Directive

About: Directive is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 5695 publications have been published within this topic receiving 56084 citations.

The Cross-Border Health Care Directive: More Free Movement for Citizens and More Coherent EU Law?

Abstract: In 2011 the Patients' Rights in Cross-border Health Care Directive was adopted. This Directive is meant, inter alia, to implement the case law of the Court of Justice on patient mobility. This arti...

Computer Programs and Copyright: More Exceptions to Infringement

Abstract: The breadth of copyright protection for computer programs is potentially very generous, extending to program structure, screen displays and preparatory materials,' but this has been significantly compromised by the Copyright (Computer Programs) Regulations 1992 which came into force on 1 January 1993. The Regulations were made in order to ensure that the United Kingdom complied with the European Community Directive on the legal protection of computer programs,2 and they make some far reaching amendments to the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 as it applies to computer programs. The nature of copyright protection creates a danger that rights in computer programs could be open to abuse and detract from the establishment of standards which is itself seen as an important goal. Unlike other original works of copyright, there is a need for computer programs to be able to interact and interoperate with each other and, failing the safeguards against abuse of right that are well established in patent law, it was seen as desirable that special provision be made to permit certain acts to be done to facilitate the interoperability of computer programs.3 Otherwise, the owner of the copyright subsisting in a computer program that had become established as the market leader could control the market either by asking extortionate royalties from other software producers who wished to make interoperable programs or refusing to grant licences in respect of the interface aspects of his program. The two primary purposes of the Directive were to provide an effective means of protecting computer programs and to harmonise the copyright protection of computer programs throughout the Member States. However, so far as the United Kingdom is concerned, since we already had strong copyright protection in place, the Directive and the Regulations have the effect of considerably weakening the ability of the copyright owner to protect his computer program, or certain aspects of it, by means of copyright law and contract law. A further concern for the computer industry is whether the Regulations fully reflect the Directive's provisions. Certainty is perceived by the industry as very important, as the period leading up to the Copyright (Computer Software) Amendment Act 1985 amply demonstrates.4 There is some doubt as to how effectively the Regulations implement the Directive and this can do nothing but detract from the goal of encouraging investment in the development of new and innovative computer programs. Add to this the difficulty in reconciling European Community Directives with inconsistent domestic legislation,5 and it can be seen that the resultant uncertainties do not help the computer

The Procedurally Directive Approach to Teaching Controversial Issues.

Abstract: Recent articles on teaching controversial topics in schools have employed Michael Hand's distinction between “directive teaching,” in which teachers attempt to persuade students of correct positions on topics that are not rationally controversial, and “nondirective teaching,” in which teachers avoid persuading students on topics that are rationally controversial. However, the four methods of directive teaching discussed in the literature — explicit directive teaching, “steering,” “soft-directive teaching,” and “school ethos endorsement” — make rational persuasion problematic, if not self-defeating. In this essay, Maughn Rollins Gregory argues that “procedurally directive teaching” offers an alternative to such approaches because it derives from the intention to guide inquiry rather than to persuade. He demonstrates that the conceptual frameworks of perfectionism and antiperfectionism, which have been proposed for directive teaching on same-sex marriage, can instead be used to generate open questions for student inquiry, as can a third, civil rights framework. Given these considerations, Gregory maintains that pedagogical guidance on this topic should be procedurally directive rather than substantively directive. Further, the fact that legal, political, and ethics scholars disagree about which framework is more appropriate to the issue of same-sex marriage indicates that such arguments cannot be dispositive of the pedagogical issue of how to frame classroom discussions about it. Rather, students should inquire into this meta-level framing dispute for themselves.

‘European Works Councils: A Transnational Industrial Relations Institution in the Making’

Abstract: 1. Setting the Scene 2. The Articulation Activities of European Industry Federations 3. EWC Agreements: The Impact of the Directive on Coverage, Barriers and Content 4. Information, Consultation and Company Restructuring: Views on the Core EWC Agenda 5. EWC Infrastructure: Articulation in the Context of Communication, Training and Collective Identity 6. Beyond the Formal Information and Consultation Agenda 7. From Review to Recast: Contesting the Revision of the Directive 8. Conclusion: Towards a Transnational Industrial Relations Institution

The State of the Art of Smart Energy Communities: A Systematic Review of Strengths and Limits

Abstract: The Smart Energy Community topic has attracted a lot of interest from policy, research centres, companies and private citizens since 2018, when in Europe the recast of the Renewable Energy Directive, and later in 2019 the Internal Electricity Market Directive, came into force to support the new role of users in energy systems. Following these directives, energy community experimentations, real projects and/or simulations and case studies have been developed and investigated in the literature. In this review paper, an investigation of recent literature about Smart Energy Communities in terms of common characteristics, fundamental scopes, and principal indexes used for their evaluation, has been realized by considering 111 scientific references, 78 of which have been published since 2018. The reference papers have been selected through the “Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analysis” methodology. In developing the review, significant barriers to Smart Energy Communities’ diffusion emerged. The main shortcomings concern citizens’ uncertainty about these new projects, due to their poor information and technical skills. These issues often hide energy, economic, environmental, and social benefits of Smart Energy Communities. Therefore, this study wants to be an opportunity for bringing to the attention of citizens Smart Energy Communities’ positive outcomes, especially from the social point of view, thus boosting their spreading and overcoming still existing criticalities.