How the new European diplomatic service is viewed from the inside of the Commission? In order to get a better sense of this new organ, Nouvelle Europe had the privilege to ask the question directly to Štefan Füle, the European Commissioner for Enlargement and Neighbourhood Policy. This interview gives us some (hopeful) insights into the working of the “family” composed by the Commissioners for External relations.
Linking economic recovery with environmental responsability is a tricky issue for European governments. Yet it is one they cannot avoid. Several strategies can increase energy efficiency in the United Kingdom. Chris Huhne, the British Secretary for Energy and Climate Change, made his case at a public lecture at the London School of Economics (LSE).
Many argue nowadays that the importance of the UK/US relationship has lessened with the end of the Cold War. On 26th June 2010, Damon Wilson, President of the Atlantic Council and Director of the International Security Program, claimed that “following 60 years of cooperation and success, the political, economic and military pillars of the special relationship are stressed today”. How the special relationship can adapt to new challenges?
After the 2004 Eastern enlargement, Poles immigrated massively to the UK and account today for the largest part of the country’s migrant population from Central and Eastern Europe. In the wake of the financial crisis followed by the economic downturn that harshly struck the UK, studies claim that Polish nationals have, for the most part, gone back to their home country. But is this assumption backed by evidence? And what are the perspectives regarding Polish immigration to the UK?
Nouvelle Europe has a British namesake, The New Europe. During the First World War, a British interest in the fate of Eastern and south-Eastern countries emerged and expressed itself through this publication. With the recent creation of Nouvelle Europe – United Kingdom, our new editorial office based in London, the history and development of this British review, which focused on the “new” Europe, become all the more interesting.
Veiko Spolitis is both Estonian and Latvian. He's an academic working in Rīgas Stradiņa universitātes (Latvia) and in Helsinki University (Finland). He is the ideal person to explain to us the debate about the European Union's enlargement to Turkey from the shores of the Baltic Sea.
At the end of March 2010, when a proposal for a Council decision on the establishment of the External Action Service was launched, even Catherine Ashton, the High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, could not know that it would take until the end of October for implementation to begin. What happened in the European Parliament that had such an influence on the EEAS's creation process?
Under the Lisbon Treaty, conflict prevention is for the first time explicitly stated as a purpose of the Union's external action, alongside democracy, the rule of law, human rights, poverty reduction, global trade integration, environmental protection, disaster management and multilateral cooperation. However, conflict prevention, in its long-term, structural form, is linked to all these objectives. Will the European External Action Service (EEAS) be able to ensure that the Union's external relations are more coherent and efficient at preventing conflicts?
A new perspective has emerged in the current negociations for Turkey's accession to the EU. Egemen Bagis, the Chief EU Negociator, now refers to the "Norwegian model": in case of a "yes" from the EU, a national referendum would take place in Turkey and have the last word upon the accession... Is this model relevant? Einar Wigen, a Norwegian researcher, provides us with an in-depth analysis of the matter