Mit dem Beitritt der zehn neuen Mitgliedsstaaten zur Europäischen Union im Mai 2004 wird sich die bestehende Machtverteilung zwischen den EU-Staaten verändern. Die Erweiterung wird sich auf die Effizienz der Entscheidungsfindung auswirken und deshalb sind weitere institutionelle Reformen...

The ways of decision making within the EU have significantly changed in the last decades: the rule of unanimity has been more and more substituted by majority voting in order to speed up decision-making processes in a Union of 27 heterogeneous member states. A third possibility is now offered by...

We introduce the notion of language disenfranchisement which arises if the number of EU working languages is reduced. We use the data on language proficiency in EU and show that, in spite of the widespread knowledge of English, the retention of French and German as working languages in essential...

A group of agents wants to reform the status quo if and only if this is Pareto improving. Agents have private information and may have common or private objectives, which creates a tension between information aggregation and minority protection. We analyze a simple voting system - majority rule...

With twelve new members the decision making in the European Union via intergovernmental cooperation will become ineffective. In order to avoid a Stagno-Europe the EU has a choice: Either it looks for the very essentials in the common institutional frame or the member states agree in ceding...

The member states have self-interested objectives and they use their voting power in the Council of Ministers (CM) to maximize their shares from the EU budget, whereas European Parliament (EP) uses its power to support benevolent objectives and equality between member states. Given the current...

Nach der Ablehnung des Europäischen Verfassungsvertrages bei den Referenden in Frankreich und den Niederlanden und den gescheiterten Finanzverhandlungen befindet sich die Europäische Union in einer Krise. Eberhard Sinner, bayerischer Staatsminister für Europaangelegenheiten und regionale...

This paper analyzes the a priori influence of the European Parliament (EP) and the Council of Ministers (CM) on legislation of the European Union adopted under its codecision procedure. In contrast to studies which use conventional power indices, both institutions are assumed to act...

The member states have self-interested objectives and they use their voting power in the Council of Ministers (CM) to maximize their shares from the EU budget, whereas European Parliament (EP) uses its power to support benevolent objectives and equality between member states. Given the current...