In this analysis, the authors scrutinizes the method of the Court of Justice of the European Union when balancing diverging or even opposing interests protected by EU law. The starting point is two joined cases, where the two authors are critical of the Court’s reasoning and argues that the Court sacrifices the fundamental interest of transparency in order to protect other interests, especially the protection of personal data.
The Hungarian presidency has faced a series of truly challenging economic and political problems. These include the responses to the economic and financial crises and the uprisings in the Arab world.
Europe's population live longer live and the workforce's share of the population is shrinking. This constitutes a big challenge for the EU´s Member States and within the EU there is now a debate on future European pension systems.
In response to the financial crisis that erupted in Greece, the European Council decided to amend the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union to allow the establishment of a stability mechanism to safeguard the stability of the euro area. This is the first use made of one of the two ‘simplified’ Treaty revision procedures introduced by the Lisbon Treaty.
The quality of government shows considerable variation within and between EU member states. The authors of this report presents new and unique data of regional differences in the quality of government and a number of conclusions regarding what distinguish regions with high quality of government and low levels of corruption.
The EU’s R&D policy has recently come under the spotlight. It is a central element both in the review of the EU budget and in the so called Europe 2020 strategy, where the goal of increasing the level of investment in R&D in the EU to three percent of GDP is emphasized.
The aim of reducing regional disparities in the European Union is enshrined in the EU Treaty. An important aspect that takes centre stage in discussions on the EU’s so-called cohesion policy is the ranking of the Union’s many regions in terms of their levels of prosperity.
Despite the financial crisis and the subsequent euro crisis, the Swedish public opinion is increasingly in favour of the EU. In the 2010 survey, 53 percent are in favour of the Swedish membership while 23 percent are against.
When markets are liberalized and open for competition, the scope of EU law is widening simultaneously. Even though EU law permits considerations other than free competition, the member states must themselves use the space available.
Even though the Member States are ambitious in setting the agenda for the EU, they are less keen to provide the funding necessary to meet these ambitions. Indeed, if the EU seriously sought to attain all goals and ambitions of the Member States, it would easily swallow large parts if not all of the EU’s combined GNI.