*** PHILIPP STROBL, MANFRED KOHLER (Eds.): The Phenomenon of Globalization. A Collection of Interdisciplinary Globalization Research Essays. Peter Lang (1 Moosstrasse, P. O. Box 350, CH-2542 Pieterlen. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - Fax: 3761727 - Email: info@peterlang.com - Internet: http://www.peterlang.com ). “Academic Research” series. 2013, 276 pp, €49.95. ISBN 978-3-631-63684-8.
The cover of books about this subject matter tend to be sombre, but this one is a striking contrast that cleverly illustrates the subject matter. Side-by-side there is the famous Gherkin tower that dominates the City of London and the wall of a Gothic building symbolising the age-old England of spires and shires. This sets the tone for the book: is the modern world (some would say the post-modern world) generating a collective anxiety about things changing too fast? This anxiety has a name. It is called globalisation. The idea was coined in the United States in the 1980s and has travelled the globe since then, excuse the pun. Philipp Strobl notes at the start of this collection of essays, however, that no precise definition has ever been provided for it and the term has become so widely used to cover just about everything, so it loses its meaning. Philipp Strobl, who lectures in economic history at Bratislava University, draws a parallel with Alice in Wonderland because the term globalisation is a cover-all that everyone interprets as they will.
The ambition of this book is to provide the first definition of the term globalisation by looking to see what it means in various scientific disciplines because the term is so widely bandied about. The authors distinguish nine disciplines, covering a vast sweep of investigation touching on history, economics, human rights and urbanism, which are all quite remote from each other but are interconnected all the same and do impact on one another. The essayists warn, however, that the aim is not to provide a single definition of globalisation, and they do not in fact provide one. Rather, their aim is to demonstrate the extent to which this hackneyed term masks different realities, depending on the field of application and also depending on the environment in which it has evolved. Another facet of this complex situation is the fact that although used around the world, the term globalisation has very different meanings and pronunciation in the north and the south of the globe. The phenomenon affects the whole world, but not in the same way, explain the authors. One should therefore not simply call on a range of scientific disciplines, but also play with differing frontiers and viewpoints. This stands out in the essays from Turkey and Malaysia.
This scientific kaleidoscope sparkles in domains as varied as philosophy, architecture, sociology, anthropology and law, well beyond the purely historical approach. The book also aims to provide a snapshot as all contributions focus without exception on current research. It therefore covers the latest research on globalisation, with most of the essays being published for the very first time. Philippe Strohl points out that it also provides an overview of future research in this domain. In order to guide the reader through the globalisation labyrinth, the book is divided into three sections. The first draws up a balance sheet of research into globalisation, painting a broad stroke picture of a possible definition of the phenomenon. The second section looks at globalisation mechanisms, while the third, the most important section, measures the impact in various parts of the world. A fine example of the raft of facets examined here has a connection with the cover: in an essay entitled 'Cities and architecture in the era of globalisation,' Jasna Cizler looks at modern cities, the 'generic city.' The photo of an anonymous building in London that could be anywhere else on the globe illustrates his argument that modern cities look alike and the generic city is killing the street. From the horizontal, we have moved to the vertical, and the skyscraper symbolises of this. Some cities have now abandoned their past, their history, their heritage, in the name of economic survival and are sometimes a little embarrassed about it. This is a way of addressing the topic with some distance and nuance. And some modesty too. Perhaps we need to remind contemporaries who are so cocksure about being having the final carat of progress in their hands that globalisation began back in the nineteenth century.
Frédéric Villon
*** Futuribles. L'anticipation au service de l'action. Futuribles Sarl (47 rue de Babylone, F-75007 Paris. Tel: (33-1) 53633770 - Fax: 42226554 - Email: revue@futuribles.com - Internet: http://www.futuribles.com ). May-June 2014, No. 400, 148 pp, €22. Annual subscription: €115. ISBN 978-2-84387-413-0.
In this 400th issue of Futuribles in which Hugues de Jouvenel calls for persistent support for this review on the future of the European project, geographer and former ambassador Michel Foucher gauges the European Union's capacity to assert itself as a genuinely global player on the world chessboard. Beginning with the future of Ukraine, which is described as a strategic knot for Europeans who want to see the European Union act 'as a collective player of influence' because what is at stake is the effectiveness of the European Neighbourhood Policy, as the first, or even only, field of action of Europeans' foreign policy, the author, who is holder of the applied geopolitics chair at the Global Studies College, welcomes the fact that European leaders are amenable to economic and security 'interests' because until recently, they tended to favour excessive talk of 'values.' He also observes that national interests remain primordial, but 'are sometimes better expressed in a collective European framework,' particularly because the EU28 has to deal with an 'independent but uncooperative world,' or 'a classically Westphalian world, turning its back on the post-sovereignist spirit that reigns in Brussels.' The author therefore invites the EU member states to consolidate the central role of the transatlantic arena in global trade - as long, that is, that they don't simply align themselves with American practices - and to design a 'geopolitical programme suitable for the third stage of the European project,' which at first will have to 'result from simply the initial convergence of the intentions of a handful of states.' The author therefore formulates eight thematic recommendations about shared aims and interests that can be laid down and collectively promoted by Europeans in order to 'get past the discordance between the level of economic interests and the level of political action that currently characterises the European project.' There is also a presentation in this issue of a study of future prospects (until 2050) carried out by the Observatoire en Réseau pour l'Aménagement du Territoire Européen, which promises a positive development for the European Union and its immediate neighbours, particularly in the Mediterranean.
(MT)
*** NARINE GHAZARYAN: The European Neighbourhood Policy and the Democratic Values of the EU. A Legal Analysis. Hart Publishing Ltd (16c Worcester Place, Oxford, OX1 2JW, UK. Tel: (44-1865) 517530 - Fax: 510710 - email: mail@hartpub.co.uk - Internet: http://www.hartpub.co.uk ). Modern Studies in European Law series, No. 41. 2014, 208 pp, £50. ISBN 978-1-84946-278-5.
A substantially revised and updated version (updated to 1 July 2013) of a doctorate thesis for Nottingham University, this book provides a detailed, caustic and exhaustive legal analysis of the European Neighbourhood Policy. Nariné Ghazaryan is now lecturer in law a Brunel University. In the book, he bluntly unveils the foundations of this policy born from the European Union's desire to position itself as a global player in the reconfigured world after the fall of the Iron Curtain and also from its 'enlargement fatigue,' in order to draw special connections and hence a power of influence with countries destined to remain outside the European Union club. The author says these countries are primarily European. Although he also looks at countries in the South, his attention is focused on the east of the European peninsula, particularly Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia. The analysis is caustic because the author compares and contrasts the legal aspects of the European Neighbourhood Policy with the way the European Union hopes to be a spearhead for the promotion of democracy, and the EU does not always put its money where its mouth is… Nariné Ghazaryan views the European Union as a global 'actor whose identity requires it to act 'normatively' in its external action, which nevertheless is not devoid of rationalist motivations.' In seven of the book's chapters, he sheds light on the way the policy is used to promote the EU's own interests because the European Union is anxious to get its neighbourhood partners to become islands of stability and security for itself, rather than paragons of democracy, as shown by the different emphasis in wording used by the EU28 depending on the partner in question. One of the book's conclusions is therefore that the European Neighbourhood Policy is not an unequivocal vision of the European Union's immediate neighbourhood.
(MT)
*** GIGA GABRICHIDZE: Der Prozess der Angleichung des georgischen Wettbewerbsrechts an das Recht der Europäischen Union. Peter Lang (see above). "Saarbrücker Studien zum Privat- und Wirtschaftsrecht" series. 2013, 209 pp. ISBN 978-3-631-64443-0.
In this thesis, Giga Gabrichidze, who is currently assistant professor at Grigol Robakidze University in Tbilissi, Georgia, starts by tracing the path followed by Georgia to bring its legislation into line with European Union competition laws, as laid down in the 1996 Partnership and Cooperation Agreements between Georgia and the EU. The thesis focuses on a comparative analysis by the author of the Georgian law of 2012 on freedom of trade and competition. After highlighting the law's weak points, Giga Gabrichidze concludes that it does not meet basic standards of European and international law, but this does not prevent him from making a number of recommendations.
(GLe)
*** FINN LAURSEN (Ed.): EU Enlargement. Current Challenges and Strategic Choices. 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 ). 'Multiple Europes' series, No. 50. 2013, 360 pp, €46-50. ISBN 978-2-87574-067-0.
This book reports on a conference in April 2012 at the European Union Centre of Excellence at Dalhousie University in Halifax, which at the time was headed by Finn Laursen, who was also the holder of a Jean Monnet chair in European studies ad personam. The question of EU enlargement is studied scientifically from all angles, particularly in the light of the impact of past accessions, and also the various obstacles now encountered by the very idea of EU expansion. First of all, enlargement policy is examined since the 2004 Big Bang and the accession of Bulgaria and Romania in 2007. Eli Gateva of Manchester University points out that bilateral relations (between France and Turkey, for instance) disrupt the policy. Tanel Kerikmäe and Lehte Roots (both of Tallinn University of Technology) demonstrate that the crisis in the eurozone requires progress to be made in integration that is likely to make future enlargements more problematic. Federiga Bindi and Irina Angelescu (of Tor Vergata University in Rome) explain the lack of enthusiasm for enlargement among current leaders by 'an absence of a sense of historical legacy, justification based on the economic crisis, lack of popular support and a sense of "enlargement fatigue".' The second part of the book is devoted to the processes leading up to accession, covering topics as diverse as the economic and political adjustments required by accession, corruption, the Europeanisation process that was encouraged by transnational civil society players in the case of Croatia, and political and cultural problems encountered in Serbia. In the third section, other authors examine the various ways the political parties can position themselves vis-à-vis the European project and the benefit for them of associating themselves with the EU. The last two sections look at Western Balkans states, with an article on the tricky question of Turkey and Gentian Elezi of Sussex University commenting that the conditionality instrument doesn't seem to perform anywhere near as well as it did for central and Eastern European countries.
(MT)
*** ANA FOTEVA: Do the Balkans begin in Vienna? The Geopolitical and imaginary borders between the Balkans and Europe. Peter Lang (see above). “Austrian Culture” series, Vol. 47. 2014, 330 pp, €78-10. ISBN 978-1-4331-1565-3.
This book looks at one of the most politically diverse regions of Europe - the Balkans. With its heritage from the Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman, Byzantine and Roman Empires, the Balkans region has always been viewed as the border between the East and West of Europe. During the 1820s, Austrian diplomat Richard Klemens von Metternich says that 'The Balkans begin at Rennweg' in Vienna, but the region is often seen in European political and cultural imagination as a frontier keeping out 'the other' that is threatening Europe. This enables Ana Foteva, Assistant Professor of Germanic Studies at St. Lawrence University, to describe the fictional imagination of the Balkans as a 'utopian dystopia, an imaginary space and an abnormal no-place' or no-man's land where the historic tensions of the various empires have been projected. While examining the cultural and political contours of the region, along with the various approaches that enable a border to be traced between the Balkans and Europe, the author pays particular attention to the impact of the Ottoman and Habsburg Empires on the region's cultural influences. In the light of historical and political discourse and fictional imaginings of the Balkans, the author retraces the negotiations of the identity and cultural limits of a region 'whose borders have always been fluid, arbitrary, and particularly challenging.'
(SD)