*** The Federalist Debate. Papers on Federalism in Europe and the World. Einstein Center for International Studies (26 via Schina, I-10144 Turin. Tel/Fax: (+39-011) 4732843 - email: federalist.debate@libero.it - Internet: http://www.federalist.debate.org ). 2008, No. 3, 64 pp. Annual subscription: €15.
This federalist publication is always worth reading and is well-known to the readers of European Library. The reason for choosing this publication for this issue's leading book review is because several articles are directly connected with burning topics of the moment. The editorial, for example, which at the same time as Barack Obama was taking office in the White House, diagnosed (with pleasure) the inevitable decline of the power of the United States. The editor, Lucio Levi, who is professor of comparative politics at Turin University in Italy, bases his appreciation with its activist tinge on two resounding defeats for the United States. Firstly, the war in Georgia which, he says, showed that United States' was "unable t defend its ally". At the other end of the scale, the mediation of the European Union made it possible to stop Russian troops from reaching Tbilissi, and this success by Nicolas Sarkozy showed his ability to boost cohesion among the 27 Member States, particularly the former Soviet satellite states, which "felt that the EU assured them better protection than NATO". The author adds, however, that the problem with the EU is that its action on the world stage is still held back by the right of veto and its "condemnation of South Ossetia's and Abkhazia's separatism is contradicted by its support for Kosovo's secession". Prof. Levi reminds the EU of its duties and that "the only alternative to ethnic nationalism is federalism, that enables peoples to compound their aspirations to autonomy with lasting peace, assured by supranational institutions".
Prof. Levi says that the international financial crisis is an even clearer indication of the decline of the power of the United States. Since Reagan, "Wall Street has created a mountain of debts that are overwhelming the world economic system and destroyed the prestige of the American economic model". He notes that the colossal financial bail-out that President Bush was forced to provide (and his successor will not be able to avoid) costs the same as the second Iraq war, which should lead to a drastic cut in US military spending and, in the long-term, deprive the United States of its status as a superpower. Is this to be regretted? Quite the opposite, writes Lucio Levi, arguing that the current volcanic shake-up "represents a great opportunity for the evolution of the world towards a multipolar order without hegemonies, and for reform of the UN system". In this situation, he argues, it is necessary for the European Union to urgently take on new responsibility in the form of initiatives to create a new Bretton Woods and a nuclear weapon-free world, without ignoring global warming and regionalising the UN Security Council.
In order for this to be possible, however, the European Union will have to start speaking with a single voice. In this connection, Lucio Levi observes that macroeconomic policies are still the prerogative of the Member States and supervisory powers remain the preserve of the national central banks, which acts as a brake on the resources that would enable the EU to take effective action on a par with the sheer scale of the challenge. Optimistically, the author writes that "the crisis can accelerate the unification process" that was slowed down by the no vote in the Irish referendum. On this issue, John O'Brennan, lecturer in European Politics and Society at the National University of Ireland at Maynooth, argues that the latest 'no' vote is mainly due to "the attachment of the Irish people to a particular conception of Irish identity," and this is combined with a lack of knowledge among Irish citizens, and unfortunately the Irish are not alone here, about both the European Union decision-making system and the content of the Lisbon Treaty itself. On the other had, Lucio Levi's observation that "with the euro, the EU has become a monetary power, which (…) has opened the way to monetary multipolarism" echoes Brendan Donnely's article on the position taken by the United Kingdom vis-à-vis the European single currency (a position that is becoming ever less tenable, but…). It is so good to savour a British writer expressing views on the arrogance and condescension of Gordon Brown with regard to his peers when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer. It is a pleasure to read that everything is falling into place now for "the question of British membership of the single European currency would now be returning to the centre of current domestic debate". Without a shadow of a doubt, Brendan Donnely, chair of the Federal Union and director of the Federal Trust, is right, but he is also aware, as he explains, that he is also wrong because his voice is virtually a voice in the wilderness in the United Kingdom …
Michel Theys
*** OLIVER MICHAEL HÜBNER: Die Rolle der regionalen un lokalen Gebietskörperschaften im Entscheidungsprozess der Europäischen Union. Peter Lang (1 Moosstrasse, CH-2542 Pieterlen. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - Fax: 3761727 - email: info@peterlang.com - Internet: http://www.peterlang.com ). "Publication Universitaires Européennes" series, No. 4593. 2007, 428 pp, €64. ISBN 978-3-631-56580-3.
This publication is based on a thesis on the role of local and regional authorities in the European Union decision-making process, submitted in July 2005 to the law and economic science faculty at Saar University in Germany. The research in the book, carried out prior to July 2005, is based on an institutional EU set-up that has changed somewhat since then. Facing the uncertainties of the present day, one might be tempted to ask whether the book is historically out-of-date. The author hints in the book's subtitle that it is intended as a work of analysis of the situation ahead of the 2004 round of EU enlargement. We must acknowledge that the analysis is highly elaborate and precise, and the book can serve as a source of very comprehensive information about the situation of local and regional authorities in all the old Member States, along with Poland and the Czech Republic.
The status of local and regional authorities differs from place to place, as do their powers and involvement in the political decision-making process, depending on national constitutions and history. In order to understand the extent to which local and regional authorities can take an active role in the decision-making process at EU level, it was necessary to look at how this power could become tangible, taking account of proportionality. Independently of the status and role of the Committee of the Regions in the decision-making process, the composition of the Member States' delegations to the Committee, and the nature of the political representation they personify in line with national rules and regulations, will lead to a highly diversified level of political weight at EU level. The very detailed analysis in the book will help readers get a clear view of the situation. At a time when the role of the Committee of the Regions is under discussion, the book can be seen as a very useful reference tool on how local authorities operate and how they can act at EU level. (GFr)
*** ALDONA SZCZEPONEK: Die Umsetzung des Völkerrechts und des europäischen Gemeinschaftsrechts in Polen. Unter Berücksichtigung verfassungsrechtlicher Lösungen anderer europäischer Staaten. Peter Lang (see above). "Schriften zum internationalen und zum öffentlichen Recht" series, No. 77. 2008, 373 pp, €52.80. ISBN 978-3-631-57872-8.
Written by a researcher at the Public Law Institute of Marburg University, this book studies the transposition and implementation of international and European law in Poland. The first section is devoted to explaining the legal foundations of the transposition, and the following chapters compare and contrast Polish transposition with transposition in other countries. Simply introducing the rules into a country's domestic legal system is only the first step, however. Lawyers' expertise is required but Aldona Szczeponek argues that it has to be combined with citizens' expertise, not to mention the fact that interpretation of national law should be take account of the EU context. The book's main recommendation is that EU and international rules should be made to co-exist in the national set-up without contradicting one another, which is not the case in Poland. Despite the ratification of many rules by the Polish parliament and an openness in the legal system to EU and international laws, Poland still has to work on a more coherent legal system, arranges the author. (EPi)
*** Agences de l'Union: obtenir des résultats. European Court of Auditors (Official Publications Office). Fax: (352) 2929-42758 - Internet: http: //bookshop.europa.eu). 2008, 4 pp. ISBN 978-92-9207-077-9. Also available in English, this special European Court of Auditors report looks at the world of the eight EU agencies, focussing on the new management issues arising from the new style of EU governance and making fifteen recommendations. (MT)
*** PETER BECKER, RÜDIGER VON KROSIGK: Figures of Authority. Contributions towards a Cultural History of Governance from the Seventeenth to the Twentieth Century. 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. 42. 2008, 317 pp, €34.90. ISBN 978-90-5201-429-6.
The aim of this book is to study a type of organisation that is little loved and often criticised but is omnipresent in modern society, namely bureaucracy. The authors examine the role played by authority figures,, leaders in other words, and other members of the institutions' hierarchies in the development, installation and duration of bureaucracies. Judges, civil servants, engineers and scientists draw their authority from the position they occupy and their performance rather than from their social position. The resulting image, projected onto the chain of command, has a great influence on the nature of the chain of command itself. The authors of this study try to destroy the stereotype of the typical bureaucrat as faceless, cold, austere and distant, operating in virtually total abstraction because their relationship with the world is carried out through written documents - aiming to replace it with more of a human face, taking account of the special nature of bureaucrats as members of an institutional group and the social situation within a bureaucracy. They also stress that while the institutional environment and its norms play a role in shaping individuals, the individuals are also responsible for changing the direction in which the institutions move.
Initially, the authors study the first forms of administration that arose in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The initial chapters examine how the first modern states evolved into complex; rational administrative systems giving rise to the idea that human beings are "subject to change". Back then, administrative skills were at ties linked to religious references and some commentators of that epoch commented on this type of scientific subjectivity that "its main elements are a socially-detached model of cognition and decision-making which was linked to the superior mode of perception reserved exclusively for angels". The connection between angels and managers might seem far-fetched until one observes how an order descending from the "abstract heights of a super-personal agency" - some kind of a civil service of angels - seems to come down and weigh upon the inferior orders of humanity without human being able to influence it very much. Modern civil services had to be scientific and be socially and emotionally detached from the world. Civil servants fell in with this and much fun has often been poked at this characteristic by authors like Kafka and Weber. It played a huge role in the image people still have today of the civil servant. The authors therefore look in the third part of the book at the psychological evolution of these figures of authority. To this end, they call on psychoanalytic tools like JuJung's concept of persona. This concept is understood as the incarnation of a role, like a kind of inner structuring of onself. Through the concept, the authors try to isolate the "bureaucratic or academic self", to work out how these administrators got to this stage, which elements arising from the institutions played their role in this evolution, and the extent to which the institutions themselves have been shaped by the administrators. The fourth and final part of the book studies bureaucratise during times of political upheaval, like German nationalism in the 1930s and, of course, the changes of regime in the EU institutions since the 2004 reforms. (NDu)
*** FRANCOISE CURTIT, FRANCIS MESSNER (Eds.): Droit des religions en France et en Europe: recueil de textes. Bruylant (67 rue de la Régence, B-1000 Brussels. Tel: (32-2) 5129842 - Fax: 5119477 - email: jean@bruylant.be - Internet: http://www.bruylant.be ). 2008, 1193 pp, €95. ISBN 978-2-8027-2535-0
Arising from the work of a research unit at CNRS and the Robert Schuman University in Strasbourg, a unit known as “Prisme,” this hefty tome fills a gap by describing the legal framework for religious activity in France in the light of international law and the way religions are treated in other European countries. It includes most sections of French law dealing with the organisation and exercise of religions, and the relation between public authorities and religious communities, including the special situation in Alsace-Moselle and the French overseas territories. For other EU Member States, the book notes the constitutional measures, main laws and some other agreements in place that illustrate the legal status of religions and the type of official religions in each country, the main sources of international law on religious freedom and EU legal measures that take religious affairs into account. The authors describe the legal framework of the Member States in this connection. Each series of texts is preceded by a brief presentation of the main elements of the legal status of religions for the country in question. For the United Kingdom there are no legal texts because the common law legal system there is in force, but there is an article making several references to it. (PBo)