This Master's thesis analysed integration process of national energy markets through non- legislative and legislative EU documents. The aim was to study integration of national energy markets and aspects that had influence on the integration process through interpretative content analysis. Additionally, the definition of internal energy market was augmented. The internal energy market requires not only competitiveness, market-based approach, customer orientation and flexibility, but it is also necessary to ensure security of supplies, diversification of suppliers, sustainability, and transparency. Four aspects were analysed. It was partially proven, that several initiatives and proposals made by the European Commission were implemented by the member states in binding EU legislation (energy packages) in the period from 2000 to 2019. The initiatives presented by the European Commission were far more ambitious. However, as it was pointed out several times in Commission's publications that progress was rather slow in transposition of EU legislation into national laws by the member states which significantly prolonged integration process. Main problems were deregulation of gas prices for end users, ownership unbundling and independence of national regulatory authorities. Next, geopolitics within the EU...

This thesis is embedded in the theoretical approach of multilevel governance and presumption of the rational behaviour of actors. Using the method of process tracing it aims to uncover the legislative process in the European Union. It is a single case study and as a case was chosen the negotiation of the regulation of the citizens' initiative. Various actors were involved in the negotiations, this thesis focuses on the main one - European Commission, European Parliament, the Council, interest organisations and national parliaments. The thesis presumed, that all actors will try to push through their interests based on their rational choice. This presumption was verified, although the success rate of the players varied a lot. As the most successful should be considered the European Parliament, who defended the interests of the individuals and the Council, which apparently represented the interests of the governments of the member states (especially in the issues of lowering the bureaucratic burden). The interest organisations showed their positions clearly, however the Commission did not take their positions much into account while preparing the draft regulation. The position of the national parliaments was different then presumed. Although the thesis expected them to be directly involved in the...

The goal of this thesis is to explain the current dynamical development of the energy policy of the EU with the focus on the gas sector. Furthermore, this work examines what role in that process plays the European Commission. Lastly, it seeks to ascertain whether the EU's energy policy has a real impact on the development of the gas markets of Bulgaria, Czech Republic and Lithuania. The first two questions are answered with the aid of John W. Kingdon's Multiple stream theory. The conclusion has it that the key role in the creation of the EU's energy policy was taken up by the European Commission, which can be described as the Kingdon's policy entrepreneur. As a true entrepreneur the Commission attempted to build the way for the creation of the single EU gas market, which would be based on sufficient cross-border infrastructure and diversified gas imports. Such a conclusion is supported by the Commission's activities leading to the adoption of important energy legislation, as the third energy package, and essential funds as were European Energy Programme for Recovery and the Connecting Europe Facility. Latter, this work looks into the third research question. On the case studies of Bulgaria, the Czech Republic and Lithuania it proves, that the outputs of the entrepreneur activities of the Commission...

European Union faced several external challenges in the beginning of the 21st century. Its enlargement to 24 member states led to a state of dissimilar and not well interconnected economies in need of a new model of external competitiveness. Finding the model and, more importantly, delivering it on community level, was a new task of the European Commission, especially after re-launch of the Lisbon strategy in 2005. Yet, there was another challenge for EU that was not so easy to address by the Commission: the relative weakening of EU's external economic action comparing to new increasingly assertive policies of other international players, especially BRICs. Was it possible for the Commission focus only on supporting EU competitiveness without any external action, as was expected by articles of the Treaty of Nice? As the thesis argues, indeed there was an external action of the Commission before the Lisbon treaty, through its public support of SME internationalization within the Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP). A neoinstitutional analysis of the issues on two levels is carried out: Firstly on the level of European institutions (motives, relevant contexts and institutional rules), secondly, on the level of secondary actors (SMEs, NGOs, CIP executive agency EACI), where the...

Disability Mainstreaming zielt (analog zu Gender Mainstreaming) darauf, Anliegen und Bedürfnisse der Personengruppe 'Menschen mit Behinderung' nicht allein in den für diese Gruppe offensichtlich wichtigen Bereichen anzusprechen, sondern sie in allen gesellschaftspolitischen Handlungsebenen mitzudenken und dementsprechende Forderungen umzusetzen. Dabei wird ‚Behinderung‘ vorrangig als soziale Konstruktion interpretiert, die mit der Erfahrung von Diskriminierung und Exklusion einhergeht.

Circular and digital transformations are key focal points in the European Commission's regulations and directives, as evidenced by the proposed Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation. This regulation aims to reduce the environmental impact of products throughout their life cycles. To facilitate this objective, the implementation of digital product passports has been put forward as a means to seamlessly exchange product information. However, the ambiguity and absence of an implementation timeline in the ESPR framework hinder producers' preparedness for the expected information requirements in a digital product passport. Consequently, the extent of producers' compliance with the implementation schedule, along with the associated actions, challenges, and opportunities, remains uncertain. This study conducted two sequential qualitative phases to address these issues. The initial phase examined the anticipated information requirements and implementation timeline, while the subsequent phase assessed producers' current information collection practices.The findings reveal that producers effectively collect the majority of the 29 anticipated information elements mandated by a digital product passport, categorized as traceability, product-related, environmental, and circular information. However, producers’ information collection practices are not aligned with the implementation timeline due to limited prior knowledge of forthcoming regulations. Producers are taking measures such as collaboration, enhanced transparency, and effective management of end-of-life products and facilities to comply with the requirements. Challenges include balancing transparency with safeguarding sensitive information, information gathering across the supply chain, and managing the inclusion of essential information. On the other hand, opportunities arise in improved decision-making, innovation, extended product lifespan, and continuous learning. This research contributes to understanding the anticipated information requirements of digital product passports and provides valuable guidance for producers' data collection efforts. / Cirkulär och digital transformation är centrala fokuspunkter i Europeiska Kommissionens- förordningar och direktiv, vilket tydligt framgår i förslaget Ecodesign för hållbara produkter. Syftet med denna förordning är att minska produkters miljöpåverkan under hela deras livscykel. För att underlätta detta föreslås implementering av digitala produktpass för sömlöst utbyte av produktinformation. Men otydlighet i ESPR förslaget och avsaknad av en tidsplan för implementering hindrar producenternas förberedelse inför de förväntade informationskraven i ett digitalt produktpass. Följaktligen är det oklart i vilken utsträckning som producenter följer tidsplanen och vilka åtgärder, utmaningar och möjligheter som är förknippade med detta. I denna studie så genomfördes två sekventiella kvalitativa faser för att ta itu med dessa problem. Den första fasen undersökte de förväntade informationskraven och tidsplanen för implementering, medan den andra fasen bedömde producenternas nuvarande praxis för informationsinsamling. Resultaten visar att producenterna effektivt samlar in majoriteten av de 29 informationselement som förväntas krävas i ett digitalt produktpass, kategoriserade som spårbarhet, produktrelaterad information, miljöinformation och cirkulär information. Dock är producenters praxis för informationsinsamling inte anpassad till tidsplanen på grund av begränsade förkunskaper. Producenterna vidtar åtgärder såsom samarbete, ökad transparens samt effektiv hantering av uttjänta produkter och anläggningar för att uppfylla kraven. Utmaningar inkluderar att balansera transparens med företagskritisk information, insamling av information genom hela leverantörskedjan samt att hantera inkludering av nödvändig information. Även möjligheter uppstår, såsom förbättrade beslutsprocesser, innovation, utökad produktlivslängd och kontinuerligt lärande. Detta examensarbete bidrar till förståelsen av förväntade informationskrav för digitala produktpass och ger värdefull vägledning för producenters informationsinsamling.

In 2020, the corona virus was officially classified as a pandemic. Most countries’ economywas badly affected, and many companies were in need of state aid to survive. However, due to the European single market and its competition policy, the European commission has strict state aid rules. Hence, because of the circumstances, the commission implemented a temporary framework for state aid, which enabled for economic assistance that would normally not be in accordance with the competition policy. Because some countries had expressed concern for more generous state aid rules to threaten the single market, the commission needed to be strategic with their communication, in order for the member states to see it as necessary and legitimate. The aim of this study is to illustrate and analyze how the commission framed the temporary state aid rules to legitimize it. The method of use isframing analysis. The main results are that the two frames the commission used to legitimize the temporary state aid rules were that the crisis needed to be solved mutually, and the fact that it was an economic crisis. In conclusion, the commission framed the temporary state aidrules by alluding to common interests among the member states, such as the importance of European cooperation and the single market. They did this to legitimize the temporary state aid rules.

2022 lade Europakommissionen fram ett förslag om att all kommunikation, offentlig somprivat, borde vara obligatoriskt övervakat. Detta förslag kom fram genom att det ansågskunna hjälpa fler barn från sexuellt utnyttjande. Kommissionen föreslog att all digitalkommunikation borde bli dekrypterad (avkodad). Om kommunikationen visar någon form avmisstänkt aktivitet hamnar det i en databas kallad ”Europol”, där det kommer bli lagrat,analyserat, spårat och rapporterat.Meningen med den här uppsatsen är att analysera EU-kommissionens förslagsdokument föratt se vilken typ av kommunikation och vilken diskurs som används för att etablera makt.Efter det har vi genomfört analys av förslagets likheter mellan Shoshana Zuboffs teori omövervakning och George Orwells dystopiska roman 1984. Teorin och metoden som används idenna studie är kritisk diskursanalys och övervakningsteorier.I vår uppsats fann vi ut att EU-kommissionen använder sig av diskursen kring barns säkerhetför att få människor ombord på att barnens säkerhet är viktigare än alla andra mänskligarättigheter. Slutsatser från den här studien inkluderar också att det finns likheter på så sätt attövervakning kan kontrollera vårt beteende om den här lagen kommer i kraft, precis som iZuboffs teori och Orwells dystopiska framtidsroman. / 2022, the European Commission put forward a proposal that all communication, public andprivate, should be under mandatory surveillance. This proposal came to be because theybelieve this could help keep more children safe from sexual abuse. The commission proposedthat all digital communication be decrypted (decoded). If the communication shows any formof suspicion it will then be sent to a database called ”Europol”. There it will be stored,analysed, tracked and reported.The purpose of this study is to analyse the EU- Commission's proposal document toinvestigate what type of communication and discourse is used to establish power. After that,we also performed an analysis on the proposals' similarities to Shoshana Zuboff’s theoryabout surveillance capitalism and George Orwell's dystopian book 1984. The theory andmethod used in this study is critical discourse analysis and surveillance theories.In our essay we found that the EU-commissions uses the discourse surrounding children'ssafety to get people onboard the idea that children's safety is more important than all otherhuman rights. Conclusions from this study also include that there are similarities in the waysurveillance could control our behaviour if this law comes to pass, as it does in Zuboff’stheory and Orwell's dystopian future fiction.

Development issues have been the centre of most international governmental organisations for quite a long time. Most developing countries tend to depend on Western foreign donors to assist them in their developmental ambitions. Ghana as a developing nation also depends on it foreign donors to finance most of it developmental projects. Even though the European Union is an international governmental organisation that is much known for assisting developing countries with their developmental projects it is anticipated that recent occurrence such as the global economic meltdown, climate change coupled with terrorist attacks on most developed nations will limit or perhaps even halt the flow of development aid to developing countries as they might be more concerned with securing their territory rather than thinking of other people somewhere else.This is because such occurrences have resulted in raising a new concern, thus the New Security Agenda or Human Security. The Human Security in respect to its economic sector is what this paper deals with. This paper takes a critical look on Ghana’s Growth and Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (GPRS), as pertaining to the aspect of these papers that received developmental aid from the European Development Fund (EDF). It is proved here that almost all aspect of Ghana’s developmental projects in one way or other received funding from the EDF. The New Security Agenda in terms of its economic sector was rather found out to be a positive influence for developing nations like Ghana as a result of the country’s stability. This is because it was found out that rather than limiting the flow of development aid to Ghana, it is during this time that the 10th EDF budget for Ghana received the highest funding. It was later found out that all these developmental projects conforms to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which is also an area of concern in the New Security Agenda. All this occurrences are much more explained along a theoretical framework (thus the notions of liberalism, critical theory and constructivism). However other academic works on the subject matter was also comprehensively acknowledged.

The New Medical Device Regulations (MDR) will become affective on 26 May, 2021. The new regulation entails higher requirements for companies that develop medical devices, but also for all parties involved in the medical device industry. The strengthened requirements mean that it will be more difficult to meet all the criteria for placing medical devices on the market. This thesis has been carried out on behalf of the Swedish Institute for Standards (SIS) and examines companies' transition to MDR and how companies can get support from SIS, but also by other organizations and authorities. A qualitative literature study and document study has been carried out to ponder interview questions, which have then been answered by companies, authorities and organizations who are in one way or another affected by the transition to MDR. Part of the work was also to find out how the companies, depending on size, differ from each other to comply with the new regulation. The results showed that the transition to MDR differs significantly between all the interviewed parties, but that everyone agrees that standardization is important. / Den nya förordningen om medicintekniska produkter (MDR) kommer att träda i kraft den 26 maj, 2021. Den nya förordningen innebär högre krav på företag som utvecklar medicintekniska produkter, men även på alla inblandade parter i den medicintekniska industrin. De stärkta kraven innebär att det kommer vara svårare att uppfylla alla kriterier för att kunna placera medicintekniska produkter på marknaden. Detta examensarbete har utförts på uppdrag av Svenska Institutet för Standarder (SIS) och undersöker företagens övergång till MDR och hur företag kan få stöd, bland annat av SIS, men också av andra organisationer och myndigheter. Det har genomförts en kvalitativ litteraturstudie och dokumentstudie för att formulera intervjufrågor som sedan har besvarats av företag, myndigheter och organisationer som på ett eller annat sätt blir påverkade vid övergången till MDR. En del av arbetet var även att ta reda på hur företagen, beroende på storlek, skiljer sig mellan varandra vad gälleratt uppfylla det nya regelverket. Resultatet visade att övergången till MDR skiljer sig markant mellan alla de intervjuade parterna, men att alla är eniga om att standardisering är viktigt.