Explores the institutional, economic and ideational factors that shaped the way in which Europe adapted to, resisted, and responded to the challenges of globalization. This book reveals 3 main strategies adopted by European political actors in their response: resistance, adaptation, and the production of alternatives to global norms and practices.

This book investigates the perceptions of political actors towards the creation of Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) in Europe. The research is largely based on personal interviews conducted with key informants in central banks, finance ministries, employers' organizations and trade unions in Britain, France and Germany. It examines why actors perceived EMU to serve or frustrate their interests. It concludes that actors favoured EMU for a variety of reasons. The book contributes to the literature of European integration and incorporates economic, political and historical facts.

Globalisation turns out to be untenable because it does not guarantee minimum social equity, peace and respect for the environment, and therefore does not guarantee the effective accomplishment of human rights. This book analyzes this issue and raises proposals for a new perspective. The first part describes the soft threats to human rights, derived from the devaluation of the politics and the productive economy with regard to the finance. It entails the concealment of the reality in the shape of exploitation as the tax havens and in the shape of marginalization of the persons with different abilities. The second part include a study of hard threats to human rights and examines two cases of failed states: Afghanistan and Somalia, in which the violence has supplanted the politics and the economy. In view of these situations it is necessary to rethink the force of classic ius gentium and the humanitarian right. The third part presents the European Union as a legal and political space in which conditions of a worthy life are better defended by means of the Primacy of Practical Reason and Social State of Law, and by the requirement of peace as the main rule of international relations.

The Lisbon Agenda aims to prepare Europe for globalization by updating European policies for research, innovation, competition, trade, employment, education, social protection, environment and energy at both the European and national levels. Designed to inspire the new cycle of the Lisbon Agenda until 2010 and beyond, this timely and significant volume explores the intellectual elaboration of the agenda for the coming years. With contributions from some of Europe s leading scholars, this book explores new developments in the European agenda for globalization, addressing four critical areas: European policies, their adaptation to national diversity in Europe, their implications for the external action of the European Union and, finally, their implications for EU governance. This book presents the outcome of an organized dialogue between the political and research communities. Europe, Globalization and the Lisbon Agenda will undoubtedly prove an outstanding addition to the current literature and will be an invaluable resource for European policy-makers, governments and academics from a wide range of disciplines who are concerned about the future competitiveness of Europe.

The complex relationship between globalization and European integration was largely shaped in the 1970s. During this decade, globalization began, for the first time, to threaten Western European prosperity. Using an innovative approach, the book shows how western Europeans coped with the challenges of globalization during a time of deep economic crisis during the period 1973-1986. It examines the evolution of economic and social policies at the national, European and global level and expands beyond the European Economic Community (EEC) by analysing the various solutions envisaged by European decision-makers towards regulating globalization, including the creation of the Single Market. Based on extensively examined archives of transnational actors, international organizations and focusing on the governments of France, Germany and the UK, as well as the European Commission, the book uncovers deep, previously unknown, economic divisions among these actors and the roles they played in the success of the EEC. This book will be of key interest to students, scholars and practitioners of political science, European studies, history, comparative politics, public policy and economic history.

This rigorous survey and companion volume to Coping with Globalization, focuses on the political, ideological and economic factors lying behind responses to globalization. A panel of international experts examine subjects which include; * The international monetary system after the Euro * The response of the Japanese software industry to globalization * The dynamics of globalization strategy in South Korea * Australian integration into the global economy * The impact on China and Russia in their moves toward a market economy