Europeanization Of The Swiss Energy System

Switzerland and the EU have been negotiating an electricity agreement since 2007. Irrespective of the outcome of these negotiations, whose success is also dependent on other factors, European energy policy will influence the framework conditions and players in Switzerland's energy policy. The effects of a "Europeanization" of Swiss energy policy are the primary interest of this book. It focuses on the influence of current and future EU policies on the (regulatory) framework and policy instruments in Switzerland, including the effects on public and private actors active in the Swiss energy sector. It will also present the consequences of the possible integration of Swiss energy policy into the complex European multi-level governance system, taking into account two scenarios: the "direct Europeanization" in case of the conclusion of a bilateral electricity agreement between Switzerland and the EU as well as the possible "indirect Europeanization" in the sense of autonomous adjustments to European policies.

This book is a guide for understanding the EU renewable energy policy as one of the most ambitious attempts world-wide to facilitate a transition towards more sustainable energy systems. It contains key case studies for understanding how member states have shaped the EU renewable energy policy, how the EU has affected the policies of its member states and how renewable energy policies have diffused horizontally. An analysis of the external dimension of the EU renewable energy policy is also included.

This open access book gathers the results of an interdisciplinary research project led by the Swiss Competence Centers for Energy Research (SCCER CREST) and jointly implemented by several universities. It identifies political, economic and legal challenges and opportunities in the energy transition from a governance perspective by exploring a variety of tools that allow state, non-state and transnational actors to manage the transition of the energy industry toward less fossil-fuel reliance. When analyzing the roles of these actors, the authors examine not only formal procedures such as political and democratic processes, but also market behavior and societal practices. In other words, the handbook focuses on both the behavior and the positive and normative frameworks of political actors, bureaucracies, courts, international organizations, lobby groups, civil society, economic actors and individuals. The authors subsequently use their findings to formulate specific guidelines for lawmakers and other rule-makers, as well as private and public actors. To do so, they draw on approaches stemming from the legal, political and management sciences.

This book investigates how the EU member states’ domestic energy policies have transformed in the last two decades as a consequence of horizontal and vertical integration forces. Integration is a dynamic process where member states adopt community rules, norms, and values, and meanwhile, learn from each other’s experiences. Today, Europe experiences an energy transition from fossil-fuels to cleaner sources of energy and European policy makers are committed to taking this significant step forward. Domestic structural change is, thus, observed in all member states‘ environmental and energy policies. This book presents an overview of the EU norms, legislation, and policy standards for renewable energies and analyses how member states transpose them into their domestic structure. The book also analyses the policy outcomes in the EU member states in a comparative perspective by using the most recent statistical data. This comparative analysis gives insight to investors and developers to decide on investment projects and/or manufacturing of renewable energy devices to these countries. It also provides a useful reference for policy makers, academics, students, and NGOs who need a quick overview of relevant national and EU legislation, policy standards, and policy outcomes.

This book examines the Europeanization of the polity and politics of a new EU Member State. Using social network analysis in a comparative research design, it provides a systematic analysis of the effects of Europeanization on the institutions, policy processes, power constellation and conflict among national elites. Providing a detailed case study on Romania in comparative perspective, the book analyses the impact of the European Union integration process on decision-making in six policy networks to develop a cross-sector and cross-time comparative analysis. It explores mandatory EU requirements in the area of immigration and asylum and the implementation of various EU directives during the negotiation period as well as post-integration. It also examines soft/non-mandatory Europeanization in the social sector and investigates a third control case on a domestic reform, fiscal decentralization in the education sector, where the EU influence is absent. Measuring the impact of Europeanization both before and after integration, this book has considerable implications for the study of current and future candidate states. It will be of interest to students and scholars of EU enlargement, Europeanization studies, European politics, especially Central and Eastern European politics.

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 in-depth study of the decision-making processes of the early 2000s shows that the Swiss consensus democracy has changed considerably. Power relations have transformed, conflict has increased, coalitions have become more unstable and outputs less predictable. Yet these challenges to consensus politics provide opportunities for innovation.

Europeanization has often been conceived as a top-down process, necessitating implementation and adjustment at the national level. However, Europeanization can also be conditioned by bottom-up national initiatives. While recent endeavors in comparative political economy have emphasized the resilience of coordinated market economies, few detailed empirical studies have examined to date exactly how different European systems of political-economic governance cope with and respond to an European impetus for liberalization. This original study of the impact of the EU-induced liberalization of service provision on member states argues that innovative national re-regulatory strategies may be implemented in response to Europeanization. In permitting any company registered in an EU member state to provide services throughout Europe, new possibilities were created for the transnational posting of workers from low-wage to high-wage countries. However, high-wage countries could re-regulate the wage levels applicable to such employees. The exact nature of such response strategy is colored by the respective institutional power that labor market interest associations like trade unions and employer associations command. Therefore, different institutionalized varieties of capitalism generate distinct re-regulations of the Single European Market. Drawing on detailed case studies of ten European countries, this volume bridges the gap between the rapidly unfolding scholarly debate on Europeanization and varieties of capitalism. It argues that both strongly neocorporatist systems of political-economic governance and statist systems are capable of creating swift, comprehensive and thorough national re-regulations. This applies to Austria and France, but also Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Belgium, and Luxembourg. By contrast, countries with less strongly embedded neocorporatist structures, in which due to organizational deficiencies trade unions face difficulties blocking employer demands, create liberal response strategies, permitting a stratification of wage levels. Hence, both Germany and the Netherlands implemented liberal business-friendly re-regulations. The volume makes the case for important amendments to existing accounts of Europeanization and varieties of capitalism. Scholars of Europeanization need to incorporate bottom-up re-regulation into their conceptual framework, particularly in response to 'negative integration'. Recent strides in comparative political economy have placed great emphasis on continued divergence, yet this study suggests that even within the presumably unified group of 'non-liberal' coordinated market economies important institutional differences produce very distinct responses in the face of European liberalization.