Political Economy of European integration in the polder - 15

Economics; European Unio

The Transnational Political Economy of Corporate Governance Regulation: A Research Outline

Corporate governance has become a buzzword of the global business community and is now receiving even wider attention given the repercussions of the Enron collapse. Although there is a burgeoning literature on this topic, the bulk of it is either highly normative or focused on corporate governance practices at the level of the firm. In contrast, our aim is to explain the current transformations of corporate governance regulation. Whereas this regulation used to be a distinctly national affair, it is now increasingly an area subject to both public and private (self-) regulation in multiple arenas, of which three are outstandingly important as well as closely interrelated and, therefore, form the empirical focus of the programme:- Europeanisation in the area of corporate governance regulation affects national regimes of corporate governance with a particular historical diversity, without entirely replacing them.- The EU, furthermore, does not operate in a vacuum but in a transatlantic and global context where it has to negotiate its choices with both state (mainly the US) and non-state actors. At the global level, private bodies such as the International Accounting Standards Board set many corporate governance standards, and international organisations like the OECD disseminate norms for good corporate governance.- Central and East European countries (CEEC) are exposed to the multiple (and partially conflicting) demands by global institutions and the EU when developing their corporat

Transnational class agency and European governance: the case of the European Round Table of Industrialists

This article analyses the political and ideological agency of an emergent European transnational capitalist class in the socioeconomic governance of the European Union (EU) by examining the case of the European Round Table of Industrialists (ERT). It seeks to show that the ERT-as an elite forum mediating the interests and power of the most transnationalise d segments of European capital-has played a significant role in shaping European governance in as much as it has successfully articulated and promoted ideas and concepts thathave at critical times set the political agenda and, beyond, have helped to shape the discourse within which European policy making is embedded. Here, the increasingly neoliberal orientation of the ERT reflects, and at the same time is a constitutive element within, the construction of a new European order in which governance is geared to serve the interests of a globalising transnational capitalist elite, and hence the exigencies of global 'competitiveness'. Although in recent years some detailed work has been done on the role of the ERT in the internal market programme, there has as yet been little attention paid to (and thus interpretation of) the content of the ideas promoted by the ERT and hence to the ideological power that this forum of transnational capitalists exercises. The article is divided into four main parts. The first briefly elaborates the theoretical framework that informs my analysis. Drawing upon what has come to be labelled the 'neo-Gramscian school' in International Relations (IR), I willadvance a historical materialist understanding of the dynamics of European integration, emphasising in particular the role of transnational social forces-as engendered by the capitalist production process-in the political and ideological struggles over European order. The second part introduces the case of the European Round Table. I will claim that the ERT is neither a simple business lobby nor a corporatist interest association, but must rather be interpreted as having developed into an elite platform for an emergent European transnational capitalist class from which it can formulate a common strategy and-on the basis of that strategy-seek to shape European socioeconomic governance through its privileged access to the European institutions. It is this latter role of the ERT that will be the focus of the final two parts. As such, the third presents an analysis of the evolution of ERT's strategic project and the initiating role the Round Table played in the relaunching of the integration process from Europe 1992 to Maastricht. Following this, the fourth part will analyse the ideological orientation and strategic outlook of today's Round Table and its current role in shaping what I will call the neoliberal discourse of competitiveness which, I argue, increasingly underpins European governance

Fauna en terreinkenmerken van bos; een studie naar de relatie tussen terreinkenmerken en de geschiktheid van bos als habitat voor een aantal diersoorten

In dit rapport wordt een methode beschreven waarmee de geschiktheid van het bos als habitat voor verschillende diersoorten kan worden bepaald op basis van de terreinkenmerken van het bos. De methode is gebaseerd op HSI-modellen. Er zijn 10 terreinkenmerken gebruikt om de habitatgeschiktheid te bepalen. Naast het onderdeel dat de habitatgeschiktheid van bos aangeeft, is er een onderdeel toegevoegd dat de bosbeheerder informatie geeft over de soorten die in het bos voor kunnen voorkomen op basis van de ligging en grootte van het bos. Voor zes diergroepen is de relatie tussen de terreinkenmerken en de habitatgeschiktheid weergegeven

The cultural grammar of governance: The UK Code of Corporate Governance, reflexivity, and the limits of 'soft' regulation

We identify limits of ‘reflexive governance’ by examining the UK Code of Corporate Governance that is celebrated for its ‘reflexivity’. By placing the historical genesis of the Code within its politico-economic context, it is shown how its scope and penetration is impeded by a shallow, ‘single loop’ of reflexivity. Legitimized by agency theory, the Code is infused by a ‘cultural grammar’ that perpetuates relations of shareholder primacy as it restricts accountability to narrow forms of information disclosure directed exclusively at shareholders. Engagement of a deeper, ‘double loop’ reflexivity allows account to be taken of the historical conditions and theoretical conceptions that shape practices and outcomes of corporate governance. Only then is it possible to disclose, challenge and reform narrow conceptions, boundaries and workings of ‘reflexive governance’

Dysregulated innate and adaptive immune responses discriminate disease severity in COVID-19

The clinical spectrum of COVID-19 varies and the differences in host response characterizing this variation have not been fully elucidated. COVID-19 disease severity correlates with an excessive pro-inflammatory immune response and profound lymphopenia. Inflammatory responses according to disease severity were explored by plasma cytokine measurements and proteomics analysis in 147 COVID-19 patients. Furthermore, peripheral blood mononuclear cell cytokine production assays and whole blood flow cytometry were performed. Results confirm a hyperinflammatory innate immune state, while highlighting hepatocyte growth factor and stem cell factor as potential biomarkers for disease severity. Clustering analysis reveals no specific inflammatory endotypes in COVID-19 patients. Functional assays reveal abrogated adaptive cytokine production (interferon-gamma, interleukin-17 and interleukin-22) and prominent T cell exhaustion in critically ill patients, whereas innate immune responses were intact or hyperresponsive. Collectively, this extensive analysis provides a comprehensive insight into the pathobiology of severe to critical COVID-19 and highlight potential biomarkers of disease severity