Online research in philosophy

The decision to allocate policy jurisdictions to different levels of government is related to a number of trade-offs between the advantages and disadvantages of centralized versus decentralized provision of public services. A trade-off central to many discussions is that between the internalization of externalities under centralization versus an accountability advantage of decentralization. In this paper we formalize this trade-off in the context of a class of principal agent models known as common agency.

This article analyzes the unique legal position of the European Community (EC) in the world trading system. Its polycephalous anatomy derives from the fact that all 27 Member States of the EC are members of the World Trade Organization (WTO) along with the EC itself. This means that when referring to the EC, the whole as well as its parts are independent Members of the WTO. This has legal and political consequences related to the allocation of powers between the national and supranational levels that will be analyzed. The article explains what is meant by a mixed agreement and analyzes the various existing types of mixed agreements in the field of the European Community's external relations. The effects of the EC's international agreements vis-à-vis third parties are examined. EC Treaty practice has become increasingly dominated by mixed agreements for they reflect the legal and political reality that the EC is not a single State for the purposes of international law. Problems raised by mixed agreements do not exist within the context of exclusive EC competence, but instead relate to the EC's functioning. Within the EC treaty-making, there is a tendency to sign mixed agreements rather than pure Community agreements in areas dealing with the EC external relations. This shows their importance for the European Community and for its position in the world. The article concludes with some suggestions on what might be the optimal way to move forward in the complex field of external relations law of the EC and the European Union (EU).

This contribution questions the evolution of the European legislature. Is the European legislature - as it was established after the Maastricht Treaty - developing into a full fledged legislator comparable to state legislators. In order to answer this question the concept of 'legislature' is studied from different angles. Then the relation between the European legislature - as it emerges from the Constitutional Treaty and the subsequent Lisbon Treaty of 2007 - and the other European institutions is analysed and assessed. The contribution concludes that the European legislature is maturing and developing, sometimes even outside the confines of the Treaties strictu senso.

This academic research paper outlines the legal framework of economic policy coordination within the EMU and evaluates the different coordination methods in place through the monetary, fiscal and supply-side policies. The introduction presents the general EMU economic policy framework and introduces the main methodological issues for economic policy coordination which are developed throughout the paper: the centralised/decentralised approaches, the hard/soft law systems, the Community/intergovernmental methods and the Open Method of coordination. The legal framework of each main EMU macroeconomic policy is then analysed in a specific chapter and limits are pointed out in each case. Eventually, each chapter presents ideas and/or recommendations to improve the existing economic policy legal framework. Chapter 1 focuses on the EMU monetary policy and its legal system, made of the European System of Central Bank and the European Central Bank. The centralized EMU monetary policy is analysed and it is argued that further coordination is needed with the other economic policies; especially with the exchange rate policy. Chapter 2 deals with the EMU fiscal policy and is divided into two main sections: the Broad Economic Policy Guidelines and the Stability and Growth Pact. The BEPGs section insists on the intergovernmental and soft law aspect of the BEPGs and their limits for the conduct of EMU fiscal policies; whereas the SGP section emphasises the multilateral surveillance system of the SGP and more particularly the Excessive Deficit procedure and its hard law aspect for coordinating the national budgetary policies. Chapter 3 focuses on the supply-side policies and the recent Lisbon strategy for employment and reforms, and particularly emphasises the Open Method of Coordination chosen at the Lisbon Council in March 2000. The paper finally suggests that despite all the different coordination processes already in place, the EMU legal framework for economic policy coordination still needs to be improved; and that a suitable method for economic policy coordination in the EMU still needs to be designed or identified to deliver sustainable economic policy coordination in the EMU.

The manner of conduct of Constitutional referendums in Ireland has come under particularly sharp focus since the defeat of the referendum which was intended to facilitate the ratification of the Treaty of Lisbon in June 2008. The Supreme Court rulings considered in this article - Crotty v. An Taoiseach, McKenna v. An Taoiseach (No. 2) and Coughlan v. Broadcasting Complaints Commission and RTÉ combined with the failure of successive executives and legislatures to react to them in an adequate manner with legislation have played a significant role in the failure of Ireland to ratify the Treaty of Lisbon by the time of writing. Indeed, if the decision not to ratify the Lisbon Treaty is not ultimately reversed, it may well be that these judgments will collectively come to be regarded as the most significant examples of judicial activism in Irish legal history. Somewhat curiously, notwithstanding the very major impact which Supreme Court jurisprudence has had on the frequency and conduct of referendums on European Treaties in Ireland, the case-law examined here has until recently attracted relatively little academic attention. This article seeks to redress this lacuna.

This report was prepared at the request of the Oireachtas Sub-Committee on Ireland's Future in the European Union. Its purpose is to identify the range of options available to the Government regarding Ireland's relationship with the European Union and, in particular, the Lisbon Treaty. It discusses the nature and foreseeable implications of each option, but does not make recommendations. Discussion of particular scenarios does not constitute their recommendation. With respect to the 'big picture' of Ireland's future relationship to the EU, the State has three major options: (1) continued membership with limitations in several policy areas, (2) economic engagement through the common currency and the European Economic Area but withdrawal from the EU's political or decision-making structures, and (3) membership in a yet-to-be-constructed two-tier Europe. A hypothetical fourth option - total disengagement - is neither economically feasible nor demanded by any major political or social group, so it is not discussed in this report. With respect to the narrower but thorny issue of the Lisbon Treaty, the Government has a wide range of options. The first three are premised upon a renewed attempt to seek ratification of the Treaty. The next three are premised upon the other Member States working with Ireland in the event of an Irish decision not to attempt to secure ratification of the Treaty or a failure of this attempt. The remaining four are premised upon Ireland not ratifying the Treaty and the other Member States pursuing a path that does not require Irish involvement.

Analysing the EU’s System of Government on the basis of the treaties establishing the Community and the Union leads to identifying five basic government functions, which are distributed in a complex system of checks and balances between the EU institutions and between the latter and member states’ institutions. Those five functions may be characterised as legislative function, which evolved over time from rule making to law making, the executive function which consists in implementing common policies, the supervisory function, consisting of judicial review and of oversight of member state’s compliance with their treaty obligations, the function of direction, consisting of policy guidance and programming, and an organic function consisting in institutional development. The new wording of the relevant treaty clauses by the Lisbon treaty clarifies the nature and distribution of these five functions and thus enable us to understand how separation of powers is organised in the EU.

This paper examines the implications of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), the World Trade Organization’s agreement governing trade in health-related services, for health policy and healthcare reform in the United States. The paper describes the nature and scope of US obligations under the GATS, the ways in which the trade agreement intersects with domestic health policy, and the institutional factors that mediate trade-offs between health and trade policy. The analysis suggests that the GATS provisions on market access, national treatment and domestic regulation, which are designed to eliminate ‘regulatory barriers’ to global trade in health services, limit the range of options that state and federal regulators and legislative bodies can employ to regulate the health sector and implement healthcare reforms. As such, the paper identifies the broader social and ethical implications of free trade policy.

The Lisbon Reform Treaty would improve the role of the sub-national level in the European Union institutional framework. Not only the intended institutional reforms but also the process that led to the Reform Treaty - the European Convention, the Constitutional Treaty, and the period of reflection - strengthened the presence of the regions in the European decision-making process and improved network building within the regions and the system of "Muli-Level Governance" in Europe. In this system of Multi-Level Governance the German Laender followed their two main strategies. The first was to search direct ways to affect actors on every level ("let us in") and the second was to save their own autonomy regarding their own politics ("leave us alone"). Obviously there was no big bang of great expansion of regional rights in the constitutional treaty or in the treaty of Lisbon. But nobody - the regions neither - would have thought that such a big bang would come. It seems to be a path dependent strengthening of the role of the regions.