Week schedule

Week	Task (TG + training + Lecture)	Skills	Project	English	Miscel-laneous
1 (35)	History + Institutions FRJS (no TG)	Negotiating simulation FRJS / MAJP		Intro I portfolio English ENJA
2 (36)	The Single Market FRJS	Negotiating MAJP	1.EU decision making FRJS	Intro II Portfolio English ENJA
3 (37)	European law VEMO	Negotiating MAJP			Kick-off individual paper FRJS
4 (38)	Euro FRJS	Negotiating MAJP	2.EU law MAJP	Portfolio English ENJA	Progress test task 1-3
5 (49)	The big spenders: FRJS
6 (40)	Equality VEMO		3.Corporate Social Respons. PEPE	Portfolio English ENJA
7 (41)					Written exam
8 (42)	Excursion				Excursion
9 (43)	Autumn holiday
10(44)	Competition Policy 1 MAJP		4. Lobbying MEVO	Debating ENJA
11 (45)	Mergers & Acquisitions VEJC			Debating ENJA
12 (46)	Corporate Governance VEJC		5.Mergers & Acquisition VEJC	Debating ENJA
13 (47)	Free movement MAJP			Debating ENJA	Progress Test Task 7 - 9
14 (48)	Competition Policy 2 FRJS		6.Competi-tion policy MAJP	Debating ENJA
15 (49)	Future of the EU: FRJS			Debating ENJA	Due date individual paper
16/17 (50/51)	Oral Exam

Tasks

Task 1: History and decision making

Part 1:

Europe's mid-life crisis Mar 15th 2007 From The Economist print edition A successful club celebrates its 50th birthday in sombre mood

ANYBODY reaching 50 naturally likes to reflect a bit on their achievements and failures. So it is with the European Union, which later this month marks the 50th anniversary of the signing in Rome of its founding treaty in 1957. Europe's leaders plan a jamboree in Berlin that will issue a portentous declaration. Their voters may not be impressed.

In 2007, the European Union celebrated its 50^th anniversary. A lot has changed since the start of the European “project”. Although start, what in fact wás the start? Some people believe that the actual age of the EU is not 50 but even more than that, whilst others claim that the European Union is still in its teens.

As The Economist article shows, people have mixed feelings regarding the development. This was also the outcome of a study of the Dutch Bureau of Economic Policy Analysis (CPB), which was presented on 9 May (Europe day) 2007. According to this study, 72% of all the Dutch support the EU membership, but on the other hand less than 50% of the people are in favour of a further widening of the EU.

Anyway, 50 years is a long time and a lot has changed. After the Treaty of Rome, a lot of other Treaties, like the Treaty of Maastricht, have followed, which all introduced minor or major changes to the EC. The Union has widened, but also deepened, and there were internal changes within the institutional structure as well.

Part 2

On his first day as an EU-Commissioner, Mr Leonard Orban was wondering: Being the (first) Romanian EU commissioner for Multilingualism, he thought it was time to leave his mark on the development of the integration process within the EU. Sometimes, the meetings in European institutions were very chaotic because of all the different languages representatives were speaking. Of course, the EU had employed a lot of very skilful interpreters (and so increased employment as well), but in his opinion, the money that was spent on it had better be spent on other subjects. The source of the language problem, according to Mr Orban, was the lack of language training, especially during primary education in the nation states. Wasn’t it a good idea to give all children in Europe the opportunity to learn a second language already during primary school and even a third language in their secondary school education?

In his view this issue was of major importance for the EU integration process, and so would probably comply with the subsidiarity principle, so he planned to propose a new European law that would deal with this issue. Unfortunately, he was not very experienced yet with EU decision making, but his civil servants certainly would be able to inform him on the necessary steps to be taken. They had to inform him about the complete procedure. He had heard them talking already about co-decision and qualified majority but he was not certain whether that was applicable in this case. Yesterday, one of the members had put some information on his desk regarding the whole procedure that was followed with the introduction of EU rules for tobacco advertisements.

Task 2: Internal Market

Spring 1985: Young Jim was excited. He had come to work as a work placement student in the Industrial Affairs and Internal Market DG of the European Commission, where plans to create a real Single Market in Europe were just about to be announced. Jim liked Brussels much more than Strasbourg or Luxembourg, where he had spent some time attached to the European Parliament, and he knew that when the White Paper on the completion of the Internal Market was submitted in June, there would be a chance for a historic breakthrough in the process of integration in Europe. Collecting information seemed at that time to be the main business of the division where he worked, and a lot more would be needed before a convincing plan to remove barriers to the free movement of goods, services, capital and persons could be presented to the Commission as a whole, and then to the national governments.

Pierre Defraigne, the head of the division, explained to Jim that a Common Market had been promised more than 25 years earlier, in the Treaty of Rome, but that political will, and some technical expertise, had been lacking until recently, but the economic situation of Europe had convinced a lot of people that something had to be done. It would still be a difficult package to sell to the politicians, and then if they agreed, to pass the laws necessary before the deadline. A deadline was necessary, he explained, to get anything done at the highest level, especially given the complications of the proposed programme, and the wide reaching changes it demanded. One of the more important points, but not very well known to the public, was the point of the public procurement, where only 2% of the public contracts were awarded to firms from a member state other than that in which the invitation to tender was issued.

Jim asked if the political leaders and member-states who resisted these changes might not have a point, but was told that they were mostly afraid of the work involved in passing new laws, and of persuading others to accept that these changes were central to the integration process, and explaining the economic benefits which the four freedoms would bring, both in the short run and in the long run, the dynamic effects. So far the economic benefits of the customs union had been doubtful because the trade diversion exceeded the trade creation. But fortunately, to convince politicians the Italian Cecchini would shortly publish a report, which calculated the costs that would occur if politicians decided not to complete the internal market. “And besides”, Jim was told, “they all signed up for Ever Closer Union when they joined the Community, and they all have a good idea of what that really means”.

Task 3: European Law

Дата добавления: 2015-11-16