Asian Migrants in Europe: the Need for a Global Perspective
Over the past ten years Asian migration to the European Union (EU) has gradually gained in importance as an area of policy making.1 The Amsterdam Treaty (1997, enacted in 1999) and the Tampere Council (1999) are the most important hallmarks of this trend: they reflect the widely felt need among policy makers at the top of the EU, in particular within the European Commission, to liberalize external migration and thus fulfil the EU’s fundamental commitment to the principles of liberal democracy (Angenendt and Hernandez, 2004, p. 3; Batistella, 2002). Nevertheless, progress is slow, and EU policies have retained their defensive character: they serve to control and restrain external migration flows rather than facilitate them (Angenendt and Hernandez, 2004, pp. 6–8; Angenendt and Kruse, 2004, pp. 100–1).
Israel's military transfers to China and Taiwan
Criticism of Israeli military-technology transfers to China is largely unfounded. The sales actually enjoyed tacit American support when they started in the 1970s (to Taiwan) and 1980s (to China). Washington's recent accusations of illegal transfers of US technologies reflect changed political considerations more than actual facts. Military sales to China have helped mitigate the economic crisis facing Israel's defence-industrial complex, have promoted political and strategic relations between Israel and China, and have had only a limited impact on the Asian balance of power. Israel's arms-export control mechanisms, moreover, have been tightened considerably in recent years, while military transfers to China and Taiwan have drastically declined.
The European Council and The Council of the European Union: Shapers of a European Confederation
The European Council and the Council of the European Union play key roles in the European Union.' The European Council is largely concerned with system-steering, while the Council of the EU undertakes sectoral policymaking. What is common to these roles is the balancing act carried out by both institutions. Both have to mediate the centripetal dynamics of integration, termed cooperative confederalism here, and the centrifugal dynamics which are found in the strongly entrenched territorial nature of power, centered on the member states. Using new institutionalist analysis, the article illuminates different facets of the two institutions 'functioning in mediating the two dynamics.