Council Presidency

The changes in the institutional structure of the EU brought about by the Lisbon treaty and recent developments in economic governance are offering scholars new fields of interest. In particular, the emergence of the European Council - and its President - as the institution driving integration further in times of crisis, the extension of co-decision and the continued quest for legitimacy through transparency are among the factors inviting scholars to cast new light on the role and functioning of the European Council and to re-assess the role and functioning of the Council of the European Union. The General Secretariat to both institutions has also increasingly been the object of scholarly enquiry.
The Library of the General Secretariat, a part of DG Communication and Document Management, wishes to contribute to and foster further research by offering scholars, libraries and civil society a structured bibliography of literature on the European Council, the Council of the European Union and their General Secretariat. The bibliography has been compiled by the Library on the basis of its own holdings and of targeted bibliographical research. It has greatly benefited from contributions by a variety of individual researchers and academic institutions throughout Europe and is constantly being updated with new contributions.
In its enhanced and updated January 2016 edition, the bibliography contains more than 1750 records: monographs, theses, academic articles and chapters of books. Records are indexed with EuroVoc descriptors http://eurovoc.europa.eu/ and classified by subject area. EuroVoc, the EU's multilingual thesaurus, is freely available via the EU Open Data Portal: http://open-data.europa.eu/en/data/dataset/eurovoc
In addition to the present printed release, the bibliography can be searched and browsed online at: http://ec.europa.eu/eclas/F?func=find-a-0&local_base=BIB
The Library invites research communities to use the bibliography and welcomes comments and suggestions on additional resources to be included. All materials referenced in the bibliography are held in full text in the Library and inter-library loans can be arranged. Researchers and students can access Library collections on site by appointment.

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This paper deals with the media relations activities performed in the Council of the European Union and more specifically explores the communication tasks and practices of press officers in the Press Service of that institution. We begin by reviewing the literature on public sector communication and government public relations in relation to the European Union. In the second section we state our research objectives and present our methodology. The third section focuses on the Council press officers" institutional

Europa Varietas Institute
Authors : Anikó Bródy; Zsolt Horbulák; Kinga Torbicka; Dr. András István Türke Ph.D; Dr. Hortenzia Hosszú Ph.D; dr. Dávid Pusztai; Katalin Velich
Comparative analysis of the presidencies of the Council of the Europan Union and preparatory processes between the period of years 2008-2011, special assessment of Hungarian EU Presidency.
Europa Varietas Institute - http://www.europavarietas.org

Most studies in public relations focus on communication within business organizations. Communication in the public sector has largely been ignored, even though it poses unique problems (Gelders & Ihlen, 2010; Graber, 2003; Lee, 2001a, 1999; Heise, 1985). Only few case studies on public sector communication exist (Avery et al., 1996) and in most cases these studies have applied models developed for analysis of private sector communication (Liu & Horsley, 2007; Fairbanks et al., 2007). Within the European context, only a limited ...

In 2009 the European Union (EU) reached a crucial moment in its history, in which the terms Europe and crisis became conjoined: the European sovereign-debt crisis, or Euro-crisis. Yet enlargement remains on the agenda, with the EU’s next enlargement starting on 1st July 2013 with the accession of Croatia, Iceland and FYROM looking set to follow in the near future, and probably other Western Balkan states and possibly Turkey in the long term. Enlargement therefore will soon come back into focus. Focusing on climate and energy security policy, this working paper first reflects upon the impact of the 2004/2007 enlargement on the EU. A reflection on the EU’s recent past with some of the lessons that can be learnt then follows, with a
consideration that predictions of decision- and policy-making gridlock were not realised, that newer member states have proved influential, and that prospective member states cannot be expected to be passive nor impotent. The latter part of this paper evaluates the potential prospects and outcomes of these lessons with regard to future enlargement from within (Scotland and Catalonia), and outside (Turkey), and the political factors which may dictate whether these possible enlargements are
realised.

The basic questions of this book concern the contemporary role and importance of the presidency in the European Union. How has the presidency – initially quite a modest function – been able to gain such a significant role for the EU proceedings? It managed to initiate far reaching projects, solve basic negotiating problems, or – until the Lisbon treaty – to represent the Union externally. What are the main challenges related to its preparations and how it is run? Answers to these questions seem to be necessary to capture the elements of the contemporary dispute over the political leadership in the European Union, narrowed down to the issue of the presidency and its institutional
role in the EU decision-making system. Hence, another question arises: What is the significance of the presidency for the general models of European integration? Understanding that would help us not only to explain the long-term integration trends, but would also provide a reference framework for practical projects that might be undertaken by future presidencies. The basic theory of European integration tested here is institutionalism in its various formulations.