Sovereignty over the Economic and Monetary Union, EMU, is divided. Monetary policy is unified at the European level while economic policy is in essence national.

Welfare services in Sweden are to a large extent the responsibility of municipalities, county councils and regions. This includes the provision of housing, health care, waste management and education.

In the aftermath of the financial crisis, a vast amount of economic analysis and a sizeable number of reforms in the financial markets have followed. In this report, Professor Henry Montgomery takes the analysis one step further by examining the psychological explanations behind the crisis.

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.

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.

Can organised interests be of help in bringing the EU closer to its citizens? In this SIEPS report the issue is examined by studying the process that produced the new regulatory system for chemicals (REACH). The conclusion is that participation of interest organisations contributed to better and more well-balanced decisions.

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.

For quite some time now, the EU Member States have tried to mold the EU into a socially more acceptable form. This has largely remained big words and solemn declarations, but the Lisbon Treaty establishes the EU as a social market economy.

The ongoing crisis in the Eurozone has posed particular challenges to the current Polish EU Presidency. Poland, like Sweden, is not a member of the Euro Group and has therefore been excluded from some of the most important decision-making during the second half of 2011.