Europe’s Challenges

The current work is the third volume in the se ries "Europe's Economic Future", edited by Strasbourg's Robert Schuman University, under the direction of Professor Sabine Urban, head of the CESAG-IECS research center. This series intends to analyze the European situation -not through idealized models of operation or abstract schemas - rather based on concrete observations, equally elose to the actions and the life of the European citizen as of Europe's corporations and institutions. The studies that are presented here are not, however, simply descriptions; they refer to precise conceptual frameworks and nourish a long-term reflection. This volume, like its predecessors, reflects the diversity which characterizes Europe, rich and stimulating but, at the same time, difficult to manage. Spectacular advances are followed by moments of hesitation. With European construction, new processes of adaptation and new competitive strategies must be implemented by businesses. Public authorities must respect the convergence constraints imposed by the European Union (Maastricht I) and imagine a modified institutional framework for the European Intergovernmental Conference of 1996 (Maastricht II). The citizens of the fifteen countries involved need themselves to be enlightened about the future, to understand how - between independent markets and coordinated policies - a desirable economic and social cohesion in the European area will be realized. Furthermore, the area itself is not fixed; it is evolving between the strengthening of links and the opening of new horizons.

1. Introduction.- 2. A Republican Concept of Corporate Ethics.- 3. Performance Centers in Public Administration.- 4. Economic and Monetary Union: Between Solidarity and Efficiency.- 5. The Drift of the Public Debt: Threat for Europe? The Italian Case.- 6. Stability Culture as a Precondition for the Sustainability of the European Monetary Union (EMU).- 7. Financial Governance in the New Europe.- 8. Core-Periphery Interactions in European Stock Markets.- 9. What Kind of Patent System Does Europe Need?.- 10. The Impact of European Policies Towards Science and Technology on the European Research Landscape.- 11. The Technology of Communication and the Reshaping of the European Broadcasting Industry.- 12. The European Union and Russia.- 13. Consolidation and Expansion of the European Single Insurance Market.- 14. Differences in the Export Profiles Among Users of Export Marketing Research: Evidence from Two European Countries.- 15. Accounting Codification: Experience and Prospects in the European Context.- 16. A First Gross Measure of Unexploited Single Market Integration Potential.