The Securitization of Development Policy or the Developmentalization of Security Policy?: Legitimacy, Public Opinion, and the EU External Action Service (EAS)

The EU has strained to find its identity as a security and defense power. The EU, historically, has more experience and credibility in the area of its development policy. Given the EU’s history of development promotion and recent efforts to expand and clarify its foreign policy objectives, it should not be surprising that development and security goals often resemble each other. This paper argues that the conflation of traditional security concerns with the overall development policy of the EU indicates an expansion of and an effort to legitimize the EU’s foreign and security policy. However, the lack of a clear distinction between security and development strategies acts as both a hindrance, in terms of operational clarity, and an asset, in terms of justification, to the formulation of a more coherent EU foreign policy, especially after the passage of the Lisbon Treaty

a practice based approach to safety as an emergent competence

This chapter proposes to look at safety as a collective knowledgeable doing, i.e. a competency embedded in working practices. Therefore, by adopting a practice-based approach to inquire into how work is actually accomplished, we can study how knowing safe and safer working practices is kept and maintained within situated ways of working and talking about safety. The knowledge object 'safety' is constructed—materially and discursively—by a plurality of professional communities, according to specific scientific disciplines, controlling specific leverages within an organization, and talking different discourses. In a workplace, there are competing discourses: technological, normative, educational, economic, and managerial. Therefore, learning safer working practices is mediated by comparison among the perspectives of the world embraced by the co-participants in the production of safety as an organizational practice. Training and learning based on situated working practices presumes the collective engagement of researchers and participants in reflexivity, which can help to bring to the surface the experience knowledge embedded in practicing and transform it into actionable knowledge to produce practice changes. In fact, the engagement of practitioners, their experience knowledge and their care for what they do may enhance workplace resilience

administration and leadership from the high representative´s perspective

Esta tese analisa a arquitetura legal da Política Externa e de Segurança Comum, o regime administrativo, e aspetos financeiros, abordando a evolução dos Tratados da União Europeia no que concerne a política externa, segurança e defesa. Procura questionar a validade de visões canónicas continuamente reproduzidas academicamente, nomeadamente o peso que o Intergovernamentalismo e o Requerimento de Unanimidade têm em limitar a Política Externa e de Segurança Comum. Enquanto que a maioria dos estudos exagera o papel desempenhado pela Soberania, estes fazem-no partindo do pressuposto que Estados-Nação são inerentemente aversos à cooperação, logo, naturalmente ou política externa da UE não existe, ou tem um teto autoimposto. Os estudos que chegam a abordar outros aspetos contribuintes para falhas de desempenho da Política Externa e de Segurança Comum são maioritariamente ou mono temáticos, ou de raiz puramente ancorada à Ciência Política, ao invés do Direito. Esta tese realça padrões comuns encontrados no anterior, expondo tendências comuns e como se relacionam e influenciam mutuamente, enquanto reconhece também o valor do posterior. Esta tese adota uma análise holística, contribuindo para o mundo académico ao comparar e articular pontos frequentemente desconexos e negligenciados.This thesis analyzes the Common Foreign and Security Policy’s legal architecture, administrative regime, and financial aspects, addressing the European Union’s Treaty evolution concerning foreign, security and defense. It aims at questioning the validity of canonically held views continuously reproduced throughout academia, namely the weight that Intergovernmentalism and the Unanimity Requirement have on limiting the Common Foreign and Security Policy. While most studies exaggerate the role Sovereignty plays, they do so starting from the assumption that Nation-States are inherently uncooperative, ergo, naturally EU foreign policy either doesn’t exist, or has a self-imposed ceiling. Those studies that do approach other aspects contributing to the Common Foreign and Security Policy’s shortcomings are mostly either single-issue focused, or purely within the realm of Political Science, rather than Law. This thesis highlights the common patterns found in the former, exposing common trends and how they relate and influence each other, whilst also acknowledging the value in the latter’s insights. This thesis adopts a holistic analysis, contributing to the academic field in comparing and articulating often disconnected and overlooked points

Of Power and Responsibility: The Political Morality of Federal Systems

In comparative constitutional discourse, Americans are from Mars and Europeans from Venus; we eagerly tell our European counterparts about the U.S. constitutional experience, but rarely do we listen when they talk to us about their own. Whereas Europeans routinely examine U.S. constitutionalism as an illuminating point of comparison or contrast, as Americans, we seem convinced that we have nothing to learn from looking abroad. This Article challenges that assumption. In particular, it argues that American courts and scholars have overlooked an important alternative to the dominant interpretation of the division of powers in the United States by ignoring the theory and practice of federalism in the European Union and in Germany

Creative ‘Class’: Leading Innovation with Digital Pedagogy in Cultural and Creative Industry (CCI) Programs

Leaders of cultural and creative programs (CCIs) in Ontario community colleges are key to realizing potential in higher education related to digital pedagogy, creativity, industry partnerships, entrepreneurship and innovation. In this Organizational Improvement Plan (OIP), the role of an academic leadership group is considered from Ontario-centric creative industry and innovation policies and college processes. The problem of practice is the gap of harmonized leadership strategy between higher education classroom practices and regional and provincial overarching educational strategy to increase innovation through digital pedagogy. Colleges have collective capacities in innovating with digital pedagogy in creative industry programs and providing graduates with workplace skills, while supporting humanistic ideals of culture and creativity. There is an opportunity for a Creative Program Leaders Committee to move from a community of practice to become influencers of strategy and research. In the OIP I outline a plan to begin the process to define digital pedagogy in creative programs, collect exemplars, and plan to create a strategy document to lead to knowledge transfer among stakeholders. The OIP is contextualized through themes of complexity, ambiguity, and connectivity in a neo-liberal era. Eddy’s (2010) community college change communication framework and Hernes’ (2008, 2014) ideas of process organizational theory inform these themes. By doing so, the informed strategy creation can help harmonize and advance collective goals for both colleges and provincial institutions