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The paper deals with some important matters concerning economic and social models of Serbian way to the EU with some obstacles in this process. This paper analyses the role of trust in modern society too, as an indicator of social capital and a factor that can enhance economic growth and social well-being. Social and economic systems that feature efficient public sectors and flexible market structures tend to experience reasonably sustainable public finances, high economic growth, education standards and employment, and wellfunctioning markets. The findings of this note support calls for the comprehensive reform of fiscal policies, as well as of labour market.

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The subject of this research is the discourses on NATO in the Serbian parliament from 2000 to 2008. The discourses were constructed upon the empirical debate materials in the parliaments, speeches of Prime Minister Vojislav Koštunica and the statements of politicians given for media. Two discourses were present in this period. The first had promoted cooperation with NATO and was dominant by the end of 2007. The second discourse was against cooperation with NATO and became dominant after the adoption of the Resolution of Protection of Sovereignty, Territorial Integrity, and Constitutional Order of the Republic by which Serbia proclaimed military neutrality. The actors of the discourse that promoted cooperation with NATO were the Democratic Party, Civic Alliance of Serbia, G17 Plus, Serbian Renewal Movement, Liberal Democratic Party, and Alliance of Vojvodina Hungarians. The actors of the discourse that was against cooperation with NATO since 2007 were representatives of the opposition, this including the political parties such as the Serbian Radical Party, Socialist Party of Serbia and Democratic Party of Serbia. The discourse on NATO is highly politicized, i.e. politically open, and that is indicated by the change in dominance of the two discourses. In the following period, it is expected that the struggle in the political arena will continue on understanding of the values that are important for welfare in Serbia. This struggle will certainly reflect through defining of priorities in the foreign policy and the development of Serbia’s security.

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The effects of the financial crisis such as drop in financial activity, unemployment growth, inflation, and drastic currencies fall as well as abuse of financial systems increase the danger from money laundering and terrorism financing. Taking into account that this problem is global the only solution is a global one – harmonisation of international legislations and measures to fight money laundering in all world financial centres and implementation of international standards such as FATV forty recommendations.

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The presidential elections in Ukraine that took place in early 2010 are an important event in the internal polical life of this big East European country, while on the other hand, they will affect its foriegn policy position in the coming years. In this paper, the author has chosen to analyse the results of the elections by the Ukraine administrative regions. Thus, he concludes that in spite of the overall victory by Viktor Yanukovich by 3.5 per cent of votes gained in the second ballot over hitherto prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, tbe regional differences have remained outstanding. Actually, there is a prominent difference between the north-western part of the country where voters mostly support nationally-orientated political candidates and south-eastern part where voters mostly support pro-Russian ones.

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The paper discusses the factors relating to environmental crime that could provide opportunities in Serbia for cooperation of transnational and local organised crime entities. The analysis focuses on illegal trade in endangered species and illegal trafficking and disposal of hazardous waste as most profitable types of environmental crime in Serbia. The increasing demand in rich societies for illicit ecosystem goods, low risk of detection of environmental crime, inefficient control policy of organised crime and low level of environmental awareness, all reduce the risks for organised crime groups and generate enormous criminal profits. The author concludes that the emergence of environment-related criminal business in Serbia may pose serious and long-term threat to the environmental aspect of human security, and it ought to be urgently included in the security policy agenda.

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The global economic crisis has changed the relations between the state and the market. It seemed that there had been an optimal relation between regulation and free market mechanism, but in the last two years new architecture of financial regulation has been waited for. After the great shocks in autumn 2008. the state took unprecedented measures to revitalize markets and managed to foster economic recovery. However, in this process, public finance has worsened dramatically, so the market is again carefully eyed upon when implementing measures of economic policy.

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The paper presents an analysis of the main characteristics of Serbia’s foreign trade relations with African states in terms of volume, value, geographic and product structures, the economic feasibility analysis of improving the trade relations with African states and the completion of strategy of increasing exports, which the Government of Serbia adopted in June 2008. African countries since 2001. have a small share in total foreign trade of Serbia, on average 1-2% annually. Republic of Serbia has not concluded a trade agreement neither with African states, nor with the African regional economic communities, African Union or the African Economic Community. But there are long-term agreements on trade and economic cooperation, which former Yugoslavia concluded with some African states that are still in force and guarantee to the contracting parties the most favoured nation treatment. Serbia’s most important trading partners are Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Morocco and Algeria in North Africa; Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and the Seychelles in East Africa; Equatorial Guinea, Congo, DR Congo and Cameroon in Central Africa; Nigeria, Ghana and Ivory Coast in West Africa and the Republic of South Africa and Angola in South Africa. The Government strategy envisaged the export increase only to the countries of North Africa, although the increase of export to all five African regions is economically well founded.

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The subject of the paper is the presentation and analysis of Federal Republic of Germany’s (FRG) foreign cultural policy as well as its cultural organisations that carry out that policy towards Serbia. The author does it by analysing the characteristics of its cultural policy towards various states and especially the places, roles and significance that some institutions as the main agents of the German culture play in achieving the goals of this policy in building, promotion and improvement of mutual cultural relations and cooperation between Serbia and Germany. The paper will also discuss the notion of foreign cultural policy and its general characteristics, FR Germany’s foreign cultural policy, history, and the main features and objectives of that policy towards Serbia. The author has also analysed the role of some agents of the German culture in their field of acting abroad as intermediary institutions of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of FR Germany that is in charge of creating and pursuing the foreign policy. By describing and analysing the activities of these organisations one gets a clearer picture of the official foreign cultural policy Germany pursues towards Serbia and its characteristics. The analysis of the German foreign cultural policy and activities of some institutions as its intermediary shows the characteristics of the German cultural policy in general as well as the directives that these cultural policy leads towards our country.

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The author investigates whether the established political identity of the European Union is at present time a common denominator of the European identity. The research is based on the hypothesis that the European Union identity is being established as a political identity, which is grounded on the single European citizenship. Due to this, it provides necessary legitimacy to the European Union policy. The aim of this paper is to briefly review and critically analyse the discussion on building of the EU identity.

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The Lisbon Treaty has brought changes in the EU foreign policy activities. One of the most important innovations is the institution of High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. The article presents a short history of this institution, the appointment and dismissal procedure, mandate length, competences, the position in the Foreign Affairs Council, European Commission and in the European Council as s well as the High Representative’s relationship with the European Parliament. Special attention is given to the organization of the European External Action Service.

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After the Treaty of Lisbon entered into force the European Union has undergone significant reforms in the area of foreign policy. Intending to use the newly created institutions, this mainly including High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and President of the European Council, to improve the multilateral aspect of its international activities, in 2010, the European Union took initiative to reinforce its observer status in the United Nations and gain additional rights in the General Assembly. The study searches for the motives for transforming of the EU acting in the United Nations putting special emphasis on the factors that have, in the author’s view, made the influence of the block in this organisation the most prominent than it has ever been.

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Among the most important initial steps in transition to market economy the focus had been on stabilizing the monetary conditions and, therefore, foreign exchange rates. The weakening of the domicile currencies continued after the initial shock of transition, although with moderate intensity. In the mid-1990s, the trend of depreciation was completed. Since the second half of the 1990s until late 2008, most of the observed currencies recorded nominal (and real) appreciation. The global economic crisis leads to weakening of almost all East European currencies, but relatively quickly, in the early 2009, their stabilization and strengthening slightly began. Most Eastern European countries introduced more flexible exchange rate regimes and finally generally accepted (managed) floating exchange regimes, while Central European countries have implicitly and explicitly adopted the inflation targeting framework. Looking ahead, the currencies of the countries with balanced net trade positions are expected to continue their appreciation during the 2010-2014 period; however, a large number of currencies should be actually depreciated in order to service their net external debt in a sustainable way.

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Historically, the rules on international peace and security have always depended on the international structure system and relations among great powers. It was through the UN Charter and permanent membership in the Security Council that the end of World War II brought back to life the idea of great powers “concert”, which had been previously launched at the Vienna congress. Such an international legal and institutional arrangement has remained up to the present days in spite of some substantial changes in the international system. As a result of this, the informal hierarchy “contracts” took an advantage over the formal rules of international law, especially in interpreting the right to self-determination during and after the Cold war. The recent diminishing of the American power and the rise of other great powers, especially Russia, once again opens the question in what direction the international peace and security order are going to.