*** ALESSANDRA SILVEIRA, MARIANA CANOTILHO, PEDRO MADEIRA FROUFE (Editors): Citizenship and Solidarity in the European Union. From the Charter of Fundamental Rights to the Crisis, the State of the Art. Presses Interuniversitaires Européennes / Peter Lang (1 av. Maurice, B-1050 Brussels. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - fax: 3761727 - Email: info@peterlang.com - Internet: http://www.peterla ,g.com). "Euroclio" series, No. 77. 2013, 489 pp. €62.10. ISBN 978-2-87574-109-7.
This is an important book because of the questions it tackles and the answers it brings. There is absolutely nothing politically correct about it. It is also very innovative from a number of different perspectives, as well as in the analysis and ideas that shape the 29 contributions contained in this publication. It is a scientifically written book and the result of an international conference organised in May 2012 at the faculty of Law at the University of Minho in Portugal. There is a lot of food for thought in it, as well as a call to arms, rebellion and revolt against the various guises of conformism that currently threaten to lead the European project to a dead end, as well as the European democracies with it.
First of all, let's look at the questions formulated by Mariana Canotilho at the beginning of his introduction to the book. These are uncomfortable questions, heavy with meaning and accusations. He looks at what has happened to the promises to respect the inviolable and inalienable individual rights of freedom, democracy and equality proclaimed in the preamble to the Treaty on European Union, in the context of the deepest economic and social crisis of recent decades. He also looks at the way in which the Union seeks to demonstrate its support for fundamental social rights in these times of ever-increasing precarious labour markets, the grey area that exists between employment and self-employment and the demands for deregulating the labour market. Is this simply the recriminations of a trade unionist? No, these questions are raised by a professor of public Law at the University of Coimbra, who is now a legal adviser to the president of the Portuguese Constitutional Court and who dares to ask another question that could possibly be deemed incongruous and out of place by a good many governments: how will it be possible to obtain a strengthening and convergence of the European economies and promote economic and social progress, whilst what we hear from European political leaders are nothing but proposals for austerity programmes that do no appear to be working?
Asking this kind of question will certainly grate with or fall on the deaf ear of the worker ants in the North, who will interpret it as nothing other than carping. They should, however, be reassured or concerned because this book is not only written by Southern European authors, as we see by some of the other contributors such as, Jonathan Tomkin, Elaine Dewhurst, Katarzyna Gromek Broc, Bruno de Witte, Tamara Hervey and Leonard F. M. Besselin. It is a book that is less interested in the politics of envy and complaining and more interested in outlining the possibilities for putting back the European project on the right tracks before there is any fatal swerving off course. This is indeed a kind of medical diagnosis formulated by the authors of the five different parts of the book. In the first part, the different ills affecting democracy and citizenship in the European Union and its member states are analysed. In the second part, the ills affecting the economic and social health of increasing numbers of European citizens are explored in light of the imperative for greater competitiveness and the subsequent development models that result from this. The contribution that follows looks at the different questions relating to constitutionalism at its different levels and the quest for a European identity. The fourth part focuses on the themes of equality and solidarity, “the promises most often forgotten in the integration process”, as pointed out Mariana Canotilho - whilst the final part of the book looks at questions of culture and diversity, two essential component parts of the European project.
If a diagnosis is proffered, then a prescription is also required. There are many different prescriptions proposed throughout the book right up until the conclusions drawn by Mariana Canotilho and his two collaborators (Alessandra Silveira and Pedro Madeira Froufe, professors and European law at the University of Minho). One of the solutions put forward appears inevitable in the current context of the enduring crisis in the Eurozone, namely that of reinforcing the federative components in the European project and giving shape to it in order to assert its legitimacy in a European public area that does not exist because the member states never wanted it to exist. The three editors drive this message home to its logical conclusion and state that the discourse regarding the European democratic deficit has become a comfortable one because it allows the national political elites to exempt themselves from any of the responsibility reserved for the European Union. This obviously needs to be said! The most novel idea can be located in the observation that the jurisprudence of the European Court of Justice and the Charter of fundamental rights have progressively given birth to a “citizenship of rights”, namely a citizenship that provides rights other than those connected to the initial economic mobility and now creates a higher level of fundamental rights. It is not important whether these more elevated rights are European or recognised as such by an individual member state: on the basis of Article 53 of the Charter, any European citizens is within his rights to claim these as his or her own. Citizenship understood as such could therefore become the future of the Union, as well as a regenerated and reinvigorated European project.
Michel Theys
*** WINTON HIGGINS, GEOFF DOW: Politics Against Pessimism. Social democratic possibilities since Ernst Wigforss. Peter Lang (1 Moosstrasse, Postfach 350, CH-2542 Pieterlen. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - fax: 3761727 - Email: info@peterlang.com - Internet: http://www.peterlang.com ). 2013, 477 pp. €99. ISBN 978-3-0343-1445-9.
The authors of this book teach political science and political economy at Australian universities and it is obvious that they do not like capitalism, a socio-economic system they say is based on, “economic dislocation and social insecurity”, together with the tangible deprivation it bequeaths on certain members of society. They are even less keen on the neoliberalism that has dominated the Western world since the middle of the 1970s and which has led to the declassification in certain countries of a number of ideas and parties based on the democratic left. They believe that following major crisis of recent years, full employment, social justice, economic democracy and new political institutions capable of taming capitalism could again be regenerated if there was a radical reformist policy that succeeded in mobilising people and which was based on Ernst Wigforss' notions of social democracy in Sweden during the last century. Ernst Wigforss was a leading figure in Swedish social democracy and according to Winton Higgins (who studied at the University of Stockholm) and Geoff Dow, his theoretical ideas and programmes could be revised and adapted to the current context and could once again provide a complexion and gusto to forces on the left.
(MT)
*** HEATHER CONNOLLY, LEFTERIS KRETSOS AND CRAIG PHELAN (Editors): Radical unions in Europe and the future of collective interest representation. Peter Lang (see address attached). “Trade Unions”series, vol. 20. 2014, 258 pp. €59.90. ISBN 978-2-84387-412-3.
The current economic crisis, austerity measures and employers' strategies aiming to increase labour market flexibility are quite simply encouraging the deregulation of capitalism in Europe. In this economic context, this collectively written book seeks to answer one particularly precise question: do radical unionism, political action and local activism present opportunities for union renewal and the representation of collective interests? By analysing nine different national contexts, the authors attempt to assess the extent to which we are witnessing the emergence of radical political unionism as an alternative model of trade unionism in Europe, which is modelled on class war, involvement in a social movement that goes beyond the workplace and politicised strategies of the left. The authors have a broad definition of what radical trade unionism represents, including the political organisations that can be considered as such by their political ideology and identity, as well as the fact that they are involved in organisational and mobilising activities. The different articles in this book highlight the fact that the contribution made by European Unions to the more general struggle against neoliberalism and its new policies, remain limited. Nonetheless, the protest movement that followed the economic crisis signalled a new starting point for a trade unionism that appeared as if it were almost dead. Craig Phelan, a professor at the University of Kingston in London concludes that, “Trade unionism has been the vanguard of participatory democracy and social justice in Europe for two centuries, and it has been the dominant voice for a more equitable distribution of wealth. The upsurge in trade union protest across Europe since 2009 reveals that this tradition remains alive”.
(SD)
*** HERMANN KOTTHOFF, MICHAEL WHITTALL: Paths to transnational solidarity. Identity-building processes in European works councils. Peter Lang (see address attached). "Trade Unions" series, vol. 24. 2014,275 pp. €57.80. ISBN 978-2-84387-412-3.
At a time when national industrial relations systems are struggling to adapt to the mobile and global nature of capitalism, the introduction of European works councils has created a lot of interest over the past two years amongst those involved in social relations and those researching this field. European works councils have been placed at the heart of the emerging social landscape and have provided employees in multinationals in the European Economic Area with an opportunity to participate in the regulation of their working conditions. In this book, the authors, both of whom are professors and researchers in social relations, examine the mechanisms by which European works councils are becoming able to position themselves as actors in the social relations and how, “a set of strangers can cohere into a cooperative team able to offer mutual support and with the capacity to engage in the common European task of company-level interest representation”. The authors develop their analysis by drawing on an empirical study of five European works committees, which are considered as representative of best practices in this field. They then explore and analyse the conditions needed for implementing transnational solidaristic behaviour in different specific cases. The results from this research were discussed with the different European works councils in 2012.
(SD)
*** MAXIMILIAN FEDERHOFER: Europäisches Tarfirecht ? Zum Verhältnis von Grundfreiheiten und Grundrechten im Hinblick auf nationale Sachverhalte mit Tarifbezug. Peter Lang (see address attached). "Schriften zum Recht der Arbeit" series. 2013, 241 pp. €54.95. ISBN 978-3-631-64415-7.
Although the European Union does not have the scope for introducing regulation on the right to strike and trade union freedoms, the inter-professional agreements concluded nationally must, nevertheless, comply with the fundamental freedoms anchored in European law. The author of this publication, therefore demonstrates that Article 28 of the European Union's Charter of Fundamental Rights constitutes the first stone in the foundations of European law governing collective bargaining insofar as it imposes certain requirements on national law and subsequently includes some of the shortcomings observed in this branch of the law affecting the protection of civil liberties. The author never loses sight of the need to maintain a balance between fundamental rights and freedoms and principles introduced by the European Convention of Human Rights in this area. He also provides an outline of European law for collective agreements at work that help to reconcile different contradictions at play.
(GLe)
*** JULIA STRASSER: Die Haftung bei Lohnwucher im Arbeitsrecht der USA. Peter Lang (voir coordonnées supra). "Schriften zum Arbeitsrecht und Wirtschaftsrecht" series. 2014, 227 pp, €59.95. ISBN 978-3-631-65000-4.
This thesis by Julia Strasser tackles the problem of workplace loans and wages that are too low that often result from being at the end of the subcontracting chain. After having presented US legislation on this issue, namely the law on fair working standards in 1938, as well as the case law that resulted from it, the author examines the situation in Europe, in an effort to provide a comparative analysis of this important issue. To achieve this aim, Julia Strasser draws from the Union's Green Paper of 2006 and just as she is drawing from this to underpin her thesis, a directive is still expected to emerge on this issue. The author also supports her argument by drawing on French legislation and the 1975 law on subcontracting and German legislation that also sought to underline the shortcomings of the latter.
(GLe)
*** JOSE PORFIRIO MIRANDA DE LA PARRA: Rationalität und Demokratie. Herausgegeben vom Centro de Estudios Filosóficos José Porfirio Miranda. Peter Lang (see address attached). "Europäisches Denken in deutscher Philosophie" series. 2013, 209 pp. €35.95. ISBN 978-3-631-64333-4.
Drawing from a wide array of documents, the philosopher Jose Porfirio Miranda de la Parra begins this book with a thoroughgoing examination of the fundamental concepts of philosophy and ethics, which he then uses in his overall demonstration of rationality, truth and justice. Throughout this book, which resumes a number of extremely important theoretical standpoints, the author discusses the ideas of different sociologists (Habermas, Luhmann, Rawls) and philosophers (Adorno, Hegel, Rousseau) in an effort to support his ideas, which he sometimes does with much critical aggression. The struggle against relativism and the search for truth constitutes the lightning conductor of this book, which draws from a method based on both definition and proof. The author's analysis leads the reader towards a critical reflection of the key concepts of democracy, the general will and the vote by the majority, as well as the questioning of the relationship between science and society.
(GLe)