"Parties, Party System and Democracy in the EC political system"

[From the Introduction]. The EC political system is undergoing a process of parliament institutionalization. Started in the Seventies and far from being accomplished, the process depends in a substantial degree on how EP Party Groups organize party co-operation and make for party integration. The paper summarizes the Party Group experience and analyzes the EP party system in order to anticipate party organization and role in the EC political system. In the last part of the paper, attention is devoted to the related issue of EC 'democracy gap'

Chapter Order is what states make of it. Interregnum, world-scale problems, and multilateralism

The present chapter assumes that using multilateralism to address world-scale problems has an impact on the future of world politics and may be the game-changer of the world political order. In the first section, attention is drawn to the establishment of the present world order, the multilateral institutions and policies that have been the cornerstone of such order, and the current order transition process. Based on the research knowledge about the ongoing world climate policymaking process, the second section explains the persistent role of multilateral policymaking as the way of responding to the problems that are widespread over the entire planet and are inherent to the structure of the world polity of the sovereign states

Globalisation, crime and rights : the quest for role by international institutions

Concepts like environmental security, cultural security-or societal security are attracting the interest of scientists and of the public and policy-makers. Such security problems can be solved by means of international cooperation. Not just by means of mutual assistance among countries, but by international standards and norms, by world watcher agencies, by global strategies and the use of huge amounts of material and financial resources. All this requires action by international institutions. Means and solutions worked out at the state level have small and temporary efficacy. This is also true of an area of security closely associated with the fundamental rights of the individual. Usually referred to as public or internal security, it concerns the protection of individuals and people from crime and violations of law. A particular function of the state, public security - as almost all social and human affairs - has changed, today, due to the acceleration of the globalisation process which has almost overtaken the traditional sovereignty of nations.peer-reviewe

POLICY PREFERENCE FORMATION IN LEGISLATIVE POLITICS:STRUCTURES, ACTORS, AND FOCAL POINTS

This dissertation introduces and tests a model of policy preference formation in legislative politics. Emphasizing a dynamic relationship between structure, agent, and decision-making process, it ties the question of policy choice to the dimensionality of the normative political space and the strategic actions of parliamentary agenda-setters. The model proposes that structural factors, such as ideology, shape policy preferences to the extent that legislative specialists successfully link them to specific policy proposals through the provision of informational focal points. These focal points shift attention toward particular aspects of a legislative proposal, thus shaping the dominant interpretation of its content and consequences and, in turn, individual-level policy preferences. The propositions of the focal point model are tested empirically with data from the European Parliament (EP), using both qualitative (interview data, content analyses of parliamentary debates) and quantitative methods (multinomial logit regression analyses of roll-call votes). The findings have implications for our understanding of politics and law-making in the European Union and for the study of legislative decision-making more generally

The Euro-Mediterranean project of security partnership in comparative perspective. JMWP No. 52.04, September 2004

The main aspects of the building process of the Euro-Mediterranean security system are assessed in this article with the tools of analysis of the regional security systems. The Mediterranean security project is also compared with other forms and cases of regional security system. The presence of other multilateral initiatives on Mediterranean security is pointed out as a strategic tool for the future of the Euro-Mediterranean project, and the proposal for increasing the relations between the EMP and other multilateral initiatives is put on the table as a step forward to strengthen the process for building the Mediterranean security system

Regional security partnership: the concept, model, practice, and a preliminary comparative scheme. JMWP No.58.05, July 2005

Building cooperative security systems at the regional level is new practice in international politics. The concept of regional security partnership is presented here, and a descriptive models is applied to the study of the practice. Five cases of regional security partnership in Europe, East Asia, Central Asia, Africa, and the EU Neighborhood are separately analyzed. Similarity and difference of the five cases are assessed in the concluding section, in which a comparative scheme is presented

Transatlantic Relations in Post-Iraq War Global Politics. JMWP No. 50.03, December 2003

The paper analyzes the American President Bush’s prevention doctrine and the potential effect of the American intervention in Iraq on the relations between Europe and the United States. The hegemonic theory of international politics and the evolutionary world politics model are adopted to understand the present phase of change of world politics

Partnership and Security: Some theoretical and empirical reasons for positive developments in the Euro-Mediterranean area. Special edition Euro-Mediterranean Partnership. JMWP No. 27.00, July 2000

[From the Introduction]. Two security area issues are analysed in this study: the wider context and inner context. In the former, attention is drawn to three groups of factors which condition security in the Mediterranean and in other areas of the world: the systemic proprieties of security in the contemporary world; the new dimensions of security and security community building as perceived by political analysts; and the European and Arab security cultures. The analysis of the inner context, instead, reviews attempts and processes aimed at building security in the framing of the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership. The list of factors examined here does not pretend to be complete. It is a selection of factors loosely inspired by Modelski’s (1996) theory of evolutionary world politics which sees the international system as bound to the formation of global institutions and, consequently, views regional political theatres as influenced by, rather than as autonomous from, the evolution of the global system. For this reason, the prospects of the Euro-Mediterranean security building process appear to be less dark than most analysts allow the Euro-Mediterranean partnership-makers to expect. However, to point out signs favourable to positive developments of security negotiations among Euro-Mediterranean countries does not imply that we underestimate difficulties and obstacles. The analysis of the inner context of Euro-Mediterranean security in this study acknowledges the slowing-down effect of these difficulties and obstacles on the making of security agreements in the area. The overall analysis, however, supports the prospect of progress in Mediterranean security building because it identifies incentives for managing security issues through co-operative and multilateral methods rather than through the conflict instruments of the single countries

Strategies for democratising multi-state systems and the European Union. JMWP No. 28.00, November 2000

The issue of building democracy in a multi-state political system is examined in the first section of the paper. Three options for multi-state democracy are analysed in this section. The introduction of the three options in the history of the European integration process is analysed in the first section in relation with the debate on the reform of the European institutions. The second section analyses how the reform of the legislative process of the European Union has enhanced the role of the European Parliament and political parties in agreement with the third option of multi-state democracy. The third section examines the debate on the role of national parliaments in the European Union as an instrument of the first and second option of multi-state democracy. In the last section of the paper, the issue of the accountability of the EU executive is analysed as the crucial issue of the third option of democratisation of the European Union

I Processi di Integrazione Regionale nella Politica Internazionale Contemporanea = The Process of Regional Integration in Contemporary International Politics. JMWP No. 41.02, May 2002

[From the Introduction]. Il sistema mondiale contemporaneo è il primo sistema internazionale che conosce processi di organizzazione politica a livello macro-sistemico e a livello micro-sistemico o regionale. L’organizzazione dei sistemi politici regionali assume forme e contenuti diversi che vanno dalla cooperazione al conflitto. L’esistenza di processi integrativi appare caratterizzare alcune regioni più di altre e si manifesta in un numero crescente di regioni. Per questa ragione, gli studiosi di politica si occupano crescentemente di questo fenomeno e hanno posizioni diverse riguardo all’intensità del fenomeno stesso. Questo studio osserva diversi aspetti dell’integrazione regionale e si pone l’interrogativo della comparazione dei processi integrativi regionali. In particolare, esso si occupa di quattro argomenti: il regionalismo nell’analisi politica internazionale, l’unità del sistema politico mondiale e la divisione in teatri regionali, l’oggetto della comparazione dei processi integrativi regionali e i sistemi regionali di sicurezza