Berndt Katarina

Contrary to the expectations of Euro-skeptics, political leaders and parts of the expert community, neither the traditionalcentrist parties nor the right-wing populist parties (with the exception of France, Italy, Hungary and Poland) were able to conquerthe majority of the votes in the May 2019 elections to the European Parliament. On popularity and electoral support they concededto ‘green' parties - defenders of ecology and climate. The authors of the article point to the demographic renewal of voters andtheir activity on social networks during the election campaign. Among the factors that played an important role in mobilizing youngvoters who came to the ballot box to vote for the European Parliament, the average age of whose members is a solid 55 years,were the desire to protect the idea of Europe from the right-populist and nationalist parties and participation in mass protests ofschoolchildren, students, young people against the threat of global warming, held every Friday in many ‘old' EU countries. Thisled to a significant success of the European ‘green' parties, which received a record-breaking 74 mandates. The tools used byEuropean structures to inform voters about the entire spectrum of the political landscape of the EU countries are revealed. Theauthors believe that the important outcome of the European elections is not only the active participation of young people, but alsothe actual end of the two-party system that prevailed in the European Parliament and the complete political fragmentation of theEU legislature, which can lead to a violation of the long-term stability of this structure. The authors explain the modest results ofthe right-populist parties in the elections to the European Parliament by the explicit position of European youth, who believe in thefuture of a United Europe, oppose euroscepticism and separatism, populism and nationalism.

This article is based on an analysis of the strategic context of the sanctions policy in different historical periods and in various countries, as well as effectiveness of the sanctions mechanism itself. The authors show that in the course of several waves of sanctions policy directed against Russia, the European partners of the United States, under the powerful pressure of Washington, began to fully participate in the sanctions measures, which partly looked very formal. The article examines the experience of sanctions policy both from international organizations and the United States. Assessing the effects and analyzing the proportionality of sanctions measures compared with other methods of achieving political and geopolitical purposes, the authors point out the low effectiveness of Euro-Atlantic economic sanctions against the Russian Federation. Russia's implementation of countermeasures against Western countries, the introduction of the complete ban on food imports from the EU countries, caused enormous damage to the initiators of anti-Russian sanctions, especially to some European countries that suffered serious losses having big impact on the GDP of these countries. Contrary to the expectations of the initiators, the sanctions policy has had a healing effect on the Russian agro-complex. While tens of thousands of jobs were lost in the EU countries, in Russia new jobs were created, and the country strengthened its food security.

The migration crisis that started in the European Union in 2015 is the topic of the most actual and urgent political debates in Europe nowadays. The article analyses the main reasons of this crisis which can be found in the security issues and the long-term military conflicts in various countries of the Middle and Near East and Africa. The authors underline the related international legal problems and the malfunctioning of the all-European structures. The EU's collaboration with Turkey in terms of the all-European border protection from the massive illegal immigration from Turkey is critically evaluated. The article shows clearly the ambiguity of the current migration policy in the European Union, for whom on the one hand, the migration is regarded as a social, economic and demographic resource and on the other hand, as the factor of pressure on the welfare system.

The low voter turnout during the European parliamentary elections of 2014 demonstrated the attitude of Europe's citizens towards the common European idea. Eastern Europe especially virtually ignored the elections by its very low electoral participation, despite the fact that these countries were Europe's main beneficiaries after joining the EU in receiving tremendous subsidies. The article focuses on the phenomenon of “euro-fatigue” and euroskepticism. The authors' goal is to analyze the results of the European elections and to show the correlation between voter passivity and a growing centralization and bureaucratization in Brussels' processes of economic and political decision-making. Special attention is paid on the main results of the 2014 European elections, which garnered unprecedented support for right-wing populist and Eurosceptic parties in countries like France, Germany, Belgium and Denmark. The authors emphasize the possible consequences of the ongoing economic crisis that may result in a division of the eurozone into two parts: a strong northern euro and a weak southern euro. They also concentrate on the lack of transparency and efficiency in the work of such European Union institutions such as the European parliament (an institution represented by more than 160 European participating parties) and the European commission (which is still formed by appointments from all 28 EU member states). The authors conclude that Europe is unlikely to move towards further integration if its citizens are no longer living on the ideal of further European association and in fact are becoming increasingly demanding a return almost by all, without exception, of competency of governance to national governments.

Global immigration made significant changes to Western Europe's ethnic and confessional appearance during the last decades. The presented paper aims to analyze adaptation problems with cultural minorities in Europe, in particular with young Turks in Germany. Just like other EU countries, the German society also suffers from social, cultural and political problems caused by a huge portion of young Muslims not willing to become integrated into the German social and cultural world. The authors admonish of the danger that Germany might face having developed complete „parallel societies“ within its own society and state that many Turks born in Germany (members of the second and third generation there) have identity problems that may cause serious consequences. Special attention is paid to the necessary changes of Germany's integration policy and state measures to stimulate the mutual intercultural adaptation.

A comparative analysis of the European level of intolerance on the basis of a poll is conducted by the Bielefeld research group in Germany and the European Friedrich Ebert Research Foundation. The conclusions are about the impact of xenophobia in the political life of Europe.