Showing papers on "Directive published in 2007"

Controlling death: the false promise of advance directives.

Abstract: Advance directives promise patients a say in their future care but actually have had little effect. Many experts blame problems with completion and implementation, but the advance directive concept itself may be fundamentally flawed. Advance directives simply presuppose more control over future care than is realistic. Medical crises cannot be predicted in detail, making most prior instructions difficult to adapt, irrelevant, or even misleading. Furthermore, many proxies either do not know patients' wishes or do not pursue those wishes effectively. Thus, unexpected problems arise often to defeat advance directives, as the case in this paper illustrates. Because advance directives offer only limited benefit, advance care planning should emphasize not the completion of directives but the emotional preparation of patients and families for future crises. The existentialist Albert Camus might suggest that physicians should warn patients and families that momentous, unforeseeable decisions lie ahead. Then, when the crisis hits, physicians should provide guidance; should help make decisions despite the inevitable uncertainties; should share responsibility for those decisions; and, above all, should courageously see patients and families through the fearsome experience of dying.

Even rules, uneven practices: Opening the ‘black box’ of EU law in action

Abstract: While considerable attention is paid to the legal aspect of implementation of European directives, the practical ‘street-level’ implementation of EU law remains to a large extent a ‘black box’. This article sheds light on this black box with a study on the implementation of the Safety Data Sheets Directive in the Netherlands, Germany, the United Kingdom and Spain. This cross-national analysis reveals that different phases in the implementation process leave different traces. Although the member states correctly and completely transposed the directive, compliance by the regulated leaves something to be desired and enforcement by regulators is rare and varies considerably between and within the countries. This article looks into the factors that explain why even rules do not necessarily lead to even practices and argues for more attention for the phase of practical implementation.

Analysis of Policy Measures to Reduce Ship Emissions in the Context of the Revision of the National Emissions Ceilings Directive

Abstract: This paper reports on work of the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis and has received only limited review. Views or opinions expressed in this report do not necessarily represent those of the Institute, its National Member Organizations, or other organizations sponsoring the work. Abstract Maritime activities constitute a significant fraction of anthropogenic emissions of air pollutants in Europe. In 2000, SO 2 and NO x emissions from international maritime shipping in Europe amounted to approximately 30 percent of the land-based emissions in the EU-25. While legislation is in force to control emission from international shipping, the expected increase in the volume of ship movements will compensate the positive environmental impacts of these measures and will lead to a further growth in ship emissions. Under business-as-usual assumptions, by 2020 emissions from maritime activities would come close to the projected baseline emission levels from land-based sources, and surpass the target levels established by the European Commission in its Thematic Strategy on Air Pollution for land-based sources. This anticipated increase in ship emissions will counteract the envisaged benefits of the costly efforts to control the remaining emissions from land-based sources in Europe. While at present emissions from ships are responsible for 10 to 20 percent of sulphur deposition in coastal areas, their contribution is expected for 2020 to increase to more than 30 percent in large areas in Europe, and up to 50 percent in coastal areas. Technologies exist to reduce emissions from shipping beyond what is currently legally required. The study has identified a set of emission control measures that are technically available and that could – if fully applied – reduce by 2020 80 percent of the SO 2 emissions from international shipping, and almost 90 percent of the NO x emissions. Total costs of these measures are estimated at 5.5 billion €/yr. For comparison, the costs of the measures proposed by the Thematic Strategy amount to 7.1 billion €/yr. The study has explored several packages of measures that could reduce emissions at lower costs. These include combinations of seawater sulphur scrubbing, lower sulphur content in residual oil, humid air engines for new built ships, slide valves retrofitting in existing ship engines, as well as the use of selective catalytic reduction (SCR). Marginal costs of these measures are well below the costs of the measures for land-based sources that have been proposed by the Thematic Strategy. To judge the cost-effectiveness …

Do member states make european policies work? analysing the eu transposition deficit

Abstract: This article seeks to systematically describe and explain variation in European Union policy implementation performance across member states and directives. The analyses rely on a new and original dataset comprising comparable information about transposition delay for practically all EU social directives in Germany, Greece, The Netherlands, Spain and the United Kingdom. On the basis of nearly 300 observations, we could establish that only in 42.7 per cent of our cases did member states transpose in time; 17.5 per cent exceeded the deadline by more than two years. The analysis reveals modest variation between social policy areas, more profound cross-country differences and strong cross-area variations within some countries. The need for inter-ministerial coordination and administrative ineffi ciency are strongly associated with transposition delay. Whether a directive is new or merely an amendment is unrelated to transposition delay. The same holds for the directive ’ s complexity and parliamentary involvement in the transposition process. The irrelevance of the latter factors may suggest that member states anticipate some potential challenges to transposition performance and act to mitigate them. Whether and why this is the case merits further research.

Posting of workers in the single market: attempts to prevent social dumping and regime competition in the EU

Abstract: The so-called ‘Posting of Workers Directive’ was an integral part of the European Commission (EC) Action programme linked to the Community Charter of Fundamental Rights of Workers and was meant to establish a legal frame for labour conditions of workers posted for a temporary period to another Member State. Its content is about equal treatment, a guarantee of minimum protection, fair competition and respect for the regulatory frame in the host country. In the cases included in this article, increased divergence can be observed with respect to the role of the state versus the social partners with regards to regulation and control. The over-riding challenge nowadays is to develop effective mechanisms of enforcement compatible with the constraints of European Union principles and regulations. In the EC documents, any reference to the Community Charter of Basic Rights of Workers has disappeared and the weight of power has shifted in favour of the free market hardliners, who seem to regard the Directive as an oddity in breach with the logic of the four freedoms.

A policy solution to the European Union's transposition puzzle: Interaction of interests in different domestic arenas

Abstract: This article analyses how the policies specified in EU directives are transposed by EU member states. In contrast to existing transposition studies it develops a policy-specific approach to explain how directives are transposed by national actors. In this approach the outcome of transposition depends on the institutional arena in which decision-making takes place and the interests of the domestic actors involved. These institutional arenas can vary from parliament to national ministries and agencies. Domestic actors are taken as policy-specific veto players. Their preferences may lead to two different responses to the requirements of a directive. First, they can transpose a directive literally, keeping deviations to a minimum. Second, domestic actors can adopt a non-literal interpretation of the directive, leading to more substantial deviations within the boundaries allowed by the European Commission. These responses are illustrated by two cases of transposition of EU directives, the tobacco products dire...

Prevention and Remedying of Environmental Damage

Abstract: The German Act on prevention and remedying of environmental damage of May 10, 2007 (Gesetz uber die Vermeidung und Sanierung von Umweltschaden vom 10. Mai 2007, BGBl. I 19, 666, Umweltschadensgesetz-USchadG) implemented the Directive 2004/35/CE of the European Parliament and of the Council of 21 April on environmental liability with regard to the prevention and remedying of environmental damage (OJ L 143/56, April 30, 2004). In Spain and as to July 2007, an implementation bill is being discussed in the Parliament (Bill 121/00130, OJ of the Parliament 130, March 23, 2007). This paper summarizes, comments and contrasts the Directive, the German Act and the Spanish Bill.

Better regulation in the European Union: Lost in Translation or Full Steam Ahead? The transportation of EU transport directives across member states.

Abstract: Better regulation in the European Union cannot be achieved without serious attention to transposition of EU law into national legislation. As a matter of fact, EU member states breach EU law - perpetuately. Why do member states miss deadlines when transposing EU internal market directives? What factors determine delays when transposing EU directives? How do these factors influence the timeliness of the national transposition processes? And under what conditions are transpositions of directives delayed? This study analyses the timeliness of national transposition processes across nine member states of the 2004 EU transport acquis. Based on a truly mixed-method approach - a new quantitative data set with further insights gleaned from four controlled case studies and a concluding fuzzy set analysis - this study shows that the European Union has a serious transposition problem. Almost 70 percent of all national legal measures transposing the transport acquis cause problems, either because they are transposed too late, risking the opening of an infringement proceeding, or because they are too early (gold-plating), risking warping effects on the regulatory environment for business and citizens in the EU alike. Furthermore, this book provides some progress regarding the conditions under which transposition performance of member states could be improved. Seven potential European and national drivers and constrainers for timely transposition can be identified with different effects on the lengths of transposition delays. Distinguishing between three outcomes of transposition process (on time, short and long delay) it is the specific features of European directives that account for short term delays, whereas serious time lags of more than six months are a result of domestic factors. Furthermore, the timing of general elections in a member state and policy sector-related crises retard or rather accelerate national transposition processes just as political priority represents a significant necessary condition for timeliness. This is a volume in the series of the E.M. Meijers Institute of Legal Studies of Leiden University. This publication has been realized within the 'Analyzing EU Policies: The Transposition of Directives' research program of the Department of Public Administration at the Leiden Faculty of Social Sciences and is closely linked to the Law Faculty research program 'Securing the Rule of Law in a World of Multilevel Jurisdiction'

Keynote Article: What Doesn't Kill You Can Only Make You Stronger: The Doha Development Round, the Services Directive and the EU's Conception of Competitiveness*

Abstract: If competitiveness is, in Paul Krugman’s (1994) now famous terms, a ‘dangerous obsession’, then the European Union (EU) has long suffered, as it continues to suffer today, from a particularly acute obsessive competitiveness disorder. In this article I reflect on the form of this contemporary obsession, establishing the distinctiveness of the European conception of competitiveness. I do so by considering two key events affecting the EU in 2006: the suspension of the multilateral trade round on the Doha development agenda (DDA) and the eventual adoption of a revised version of the Services Directive. In each I detect a highly conserved understanding of competitiveness, shared by EU trade negotiators, the Commission and even by a number of ostensibly dissenting voices. I show that this contemporary discourse of competitiveness is not in fact dangerous in Krugman’s terms – being predicated neither upon a zero-sum conception of trade nor on the assumption that competition between nations is analogous to that between corporations for market share. Yet it is dangerous nonetheless. For in anticipating the efficiency gains arising from heightened economic integration, it tends to assume that all markets for goods and services are analogous to those for cheap consumer goods – that is, both highly price sensitive and highly demand price

Apparatus, system, and method for resilient content acquisition

Abstract: An apparatus includes a directive handling module configured to implement a directive, wherein the directive defines requirements for locating, establishing, and maintaining a network connection with a remote host, and a content acquisition module configured to acquire content over a network according to the directive. A system includes a client module having the apparatus, and a directive server configured to parse a content-related request and generate a directive in response to the request. The directive may be based upon potentially sensitive business, network, location, or other policies that remain securely maintained by the directive server. A method includes implementing a directive, defining requirements for locating, establishing, and maintaining a network connection with a remote host, and acquiring content over a network according to the directive.

Evaluating the implementation of the Nitrates Directive in Denmark and England using an actor-orientated approach

Abstract: The Nitrates Directive (91/676/EEC) was adopted to address the issue of water pollution caused by nitrate derived from agricultural practices across the European Union (EU). This study evaluates the implementation of the Nitrates Directive by considering the perspectives of respondents from significant actor groups involved in the policy implementation process in Denmark and England. Structured field interviews were conducted and discovered that Nitrate Vulnerable Zone (NVZ) designation in England was a lengthy and inefficient process compared with that in Denmark. Generally, respondents from both countries considered that whole country designation was a more effective policy instrument than designation of discrete zones. Denmark's Action Programme measures reflected the severity of its water quality problems and go beyond the demands of the Nitrates Directive. The respondents recognized that Denmark's strict measures have led to a reduction in nitrate leaching and a decline in nitrate concentrations in streams from cultivated catchments. England's current Action Programme measures do not demand any substantial changes to farming practice and so have limited potential to reduce nitrate losses. This study concludes that a number of vague and ill prepared guidelines within the Nitrates Directive undermine its ability to protect water quality adequately, and hence current implementation of the Water Framework Directive (WFD) is an opportunity to re-shape water policy in relation to nitrate. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.

Setting the Scene: How did Services get to Bolkestein and Why?

Abstract: This paper traces the origins of the recently adopted general services directives of the European Union, and addresses the question why such an important piece of internal market legislation was adopted so recently, and anyway well after the 1992 deadline for the completion of the internal market. It argues that piecemeal liberalisation of services has occurred on a regular basis ever since 1992. For each of those specific service directives, the EU institutions decided on the appropriate regulatory mix between liberalisation and targeted harmonisation. This regulatory mix was largely abandoned in the Commission's original proposal to introduce the country-of-origin principle across all services covered by the directive. It is argued in this paper that this regulatory shift was ill-advised and explains the strong political resistance which the original 'Bolkestein' draft encountered from the side of other political and civil society actors, leading to a rather different outcome in the final version of the directive.

Consistency of Psychiatric Crisis Care With Advance Directive Instructions

Abstract: Objectives Psychiatric advance directives document clients' treatment preferences in advance of periods of diminished capacity for decision making. This article presents the first empirical data regarding rates and predictors of whether crisis care is consistent with psychiatric advance directives. Methods Participants were 106 community mental health outpatients who had completed a directive. Participants' mental health services were examined over a two-year period with interviews and chart reviews to determine whether clinical interventions were consistent with directive instructions. Results Across 90 crisis events in which an advance directive was accessed, the average rate of care consistent with directive instructions was 67%. Instructions regarding medications, preemergency interventions, nonhospital alternatives, and most nontreatment personal care issues were consistent with care in nearly all cases. Somewhat less consistent with care were instructions to contact a surrogate decision maker and preferences among hospitals; between hospitals and hospital alternatives; and among seclusion, restraint, and sedating medication. Clients with fewer prior outpatient commitment orders and who had a surrogate decision maker who accessed the directive were more likely to have care consistent with directive instructions. The most commonly reported reason for overriding directive instructions was clinical need. Conclusions Overall, crisis care was largely consistent with directive instructions. To increase the likelihood of consistency, clients would be well advised to appoint a surrogate decision maker, particularly one who could be actively involved during crises. Encouraging creation and use of directives could be viewed as a positive step in the process of recovery and as an additional method of communicating client preferences during psychiatric crises.

EU Policy on Labour Migration: A First Look at the Commission's Blue Card Initiative

Abstract: On 23 October 2007, the European Commission adopted a long-awaited legislative proposal on economic migration: a draft Framework Directive on the admission of highly-qualified migrants to the EU (the so-called 'Blue Card' initiative). This briefing note looks at the key issues arising in the proposed directive and set out the main debates. So far, the proposal has elicited a fairly positive response from the business community. Whether the initial enthusiasm at the possibility of establishing a common labour migration system is justified in light of the detail of the proposal is still open to question.

Position statement on laws and regulations concerning life-sustaining treatment, including artificial nutrition and hydration, for patients lacking decision-making capacity

Abstract: We read the article by Bacon et al. with interest.1 The authors addressed the legislation in the United States for patients who are incapable of making medical treatment decisions and the effects that these laws can have on patients’ rights to self-determination. In 2006, detailed and presumptive legislation was proposed in several states declaring that without a thoroughly written advance directive, patients who are legally incompetent will receive artificial nutrition and hydration (ANH).1 This complex legislation increased the chance of a patient’s wishes being overturned. In contrast, there are several states in which legislation has been proposed to facilitate the use of advance directives. By improving education, standardizing forms, and adding advance directives to public identification cards, these states have made treatment decisions less controversial. The American Academy of Neurology (AAN) has reissued a statement that is in agreement with this less presumptive legislation. It opposes all legal/judicial interference with private decisions regarding ANH and medical treatment, and they support those options that make advance directives more appealing and useful within our society. Several studies have shown the impact of early education on behavior outcomes. For example, it has been shown that a multicomponent approach to educating adolescents about drugs, alcohol, and violence is correlated with reduction in the use of illicit …

A critical assessment of the directive on tissue engineering of the European union.

Abstract: The development of tissue engineering in Europe suffers from the absence of a coherent regulatory framework. Therefore, the European Commission has drafted a directive to regulate all tissue-engineered products in a comprehensive yet flexible framework. This article analyzes the directive from an ethical viewpoint. We argue that there are shortcomings to the proposal because of disjunctures at various regulatory levels and because responsibilities of several authorities have not been clearly established. The conscious decision to exclude ethically sensitive issues from the regulation will contribute to a continued complex regulatory environment for tissue-engineered products in Europe. We suggest that, from the start, ethical issues must be considered as an integral part of the regulation of tissue-engineered products. We propose the development of a multistage regulatory framework that makes provision for the diversity of tissue-engineered products, whereby the hybrid character and the ethical sensitivity of these products are fully taken into account. We equally suggest that the general public remain involved in regulatory issues concerning tissue-engineered products.

Freedom to Provide Health Care Services within the EU: An Opportunity for a Transformative Directive

Abstract: In the context of free movement of health care services, "the classic Community method" (CCM) of regulation through harmonized internal market law, underpinned by Treaty-based litigation, has failed. At the same time, a plethora of new governance activities concerned with health care have grown up in the EU. This article argues that the current situation represents an opportunity to develop and design, ex ante, a new Transformative Directive on health care services. The Transformative Directive would articulate the formal legal rules on cross-border receipt and provision of health care services in the EU. At the same time, the Directive would set up a framework for creating non-binding norms through participatory mechanisms, such as those found in new governance processes that already exist in other areas of EU law. The Directive would represent an example of a transformative relationship between law (the CCM) and new governance, where the procedures and institutions of new governance and traditional law are structurally designed as an integrated system, each element of which, relies on the other for its success.

National Security Presidential Directive/NSPD-43 Homeland Security Presidential Directive/HSPD-14

Abstract: (1)/Toprotectagainst the unauthorize~ importation, possession, storage, tr£hs;o~arion; ... ·. i' ·-··. · . ·' I · · . ·., development, or use of a nuclear expld:>sive device, fissile material, or radi()logical ·. material .. in .. theUnited·States, and to ptoteyt.against attackusing such.devices·qr,materials., ·· ~gainst the people, territory, or interes~s of the.United States, it is the policy'oftlie United ·.States to:

Implications of the EU Information and Consultation Directive and the Regulations in the UK – prospects for the future of employee representation

Abstract: The EU Directive on informing and consulting employees (I&C Directive) is now established on the employment relations agenda with the provisions coming into force in the UK in April 2005. The I&C D...

The Directive on Takeover Bids - Not Worth the Paper it's Written on?

Abstract: The following article introduces a series of papers in the ECFR discussing the new European Takeover Directive. It looks back on the long and winding road to the final version, marked by trading posts where Member States haggled over their support, and questions whether the remaining weaknesses really justify a pessimistic view of its future role.

Trash or Treasure: Policy Tensions in EC Waste Regulation

Abstract: The EC Waste Directive acts as a framework for Community waste policy and regulation. The scope of the Directive is dictated by its central definition of ‘waste’. Unhelpfully this definition is ambiguous and the European Court of Justice has repeatedly been faced with its interpretation. In recent years, the Court has adopted a purposive approach to this exercise. This paper critiques that purposive approach, arguing that the ECJ’s identification of the Directive’s purposes is inadequate, and the application of its approach inconsistent. This paper examines the Directive’s purposes, focusing on the ‘principles’ enshrined in the EC Treaty, in particular, the preventive principle. The preventive principle contains layers of complexity, which reveal a policy tension in the Directive’s purposes between preventing and regulating waste. That tension is not addressed by the ECJ in its recent jurisprudence on the waste definition. This jurisprudence, which primarily involves consideration of whether industrial by-products and residues are waste, is here critically analysed in light of the principled purposive approach suggested in this paper. This context is significant since the question of whether reusable by-products are waste exposes the core tension in the Directive’s purposes. It is also significant since efforts to reuse industrial by-products accord with the priority aim of EC waste policy to prevent waste generation, and any unprincipled reasoning of the ECJ which undermines such efforts must be rigorously scrutinised.

The regulation of unfair commercial practices under EC directive 2005/29 : new rules and new techniques

Abstract: 1. Introduction Stephen Weatherill and Ulf Bernitz 2. The Unfair Commercial Practices Directive and its General Prohibition Giuseppe B Abbamonte 3. The Unfair Commercial Practices Directive: Its Scope, Ambitions and Relation to the Law of Unfair Competition Ulf Bernitz 4. An End to Fragmentation? The Unfair Commercial Practices Directive from the Perspective of the New Member States from Central and Eastern Europe Antonina Bakardjieva Engelbrekt 5. The Unfair Commercial Practices Directive in Context Ida Otken Eriksson and Ulf Oberg 6. Unfair Commercial Practices Directive-A Missed Opportunity? Geraint Howells 7. Who is the 'Average Consumer'? Stephen Weatherill 8. The Relationship of the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive to European and National Contract Laws Simon Whittaker 9. The Unfair Commercial Practices Directive and its Consequences for the Regulation of Sales Promotion and the Law of Unfair Competition Jules Stuyck 10. The Case for Reclaiming European Unfair Competition Law from Europe's Consumer Lawyers Christopher Wadlow 11. Unfair Commercial Practices: Stamping out Misleading Packaging Vanessa Marsland 12. The Challenges Posed by the Implementation of the Directive into Domestic Law-a UK Perspective Christian Twigg-Flesner and Deborah Parry 13. Transborder Law Enforcement-Does it Exist? Hans W Micklitz Appendix-Directive 2005/29.EC

The European Union Blood Safety Directive and its implications for blood services.

Abstract: The European Union Blood Safety Directives have been in development since 2002 and are now in the process of being fully implemented in 27 member states. This review provides the background to their development, their scope and content. Aspects of pan-European implementation are discussed, together with specific problems encountered to date. Meetings and discussions of the competent authorities with the commission are reported, together with an updated review of 'where do we go from here'.