The Crisis Zone Of Europe

This book presents revised version of Professor Berend's Ellen McArthur Lectures, delivered in Cambridge in 1984. His theme is the problem of the consequences of only partially successful modernisation in East-Central Europe above all in the inter-war years. The results and failures of this process of modernisation generated several kinds of revolution - national, right-wing, and bolshevik - offset by the social, political and cultural effects of the First World War. Professor Berend's lectures investigate the complexity of these phenomena, the interrelationships among various economic processes, ideological and political trends, and the artistic endeavours of the period.

The latest book by journalist and author Paul Blustein to go behind the scenes at the highest levels of global economic policy making, Laid Low chronicles the International Monetary Fund’s role in the euro-zone crisis. Based on interviews with a wide range of participants and scrutiny of thousands of documents, the book tells how the IMF joined in bailouts that all too often piled debt atop debt and imposed excessively harsh conditions on crisis-stricken countries. As the author shows, IMF officials had grave misgivings about a number of these rescues, but went along at the insistence of powerful European policy makers — to the detriment of the Fund’s credibility, with disheartening implications for the management of future crises. The narrative ends with a tale of the clash between Greece’s radical Syriza government and the country’s creditor institutions that reached a dramatic climax in the summer of 2015.

The Battle for Europe brings into sharp focus the historical importance of the current political, economic and social turmoil in Europe. Thomas Fazi explains what has happened in Europe following the financial crash of 2008 as a classic case of economic shock doctrine – and the first instance in history where such 'therapy' has been applied to an entire continent. Fazi argues that the EU's insistence on pursuing austerity – despite its failure as policy and the creation of human suffering – shouldn't be viewed simply as a case of short-sightedness, but as an attempt by the wealthy elite to do away with the last remnants of the welfare state and complete the neoliberal project. As well as offering an urgent critique of the EU as currently constituted, The Battle for Europe showcases a programme for progressive reform, drawing on the experience of movements and groups such as the popular left party SYRIZA in Greece.

Translated by Ciaran Cronin. In the midst of the current crisis that is threatening to derail the historical project of European unification, Jürgen Habermas has been one of the most perceptive critics of the ineffectual and evasive responses to the global financial crisis, especially by the German political class. This extended essay on the constitution for Europe represents Habermas’s constructive engagement with the European project at a time when the crisis of the eurozone is threatening the very existence of the European Union. There is a growing realization that the European treaty needs to be revised in order to deal with the structural defects of monetary union, but a clear perspective for the future is missing. Drawing on his analysis of European unification as a process in which international treaties have progressively taken on features of a democratic constitution, Habermas explains why the current proposals to transform the system of European governance into one of executive federalism is a mistake. His central argument is that the European project must realize its democratic potential by evolving from an international into a cosmopolitan community. The opening essay on the role played by the concept of human dignity in the genealogy of human rights in the modern era throws further important light on the philosophical foundations of Habermas’s theory of how democratic political institutions can be extended beyond the level of nation-states. Now that the question of Europe and its future is once again at the centre of public debate, this important intervention by one of the greatest thinkers of our time will be of interest to a wide readership.

The crisis in Europe is often discussed as a crisis of European integration or a crisis of national economies within Europe. Both the ‘methodological Europeanism’ and ‘methodological nationalism’ miss out the important links between economic and political processes at different spatial scales within Europe, and therefore, asymmetries and phenomena of uneven development. In addition, a discussion of possible scenarios which systematically addresses the implications of anti-crisis policies is missing. This volume seeks to close this gap by systematically integrating the analysis of economic policy or ‘technical’ solutions to the crisis within a broader framework of political economy. It argues that combining critical political economy approaches and post-Keynesian perspectives allows for a systematic understanding of the economic and political dimensions of the crisis. Although both approaches have the capacity to deal with asymmetries and uneven development, the heterogeneity in Europe has been an often largely neglected dimension of analysis. However, this recent crisis has shown that this is an essential dimension which has to be addressed in order to better understand the dynamics of European development and integration. Hence, this book aims to deal with asymmetries in Europe and to bridge the gap between the two perspectives. This work will initiate an integrative debate that is crucial for a deeper understanding of the current crisis and is an important resource for all students and scholars of IPE, European political economy and European politics.

Essays taking up themes that have resonated through Professor Koenigsberger's lectures, seminars and public writings.

An innovator in theoretical approaches in the social sciences, Stein Rokkan developed general models, developmental models, and conceptual maps that specified the main variables and important relationships in European political history. In Historical Sociology, Arne Kommisrud tests these general hypotheses against specific historical and regional contexts. He uses the case of Eastern Europe after the downfall of the Berlin Wall to extend the geography of the model's range, and introduces possibilities for theoretical modification through an analysis of sequential interactions. Covering a period from the Middle Ages through the 1990s, and addressing phenomena overlooked by Rokkan such as statebuilding and nationalism, this book demonstrates that Rokkan's models continue to be relevant to modern political science and sociology. Kommisrud's study is a valuable contribution to Rokkanian approaches and the understanding of Eastern European development within the historical and geographic context of Europe as a whole.

"The Oxford Handbook of Comparative Political Theory provides an entry point into this burgeoning field by both synthesizing and challenging the terms that motivate it. The handbook demonstrates how mainstream political theory can and must be enriched through attention to genuinely global, rather than parochially Euro-American, contributions to political thinking. Entries emphasize exploration of substantive questions about political life-ranging from domination to political economy to the politics of knowledge-in a range of global contexts, with attention to whether and how those questions may be shared, contested, or reformulated across differences of time, space, and experience. They connect comparative political theory to cognate disciplines including postcolonial theory, area studies, and comparative politics. Creative organizational tools such as tags and keywords aid in navigation of the handbook to help readers trace disruptions, thematic connections, contrasts, and geographic affinities across entries"--