sustainable development by reducing the energy use by EU:s directive of energy efficiency and the UN Convention. The second purpose is to present the technical solutions regarding ventilation and heating system that is being used in passive houses. This was done using 8 passive houses, 4 germany and 4 swedish passive houses. Even the international and Swedish system requirements for passive houses have been addressed in this project. The goal was also to explain how and why the mechanical system in passive houses has developed to the technology used today.

This thesis aim to advance the Liberal Integrovernmentalism (LIG) developed byAndrew Moravcsik in order to order to explain how the European Court of Justice (ECJ) can make de facto EU policies diverge from what was originally intended by the Member States. More specifically it describes how the Posting of Workers Directive, Directive 96/71/EC, originally was created to shield certain Member States and their respective systems of regulating the labour market from pressure arising from the posting of workers form low-wage countries inside the EU. However, through a series of cases in the ECJ the de facto policy of the directive has changed and it is now in itself a potential threat against these systems. The Member States now find themselves caught in a ?Joint-Decision Trap?, unable to rectify the situation even though their original agreement has been turned on its head.

The aging population is a challenge for Europe and there must be cooperation between EU member states to join the challenge to meet. The purpose of this study is to describe and analyze the EU's ability to influence older people's health, based on experiences from a selection of European officials and on a review of the EU's common strategies. The authors studied and problematize the implementation of the strategies that the EU has negotiated for the work against the elderly poor health, with a view of member countries have different conditions. Using qualitative methods, we have collected and processed statements from targeted interviews and publications by a range of European policies. The material was then analyzed from implementation theory and organizational theory, and based on results of previous research. The result shows that the EU is developing common strategies and coordination methods to the aforementioned challenge to meet. The results also show that the differences existing between Member States causes implementation difficulties of the common strategies. The study states ultimately decide that there should be common strategies to facilitate the work of Member States when it comes to countering the elderly poor health.

This thesis analyzes the effects of export subsidies on Swedish cereal export. The analyzes are based on data on cereal export from Sweden to countries outside the EU from 1990 to 2003. In 1995 Sweden became a member of the European Union. Before the membership, the Swedish agricultural policy was decoupled in a larger sense than the European CAP was, which means that the Swedish producers had decreased their production more than the European farmers. When Sweden became a member of the EU the production started to increase again to an EU level.

This study examines regional integration in Africa with a focus on the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, COMESA. COMESA, with roots that go back to the beginning of the 1980?s, is one of the largest and most diverse areas for regional integration in Africa and has currently 19 member countries. The goal of the COMESA co-operation is to become a fully integrated area by the year 2025 that will merge into the African Union (AU). AU will then, in turn, create a fully integrated African continent in a not too far away future.

AbstractThe purpose of this thesis is to describe and analyse Europol. The research questions are:- How would increased powers for Europol impact on the cooperation between Europol and police authorities in EU-member states?- Which one of the two theories transactionalism and neofunctionalism can best create an understanding of Europol and its integration with the police of the member states?In so doing the study applies a qualitative method.Europol is the European Police Office and it was established through the Maastricht treaty in 1992 with the purpose of making the integration between police of the EU member states more efficient. In order for Europol to make integration between the police of member states more efficient it can be suggested that it needs for Europol to develop into having executive powers.One conclusion of this study is that Europol is an important tool for integration in the EU but there are at least three issues that are influencing the level of effectiveness in the integration work between the police of the member states; possible mistrust, that Europol has no executive powers and that it is voluntary for member states to participate in assisting Europol with information. Another conclusion is that Europol can be understood through an integration perspective when transactionalism and neofunctionalism are complementing each other..

The process of European Integration and creation of the single market revealed many questions and boundaries on the development and improvement of the European Social Policy. Pension?s sustainability has become the priority issue especially during the EU enlargement processes. Different policy instruments and institutions available to governments of Member States in realization of social objectives resulted in a growing diversity of pension polices which produced different combinations of public and private provisions - ?private-public hybrids? , with the state exercising different degrees of influence in their development.

There are no set guidelines on how to interpret the criteria?s in the adjustment rule within the meaning of the companies act. The criteria?s are not discussed in literature and the Swedish case law in this area is very limited. A reason for the limited use of the adjustment rule is the slow and very costly process, which does not grantee the outcome of the case.

In 1993 the internal market within the European Union was formed and ensured free movement of goods, services, capital and people. This led to the removal of trade barriers between members of the European Union. When opening up for competition, price differences between countries decreased and more jobs were created. A single currency was introduced by eleven countries in 1999 with the goal of reducing transaction costs, eliminating exchange rate risk and to further simplify trade. In 2001 Greece joined the collaboration and introduced the euro.

This study examines whether the policy breadth and the alternatives in European politics affect variations in voter turnout between member states in elections to the European Union Parliament.The theoretical approach assumes that; a larger political polarization, an increase in EU-skeptical parties and a greater voting mobilization among groups with less means results in higher voter turnout figures. The study also consider four other variables; whether the election is held on weekends or weekdays, whether elections coincide with other national elections, whether a country has held the presidential of the EU during or the immediate term prior to the election and finally the turnout figures from national elections.The research design is based upon a quantitative analysis using data from EP elections, national elections and databases from the European Elections Studies (EES). Study unit is twelve member-state countries and their four latest EP elections (1994, 1999, 2004 and 2009). The selected member-states origin from the EU-15 excluding Belgium, Greece and Luxembourg due to their compulsory voting laws.The study found relationships between higher turnout figures in EP-elections and increase in EU-skeptical parties, greater mobilization among groups with less means, elections held on weekends, elections coinciding with other, national elections and an increase in voter figures in national elections..

2005 was the year that all of the 25 member states in the European Union were to ratify the treaty of a constitution for Europe. The year did, however, offer a series of unexpected and slightly shocking events as both France and the Netherlands voted no to the constitution. Because of this the already planned referendums across many of the other member states were either postponed indefinately or the debates simply died down. The fact that two of the most pro-EU countries didn?t ratify the constitution was not only something that certainly raised the question of how future referendums in other, more EU-negative, states would turn out, but it could also be seen as harsh criticism against the EU as a whole.This is a theory consuming study, as it uses different theories of integration to explain the development of the EU, which in turn supports and strengthens the essay's conclusion.

This thesis studies two instruments within EC-law, affecting asylum issues, the Schengen Convention and the Dublin Regulation. These instruments are developed as a result of the free movement of persons in the European Union, and the development of the free internal market. The member states are afraid of losing control of who is residing within their borders, as their border controls has been removed, and these instruments are made to protect the member states now that their own means of control are gone. The thesis explains the relationship between the free movement and asylum issues and shows the connection between them. Its focus is aimed at the free movement of workers and how the European court of justice has interpreted article 39 to increase the workers ability to move within the union.

The European Union has created a common plan regarding narcotics use and abuse within the European member states. The aim here is to reduce the supply and demand for drugs among the citizens of the Union. However, the opinions on how to achieve these goals greatly differ among member states. The range of attitudes varies from the strictly restrictive attitudes of countries such as Sweden, to the complete decriminalization of personal possession of all narcotic substances in Portugal. The purpose of this paper is therefore to study the underlying attitudes and approaches that these two countries have, and hopefully to give some light to how come there is this big difference in legal frameworks regarding a rather delicate political question.

The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the European certificate of succession, and how it affects Swedish inheritance law. The European certificate of succession is a European document that will be introduced in august 2015 in the EU regulation of succession. The certificate of succession is meant to simplify the current process of cross-border inheritance by legitimizing the concerned parties, which according to the regulation are: heirs, legatees, executors of wills and administrators of the estate. According to the regulation, the member state of which the deceased had habitual residence shall have jurisdiction to rule on the succession as a whole. Since the certificate is a European document, it will have legal effect in all member states.

In 1993 the internal market within the European Union was formed and ensured free movement of goods, services, capital and people. This led to the removal of trade barriers between members of the European Union. When opening up for competition, price differences between countries decreased and more jobs were created. A single currency was introduced by eleven countries in 1999 with the goal of reducing transaction costs, eliminating exchange rate risk and to further simplify trade. In 2001 Greece joined the collaboration and introduced the euro.