Master of Science / Department of Diagnostic Medicine/Pathobiology / Justin Kastner / Food production is changing in response to an expanding global population. The ability to distribute and process ingredients amongst many individuals and countries has brought economic benefits while also creating new problems. By increasing the complexity of the supply chain, the food industry has birthed new dynamics, thus creating new opportunities for contamination, fraud, and other threats. One threat dynamic is the varying levels of food safety and quality control at different nodes along a supply chain. Contaminations pinpoint weaknesses of a supply chain, and such weaknesses could be exploited for harm. One way foods are intentionally contaminated is through food fraud. Food fraud involves substitution, mislabeling, dilution, and other means of criminal deception. Routine testing by an independent science-based group led to the discovery of one the largest scales of substitution and mislabeling in history—the 2013 adulteration of beef products with horsemeat. Commonly referred to as the horsemeat scandal of 2013, this important event in the history of the global food system affected several regions, hundreds of products, and thousands of retailers and consumers. To date, this scandal was one of the largest incidents of food fraud. Mostly based in the European Union, the horsemeat scandal prompted the European Commission to take regulatory action. The European Union’s policy response included the creation of a five-point plan that addresses the different facets associated with the scandal. The five-point plan sought to strengthen food fraud prevention; testing programs; horse passports; official control, implementation, penalties; and origin labelling. The five-point plan is intended to decrease the fraud opportunity for the adulteration of beef with horsemeat. According to the crime triangle, a concept frequently cited in the field of criminology, fraud opportunity has three main elements: the victims, the fraudsters, and the guardian and hurdle gaps. When any of these elements change, the opportunity for a fraudster to commit a crime also changes. The research question of this thesis explores the policy responses of the European Commission. The Commission’s five-point plan targets the three elements of fraud opportunity; therefore, future fraud opportunity for the adulteration of beef products with horsemeat will theoretically decrease.

This master thesis in applied ethics is a descriptive ethical analysis of the current integration policy in the Netherlands. The main purpose is to describe and critically discuss the Dutch integration policy. In the recent years there has been a major shift in the Dutch integration directive, from a liberal to a harsher integration policy. This thesis contributes with a characterization of integration by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, European Commission and within the Dutch context, particularly a characterization of values and ideals in integration policies. Also, an attempt is made to analyze what the underlying motives and core values are, and which values should be fostered. Moreover, an overview is given of the various dimensions of integration. The second part of this thesis explores the Dutch integration policy in light of the European Commission's eleven common basic principles for immigrant integration policy in the European Union. In addition, ethical implications concerning the Dutch integration policy will be stated. Finally, the consequences of failing integration will be identified and some practical recommendations for the Dutch integration policy will be provided.

The main goal of this diploma thesis is to evaluate the protection of competition in the European Union. For this purpose in EU serves competition policy, whose application is in charge of the European Commission. During my research I chose to examine the IT industry, particularly on the Microsoft case, which became one of the most significant antitrust disputes over the past years. In the thesis I compare competition policy framework with the theoretical approaches of various economic schools. Then I monitor the Commission's investigation and I discuss the legitimacy of the accusations and actions. I conclude that the EU competition policy has significant flaws in its application. I find that the European Commission is trying to reduce Microsoft's market power at all costs because when I compare Commission's attitude to other companies with identical behavior, it is completely different.

Cette thèse présente une contribution théorique et empirique à la recherche sur la représentation politique des groupes d’intérêt. Plus précisément, son objectif est de développer une analyse de la question la plus importante dans ce domaine, notamment celle de l’influence de groupes d’intérêt sur les politiques de la Commission Européenne. La nature multiforme de l’influence a été présentée dans le premier chapitre, avec un appui sur le rôle des fonctionnaires publics, le contexte politique et les caractéristiques des groupes d’intérêt. Le succès du lobbying a été comparé à travers de différents DGs de la Commission mais aussi à travers des différents contextes politiques avec des différents degrés de saillance et conflit. Les résultats de recherche confirment le rôle primordial des fonctionnaires publics dans les changements des politiques publiques au niveau de la Commission Européenne. Les recherches sur l’influence des groupes d’intérêt doivent prendre en compte le chevauchement de préférences exprimées par les décideurs politiques et les groupes d’intérêt pour mieux comprendre le succès de leur lobbying. En plus, les groups de business ont plus d’influence politique auprès des fonctionnaires qui travaillent dans les directions qui s’appuient sur les politiques économiques. Les résultats soulignent aussi l’importance des variables institutionnelles qui définissent le contexte dans lequel l’influence est exercée. Autrement dit, si certains groupes d’intérêt sont influents dépend du cadre institutionnel, et plus généralement du contexte politique dans lequel l’influence est utilisé. / This study is an account of interest group representation and lobbying success in the European Union. The questions I address are when and why interest groups succeed (or fail) to obtain their preferred policy outcome in the European Commission decision-making process. Lobbying success cannot be exclusively perceived as a function of the political resource exchanges between interest group coalitions and EU institutions. Instead, I argue that policy influence is a complex process that is under the control of policymakers. While multiple actors can effectively influence policy, public officials have a central-veto player-role in the process. They can also accommodate or reject interest group demands for other reasons than information exchange, such as their own ideological preferences, institutional embeddedness or the policy context. I argue that lobbying success can be better explained by a convergence between policymaker preferences, interest group preferences, and the policy context in which their preferences emerge. Thus, I focus on the role of policymakers as the predominant actors with formal agency capacities to change policy. Interest group scholars rely on methodological diversity, combining process tracing and survey designs, to establish the policy preferences of relevant political actors. By using such an approach, the results presented here paint a more refined picture of lobbying success, which depends much more on policymaker preferences than previous studies have considered. This conclusion should encourage scholars in the field to pay more attention to strong and weak ties within policy elite networks in an effort to better understand lobbying success.

<p>After the appointment of a new European Commission in 2004, “communication” was made a top priority on the agenda. The Commission presented a new communication policy, which would establish a dialogue with the citizens, thereby bringing more democracy to the union and bridging the gap to the citizens. Three documents containing the policy were published, namely an internal action plan for the Commission, Plan D which establishes the framework for national debates and a whitepaper on EU communication policy. These documents were met by mistrust and criticism from many different actors such as journalists and experts.</p><p>The aim of this master thesis is to examine this new communication policy from a deliberative democratic perspective. The thesis asks whether the new policy has a potential of contributing to deliberative democracy, by investigating the documents from a discursive point of view. Deliberative democracy focuses mainly on public discussions and the generation of a general will by public conversation where every one has a right to participate on equal terms. This thesis uses a discursive interpretation, as stated by the philosopher Jürgen Habermas, where the public sphere and political rights which constitutes the public area plays an important role. The theoretical perspective is used in the thesis to understand and assess the policy.</p><p>To be able to draw conclusions, the new communication policy is searched for discursive ideas and the occurrence is analyzed by a both qualitative and quantitative text analysis. The analysis shows that the policy includes a lot of actions that goes well along with a discursive perspective, as defined in the thesis, although some important considerations are missing. The new communication policy as presented by the European Commission has therefore a good potential of contributing to deliberative democracy in the Union.</p><p>The policy is also discussed in relation to the criticism that has been presented regarding the theory of deliberative democracy. The thesis shows that the communication policy includes actions which decrease the importance of this criticism, allowing for the policy to possibly contribute to European democracy and decreasing the democratic deficit.</p>

Tez (Yüksek Lisans) - Süleyman Demirel Üniversitesi, Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü, Kamu Yönetimi Anabilim Dalı, 2009. / Kaynakça var.

This dissertation examines how we construct security threats. Theoretically, it contributes to the literature on securitization and threat construction, which has hitherto overlooked how influential bureaucracies that – in contrast to the police and the military – have little to gain from widened threat perceptions, may still contribute to threat construction. The dissertation studies the European Commission and the issue of irregular immigration. By using frame analysis, it firstly explores what constructions of irregular immigration that the Commission generates and to what extent these contribute to threat construction. Using the Bourdieusian concepts of field, capital and habitus, it secondly analyzes how certain constructions of irregular immigration are authorized at the expense of others, due to the inner bureaucratic logic of the Commission. The empirical result reveals that the Commission mostly defines irregular immigrants as victims, yet simultaneously favors policy solutions that mainly seek to avert immigration. The Commission thus contributes to threat construction primarily through its policy solutions. Studying the inner logic of the Commission field highlights how informal routines and tacit power relations between Commission departments authorize certain frames over others. Importantly, the analysis shows how the naming of irregular immigrants as victims tends not to cost the officials anything in terms of symbolic capital, whereas the suggesting of less restrictive solutions tends to do so. Definitions and policy solutions thus follow different bureaucratic logics, which enables a mismatch between them. Moreover, the threat construction appears not because Commission officials believe that restrictive measures are the only way to solve problems linked to irregular immigration. On the contrary, officials believe that a multitude of solutions are needed. Instead, the threat construction is an unintended consequence of the logic of the field.

This dissertation examines how we construct security threats. Theoretically, it contributes to the literature on securitization and threat construction, which has hitherto overlooked how influential bureaucracies that – in contrast to the police and the military – have little to gain from widened threat perceptions, may still contribute to threat construction. The dissertation studies the European Commission and the issue of irregular immigration. By using frame analysis, it firstly explores what constructions of irregular immigration that the Commission generates and to what extent these contribute to threat construction. Using the Bourdieusian concepts of field, capital and habitus, it secondly analyzes how certain constructions of irregular immigration are authorized at the expense of others, due to the inner bureaucratic logic of the Commission. The empirical result reveals that the Commission mostly defines irregular immigrants as victims, yet simultaneously favors policy solutions that mainly seek to avert immigration. The Commission thus contributes to threat construction primarily through its policy solutions. Studying the inner logic of the Commission field highlights how informal routines and tacit power relations between Commission departments authorize certain frames over others. Importantly, the analysis shows how the naming of irregular immigrants as victims tends not to cost the officials anything in terms of symbolic capital, whereas the suggesting of less restrictive solutions tends to do so. Definitions and policy solutions thus follow different bureaucratic logics, which enables a mismatch between them. Moreover, the threat construction appears not because Commission officials believe that restrictive measures are the only way to solve problems linked to irregular immigration. On the contrary, officials believe that a multitude of solutions are needed. Instead, the threat construction is an unintended consequence of the logic of the field. / <p>Författaren är verksam både vid Statsvetenskapliga institutionen på Stockholms universitet och vid Statsvetenskapliga avdelningen på Försvarshögskolan.</p>

This paper applies an intuitive approach based on stock market data to a unique dataset of large concentrations during the period 1990-2002 to assess the effectiveness of European merger control. The basic idea is to relate announcement and decision abnormal returns. Under a set of four maintained assumptions, merger control might be interpreted to be effective if rents accruing due to the increased market power observed around the merger announcement are reversed by the antitrust decision, i.e. if there is a negative relation between announcement and decision abnormal returns. To clearly identify the events' competitive effects, we explicitly control for the market expectation about the outcome of the merger control procedure and run several robustness checks to assess the role of our maintained assumptions. We find that only outright prohibitions completely reverse the rents measured around a merger's announcement. On average, remedies seem to be only partially capable of reverting announcement abnormal returns. Yet they seem to be more effective when applied during the first rather than the second investigation phase and in subsamples where our assumptions are more likely to hold. Moreover, the European Commission appears to learn over time. (authors' abstract)

This thesis aims to analyze the similarities and differences in how identity is constructed by the European Commission, the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament regarding the Polish membership and the potential Turkish membership of the European Union. The construction of identity is analyzed through a social constructivist perspective where identity is constructed by distinguishing ”us” from ”them”. The research metod used is a qualitative text analysis. The arguments of identity are taken from the Commission’s and the Council’s documents, as well as from the debates of the European Parliament. The arguments of identity refer to the official accession criterias of the European Union, as well as to inofficial criterias formulated by the members of the European Parliament. Arguments used are for example that Polish and Turkish standards are not the same as the European standard, that the European norms need to be integrated into the Polish and Turkish constitutions and that Poland and Turkey are too poor to become members of the European Union. The result also shows that the construction of a European identity built on a common culture has had the greatest impact in the European Parliament and the European Commission.