Europeanisation

Slovakia’s relations with the states of Eastern Europe not only have a bilateral impact, but contain geopolitical, security and economic dimensions as well. This article analyzes the domestic, bilateral and multilateral aspects of relations between Slovakia and Russia before and after the parliamentary elections of 1998, when Slovakia adopted a pro-Western course aimed at EU and NATO membership. The article also focuses on bilateral relations with Ukraine, where Slovakia is among the most active supporters of Ukraine’s future EU membership. The final sections analyze the Eastern policy of Slovakia – particularly within the framework of the EU’s Eastern Partnership and the Visegrad Group – as well as Slovakia’s relations with the new Eastern European partners, such as Belarus, Moldova and Georgia, as target countries of Slovakia’s “soft power.”

The European Union (EU) has closely correlated different aspects of the peace process in Bosnia with progress towards European accession. The ‘power of attraction’ of EU membership would presumably induce the Bosnian authorities to accept the adaptation costs of political and economic transformation. However, the Europeanisation approach has not produced the expected results. The track record of the EU’s policies towards Bosnia represents a paradigmatic case of what would happen if almost nothing works as efficiently as in the case of the countries that joined the EU in 2004 and 2007. The article investigates the causes of EU policy failure in Bosnia and claims that the EU has not effectively responded to three challenges: 1) adjust the process to the needs of an ethnically divided post-war state; 2) preserve the credibility of accession conditionality, and 3) convey the proper messages on how to comply with EU rules. Therefore, the article argues for a more cohesive and consistent EU approach towards Bosnia.

The domestic impact of the EU on the Central and Eastern European countries is an essential part of the Europeanisation research agenda. It might be interesting to examine whether the acceding countries transpose, implement and enforce the EU acquis in the same way as do the EU-15 region, or if there is a specific eastern way of Europeanisation. As for the chosen policy area, the extent to which post-Communist countries guarantee certain rights for non-governmental actors regarding environmental matters could be considered as a democratic indicator, since their former state approach usually focussed on economic growth driven by industrialisation, while environmental protection was of a lower priority. The subject of this paper is the third pillar of the Aarhus Convention-related EU legislation, the provisions of the Environmental Impact Assessment Directive which guarantee the access to justice for the public concerned including NGOs in environmental matters.

Within the broader landscape of the European Higher Education Area, teacher education receives increasing significance as an academic field that contributes to the quality of the teaching labour force and consequently
impacts student learning. This paper aims to explore the European Teacher Education Area (ETEA) by analysing to what extent and how mechanisms, processes, and key agents of Europeanisation, internal or external to the European Union (EU), influence the transformation
of teacher education policies and practices in Europe. Transformation is understood in the context of Europeanisation, and emphasis of the analysis is placed on the process rather than the content of transforming
teacher education in Europe. To this end, data have been collected through document review and expert  interviews with European policy officials. As a result of qualitative content analysis, the data have been clustered and analysed according to the following categories, which mutually reinforce each other: (1) policy coordination; (2) cross-sectoral instruments; (3) evidence-based management; (4) the Bologna process;
(5) educational programmes; and (6) stakeholder pressure. Findings provide a conceptual framework for mapping the ETEA as a complex policy ecosystem that includes vertical and horizontal procedures of Europeanisation. The EU has developed extensive capacities to influence teacher education in Europe and increasingly involves other sectors, uch as employment, in this process.

Les sciences sociales sont périodiquement marquées par l’émergence, le développement, mais aussi le déclin de concepts à succès. Révolutions théoriques – voire paradigmatiques au sens de Thomas S. Kuhn  – dans certains cas, ces révolutions conceptuelles se révèlent à d’autres occasions n’être que de simples effets de mode ou des réactualisations plus ou moins heureuses de grilles analytiques anciennes . Dans ce dernier cas, l’innovation se révèle surtout sémantique. La genèse et l’essor de la notion d’européanisation s’inscrivent clairement dans ce mouvement de renouveau permanent des concepts et théories en sciences sociales, sans qu’il soit encore possible de prédire avec certitude la destinée scientifique de la notion. Issue du champ des études européennes, domaine particulièrement fécond en matière d’innovations conceptuelles, la notion d’européanisation s’est en effet imposée en quelques années à peine comme l’une des notions phares de la science politique, en particulier anglo-saxonne.

Η παρούσα εργασία πραγματεύεται την ελληνική εξωτερική πολιτική τα τελευταία πενήντα περίπου έτη, με στόχο την ερμηνευτική της προσέγγιση με τα εκάστοτε επίκαιρα θεωρητικά εργαλεία και παράλληλα με την ανάπτυξη της ευρωπαϊκής ολοκλήρωσης, από την περίοδο απουσίας συγκροτημένης ενωσιακής εξωτερικής πολιτικής, μέχρι την περίοδο της θεσμικής ανάπτυξής της και κλείνοντας με την
περίοδο της οικονομικής κρίσης.
Η ΕΕΠ ξεκινώντας με ρεαλιστικά κίνητρα αποτροπής και εξισορρόπησης απέναντι στην Τουρκία, πέρασε εν συνεχεία σε μια περίοδο εξευρωπαϊσμού και εντέλει κατέληξε πλήρως υποκείμενη στις επιδράσεις της κανονιστικής ισχύος της κοινότητας την περίοδο της οικονομικής κρίσης, όταν και έχασε την οικονομική και πολιτική της αυτοτέλεια. Το νέο αιώνα των εύθραστων ισορροπιών και των αδυσώπητων ανταγωνισμών σε ένα ρευστό διεθνές σύστημα, η ΕΕΠ
πρέπει να αναζητήσει με σοφία, νηφαλιότητα και ωριμότητα τα βήματα εκείνα που θα εξασφαλίσουν την επιβίωση του ελληνικού έθνους-κράτους, το οποίο θα βρεθεί αντιμέτωπο με νέες π ροκλήσεις εξ' ανατολάς.

Četiri se glavna povijesna modela lokalne samouprave u Europi: francuski (napoleonski, južnoeuropski), njemački (germanski, porajnski), švedski (skandinavski, nordijski) i engleski (anglosaksonski), kojima neki autori dodaju i peti model, srednjoeurop¬ski odnosno model bivših socijalističkih zemalja, u nekim elementima međusobno sve više približavaju. Komponente te tendencije harmonizacije lokalne samouprave u Europi identificirane u ovom radu su traženje novog legitimiteta, instrumentalizacija lokalne samouprave, ujednačavanje kruga lokalnih poslova, potpora razvoju, uključenost u rješavanje teških društvenih problema, racionalizacija, diverzifikacija financiranja, privatizacija, teritorijalna konsolidacija, regionalizacija, policentrične urbane mreže, višerazinsko upravljanje, redefiniranje vertikalne dimenzije lokalne samouprave, kvalitetno upravljanje procesima decentralizacije. Kritički se evaluira stanje hrvatske lokalne samouprave po tim komponentama i daju određene preporuke kako bi se sustav lokalne samouprave približio standardima hrvatskog Ustava i Europske povelje o lokalnoj samoupravi.
Ključne riječi: Europska povelja o lokalnoj samoupravi, Europska unija, europeizacija, harmonizacija, lokalna i regionalna samouprava – Hrvatska, razvojni trendovi

This book focuses on linguistic practices of identity construction in a popular culture media context, the Eurovision Song Contest. Subscribing to a normativity-based approach to critical discourse analysis, it studies Europeanisation as it surfaces at the discursive interface of European, national and sexual identities in Eurovision lyrics and performances. Research in critical discourse analysis that deals with Europeanisation, or the discursive work involved in European identity formation, has so far mainly studied data from EU political contexts that illustrate a top-down approach to what Europeanness means. The
present book complements this earlier research in several ways, focusing on the linguistic construction of identities, and its interrelation with non-linguistic modes of signification in the Eurovision Song Contest. Discursive mechanisms that prove to be central for the
normative shifts of Europeanisation in the given context are de-essentialisation, inclusion, camp, crossing and languaging.

Tra  vecchi  nazionalismi,  difficoltà  socioeconomiche  e  problemi istituzionali, il processo di integrazione europea si trova in un prolungato momento di grande difficoltà. Nelle rinnovate istanze di autogoverno di quelle che un tempo erano chiamate «nazioni proibite» si colgono segnali interessanti  che  rilanciano  proprio  l’Europa  «unita  nella  diversità». 
In questo  contesto  si  colloca  il  caso  friulano,  caratterizzato  oggi  come  in passato  dall’intreccio  tra  rivendicazioni  culturali  e  politiche  e  da significative connessioni tra le une e le altre e la dimensione europea, di cui si propone  un  sintetico  profilo,  tra  storia  e  attualità  e  tra  elaborazioni teoriche e esperienze di organizzazione e mobilitazione.

Presented Master thesis reveals transformation of Lithuania's foreign policy under framework of Eastern Partnership programme in 2009-2014, thus assessing, whether Lithuania's foreign policy has experienced a shift from small state policy to smart state strategy.
Supervisor: dr. Laurynas Jonavičius
Defended at Vilnius University Institute of International Relations and Political Science on January 20, 2015. Mark - 9.

"The article includes a short reflection on the ethical aspects of cooperation between researchers and business owners in the context of the absorption of EU structural funds.
The result of the article are practical guidelines for such cooperation, based on a set of principles promoted by the Committee on Ethics in Science of the Polish Academy of Sciences."

The process of Europeanization in the post-socialist states is strongly linked to their democratic transition and consolidation (Fink-Hafner, 2007). Some scholars believe that Montenegro has democratically consolidated in the aftermath of the 2006 referendum on independence. We argue that it is more likely that the process of fulfilling political criteria set by the European Union represents a continuation of the process of the country’s democratic consolidation. In this context, we focus on the Europeanization of political  parties in Montenegro as one of the consequences of the EU’s ’political pressure on candidate states to fulfill its expectations’ (Ibid). In order to determine the level of impact of Europeanization on Montenegrin political parties, we used three criteria developed by Fink-Hafner (Ibid). In addition, we aimed to identify similarities and differences between the current political situation in Montenegro and the 1998 Slovakia’s democratizing experience. To that goal, we sought to explore the odds for the EU ‘intervention’ in Montenegro’s domestic party system due to the potential lack of the accession process-related political reforms.

The history of the Italian language: a European perspective. Workshop held at Spring Agora Bergamo 2016, organized under the High Patronage of the European Parliament and of the Council of Europe. May 19, 2016.

The goal of this workshop is to present some facts concerning the history of the Italian language and to reflect on the relationship between language and culture. Italian emerged as the language spoken by the financial capital of Europe in the XIV century (Florence) and was spoken as second language by the elites in the rest of Italy and also in Western Europe. Italian shaped the national identity of Italy, but since it was the language of the elites in the Italian peninsula, the society which emerged from the unification of Italy had an important internal division between cultivated people speaking Italian and people with low education, who was not able to speak Italian and were object of linguistic discrimination. This still has important consequences on the way Italian people see themselves nowadays and on their attitude towards Europe. The aim of this workshop is to provide European students visiting Italy in occasion of the Spring Agora Bergamo with cultural information about the country they are visiting, in order to
better understand its culture and its people. There are indeed some peculiarieties of Italy as a country, and of the behaviour of its people, which can only be understood if one keeps in mind the peculiar history of a language which for centuries has never been the language of a unified Italian state and, astonishingly, had a very low percentage
of speakers in Italy itself. More interestingly, this still has repercussions on the Europeanist attitude of Italian people and on the Europeanist policy of the country, which are often not understood by foreign observers.

I argue in this article that holocaust memory discourse in Serbia is currently being promoted by the state as part of its efforts to conceal any political space where an encounter between the state and the civil society may be able to occur and redirect public debate regarding the wars of the 1990s. Thus, instead of dealing with their roles and responsibilities, Serbian governments are engaged in reframing and obscuring the contested elements of their national past. In Serbia holocaust memory is brought up to the fore as a platform for articulating national interests and thus is activated as a screen-memory. I will show here how holocaust discourse has served the domestic political elite in the course of the last decade so that Serbian victims continue to be equated with Holocaust victims and the righteous nature of the wars of the 1990s is established. Furthermore, I will show that holocaust memory discourse is instrumentalized to better Serbia’ s image on the international stage.

Ce dossier d’habilitation à diriger des recherches s’appuie sur vingt ans de travaux consacrés à l’Europe centrale et balkanique dans une approche de géographie politique liée à la construction européenne. Le premier volume propose, sous forme de travail inédit, une réflexion sur la coopération territoriale entre l’Union européenne et ses voisinages orientaux et balkanique comme politique inscrite dans la durée, créatrice de nouveaux périmètres territoriaux et comme modalité d’innovation territoriale d’une UE devenue acteur politique au sens plein. Ce travail propose donc de nouvelles pistes d’interprétation -celle de l’intermédiarité et de l’innovation territoriale- pour saisir l’européanisation des territoires aux marges orientales et balkaniques de l’Europe. L’européanisation est ici entendue non comme un simple processus mais comme un objet de recherche pour explorer les interactions d’échelles et d’acteurs. La réflexion les met à l’épreuve de la construction politique de la notion de voisinages (partie 1), de l’invention d’une politique de coopération territoriale dans les interstices des compétences octroyées à l’UE dans les traités (partie 2), et de l’émergence des macrorégions entre l’UE et ses voisinages comme champ d’analyse empirique (partie 3).

The book series European Studies in the Caucasus offers innovative perspectives on regional studies of the Caucasus. By embracing the South Caucasus as well as Turkey and Russia, it moves away from a traditional viewpoint of European Studies that considers the countries of the region as objects of Europeanization. This second volume demonstrates this by looking into forms of inter-regionalism in the Black Sea–South Caucasus area in fields of economic cooperation, Europeanization of energy and environmental policies, discussing how the region is addressed in the elaboration of a new German Eastern Policy. In the section on norm diffusion, the contributors assess the normative power strategy of the EU and its paradoxes in the region, its impact on civil society development in Armenia, and democracy promotion in Georgia. In the section on legal approximation, issues of a global climate change regime and competition law in Georgia as well as penitentiary governance reform in the South Caucasus according to EU standards and policies are analyzed. All contributions also review regional or local contestations for the topics discussed here.

This chapter investigates the similarities and differences between national and European commemorations by observing who, how and with what purpose memorialise. It analyses how Croatian political elites since the EU accession of country (2013) have framed and commemorated the main national lieu de mémoire – Vukovar, both on national and European level. This chapter draws evidence from ethnographic observation of Vukovar commemoration in loco and in the European parliament (2013-2017), analysis of commemorative speeches and interviews with political elites. Croatian political elites employ divergent narratives to frame and commemorate Vukovar (trans)nationally. At the EU level, the memory of Vukovar is instrumental in gaining endorsement of Croatia’s ethno-national narrative of the Yugoslav wars. Commemorative initiatives promote one-sided narrative of the Homeland War, that excludes victims of other ethnicities, yet it assigns to Vukovar a pivotal role in reconciliation. As such, the European commemoration is in stark contrast with local/national commemoration and the state of affairs between the Serb minority and ethnic Croats in Vukovar.

This article investigates the encounter of EU-unionization with a domesticated practice of corruption in Bosnian higher education. Relying on primary data collected in Bosnia’s public higher education system, the study finds that the country’s corrupt higher education is in conflict with the Bologna-themed reforms that would arguably help harmonize Bosnia’s fragmented higher education. As it delineates factors that perpetuate corruption, the study, somewhat surprisingly, finds that the Bologna process—despite its partly failed adaptation in Bosnia—is still perceived as potentially transformative for the country’s corruption-prone higher education system. The study further looks into why that may be the case and explores a possibility of leveraging Bosnia’s intelligentsia abroad to lessen corruption in higher education.

El volumen aborda la problemática del cambio climático y su relación con la política energética desde cuatro perspectivas. La primera introduce la dimensión exterior en relación con la seguridad de las fuentes energéticas y cuenta con las aportaciones de Gonzalo Escribano y Esther Zapater.
La segunda perspectiva, basada en la actuación internacional de la UE, nos la ofrece Oriol Costa. La tercera perspectiva, a cargo de Israel Solorio, estudia el proceso de europeización
de la política energética a partir del desarrollo de mecanismos ambientales para hacer frente al CC, centrando el análisis en la directiva relativa a la electricidad renovable.La última perspectiva se refiere a las especificidades del caso español, caracterizado,
entre otras cosas, por una dependencia energética exterior muy alta en comparación con otros estados miembros de dimensiones comparables, un rápido crecimiento del consumo y una eficiencia muy baja.

Abstract
‘Student Learning Through Work Placements’ 
The core aim of this research study is to analyse the effects of experiential learning
pedagogy on students, received during work based student placements. This study
identifies and examines the perceptions held by higher education (HE) stakeholders,
regarding the effects of experiential learning work placements on students. 
My research is situated in Bourdieusian concepts, which include ‘habitus’, ‘field’, and
‘cultural reproduction’ (Bourdieu, 1977b, p72; 1986a, p60; 1977a, p487). My research
found employability is an agency in its own right. Employability had a doxa (a societally
embedded opinion) (Bourdieu, 1977b, p169) effect on my research study. Most of the
research responses were given in employability terms. The majority of research
participants clearly indicated other aspects of experiential learning, e.g. students
developing self-efficacy were a secondary consideration. Preparedness for work was
the key priority. My research found, all HE stakeholders have been influenced to
‘ideologically reproduce’ the employability agenda, in order to ‘fit in’ with the current
HE landscape (Bourdieu, 1977a, p490; Bourdieu, 1990, p53; Brady, 2012, p346). 
This research study found that Holdsworth and Quinn’s (2012, p386) ‘reproductive’ or
‘deconstructive’ concepts present in their ‘Student Volunteering’ study, were replicated
by students on unpaid experiential learning work placements, with either a ‘Third
Sector’ organisation or a statutory agency. This study also identified hitherto
undiscovered causal factors, absent in Holdsworth and Quinn’s (2012) study. These
are additional social actors, which significantly influence whether students become
‘reproductive’ or ‘deconstructive’ during experiential learning work placements.
13 
This research found the ‘wider society’ is an existential agency, which has a strategic
governance role representing society as a whole. The ‘wider society’ has a societal
remit to coordinate delivery of all society’s needs, which includes social care provision
and environmental management. Trained people are required to deliver this societal
remit, so the ‘wider society’ is an experiential learning higher education stakeholder.

Depuis le milieu des années 1980, la construction européenne est entrée dans une phase d’accélération qui voit l’affirmation de l’Union européenne comme un espace de décision politique à part entière, dont les prérogatives et les interventions deviennent toujours plus palpables au niveau domestique. Cette thèse explore les conséquences de ce processus sur la compétition partisane. Le questionnement de la distinction populaire entre effets « directs » et « indirects » nourrit une réflexion sur les mécanismes par lesquels les partis sont affectés et nous amène à conceptualiser l’intégration européenne comme une altération de l’environnement et de la structure d’opportunités des partis, à travers l’européanisation des politiques publiques et la mise sur agenda de nouveaux enjeux. Cette perspective permet à la fois de mieux intégrer dans l’étude des partis le tournant interactionniste des recherches sur l’européanisation, et d’enrichir l’analyse en l’inscrivant dans des cadres théoriques depuis longtemps éprouvés pour étudier les partis et la compétition politique. L’européanisation de la compétition partisane en France, en Allemagne et au Royaume-Uni entre 1986 et 2009 est étudiée au prisme des opportunités et des contraintes découlant de l’intégration, puis des réponses apportées par les acteurs partisans à différents niveaux. Notre enquête s’appuie pour cela sur l’analyse d’un vaste corpus de documents, de données et de littérature, notamment sur la couverture médiatique des questions européennes, les orientations européennes discernables dans l’opinion publique des trois pays, l’européanisation des politiques publiques, les discours tenus lors des congrès des partis sociaux-démocrates et les programmes électoraux des différents partis. Nous observons une européanisation différenciée, mais significative, de la structure d’opportunités des partis. En raison des résistances déployées par les acteurs partisans qui dominent la compétition inter- et intra-partisane, cette tendance n’affecte les dynamiques de compétition partisane qu’à la marge.

Is there a causal relationship between the accessions of the neighbor countries Slovenia and Austria to the European Union on the formation and development of sociology as a scientific discipline? This study in a comparative perspective provides extensive empirical evidence for the institutional dynamic of Europeanization in regard to the social sciences. results have shown that within a European context, sociology is working under new restrictions but also encounters enabling opportunities. Transnational co-operation of scholars contributes to a stock of knowledge more and more known as European sociology.

Ilgar Gurbanov, "Azerbaijan: Europeanisation Versus Real-Politics", in the book of "Dilemmas of Europeanisation: Political Choices and Economic Transformations in the Eastern Partnership Countries" (Latvian Institute of International Affairs, Riga), 2016, pp.95-123, http://liia.lv/en/publications/dilemmas-of-europeanisation-political-choices-and-economic-transformations-in-the-eastern-partnership-countries-534

This chapter studies Cypriot LGBTIQs’ intersectional politics amidst the socio-political environment within which these are articulated, marked by strong nationalistic discourses as well as tensions with European identity and belonging. Specifically, it examines the ways in which local and EU discourses about nationhood, gender, and sexuality shape dynamics of intersectionality. It does so by analysing how gender and sexual identities are formed and by questioning how these formations inform LGBTIQ movement politics in contentious contexts. The chapter employs a qualitative research design and thematically analyses empirical ethnographic data that includes interviews with Greek-Cypriot and Turkish-Cypriot LGBTIQ participants. It marks intra-ethnic and inter-ethnic dynamics of in-group exclusions. The research argues that these exclusions are reinforced by local notions about ‘Europe,’ expressed through the ‘Europe/West-versus-the-Rest’ dichotomy. Nonetheless, it also finds that the successes of the Cypriot LGBTIQ movement have been based on opportunities afforded by ‘Europe’ and Europeanisation. Therefore, this chapter builds a theoretical and empirical framework for understanding the implications of understandings of nationhood, gender, and sexuality on LGBTIQ politics when the ‘Rest’ meets the ‘West/Europe.’

Research context
In the mark of Master II studies at Aix-Marseille Université (AMU) a three-month fieldwork research was led in Croatia from the 10th of February to the 10th of May of 2013.  It was financed by Erasmus SMP program in the mark of a research internship at the Department of Geography at Faculty of Science, University of Zagreb. The final report was validated by the program; the results of the research were defended on the 28th of June of 2013 (awarded: Very Good).

Results
• Conception of a theoretical framework based on: multi-scalar analysis of EU-ization processes; notions of territoriality and „encampment“; conflict analysis
• Ethnographical approach on the Reception Centers in Zagreb, Dugave (Porin), Kutina and Ježevo ; cartography of the spatial dynamics of the „encampment“ device in Croatia (micro, meso, macro levels)
• Case studies on conflictive processes: Stubička Slatina, Kutina and „Hotel Porin“

Studies of clay smoking pipes represent one of the major fields of research in post-medieval archaeology due to their frequent occurrence in the archaeological record and their suitability for typological dating.
During an archaeological survey in Rua do Terreiro do Trigo, located in Lisbon’s picturesque district of Alfama, very close to the Tagus River and where many different and cosmopolitan people spent their spare time during the post-medieval period, we were able to collect a significant number of smoking pipes fragments, given the site’s dimension. Amongst the sherds recovered it is possible to identify a great number of European kaolin clay pipe fragments dated from the 17th to the 18th century and also a set of unusual black and grey earthenware chibouks of (yet) uncertain origin.
Therefore, this paper seeks to report the smoking pipe assemblage recovered in Rua do Terreiro do Trigo, but also to discuss the study of smoking devices in the Portuguese post-medieval archaeological contexts.

In Cyprus, colonisation, ethnic division, and the influence of conservative
socio-political actors have stalled the creation and development of an LGBTI movement. The admission of the Republic of Cyprus to the European Union in 2004 has brought about changes in political opportunity structures that facilitated the mobilisation of LGBTI groups
on both sides of the island that remains divided across ethnic lines. Taking advantage of the tools and opportunities afforded to them by European institutions and regional umbrella LGBTI organisations, Greek-Cypriot and Turkish-Cypriot LGBTI activists have pushed for the recognition of LGBTI rights in the south and in the north of the
island respectively, and have joined efforts for LGBTI equality beyond ethnic lines. Nonetheless, in Cyprus, LGBTI equality remains a work in progress. In the north, even though homosexuality has been decriminalised, after the dissipation of the mid-2000s momentum
and of the prospect of island’s reunifcation and the admission of the north to the EU, the progress of LGBTI rights has been sluggish, trapped into changing political discourse and hampered by structural rigidities. In the Republic of Cyprus, LGBTI activists have been somehow more successful at achieving positive legal changes, like the decriminalisation of homosexuality, homophobic and transphobic hate speech legislation, same-sex civil unions and a draft bill on legal gender recognition. However, on both sides of the island, decision-makers have been slow – if not reluctant – to align national legislation with EU and international legal standards. Moreover, state/authorities-initiated attempts at tackling LGBTI social and cultural marginalisation have been limited. However, it is not all doom and gloom as, since the early-2010s, a pan-Cypriot LGBTI movement is in the making that progressively increases its efforts not only for LGBTI legal recognition, but also for substantive equality and intersectional justice beyond ethnic, class, race, sexual orientation, gender identity, sex characteristics and other hierarchisations.

Il est toujours intéressant de remarquer à quel point le scepticisme domine un peu partout lorsque ‘il s’agit des perspectives du système médiatique public dans les nouvelles démocraties, du Bangladesh à la Croatie et du Taiwan en allant jusqu’à la Roumanie. Pour simplifier, les gens n’aiment pas les médias publics parce qu’ils les confondent avec les médias de l’Etat propres aux régimes autoritaires, en proie à la censure et contrôlés par le pouvoir politique. Par le même biais, dans les jeunes démocraties le système des médias commerciales recueille la sympathie des masses qui le considèrent comme étant « libre ».

This article investigates the Europeanisation of EP election manifestos prepared by Slovak political parties over the course of Slovakia’s decade-long membership in the European Union. To this aim, it conducts a content analysis based upon a novel coding scheme in which Europeanisation is measured primarily as EU issue salience and secondarily as the discussion of different EU-related (policy) issue areas. The results show that, in contrast to election manifestos prepared for other elections, the salience of EU issues is quite high in these Euromanifestos. On the other hand, average relative EU issue salience has decreased with each EP election held in the country. In terms of party EU political agenda, we provide evidence of relatively high convergence in terms of party EU political agenda, measured as the five most prominent issue categories in individual party Euromanifestos, particularly in 2004 and 2014. We also show that the five most prominent issue categories in the party EU political agenda represent almost half the natural sentences referring to the EU political level in the Euromanifestos analysed.

The European Union (EU) paid considerable attention to national minorities after the Cold War when it used minority protection as a criterion for recognition of new states and EU membership – i.e., in a limited area of Central and Eastern Europe (and in South Europe), as a criterion for states from this region to participate in European integration. The EU has used minority protection as a matter of good governance of new states and states wishing to join the EU. The candidates were subject to Europeanisation when they were expected to adopt certain minority standards in order to prove that they adhere to European norms and values. This paper analyses what has happened with respect to the objective of minority protection in the decade after the 2004 enlargement. It demonstrates that this Europeanisation has been limited at best and that it has not led to notable changes in actual behaviour towards national minorities. This is due not only to intra-EU structural issues, but also due to how Europeanisation was carried out.