Studies in European Integration, State and Society

This study considers the multidimensional nature of the construction of the active civil society in the post-totalitarian reality of Central and Eastern Europe, covering the period of systemic transformations in the region in 1989 to the EU accession of 2004. The analysis was carried out using a multidisciplinary research perspective which incorporates historical, sociological, and legal insights, as well as those from political science. The volume illustrates the dynamic character of the process of constructing an active civil society process in a broader comparative perspective against the background of post-totalitarian societies, Germany and Italy, which underwent the process of democratic transformation in 1945 and went on to actively forge the European Community in the 1950s.

This book has two research objectives. The main objective is to present the dynamics of the system reform of the Economic and Monetary Union in 2010–2022. The other is to take stock of the reform and to highlight its successes and failures. In this context, the monograph puts forward two research hypotheses. The first hypothesis assumes that the shortcomings in EU primary and secondary law regarding the Economic and Monetary Union and the course of the euro area debt crisis were two main reasons for reforming the EMU, whereby the crisis in question actually forced the European Union and the euro area countries to implement the reform. The second hypothesis is based on the assumption that the implementation of the system reform encountered many difficulties and obstacles arising from the negative attitude of the governments of some euro area Member States to the execution of selected projects, but also from the accumulation of various severe crises that the European Union faced during the reform, in particular the euro area debt crisis, the migration crisis, the pandemic crisis and the geopolitical crisis following Russia’s aggression against Ukraine. The research hypotheses were verified using a triangulation of several qualitative methods: case study, institutional-legal method, comparative method, and critical analysis of sources and literature.

The monograph explores the heritage of Central and Eastern Europe, which is particularly important nowadays in the era of globalization, on the one hand, and nationalism, on the other, and the war on the third hand. It can indicate ways to "face" the challenges Europe is currently facing. The research on the heritage issue aims to foster a greater understanding of the various mechanisms of today’s social and political decision-making. This publication is the result of the work of a team of scholars whose research explores the subject of the heritage and who represent countries and cultures belonging to the region. This is, therefore, research done from within according to the Latin principle: "Nihil novi nisi commune consensu" (Nothing new without the common consent). The publication allows defining terms and shows the distinctive features of the culture and value system characteristic of Central and Eastern Europe. It deals with issues related to the commemoration of the region’s heritage and the issue of what is excluded from the heritage, what is forgotten, and what is overlooked.

The book consists of four chapters. The first one contains information about the topic which introduce the project’s characteristics, and, at the same time, provide the background for further theoretical and methodological reflection. The second chapter contains a list of research problems and questions, a presentation of the philosophical worldviews (research paradigms) of the project team who guided the planned research and which resulted in the adoption of research strategies compatible with them, and, consequently, procedures and techniques for obtaining source materials and their analysis. In the third chapter, we present a set of terms, ideas, and concepts which inspired the project team as useful tools for describing and analysing the phenomenon under study. The fourth chapter is a kind of ligature that binds together all the previous findings, it is a summary of integrating ideas, concepts, as well as the adopted research procedures and techniques.

The Maastricht Treaty remains a crossroad in the history of European integration. Since its ratification, policy areas at the core of the national sovereignties have been included in the Brussels agenda, the power balance between the European institutions has started to mutate, and the European Union affairs have progressively become a controversial issue in the public debate. The goal of the book is to provide a comprehensive analysis of the politicization of European affairs. The final aim is to assess the institutional and socio-political impact of EU politicization, detecting how the European elites could exploit the saliency gained by European affairs to enhance the legitimacy and effectiveness of the European institutions.