it compares the findings with the previous four rounds of the survey (starting in 2010), highlighting both the regions that are improving and those that show a declining trend in their quality of government. Third, the paper discusses the changes made to round 5 and other trends in the data over time, paying special attention to the comparison of EU citizens' perceptions and experiences of government before and after the Covid-19 pandemic. Compared to the improvements in corruption levels recorded in the 2021 study, we find that corruption levels have bounced back to more normal levels in post pandemic Europe [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Volatility in international oil markets is a recurrent phenomenon which causes spillovers on financial markets. However, a bidirectional comparison between the dynamic behavior of economic and financial crises has not been documented yet. This paper addresses this research question by employing a combined GARCH-VAR-Spillover Index methodology to measure the volatility of the WTI and the Brent in order to analyze its relationship with the SP500, NASDAQ, DAX and the IBEX for a sample corresponding to the period [2000:01, 2021:04]. Specifically, this paper compares the dynamic behavior of spillovers during the 2007-2009 financial crisis (taken as the financial crisis) and the COVID-19 pandemic (taken as the economic crisis). It has been found that there exists statistically significant net volatility shocks and spillovers from oil to stocks markets in the majority of cases and periods. These spillovers are bidirectional, and the net relationship is reversed depending on the market and the time period. The dynamic behavior of such spillovers depends on the region, being the USA more reactive to the source of the crisis than Europe. In particular, in the USA when the crisis is originated by financial shocks, financial markets are net transmitters of volatility to oil markets. When the source of the shock is economic, oil markets are net transmitters of volatility to stocks markets. This is not the case for Europe, where financial markets seem to be either transmitters or receivers of volatility no matter the source of the shock. In general, our study offers new evidence to understand macro-financial linkages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

COVID-19 (2019-) appears to have accelerated the transition of movable books from ubiquitous multimodal learning tools into artifacts and artworks, exhibited in museums and galleries. In their place, children are embracing interactive digital books. Whether they offer the same pedological value as their material counterparts remains a point of contention amongst early childhood educators. Both movable books and computers, evolved from volvelles. The devices, constructed using cut paper, emerged in Europe during the thirteenth century. Like papermaking, the technology had precedents in the orient. Their establishment in Europe coincided with The Black Plague (c.1346-1351). This article examines the inclusion or omission of papercuts in books, in relation to the broader application of papercutting within their respective communities. Primary and secondary sources were examined from Europe between the thirteenth and nineteenth centuries, from the United States during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries and from China between the nineth and twentieth centuries. Reference is also made to recent exhibitions featuring artist books and papercuts in in the museum and galleries sectors of Australia, the US, Asia, and Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The massive shift to working from home during the Covid-19 pandemic triggered discussions about its potential impact on the future demand for office space and the risk it poses to the performance of office markets. Against this background, the goal of this paper is to investigate the link between working from home and the evolution of key indicators of office occupier markets across Europe over the past three decades. Based on the data from Eurostat and CBRE, the paper uses panel regression to investigate the temporal as well as cross-sectional relationships between the share of the workforce working from home and office rents and vacancy rates in major cities. The results are interesting in several ways. Firstly, changes in the share of employees working from home did not appear to have any significant impact on the evolution of rents or vacancy rates over time. However, occasional homeworking was significant in explaining cross-sectional differences in office market indicators. Moreover, contrary to the initial expectations, higher share of employees occasionally working from home appeared to be associated with stronger performance of the respective office market. As explanation, the paper proposes a hypothesis that this was due to working from home being only one aspect of broader changes in the office work environment and related socio-economic trends that had a net beneficial effect on office occupier markets. Although the results refer to historical developments and may not be fully applicable to the current context of the pandemic, they highlight the need to consider working from home in a broader perspective of office occupier trends and ways of working. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated the urgency of better chronic disease management and the importance of making it an integral part of the recovery agenda in Europe. This paper aims to explore the shift towards digital and integrated care systems in Europe. Design/methodology/approach: In this viewpoint paper the Expert Group for Integrated Care and Digital Health Europe (EGIDE) group argues that an orchestrated shift towards integrated care holds the solution to the chronic disease pandemic. Findings: The development of integrated care cannot happen without shifting towards a digitalised healthcare system via large-scale initiatives like the European Health Data Space (EHDS) and the involvement of all stakeholders. Originality/value: The EGIDE group has identified some foundational principles, which can guide the way to realise the full potential of the EHDS for integrated care and can support the involved stakeholders' thinking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The inability of Nordic governments to coordinate their COVID-19 pandemic responses on social distancing and travel restrictions has puzzled observers and raised concerns for the future of Nordic cooperation. However, little academic attention has been directed so far to the collective Nordic response to the pandemic. In the first comprehensive account of Nordic health coordination and cooperation during the pandemic, this article investigates a paradox: how did one of the oldest regional units in Europe, with the current ambition of becoming the “most sustainable and integrated region in the world in 2030”, become one of the most inconsistent and divided once the pandemic hit? This paper argues that the recent developments have roots in the overall decline of the Nordic regional model. Increasingly based on broad commitments and informal coordination, Nordic solidarity has shown its limits in a time of crisis – leaving the Nordic project on the brink of marginalisation between the domestic and European levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The permanent changes in society affect, among other, the environment. This is why environmental efficiency plays a very important role, being quantified in different forms. In our paper we have developed a composite index of ecological efficiency taking into account two dimensions, environmental pollution and resource consumption, each one being characterized by specific indicators. Thus, using this index, the aim was to evaluate and rank the level of greening of each country in Europe. Crises over time, including the health crisis caused by coronavirus, have focused to resilience, so we have highlighted whether it is significantly influenced by the ecological efficiency index. In addition, we analyzed whether ecological efficiency is related to investments in a country, financial, material and technological potential. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Hotel & Tourism Management is the property of Faculty of Hotel Management & Tourism in Vrnjacka Banja 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.)

An editorial is presented on the COVID-19 vaccination campaign gets underway, and the coronavirus evolved at an unprecedented speed from a local phenomenon to a global threat, forcing governments to almost completely lock down what had been a vibrant society until then.

Objective. The objective of this study was to identify and interpret the current state-of-play of the implementation of digital education (DE) in higher education institutions (HEIs) in the field of library and information science (LIS) during COVID-19 pandemic. Approach/Methodology/Design. In order to collect data, a questionnaire-based survey was conducted. A survey for the study's target audience - the heads/directors of LIS schools/departments in Europe - was created and disseminated. The collected data were analysed using the method of descriptive statistics. Results. The survey was completed by the heads/directors of 56 LIS schools/departments in 23 European countries. The results indicate that DE presents a positive disruptive force that transforms the teaching and learning process and widens access to education, especially in crisis situations. It also indicates that despite the need for emergency response, almost all aspects of DE were deliberately and successfully implemented in most of the LIS higher education institutions. Further analysis of core topic areas (through interviews and focus groups) will provide a deeper insight into teachers' and students' practices and their overall appraisal of DE during the pandemic. Limitations. Limitations include the methods used to collect data and the lack of clarity and understanding of certain terms and concepts by a small number of participants. Originality/value. This paper off ers an in-depth understanding of the role of DE in crisis situations within the field of LIS. It underlines the necessity for consistent monitoring and evaluation of DE to guarantee its quality. Consequently, this paper may contribute to more eff ective policy and decision-making processes concerning DE. Moreover, it aims to help create frameworks and guidelines that facilitate simpler, more sustainable, and broader implementation of DE in LIS HEIs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Global energy consumption is growing rapidly, with the frequency and intensity of extreme events constantly increasing, posing a long-term threat to power supply and consumption. Therefore, analyzing the spatiotemporal characteristics of electricity consumption and quantitatively assessing the impact of extreme events on electricity consumption are of great significance. Based on fine-grained electricity consumption data from Europe for the years 2019–2022, this paper employs a data mining perspective and four methods including Z-score, Isolation Forest, Local Outlier Factor, and Autoencoder to detect abnormal electricity consumption during extreme events. Additionally, it combines indicators such as elastic loss, vulnerability, and duration to measure the impact of extreme events on electricity consumption. It is found that low temperatures could lead to abrupt changes in electricity consumption, with Northern Europe being more significantly affected by low temperatures. The COVID-19 pandemic had the most significant impact on electricity consumption in Europe, with the middle part of Europe being the hardest hit during the first wave of the pandemic. Electricity anomalies during the pandemic period were related to national pandemic control policies and exhibited some lag. High temperatures persisted for a longer duration in the middle part of Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Vaccination uptake is essential to controlling the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Healthcare workers (HCWs) play a critical role in receiving, recommending and delivering COVID-19 vaccination. Understanding the specific influences on each behaviour enables the development of targeted and tailored interventions to improve vaccination uptake. This paper presents a qualitative synthesis of HCWs' individual and context barriers and drivers to these three vaccination behaviours across 10 countries in Europe and Central Asia. Qualitative data from interviews and focus group discussions with 378 HCWs between December 2020 and March 2022 were synthesised and organised by four COM (capability, physical and social opportunity, motivation) factors. Differences by stage of COVID-19 vaccine roll-out (in preparation, early and late delivery) were explored. Receiving vaccination related to all four factors. Recommending vaccination mostly related to capability and motivation. HCWs were generally well-informed by official sources and viewed vaccination as the way to end the pandemic, acknowledging their important role in this. Colleagues, family and friends were positive influences on personal vaccination decisions. However, knowledge gaps were evident, particularly amongst nurses who relied on (social) media. Concerns about safety and effectiveness, often connected to knowledge gaps, were heightened by the accelerated timeline for COVID-19 vaccine development and approval. This impeded some HCWs' motivation to receive and recommend vaccination even in the later roll-out countries. Delivering vaccination was facilitated by support from public health organisations, teamwork and service re-organisation, more evident amongst later roll-out countries. Ongoing high workloads, stress and burnout hindered delivery. Complex and inter-related factors affecting HCWs' vaccination behaviours were identified. These insights should inform the design of multifaceted interventions (e.g., communication skills training, management support for HCWs' mental health, and engaging them in decision-making for service redesign); not only for COVID-19 vaccination as it is integrated into routine services but for routine immunization as a whole. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The paper explains critical changes to investment funding occurred over the past fifteen years in the European Union and explores the added value that National Development Banks create for sustainable finance. The delivery of the European Green Deal and the recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic require an unprecedented scale of resources. The need to adopt a new sustainable investment approach and adjust the operation of the financial system has become inevitable. Existing research has underlined the role national development banks play in counter-cyclical measures and promotion of the government's public policy goals. However, their standing in the sustainable finance landscape has enjoyed less attention so far. The paper, therefore, looks at how the remit of the Banks has evolved and assesses their progress and further development needs in relation to promoting sustainable finance. Design/Methodology/Approach: The research has followed a two-phase design. The first phase has included the examination of the operational setting of National Development Banks and their impact on overcoming market failures and improving access to finance. The second phase concentrated on drawing a comparison between the new regulatory requirements, in particular the European Green Deal, the EU Taxonomy Regulation and the functioning of the National Development Banks. The methodology has included a detailed literature review, desk research, data collection and re-assessment of earlier surveys, which has been used for prescriptive comparative analysis and cluster analysis. Findings: The paper concludes that National Development Banks, despite their common goals and mandates, demonstrate important variations in terms of government involvement in strategic direction and decisionmaking and the Banks' actual contribution to national policy goals. The outcome confirms the hypothesis that recent changes to the EU strategic and regulatory framework only require minor amendments to the direction of NDB investments. Their original setup and objectives are already in accordance with the new expectations and they invest mostly in economic sectors that the new taxonomy system classifies as sustainable. Practical Implications/ Originality/Value: This is important for the scholarly discourse on the essential conditions for sustainable finance. Meanwhile, the results provide usable guidance for development banks/funding agencies in Europe, too. The paper offers a solid ground for continued explorations of the European financial sector, whereas the recently adopted Digital Finance Package could further widen the agenda of the research direction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evolution of the COVID-19 pandemic has brought considerable transformations to the worldwide markets, creating an economic and sanitary crisis. Distribution channels were disrupted, affecting supply networks and business models. With restaurants and bars closed down, banned airlines and travel restrictions implemented, the economic well-being of worldwide industries got disturbed. As global decreases in alcohol trade were registered, wine market was appraised an industry worthy of being taken under consideration, with focus on its market size, incurred revenues, price evolution and degree of embracing digitalization to adapt to the ongoing restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic. The latter one referring to traditional wine tasting rooms which were banned due to the lockdown, wine industry found online wine tasting as a profitable alternative. The presented metrics were analyzed in Europe, with a high focus on region's main wine producers: France, Spain, Italy, Germany and Portugal, but not only. Research followed an exploratory approach to determine changes under pandemic restrictions, lockdown and finally economic crisis in the selected industry, by engaging international available data and statistics. The study, therefore, formulated relevant hypothesis based on market size and registered revenues, price evolution and adoption of online wine tasting strategies. Results of the paper highlight decreases in market size and revenues of European wine market, however, on the long-term, industry revival is forecasted. Prices slightly decreased mainly for prestigious wines (AOP labelled), showing consumer budget restraints brought by the crisis. European's wine market digitalization show differences among countries, with Germany being a leader for engaging such technologies. Our paper brings a snapshot of current trends and barriers under the COVID-19 pandemic, acting as a future basis and guidance for researchers in the field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Solitude is a rising phenomenon in the western world. The share of people affected by solitude has been rising for some time and the Covid-19 pandemic has further brought this trend to the fore. Yet, we know next to nothing about the aggregate subnational economic impact of the rise in solitude. In this paper, we analyse the consequences of solitude on regional economic performance across Europe, distinguishing between two of its key dimensions: alone living, proxied by the regional share of single-person households and loneliness, proxied by the aggregate share of social interactions. We find that solitude has important implications for economic development, but that these go in different directions. While alone living is a substantial driver of economic growth across European regions, high shares of lonely people undermine it. The connection of loneliness with economic growth is, however, dependent on the frequency of in-person meetings, with large shares of the population meeting others socially on a weekly basis, alongside a small percentage of people who never meet others, yielding the best economic returns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper investigates the determinants of subjective well-being in Europe using the European Living, Working and COVID-19 (ELWC) Survey carried out by Eurofound (2021). Socio-demographics characteristics, employment status, measures of economic distress, inequality and work life balance are considered. Particular attention is paid to how quality of government support (QGS), that considers the dimensions of good governance such as integrity, fairness, reliability, responsiveness and influences subjective mental well-being (WHO-5) through the mediation of trust in other people and in institutions. Design/methodology/approach: To this end, the authors estimate a moderated mediation model for analysing the indirect role of QGS on WHO-5 through institutional trust and trust in people. Findings: The results support the hypothesis that the reduction in WHO-5 in the European population during coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID--19), particularly marked in the 18–34 age group, is related to the perceived inadequacy of government interventions in managing economic and social uncertainty through supportive measures. This outcome is also due to reduced trust in institutions and other people, as both are significant mediators that reinforce the impact of public support on WHO-5. Practical implications: Government should pay greater attention to this relationship amongst good governance, trust and mental health of citizens because a healthy human capital is a significant factor for the long-run economic growth, in a special way when the authors refer to the young workforce with a greater life expectancy. Originality/value: In the literature, the role of trust as a mediator has been analysed in the relationship between individual economic situations and subjective well-being before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. To the best of the authors' knowledge, no studies have examined the role of perceived QGS on subjective mental well-being using the mediating and backing effects of trust in people and institutions. Peer review: The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-08-2022-0549. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the volatility transmission between European Global Systemically Important Banks (GSIBs) and implied stock market volatility. A Dynamic Conditional Correlation Generalized Autoregressive Conditional Heteroskedasticity model is applied to determine the dynamic correlation between returns of Europe's GSIBs and the world's most prominent measure of market "fear", the CBOE Volatility Index (VIX). The results identify a higher negative co-relationship between the VIX and GSIB returns during the COVID-19 period compared with the Global Financial Crisis (GFC), with one-day lagged changes in the VIX negatively Granger-causing bank returns. The asymmetric impact of changes in implied volatility is examined by quantile regressions, with the findings showing that in the lower quartile–where extreme negative bank returns are present–jumps in the VIX are highly significant. This effect is more pronounced during COVID-19 than during the GFC. Additional robustness analysis shows that these findings are consistent during the periods of the Swine Flu and Zika virus epidemics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Air transport has been identified as one of the primary means whereby COVID-19 spread throughout Europe during the early stages of the pandemic. In this paper we analyse two categories of methods – dynamic network markers (DNMs) and network analysis-based methods – as potential early warning signals for detecting and anticipating COVID-19 outbreaks in Europe on the basis of accuracy regarding the daily confirmed cases. The analysis was carried out from 15 February 2020, around two weeks before the first COVID-19 cases appeared in Europe, and 1 May 2020, approximately two weeks after all the air traffic in Europe had been shut down. Daily European COVID-19 information sourced from the World Health Organization was used, whereas air traffic data from Flightradar24 has been incorporated into the analyses by means of four alternative adjacency matrices. Some DNMs have been discarded since they output multiple time series, which makes it very difficult to interpret their results. The only DNM outputting a single time series does not emulate the COVID-19 trend: it does not detect all the main peaks, which means that peak heights do not match up with the increase in the number of infected people. However, many combinations of network analysis based methods and adjacency matrices output good results (with high accuracy and 20-day advance forecasts), with only minor differences from one to another. The number of edges and the network density methods are slightly better when dynamic flight frequency information is used. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives. To review the prevalence of loneliness (during/after COVID-19) in older people. Design. Scoping review using Medline and PsycInfo for worldwide prevalence estimates (white published literature search) and Google for prevalence data inside the Euregio Meuse-Rhine (grey literature). Setting. Worldwide prevalence estimates and a focus on the Euregio Meuse-Rhine. Participants. Papers published between 2016 and 2022 and a mean age of minimum of 65 years. Measurements. Prevalence estimates for older people. Results. The white literature search yielded 37 articles. Before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, loneliness estimates were the highest in Nigeria (46%) and the lowest in Australia (5%) (mean prevalence was 25.6%). Loneliness was reported to be higher in specific populations, for example, people living in specific communities such as senior housing communities or with impairments, than in the general population, with a mean prevalence estimate of 47.8%. During COVID-19, the prevalence of loneliness was higher than that before the pandemic: we observed a mean prevalence of 39.4%, in comparison to 25.6 before COVID-19. The grey literature search showed that, compared to Belgium and the Netherlands (13.5% and 36.5%, respectively), loneliness estimates were the lowest in Germany, with a mean prevalence of 7.7%. Conclusion. Large international differences in the prevalence of loneliness were observed between countries and populations studied. Several hypotheses could explain such differences, including sociocultural or historical-political characteristics. Without surprise, the pandemic and associated measures were linked to a higher level of loneliness. Furthermore, recommendations for addressing loneliness, including interventions, are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work explores the transition process towards a circular economic model in the European context. By placing the role of policies and waste as a focus of the debate, it first examines the possible effects that a stringent policy can generate and, secondly, how much waste and its management can influence the goodness of the transition process. By analyzing European data on major indicators of circularity, waste generation, and management, this paper attempts to provide a snapshot of the European situation and its different speeds along the transition path. In light of the recent development programs established by European institutions in the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic that strained the world economy, the trends show how program resources should be directed towards key sustainability sectors that can stimulate European countries towards a common circular pathway. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 crisis and countries' reactions led to analyses about how governance systems influenced the management of the pandemic and how COVID-19 influenced businesses. The concept of institutional resilience transcends these directions of research, but we know little about what it means and how to measure it. This paper proposes an innovative framework to conceptualize and assess institutional resilience based on three organisational traits: preparedness, agility and robustness. This approach provides the opportunity to sequence actions before, during and after the pandemic. This framework will be applied through various cases studies in Europe in the contributions to this symposium. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent statistical data and market studies have shown that the microgreens market is on a continuously upward trend in Europe and globally due to their healthier and nutritious qualities and for fast adoption of indoor and vertical farming especially in the cities. Worldwide the microgreens become of great interest due to their benefits for people`s health and beauty, being 40 times more nutritious than mature vegetables, increasing also the amount of available space that might be put into food production, with environmental benefits and economic profitability. The evolution of microgreens market to its real development potential depends of consumers behaviour and income level. Microgreens are considered ‘desert food’ by their huge potential to provide food in marginal areas affected by climate change becoming a part of sustainable farming. The present study pursued the evaluation of microgreens global market trends and forward statements in order to identify them as a potential profitable business in the era of Covid 19 pandemic when farmers should adapt food production to the new economic and social contexts. The study showed an increased consumer interest for “healthy” products, so that the change according to their behaviour shall generate an increase in the microgreens market worldwide. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 pandemic brought many changes to social behaviours in Europe. One of its major consequences was the temporary closure of borders, which was introduced as a measure to prevent the uncontrolled pandemic spreading and involved internal Schengen borders. This has had a major impact in the way in which cross-border cooperation has been conducted in Europe, including the Czech-Polish borderland, as it dramatically restrained all flows across borders. In this paper, we evaluate the impact of the pandemic on five roles of cross-border cooperation: 1) as a multi-level governance form; 2) as a regional development tool; 3) as a para-diplomacy form; 4) as a post-conflict reconciliation tool; and 5) as Europe-building. We argue that the impacts of the pandemic complicated regional development and the Europe-building role of cross-border cooperation in the Czech-Polish borderland. The article envisages re-bordering processes also in the Czech-Polish borderland, but with important exceptions in the regions with a high level of cross-border integration, mainly in the Euroregion Těšínské Slezsko/Śląsk Cieszyński. The paper also calls for the elaboration of the guidelines for possible repeated (Schengen) border closures and proposes modifications of the INTERREG microprojects schemes, to keep them attractive also in times of expected cuts in public finances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Española de Sociología is the property of Federacion Espanola de Sociologia 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.)

This paper explores the characteristics and inter-relationships of tax systems in the OECD countries over the period 2014–2020, i.e., from a relatively consolidated economic period until the end of the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. A predictable tax system is essential for the proper functioning of the economy. One of our two main research objectives was to develop a composite indicator for taxation, consisting of tax rates and tax administration time. This composite indicator was then tested using multivariate statistical methods. Our second research objective was to explore the correlation between tax rates, tax burden indicators and macroeconomic indicators over the period 2014–2020, focusing on three years, 2014, 2019 and 2020. An important criterion for the choice of the study years was that 2014 was considered the first overall year of recovery from the crisis, 2019 the last year before the COVID-19 pandemic, and 2020 the first year affected by the pandemic. We investigated the significant differences between the composite indicator categories and the tax burden macroeconomic indicators, and examined and tested correlations between the variables under study (tax rates, tax burden and macroeconomic variables). We found that the amount of working time spent on tax administration is decreasing, presumably due to the increasingly digitalised environment, but this trend has been slightly interrupted by the pandemic. Furthermore, we found that countries with more complex tax systems with a high tax burden perform worse on certain macroeconomic indicators, mainly in southern Europe from a geographical perspective; however, these potentially more burdensome, higher-rate tax systems of more developed countries do not put these countries at a competitive disadvantage. This reflects on the fact that these countries rely on the monetarist school rather than the Keynesian school, a fact which was also compared and considered in our paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to contribute technical arguments to the debate about the importance of health examination surveys and their continued use during the post-pandemic health financing crisis, and in the context of a technological innovation boom that offers new ways of collecting and analysing individual health data (e.g. artificial intelligence). Technical considerations demonstrate that health examination surveys make an irreplaceable contribution to the local availability of primary health data that can be used in a range of further studies (e.g. normative, burden-of-disease, care cascade, cost and policy impact studies) essential for informing several phases of the health planning cycle (e.g. surveillance, prioritization, resource mobilization and policy development). Examples of the use of health examination survey data in the World Health Organization (WHO) European Region (i.e. Finland, Italy, Malta and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland) and the WHO Region of the Americas (i.e. Chile, Mexico, Peru and the United States of America) are presented, and reasons why health provider-led data cannot replace health examination survey data are discussed (e.g. underestimation of morbidity and susceptibility to bias). In addition, the importance of having nationally representative random samples of the general population is highlighted and we argue that health examination surveys make a critical contribution to external quality control for a country's health system by increasing the transparency and accountability of health spending. Finally, we consider future technological advances that can improve survey fieldwork and suggest ways of ensuring health examination surveys are sustainable in low-resource settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on political conflict often overlooks the role of visual-based platforms like Instagram in expressing political discontent, focusing primarily on textual content from newspapers and social media. This paper examines the practicalities and challenges of conducting visual research on Instagram, particularly in the context of comparative studies. We highlight the difficulties associated with sampling representative visual content. Through a small case study, we illustrate how hashtags associated with a single country can generate multiple conflicts, using indicators developed in political protest research and contentious politics. The existence of diverse debates within and across hashtags complicates cross-country comparisons of Instagram content and conflict dynamics. To address this issue, we propose an analytical tool for cross-hashtag analysis, allowing for the assessment of degrees of conflict. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Different Council of Europe organs have been attentive and reactive to specific human rights issues in the COVID-19 context, quickly alerting on the risks of inequitable access to quality health care, vaccines, or medicines for vulnerable groups. Yet these reactions have mainly taken the form of nonbinding instruments such as declarations, statements, and recommendations. Although these reactions derive from the interpretation of binding Council of Europe conventions, the observance or implementation of these conventions is not always monitored. Strasbourg judges have on several occasions confirmed that European Convention on Human Rights case law must consider other international instruments, especially those of other Council of Europe organs, in order to interpret the guarantees of the convention. As a consequence, soft law rules can sometimes indirectly acquire binding force when used as an interpretation and implementation tool for binding treaties. In this paper, I examine how Council of Europe organs interpret the principle of equitable access to health care of appropriate quality in the context of a pandemic and whether and how this interpretation is being implemented within the Council of Europe's interpretation of binding treaties such as the Medicrime Convention, the European Social Charter, and the European Convention on Human Rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The temporary enforced closure of businesses in response to the coronavirus pandemic has resulted in governments in Europe and beyond offering short-term financial support to the businesses and workers affected. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate a group of workers unable to benefit from the short-term job retention schemes and support to the self-employed made available by governments, namely, those whose paid work is comprised wholly of undeclared work, and how this could be addressed. Design/methodology/approach: To identify those whose paid work is entirely undeclared, a Eurobarometer survey of undeclared work in Europe is reported conducted in September 2019, just prior to the pandemic, and involving 27,565 face-to-face interviews in 28 European countries. Findings: The finding is that the paid work of one in every 132 European citizens is comprised wholly of undeclared work, and these workers are concentrated in non-essential businesses and activities severely affected by the lockdown. These workers whose paid work is comprised wholly of undeclared work are significantly more likely to be widowed or divorced/separated, living in households with three or more adults, without children and most of the time have financial difficulties in making ends meet. Practical implications: Given that businesses and workers in the undeclared economy are largely unable to work under lockdown, it is argued that providing access to short-term financial support, through a regularisation initiative based on voluntary disclosure, would not only provide the income support these workers need but also bring them out of the shadows and put them on the radar of the state authorities, thus transforming undeclared work into declared work. Originality/value: This paper shows how in the current or repeat lockdowns, the short-term financial support made available by governments can be used to transform undeclared work into declared work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The uncertainties and scale of the Covid-19 pandemic has mobilised global anxieties and insecurities, and many cultural groups have conjuncturally embedded conspiracy theories within millennial and apocalyptic thought to explain and find meaning in the pandemic. The apocalypse lends itself well to conspiratorial thinking because conceptually it is flexible enough to reflect any crisis. To this end, the global development of Covid-19 conspiracism is what the authors term 'contagious conspiracism' which is defined as viral global cultural conspiracism. The paper explores how millennialist responses to Covid-19 in various media outlets transcend academic categories of analysis and cultural boundaries between, say, religious and secular, far-right and radical left. First explored is how the crisis became embedded in established (mainly American) contemporary millennial beliefs and prophecies through selected far-right, evangelical and radical left narratives. Second, it is shown how these theories have been 'improvised' to include 5 G and also travelled to Europe and taken on geographical significance in Belfast and Berlin. Third, the authors illustrate the shared ingredients, motivations, and semiotics across apocalyptic conspiratorial Covid-19 narratives, all of which resonate with concerns about power, specifically emergent surveillance technologies, governmental abuse of power, and neoliberal capital, with divergent truths about who is blame from 5 G/vaccine theories to corporate technocapitalism. The paper concludes that these shared discourses across apocalyptic and conspiratorial Covid-19 narratives mean many of us are conspiracists and/or conspiracy theorists at some level and is therefore both revealing of the similarities and has the potential to create democratic constituencies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Financial integration has been proven to benefit European economies. However, it may obstruct diversification attempts, and so attracts the attention of investors and researchers. The aim of this paper is to analyze changes in spillovers between European markets, the European Index, and the World Index, over a period of two decades (2000–2021), with regard to the level of development. Mature markets have higher spillovers than emerging and frontier ones. The main finding is that non-developed markets’ spillover levels in tranquil periods did not substantially increase in the last two decades, despite ongoing integration with developed European markets. However, spillover rises in time of global or regional crisis (e.g. Great Financial Crisis, Eurozone Debt Crisis, COVID-19 pandemic) for all markets, regardless of economic development, which can undermine diversification attempts just when they are most needed. Afterwards, the transmission of shocks falls back to the pre-crisis level, with the exception of the spillover between Eurozone markets and European Index, which remained very high even after the end of the particular crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The coronavirus pandemic, which first impacted European societies in early 2020, has created a twofold crisis by combining a health threat with economic turmoil. While the crisis has affected all European societies very significantly, its impact varies across countries, social groups, and societal domains. In an effort to provide a first overview of the effect of the coronavirus crisis, in this editorial we discuss contributions of 58 papers published as part of this special issue. These early research papers illustrate the varied impact of the pandemic on various areas of social life. The first group of studies in this special issue analyzes the effect of the pandemic on social inequalities with respect to gender, ethnic otherness, education, and work. A second stream of research focuses on the psychological consequences of the pandemic, especially with respect to wellbeing and resilience. Thirdly, the crisis is discussed on a societal level, in regard to welfare states, social policies, and approaches to crisis governance. In a fourth line of inquiry, several studies have analyzed the impact of the pandemic on social solidarity and cohesion. A fifth strand of research is devoted to examining the role of culture and lifestyles. This review ends with a discussion of areas for future research trajectories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The financial crisis in 2008 and the COVID-19 pandemic today have made it clear that both financial and medical crises spread pervasively across borders. The financial crisis proved that the health of the entire European banking system stands and falls with the health of a single systemically important bank. As such, in the past decade, European Union (EU)-wide cooperation and regulation have been strengthened to ensure financial health across Europe. Today, the COVID-19 crisis reveals the de facto existence of a European healthcare system, where Member States’ medical health is interlinked and challenged. It too highlights the need for a more coordinated approach. This paper will draw lessons from European financial regulation and stress testing to make recommendations for EU-wide healthcare. The paper will show the latent benefits that a stress test might have on healthcare performance through mechanisms of governmentality. Moreover, it will pinpoint shortcomings in the financial stress test that could pose looming dangers for a European Health Union, such as a lack of de facto risk sharing. The paper concludes with pragmatic suggestions for a way forward in European healthcare regulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the puzzle of how what could have been initially regarded as a decline in populist support became compatible with widespread conspiracy beliefs during the Covid crisis. Analyzing survey data collected in 16 countries in June–July 2021, we explore how support for Covid conspiracies is embedded in the attitudinal map of individuals and offer three contributions to the literature on conspiracy beliefs and populism. First, we employ an original scale for measuring conspiracy beliefs benchmarked both on a general conspiratorial mindset item and on a non-conspiratorial item. Second, building on the multidimensionality of the concept of populism and its empirical distinction to neighboring anti-technocratic attitudes, we employ a new scale developed and tested by Bertsou and Caramani (2022) that allows us to highlight the differential role that these attitudes play into conspiracy beliefs. Third, we inquire into the role played by previous factors associated with populist attitudes, such as trust and ideology, but also understudied ones such as performance evaluations and (dis)satisfaction with the management of the crisis at the domestic and at the EU level. Our results show that conspiracy, populist, and anti-technocratic attitudes are highly prevalent and related to each other, despite an initial "rally" effect in the beginning of the pandemic. Furthermore, government and EU performance in the crisis matter, net of trust and ideology, playing a moderating role in the populism–conspiracy nexus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on 117 responses to a web survey in 29 European countries and interviews with bureaucrats in managerial positions, this paper investigates how people working professionally with antimicrobial resistance (AMR) assess the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on their future long-run cooperation in the struggle against AMR, both within their own country and among the European countries. We measure whether the severity level of the AMR problem, cumulative COVID-19 death rates, and the daily number of confirmed new COVID-19 cases in their own countries have affected bureaucrats' beliefs about long-run AMR collaboration. We find that around 40% of the bureaucrats believe that the cooperation will increase domestically and at the European level, indicating that global health crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic can shape future collaboration across the European countries when it comes to the equally global but more long-run health problem, AMR. However, there are considerable differences across regions: Eastern European bureaucrats are clearly the most pessimistic about future cooperation, while the Southern European and Nordic bureaucrats are the most optimistic. Neither the severity of the AMR problem nor the number of confirmed new COVID-19 cases in their own countries has a significant impact on bureaucrats' beliefs about future collaboration. Instead, it is the cumulative COVID-19 death rate that increases the perceived likelihood of future AMR collaboration, both domestically and among the European countries. Furthermore, our interviews highlight the longer-term impact of the pandemic on public health in the EU countries and the prospect of increased EU control to prevent future cross-border health hazards. The mixed methods approach details both the broader patterns of bureaucrats' perceptions of the impact of the pandemic on AMR-related work as well as the more long-term institutional changes that are likely to follow in the wake of the pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Restriction during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic has brought significant changes to all aspects of life, in food consumption and foreign trade. This raises questions about local and intercontinental food trade and transport. The aim of this paper is to describe the European and global changes, focussing on their background and causes. Its methods are to examine the foreign trade data of the main food products in the WITS database using a trend function and to investigate possible changes by calculating the Balassa index. The first results show that in absolute terms, the value of foreign trade has not decreased for most food products, but that there has been a decrease for almost all food products compared to the expected value of the trend function. In addition to Ukraine's significant decline in competitiveness indicators, Russia's positive performance warrants further research. As well as China's significant competitiveness decline, the good performance of the US requires further analysis and comparison. The main conclusions of this research are that COVID-19 has also had an impact on food supply. There is a need to maintain and support local markets and regional trade in the face of global food trade, as only they can remain stable during these crises and austerity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several recent studies suggest that the home advantage, that is, the benefit competitors accrue from performing in familiar surroundings, was—at least temporarily—reduced in games played without spectators due to the COVID-19 Pandemic. These games played without fans during the Pandemic have been dubbed 'ghost games'. However, the majority of the research to date focus on soccer and no contributions have been provided for indoor sports, where the effect of the support of the fans might have a stronger impact than in outdoor arenas. In this paper, we try to fill this gap by investigating the effect of ghost games in basketball with a special focus on the possible reduction of the home advantage due to the absence of spectators inside the arena. In particular, we test (i) for the reduction of the home advantage in basketball, (ii) whether such reduction tends to disappear over time, (iii) if the bookmakers promptly adapt to such structural change or whether mispricing was created on the betting market. The results from a large data set covering all seasons since 2004 for the ten most popular and followed basketball leagues in Europe show, on the one hand, an overall significant reduction of the home advantage of around 5% and no evidence that suggests that this effect has been reduced at as teams became more accustomed to playing without fans; on the other hand, bookmakers appear to have anticipated such effect and priced home win in basketball matches accordingly, thus avoiding creating mispricing on betting markets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the COVID-19 pandemic, most workers had to work from home due to the successive lockdowns across European countries. This constraint posed significant challenges to many workers and companies regarding working conditions and work–life balance. Framed by the job demands–resources model (JD–R), the goal of this paper is to examine the association of perceived organizational support (POS) and individual resilience (IR) with work–life balance (WLB) during the COVID-19 pandemic across European countries. This goal is complemented by assessing the role of work-from-home (WFH) as a mediator. Based on a quantitative approach, data were extracted from the second round of the survey "Living, Working, and COVID-19" from Eurofound. A series of regressions using SEM-PLS tested the hypothesis. Findings reveal that WFH negatively influences WLB. POS positively influences WFH and negatively influences WLB when mediated by WFH. IR negatively influences WFH and positively influences WLB when mediated by WFH. These results have essential theoretical implications related to the relations between individual and organizational resources and WLB and practical implications for the management of WFH, namely, the importance of providing adequate organizational resources and promoting the development of individual resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The future of mega-events has never been more uncertain. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has introduced an unparalleled level of doubt regarding the kind of mega-events that will take place in the coming years. While the 2019 call for papers could not predict such a radical shock, this special issue arrives at a quite unique moment of reflection. Prior to 2020, cities were already questioning the traditional format of mega-events (e.g. Olympics and Expo) while other cultural mega-events have been spreading and gaining popularity, thanks in part to typically lower costs of infrastructures and venues, far more adaptable arrangements, spatial distribution and time frame for hosting. In these ways, they have already been demonstrating higher flexibility in which to respond to future health and safety constraints. When it comes to the relation to the existing city, cultural mega-events have been planned, implemented and studied far more than any other. By leveraging the richness of cultural mega-events, this special issue deepens the intersection between events and cultural heritage in particular. This introduction provides a theoretical framework that cuts across mega-event and heritage research fields. It introduces the questions and approaches of the following contributions, arguing that the nexus between mega-events and heritage is a key challenge for many cities in Europe and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Paper provides for a systematic overview of the EU scheme for the State aid rules applicable to the air transport sector during Covid-19 crisis. The COVID-19 outbreak is having a major impact on European air transport sector. In order to help air transport undertakings in Europe to overcome the financial troubles, to preserve jobs, to secure supply of essential food, medicals or other items, etc., the EU Commission adopted set of legislative measures enabling the EU Commission and Member States to authorise hundreds of State aid measures, not only to air transport sector, but also to other economic sectors, which were mostly affected by the pandemic. Since in normal circumstances member states State aid to national undertakings are subject to extremely stringent EU competition law regime, the intention of this paper is, firstly, to analyse to what extent and under what conditions that has changed during pandemic. Secondly, the intention of the paper is to explore to what extent and for what purposes different Member States granted State aid to their airline industries with special respect to the French, Austrian, Swedish and Croatian State aid policy. Lastly, the authors will raise question whether massive capital injection to air transport companies being made only by certain, wealthier, member states are going, in long term, to cause negative impacts on the competition in the air transport sector in the internal market 3. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) represent the backbone of global economic development because they account for creating private initiatives, innovation, and employment. In the wake of the Coronavirus outbreak, the SMEs were strongly affected, both from the demand and supply of products and services, tightening the ability to gather financial resources in order to meet short term liquidity demands and working capital requirements. Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, many governments and multilateral development banks (MDBs) have provided financial resources to SMEs in order to tackle the effects of lockdown. This paper aims to characterize and assess current measures and initiatives adopted by MDBs to support SMEs. We highlight that international financial institutions act countercyclically in securing businesses and supporting jobs. The paper underlines the importance of transparency, a correct evaluation of risks and fiscal costs, and strong governance while dealing with MDBs support. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mobile applications for digital contact tracing have been developed and introduced around the world in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Proposed as a tool to support 'traditional' forms of contact-tracing carried out to monitor contagion, these apps have triggered an intense debate with respect to their legal and ethical permissibility, social desirability and general feasibility. Based on a large-scale study including qualitative data from 349 interviews conducted in nine European countries (Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, German-speaking Switzerland, the United Kingdom), this paper shows that the binary framing often found in surveys and polls, which contrasts privacy concerns with the usefulness of these interventions for public health, does not capture the depth, breadth, and nuances of people's positions towards COVID-19 contact-tracing apps. The paper provides a detailed account of how people arrive at certain normative positions by analysing the argumentative patterns, tropes and (moral) repertoires underpinning people's perspectives on digital contact-tracing. Specifically, we identified a spectrum comprising five normative positions towards the use of COVID-19 contact-tracing apps: opposition, scepticism of feasibility, pondered deliberation, resignation, and support. We describe these stances and analyse the diversity of assumptions and values that underlie the normative orientations of our interviewees. We conclude by arguing that policy attempts to develop and implement these and other digital responses to the pandemic should move beyond the reiteration of binary framings, and instead cater to the variety of values, concerns and expectations that citizens voice in discussions about these types of public health interventions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the role of large outbreaks on the persistence of Covid-19 over time. Using data from 650 European regions in 14 countries, I first show that winter school holidays in late February/early March 2020 (weeks 8, 9 and 10) led to large regional outbreaks of Covid-19 in the spring with the spread being 60% and up-to over 90% higher compared to regions with earlier school holidays. While the impact of these initial large outbreaks fades away over the summer months, it systematically reappears from the fall as regions with school holidays in weeks 8, 9 and 10 had 30–70% higher spread. This suggests that following a large outbreak, there is a strong element of underlying (latent) regional persistence of Covid-19. The strong degree of persistence highlights the long-term benefits of effective (initial) containment policies, as once a large outbreak has occurred, Covid-19 persists. This result emphasizes the need for vaccinations against Covid-19 in regions that have recently experienced large outbreaks but are well below herd-immunity, to avoid a new surge of cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID 19 pandemic has seriously affected human resource management practices, as it has in many other aspects of work and life, both internationally and domestically. Through this paper we do not propose to highlight the challenges that managers had to face when they decided to work from home, adopting innovative solutions, examining changes in workforce management and employee well-being. Employees need for flexibility was the driving force behind HR manager's decisions, as well as safety measures and maintaining employee motivation and productivity. Also, the one that can play an important role in addressing the challenges of human resource management during a pandemic is social responsibility, according to some research in the field. Human resource management practices in Europe show that organizations were somewhat prepared, but faced difficulties in facing the situation. At the same time, the US pandemic has forced management to consider alternative approaches to work and address disparities within the profession. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]