*** ROBERTO CASTALDI (Editor): Immanuel Kant and Alexander Hamilton, the Founders of Federalism. A Political Theory for Our Time. Presses Interuniversitaires Européennes / Peter Lang (1 av. Maurice, B-1050 Brussels. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - fax: 3761727 - Email: info@peterlang.com - Internet: http://www.peterlang.com ). "Federalism" series, No. 2. 2013, 308 pp. €48.70. ISBN 978-2-87574-016-8.
While nationalists and arch-defenders of the nation state prepare for the battle of the European elections in which they are expected to do better than ever before, it is undoubtedly useful to look at thinkers who were heralds of a less narrow vision of the world, namely the German philosopher Emmanuel Kant and Alexander Hamilton, the “founding father” of the United States of America. Both of these historic figures passed away in 1804 and through their respective writing, as well in the political activity of Hamilton, they were effectively the inventors of the political concept of federalism. In this excellent collectively written book, supervised by the Federalism Studies Centre in Turin, nine specialists provide an innovative account and cross-spectral and thoroughgoing analysis of the respective contributions made by Kant and Hamilton to the definition of federalism. One of their main objectives is to better identify the similarities and differences between their points of view.
In his introduction, Roberto Castaldi provides a framework for the subject by drawing on the intellectual and militant endeavours of the Italian federalist Mario Albertini, the first to develop a theory of federalism that is explicitly linked to these two thinkers and who claimed in 1963 that federalism was, “a political theory in its own right, in the same way as liberalism, socialism, communism or nationalism was”. The editor of this book (senior lecturer in international relations and political science at the Higher Education Institution in Pisa) indicates that it is useful to distinguish between the different visions of utopia that seek to change the existing political order, because some of these ideologies also seek to endorse and preserve this order. Nonetheless, it is true to say that any flourishing utopia will at one stage or other, transform itself into an ideology because it is preferable, “to distinguish a utopian and ideological phase from a successful political school of thought”. Proof of this is provided in the values that the European welfare state owes to liberalism, Socialism and democracy. It is particularly in this theoretical context that Albertini identifies the three main pillars of federalism as a political theory: first of all, peace, this essential value which requires, according to Kant, the creation of a “cosmopolitan federation”. According to Albertini, the ambiguities associated with this thinker and the possibility of this involving a confederal solution, is only because that he knew little about the previous US federal example. Identification by Alexander Hamilton is then provided of the institutional characteristics of a federal state and finally, drawing on Proudhon, “the socio-historic Federalist vision of the evil of absolute national sovereignty” is also outlined.
It is on this rich intellectual terrain that the authors sharpen their analyses and political expertise by placing federal structures, peace and democracy at the core of their scientific investigation and subsequently help to provide a greater understanding of the founding ideas of Kant and Hamilton in this context.
Michel Theys
*** L'Europe en formation. Revue d'études sur la construction européenne et le fédéralisme - Journal of Studies on European Integration and Federalism. Centre international de formation européenne (10 av. des Fleurs, F-06000 Nice. Tel: (33-4) 93979397 - fax: 93979398 - Email: europe.formation@cife.eu - Internet: http://www.europeenformation.eu ). 2013, No. 369, 207 pp. €20. Subscription: €50.
This edition of the journal founded by the tribune of comprehensive federalism, Alexandre Marc, contains an excellent feature article on the “smaller worlds… and constituent entities in the states and federal political systems”. This is an extension of an international research workshop organised in Kent a year ago. It brings together contributions by political scientists and constitutional experts that illustrate in 11 short case studies the range of motives, tension, stress and restrictions encountered by these basic regional units. Professor Michael Burgess (Federal Studies Centre, University of Kent) opens intellectual fire by proposing an analytical study of the character, role and importance of the constituent unity in a variety of federal states. This enables him to depict the complex infra-national policies between them. On this basis and by looking at the different political, legal, economic and social considerations, the other contributors explore the situations that have emerged from the US case and in Quebec, as well as those prevailing in Germany, Austria, Spain, Italy and the European Union itself. With regard to the latter, Stelio Mangiameli points out that the identity of member states keeps European competences and the integration process in check, as well as determines the way in which European law is interpreted because the inviolable and essential nucleus of constitutions can prevent application of European law. According to this professor of constitutional and European law, the past decade has even revealed the fractures emerging in the integration processes because some states are becoming more equal than others, as clearly borne out by the Treaty on stability, coordination and governance, which has effectively resulted in the allocation of budgetary sovereignty that benefits some states rather than the Union at large. The prevailing situation is also examined in Switzerland, Russia, Bosnia Herzegovina and, more generally, in south-eastern Europe. Jean-Pierre Gouzy also provides a critical insight into what has been happening over recent months in this connection. (MT)
*** ENRIQUE GONZÁLEZ SÁNCHEZ: Manual del Negociador en la Unión Europea. Ministerios de Asuntos Exteriores y Cooperación (Building « Torres Ágora », 26 Serrano Galvache, 28071 Madrid, Spain. Tel: (34-91) 3799559 - fax: 3948691 - Email: informae@maec.es - Internet: http://www.exteriores.gob.es ). 2013, 250 pp.
Although integration is one of the ultimate aims of the European Union, the characteristics and ways of achieving European rapprochement do not meet any precise definition. This specificity has led to the setting up of a differentiated decision-making process containing an important section on negotiations. At the Council, national civil servants are subsequently encouraged to put forward the national interest of different member states so that they are taken into account in the context of developing common policies and the common interest. This instructions guide was drafted for the benefit of Spanish civil servants and seeks to clarify the way in which the negotiating process operates in the Council. It subsequently seeks to, “promote the best defence of national interests” in this institution. According to the author, “the result of this defence of national interests creates the gradual emergence of a common interest, which shifts internally to the advantage of all member states of the European Union”. Enrique González Sánchez, the author of the manual, is the ambassador for the special mission for relations between the European institutions and Spanish Department of Foreign affairs and Cooperation. He drew from his experience working at the European institutions to draft an initial version of this manual in 1992. This new edition seeks to update the contents of the manual, given the many developments that have taken place in the Union. It is divided into six chapters and provides an insight into the European decision-making process. The author then provides an illustration of the procedures setting out a national position within the member states. The third part provides a detailed examination of the negotiating process at the Council. The rest of the manual describes the way in which the national governments participate in the management of common Union policies, as well as that of the national parliaments and regional bodies in the Community decision-making process. (SD)
*** OLIVIER COSTA, NATHALIE BRACK: Le fonctionnement de l'Union européenne. Editions de l'Université libre de Bruxelles (26 av. Paul Héger, CP 163, B-1000 Brussels. Tel: (32-2) 6503799 - fax: 6503794 - Email: editions@ulb.ac.be - Internet: http://www.editions-universite-bruxelles.be ). "UBlire" series, No. 13. 2014, 379 pp. €11. ISBN 978-2-8004-1547-5.
Everything positive about this book in which two political scientists present a very pedagogical account of the European Union, its dynamics and the concrete way in which it operates, was illustrated a long time ago by the Bibliothèque européenne time 19 April 2011 (No. 10361/911). It goes without saying that this updated and expanded version deserves the same praise. It takes into account the many questions about the Union's legitimacy and its sovereignty, following the economic, financial and political crisis that has now turned into an existential crisis that has even upset the institutional balance that we believed was set in marble. The democratic deficit, politicisation, the role of member states, institutional crisis, Europeanization and how different interests are represented are some of the key questions dissected by these highly esteemed expert academics. Olivier Costa was director of the Department of Political and Administrative Studies at the College of Europe in Bruges and Nathalie Brack was a postdoctoral student at the University of Oxford and responsible for teaching at the Université libre de Bruxelles. One course of action they propose is to sufficiently take into account the relative but very real expansion of Euroscepticism in a Union, which enjoys a wider scope. They believe that the democratic character of the system is not only dependent on the views and feelings of the actors and institutional experts but also on the perception of citizens, even though this is very often formed by insufficient information and sectarian manipulation. (MT)
*** GEORGE VASSILIOU: Une odyssée moderne. Autobiographie. Editions Papazisi (2 Nikitara, GR-10678 Athens. Tel: (30-210) 3822496 - fax: 3809020 - Email: papazisi@otenet.gr - Internet: http://www.papazisi.gr ). 2013, 517 pp. €28.75. ISBN 978-618-80309-4-7.
In this book, the economist, George Vassiliou, narrates his family's odyssey and that of himself during the first decades of the 20th century up until 1988, when he was elected president of the Republic of Cyprus for a period of five years. George Vassiliou is a very special kind of person and the complete opposite of the traditional politician in Cyprus or Greece. In this book he provides his vision and interpretation of the great adventure of the previous century, the century of major ideas that very often ended up getting annihilated, together with the conflicts and their millions of victims, a century of both progress and regression. In other words, it was a century of contrasts, which left its intense and indelible traces on Cyprus and Greece just as it did throughout Europe. He therefore writes about the most passionate episodes of this history, which were more often those recounting the lives of individuals who found themselves mixed up in the vortex of a storm of historic events and major change, often owing to their own will but not always… The author has also promised another two volumes that will cover the period of his presidency and the years that followed up until the present day. (AKa)
*** FREDERIC CLAVERT, SERGE NOIRET (Editors): L'histoire contemporaine à l'ère numérique / Contemporary History in the Digital Age. Presses Interuniversitaires Européennes / Peter Lang (see address details attached). 2013, 381 pp, €48.70. ISBN 978-2-87574-048-9.
This is the extension of an academic symposium organised in the capital of the Grand Duchy almost 5 years ago, on the initiative of the Virtual Knowledge Centre on Europe and the Master in Contemporary European History at the University of Luxembourg. The book is based on a number of facts: not even historians are able to escape from the irresistible rise in power of the digital age. Therefore, the historians, Serge Noiret (University Institute of Florence) and Frédéric Clavert (Coordinator of the Digital Humanities Laboratory at the Virtual Knowledge Centre) explain in their introduction that contemporary history will have to use new instruments, due to the rapid pace of digitalisation in existing archives and the presentation of enormous quantities of original information from digital sources. They illustrate this by the fact that we only have to think about the huge number of e-mails had have been exchanged during the years that preceded the expansion that came with the big bang of 2004. How then can we have any doubts that work will very soon be dependent on digitalisation? The authors provide both positive and negative contributions that encourage reflection on the work carried out by historians in the digital age and which take into consideration the new available instruments, as well as the ways in which they can be used. The second aim of this book is to help provide a contribution to this new and increasingly developing discipline in digital humanities in this evolving digital age. (PBo)
*** EVANGELIA PSYCHOGIOPOULOU (Editor): Media Policies Revisited. The Challenge for Media Freedom and Independence. Macmillan Publishers Ltd (Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, RG21 6XS, RU. Tel: (44-1256) 329242 - fax: 479476 - Internet: http://www.palgrave.com ). 2014, 304 pp. £55. ISBN 978-1-137337832.
What are the characteristics of free and independent media? Do European media policies help promote their freedom and independence? What are the main restrictions and threats to the functioning of free and independent media? What are the political processes, institutional structures, regulatory practices and tools that can help this kind of media defend its independence? In a period of profound change in the media economy and in their consumption, this collectively written book explores the main characteristics of policies and regulation in the media in 14 different countries. The different contributions draw up a balance sheet of their strengths and weaknesses in the struggle to protect their independence. This volume can be located at a crossroads between media studies and legal research and provides a very useful reflection regarding the conditions in which political measures can provide concrete support for free and independent media. (AKa)