Digital Single Market as an Element in EU-Georgian Cooperation

<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">The digital single market is one of the most important objectives and challenges for the European Union. However, given that digitalisation implies a borderless world it requires a different form of governance and has distinctive features from other aspects of the single market. In addition, it raises a number of practical and political issues for countries outside the EU, but which maintain close economic and trade relations with the latter. The article examines the regulatory implications of the digital world from the point of view of states involved in the European Neighbourhood Policy, in particular Georgia, and looks into the future challenges in this process.</abstract>

Faculty of Economics and Political Sciences, School of Political Sciences Economics and Political Sciences Building

The European Union Digital Single Market—Challenges and Impact for the EU Neighbourhood States

<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">The aim of this article is to examine the impact religion has had on the post-Soviet economic development of Georgia and Estonia. The role of religion in economic development has been neglected in the field of social sciences, in which political and economic theories dominate. Considering the difference in the religiosity of the two countries—Georgia is one of the most religious countries in Europe while Estonia is the most atheist—religion will be incorporated as a factor that could have directly or indirectly impacted the post-Soviet development of the two countries. By studying the relationship of the church and the state in the two countries and the population’s economic attitudes that may have been influenced by their religiosity, this paper will conclude that religion can be considered a contributing factor in the economic divergence between Estonia and Georgia. The article’s overall findings will suggest that the practice of Eastern Orthodoxy in Georgia impedes the development of good governance and a free market economy, whereas the opposite holds for Protestantism or atheism in Estonia.</abstract>

Beyond Neoclassical Economics: The Impact of Religion on the Economic Disparity Between Georgia and Estonia

<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">This study analyses China’s One Belt, One Road (OBOR) initiative for the Baltic and South Caucasus countries. Trade, Foreign Direct Investments and transit potential are taken as main factors for the cooperation. A clash of China and the West in pursuing economic leadership is taken into account. The study suggests a new, alternative route for the OBOR initiative through the Caucasus, which has all the needed infrastructure and readiness for being started. Moreover, Georgia is not new to the EU preferences, it has experience of GSP+ and now the unique achievement of free trade regimes with the EU and China is also taken as an alternative route and an advantage for the Caucasus and the Baltic States.</abstract>

The Caucasus 3 Plus the Baltic 3 and Economic Cooperation with China

<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">The Baltic people of Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia gained recognition with their successful use of a cultural tool, singing folkloric songs, to protest collectively against their common Soviet oppressor in the summer of 1988, preceding the collapse of the Soviet Union. Rational-choice theorists have argued that large rebellious movements are paradoxical because the larger the number of potential revolutionaries, the greater the leadership, participation, and coordination problems they face (Olson, 1971; Tullock, 1974). This paper investigates Estonia’s Singing Revolution and illustrates how ethnic Estonians used their shared cultural beliefs and singing traditions as a tacit, informal institutional solution to overcome the collective-action problems with organizing and participating in mass singing protests against the Soviet regime. The paper goes further to extend the standard rational-choice framework and to include a more dynamic, entrepreneurial-institutional perspective on socio-cultural change by accounting for the role of cultural leaders as cultural entrepreneurs, a subset of institutional entrepreneurs. The success of Estonia’s Singing Revolution can be ultimately attributed to leadership in the form of cultural entrepreneurship going back to pre-Soviet Estonian times. The revived legacy of ancient shared beliefs, folkloric practices, and singing tradition represented the necessary social capital for the Estonian people to voice collectively shared preferences for political and economic governance during a window of constitutional opportunity. Mikhail Gorbachev’s Glasnost, a policy aimed to improve Soviet formal institutions by fostering freedom of speech and political transparency, also provided a context propitious for the Singing Revolution because it lowered the perceived costs of participation in the rebellious singing and opened a window of opportunity for political change.</abstract>

Cultural Leadership and Entrepreneurship As Antecedents of Estonia’s Singing Revolution and Post-Communist Success

<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">The article explores the sources of the idea of nation as it is encoded in the legislative framework of the Pole’s Card and its implications for the processes of identity-making taking place beyond the eastern borders of the Polish state. Given the problems with defining the role of the historical Polish diaspora in the East, the question of the conceptualization of national belonging is significant and has practical consequences at the macro-, meso- and micro-levels. The argument of the paper is twofold: (1) On the one hand, the document of the Pole’s Card reflects a specific inclusive—”cultural”— conception of the nation. In this conception, which is forged by the Polish policymakers, the conditions whereby the national belonging can be achieved are widely conceived. (2) On the other hand, the administrative decision-making process and the diplomatic practice of granting the Card prioritizes and executes the exclusive conception of the nation with its limited ethnic, religious (Roman Catholic) and linguistic background. This way, the document of the Pole’s Card becomes a legal device for establishing new social distinctions in societies of Poland’s eastern neighbours. By discussing this case on the ground, this paper hopes to demonstrate the ways in which the new creative notions of the nationhood are forged in Poland.</abstract>

’National Belonging’ in Legal and Diplomatic Formulas: The Pole’s Card as a Legacy of Poland’s Colonial History

<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">On 28 March 2018, the European Commission published a press release stating that there is a plan to revoke all.eu domains owned by the United Kingdom’s individuals and entities due to Britain’s exit from the European Union. The article highlights issues related to the process of the UK leaving the EU, gives examples from other fields of the Union law and the national law of the Member States which have experienced similar situations and also points out the fundamental rights that the Commission needs to comply with. The basics of domain names are also partially covered to inform the reader about what domain names are based on and of existing regulations in the field.</abstract>

.eu regulations under Brexit

<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">In the context of the EU’s Digital Single Market (eHealth) Strategy, the deployment of digital tools for patients’ empowerment and person-centred care is of high demand and importance. Shifting from treatment to health promotion and disease prevention, a variety of internet-based cognitive behavioural therapy programmes have been proven to be effective for managing common mental health disorders in secondary care even hough the effectiveness and the clinical use of internet-based cognitive behavioural therapy programmes alone in primary care have not been approved yet. Additionally, such interventions are neither included in the international clinical guidelines for treating common mental health disorders nor regulated by Member States as a healthcare service. Despite that, the UK National Health Service and the Swedish National Board of Health and Welfare endorse the use of internet-based cognitive behavioural therapy as a first treatment option. The aim of this research is to investigate the global experience of internet-based cognitive behavioural therapy programmes in controlled and real-life conditions in general practice and to evaluate the reliability of the results and concomitantly their compliance with the European Commission’s eHealth Strategy. A systematic review of quantitative studies was conducted from January 2007 to December 2017. The results indicated that unsupported internet-based cognitive behavioural therapy programmes alone are less effective than combined therapy options for treatment purposes, if no additional therapy is prescribed. Guided internet-based cognitive behavioural therapy may supplement traditional treatment methods resulting in improving the control of mental disorders, but are unable to demonstrate consistent quality or replace face-to-face therapy.</abstract>

Department of Family Medicine, Faculty of Medicine

A Review Article on Internet-based Psychological Interventions in Primary Care. What is the Global Experience? How Reliable are Results from RCTs? Lessons Learned from the European, US and Australian Case Studies

<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">The article seeks to assess policy options of the Eastern Partnership Policy in stimulating long-term change in the partner countries. It argues that the policy has limited power to directly promote consolidation of democratic and market economy institutions or implementation of sectoral reforms. This is due to the embeddedness and mutual reinforcement of existing institutions in the partner countries. Instead, the Eastern Partnership Policy can create new dynamics of change by altering the outcomes of day-to-day interactions of a large number of individuals and organisations. In this regard, removal of barriers to travel, trade and participation in the EU programmes is an overdue (albeit too small) step in the right direction.</abstract>

European promises: policy options of Eastern partnership policy

AHEAD OF PRINT

Volume 13 (2023): Issue 2 (December 2023)

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Volume 9 (2019): Issue 4 (December 2019)

Volume 9 (2019): Issue 3 (September 2019)

Volume 9 (2019): Issue 2 (September 2019)

Volume 9 (2019): Issue 1 (June 2019)

Volume 8 (2018): Issue 2 (September 2018)

Volume 8 (2018): Issue 1 (June 2018)

Volume 7 (2017): Issue 2 (October 2017)

Volume 7 (2017): Issue 1 (June 2017)

Volume 6 (2016): Issue 2 (October 2016)

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Volume 5 (2015): Issue 2 (October 2015)

Volume 5 (2015): Issue 1 (February 2015)

Volume 4 (2014): Issue 2 (October 2014)

Volume 4 (2014): Issue 1 (June 2014)

Volume 3 (2013): Issue 3 (December 2013)

Volume 3 (2013): Issue 2 (October 2013)

Volume 3 (2013): Issue 1 (June 2013)

TalTech Journal of European Studies

 TalTech Journal of European Studies (abbreviation TJES) is a semiannual international peer-reviewed research journal (formerly known as the Baltic Journal of European Studies and Proceedings of the Institue for European Studies) with an international editorial office and extensive international editorial board. The journal is abstracted in SCOPUS, Web of Science (Emerging Sources Citation Index) and other relevant databases. Since 2020, the scope of the journal is related to digitalisation and technology implementation and their impact in the social, legal, political, economic and cultural domains in the European Union and its Member States. We kindly encourage members of the academic community to contribute to our journal. Papers submitted to the forthcoming issues will be reviewed by eminent scholars in the particular field under strict supervision of the international editorial board. Special issues   BJES 2013 Vol. 3 Issue 3 was guest co-edited by Natalia Chaban and Martin Holland (University of Canterbury, New Zealand)  BJES 2014 Vol. 4 Issue 2 was prepared in cooperation with Latvian European Community Studies Association (LECSA)  BJES 2017 Vol. 7 Issue 2 has been supported by the European Commission’s Jean Monnet Module “Digital Single Market as a New Core of European Union Studies”, project reference number 587255-EPP-1-2017-1-EE-EPPJMO-MODULE.   BJES 2018 Vol. 8 Issues 1 and 2 have been supported by the project ‘Digital Single Market as a Key Element in EU-oriented Georgian Higher Education’ (no. 155-2016-A), funded by the Estonian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the framework of Development Cooperation and Humanitarian Aid. TJES 2023 Vol. 13 Issue 1 was guest edited by Viktorija Skvarciany (Vilnius Gediminas Technical University, Lithuania).      Why submit  TJES is an effective channel of academic dissemination as it is widely read and distributed through Baltic and European research networks and libraries and read by policy makers as well.  Archiving  Sciendo archives the contents of this journal in Portico - digital long-term preservation service of scholarly books, journals and collections.  Plagiarism Policy  The editorial board is participating in a growing community of Similarity Check System's users in order to ensure that the content published is original and trustworthy. Similarity Check is a medium that allows for comprehensive manuscripts screening, aimed to eliminate plagiarism and provide a high standard and quality peer-review process. 