The process of approximation between the EU and its ‘eastern neighbourhood’ has created conditions for deepening economic interactions and market integration, giving to the EU –and to EU businesses– an elevated role in the process of economic modernisation and transition in the...

This paper discusses convergence through the concept of industrial upgrading and its application to the Spanish case. The paper explains the recent rise of Spain’s firms in high value-added service sectors and the fall in capital and skill-intensive manufacturing through the characterisation...

In this paper it is analysed whether the euro-crisis has induced a change in the degree of Europeanization of national public spheres. It is argued that ‘mediatizing politics’ on TV is a prerequisite for the accountability structures of liberal democracies. Examining the degree of...

European Higher education is facing times of significant change that has been affecting its identity and the political expectations regarding its societal roles. At the European level this has been fostered by a trend that increasingly regarded higher education as a tool for economic and social...

The paper sets out to analyze the allocations of financial resources accruing to the European regions from the Regional, Rural Development and Agricultural policies of the European Union in order to assess their territorial coordination and synergies and their degree of compatibility with the...

The collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008 ushered in a financial crisis whose ramifications are still being felt. Within the EU, collapse not only led to a change in regulatory rhetoric, emphasising the need to secure the stability of EU money markets, but also to a significant widening and...

How does fiscal decentralisation affect the development of a health system? Evidence from health care decentralisation in Europe can offer some insights to the question above. This paper addresses the effects of health care decentralisation in Europe, and reviews some of the key questions on the...

In the public policy literature, there is a widespread belief that industry self-regulation would only take place—and lead to satisfactory results—if industry was faced with a credible threat of hierarchical government intervention. At the example of intermodal transport standardization,...

The study of welfare capitalism is concerned with a founding question of political economy, namely how capitalism and democracy can be combined. Ever since the publication of Esping-Andersen’s Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism in 1990, the answer was sought in identifying ideal types of...

This paper explores the extent to which current reforms of the euro-zone’s governance remain encased in the constraints of the Maastricht Treaty - the narrowness of its underlying paradigm; the gaps and imbalances of its design – and the implications for the future of the euro. With a model...