Introduction

In the mid nineteenth century, scientists started to investigate human mental life experimentally. The mind had, up until this point, mainly been the topic of theoretical or logical discussion or, when empirical, based on the everyday observations of thinking and feeling. Now, however, the new methods and equipment of laboratory science were turned towards the investigation of the mind. But though the methods of science were mobilised in this direction, this did not mean that the investigators in this new field had completely jettisoned philosophical ideas about the mind as put forward by some of their predecessors. Indeed, as we shall see in this chapter, developments in the scientific approach to mind were explicitly informed by philosophical theories and the resulting empirical work was an attempt to make concrete the theoretical ideas of certain philosophers. Two philosophers in particular had an important influence on the development of physiological psychology. One of them was Kant, who has already been discussed in Chapter 6; the other is Spinoza.

INTRODUCTION

Union citizenship was introduced in 1992 by the Treaty of Maastricht. In the course of the two decades since then, Union citizenship has become one of the Union’s most ambitious legal projects. Union citizenship is, in the words of the Court, “destined to be the fundamental status of nationals of the Member States.”

Today, Union citizenship is considered not only an emblematic showpiece of evolutionary progress in European integration, but also tangible proof that the Union has transcended its original confines as a regional trade organization. Yet it is noteworthy that there have been important initiatives predating the Maastricht Treaty that created rights for individuals beyond a narrow economic scope. As early as 1951, Walter Hallstein, the Commission’s first President, described the freedom of movement of workers in the European Coal and Steel Community as coming close to what he called a European citizenship; and, in 1968, the Commission’s Vice-President, Lionello Levi-Sandri, declared that the free movement of economically active persons “represents something more important and more exacting than the free movement of a factor of production. It represents rather an incipient form – still embryonic and imperfect – of European citizenship.” And, indeed, the Union’s early legislation on worker mobility has moved beyond the narrow framework of mere economic mobility. Regulation 1612/68 (1968), for example, granted broad equal treatment rights not only for workers but also for their families in areas such as social and tax advantages and access to the education system. The underlying assumption was that workers would not exercise their mobility rights if they were treated like second-class citizens. Advocate General Jacobs took the view in Konstantinidis (1993) that:

INTRODUCTION

The freedom of movement for workers is a core feature of the European Union and, from its inception, distinguished it from other regional economic organizations. The European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC, 1951) established the mobility of workers in the coal and steel sectors. The Treaty of Rome (1957) provided for the gradual establishment of a general freedom of movement of workers in the EEC. Article 48(1) EEC provided: “Freedom of movement for workers shall be secured within the Community by the end of the transitional period at the latest.” Even before the end of the transitional period in 1969, the Community institutions began to implement the Treaty provisions governing the free movement of workers. An early example is Directive 64/221/EEC on the “co-ordination of special measures concerning the movement and residence of foreign nationals which are justified on grounds of public policy, public security or public health.” It limited the discretionary powers of the Member States to restrict movement of the citizens of other Member States. One of the most important acts of legislation was Regulation 1612/68, spelling out the principle of equal treatment with regard to employment. Directive 68/360/EEC, furthermore, eliminated many restrictions on movement and residence, creating movement and residence rights which, a few years later in the 1970s, were extended to self-employed persons (see Chapter 6 below). The early European legislative measures aimed at establishing a far-reaching principle of equal treatment which the Court then further generalized. In Sagulo (1977), the Court held that “community law . . . is based on the freedom of movement of persons and, apart from certain exceptions, on the general application of the principle of equal treatment with nationals.” It extended the principle of equal treatment to areas that it held to be important to facilitate mobility and the integration of the worker and his or her family into the host society.

Introduction

In the previous chapter we saw how pragmatism emphasised the connection of ideas with their practical consequences and how functionalism, exemplified in the work of Dewey, applied this approach to psychology. For the functionalists, mental states had to be understood in terms of the functions that they performed, and these functions were a matter of allowing an organism to survive in its environment. The idea of a pure realm of consciousness, completely divorced from the practical demands of action, was rejected; mental states could only be studied validly in connection with the behaviour to which they were intrinsically connected. This strain of thought was taken to a more radical conclusion by behaviourism. To the most radical of the behaviourists – and both J. B. Watson and B. F. Skinner, two of the thinkers to be discussed in this chapter, described themselves as radical behaviourists – functionalism had not gone far enough. It was not simply the case, as the functionalists had argued, that one cannot talk about mental states without also talking about behaviour, but that so-called ‘mental states’ were nothing more than types of behaviour. Before examining the ideas of Watson and Skinner, however, we turn to one of the important precursors of behaviourism, E. L. Thorndike.

Introduction

In the previous chapter we saw that one of the crucial assumptions behind cognitivism was what Fodor called methodological solipsism. This is the idea, ultimately deriving from Descartes, that the mind is to be understood in its own terms rather than in terms of its connection to the environment. The nature, even the existence, of an environment external to the mind is as irrelevant to a description of its operations as it would be to the description of a computer’s programe: the program is still the same program regardless of what is going on outside the computer.

We also saw that one of the corollaries of this view was that all the constraints and structuring of behaviour could not be seen as the effects of environmental or situational factors because these were considered irrelevant to the actual nature of the mind. Structure, even the structure of overt behaviour, had to come from inside the mind. Fodor puts it thus:

INTRODUCTION

Article 49(1) TFEU provides:

It grants individuals the right to establish themselves in another Member State to pursue an economic activity on a self-employed basis. The Court held in Gebhard (1995) that the rationale of the freedom of establishment is “allowing a [Union] national to participate, on a stable and continuous basis, in the economic life of a Member State other than his State of origin and to profit therefrom, so contributing to economic and social interpenetration within the [Union] in the sphere of activities as self-employed persons.”

According to the EEC Treaty, freedom of establishment had to be implemented over the course of the transitional period, which ended in December 1969. This process was laid down in the “General Programme for the abolition of restrictions on freedom of establishment” (1962). In particular, the General Programme mapped out the liberalization of the various economic sectors through numerous legislative measures. By the early 1970s, broad economic sectors, including commerce, industry and crafts, had been opened up to European competition. After the transitional period had ended, the freedom of establishment became directly effective. As a consequence, the Court became increasingly relevant in the continuing integration of the European markets. This was particularly the case in areas where no consensus among the Member States for harmonizing measures could be found.

Introduction

The idea that species changed through evolution was one that preceded Darwin by a good many years, perhaps even centuries. Traces of such ideas can be found as far back as the works of Aristotle and evolutionary ideas were particularly prevalent among eighteenth-century naturalists, such as Buffon (1707–88). Pre-Darwinian approaches to evolution were not necessarily inimical to religion and many saw evolution as the unfolding of God’s design; it was creation in action. This meant that nature had a purpose: the instantiation of the divine plan through evolution. Humanity, as the pinnacle of God’s creative plan was, therefore, the last to emerge from the evolutionary process.

The fundamental idea behind these approaches to evolution was that of progress. The evolutionary process was understood as naturally tending towards the appearance of more and more sophisticated species. Even those who rejected the idea of a divine plan and who had a secular understanding of evolution nevertheless held it to be something progressive. One of these theorists was Herbert Spencer (1820–1903), one of the most influential and widely read scientists and philosophers of the nineteenth century. It was Spencer who was the first thinker to bring the idea of evolution to bear on psychology in a major way.

Introduction

Wilhelm Wundt (1832–1920) is generally regarded as the father of experimental psychology. A glance at the opening chapter of virtually any introductory psychology textbook, which usually contains a brief history of psychology, will almost certainly refer the importance of his book Principles of Physiological Psychology (1874; English translation by E. B. Titchener, 1910) and, in particular, of the laboratory that he set up in Leipzig in 1879. The Leipzig laboratory is usually held to be the first experimental psychology laboratory and was important not only for the research that was carried out there, but for the large number of psychologists, both European and American, that trained there. For many psychologists in America, a trip to Leipzig to learn the new experimental methods was an important part of their education.

But the questions that Wundt sought to answer through these laboratory techniques cannot be fully understood in isolation from his philosophical presuppositions, and these, as Wundt himself says in the Preface to Principles of Physiological Psychology, owed much to Kant. In Chapter 6 we saw how Kant and Hume differed in how they sought to account for our experience. For Hume, experience essentially consisted of elementary sensations that were linked together through a mechanical process of association. Kant, on the other hand, believed that one could never account for the ordered nature of experience in this way. The fundamental flaw of empiricism, for Kant, was its willingness to accept sensory experience as fundamental rather than recognising that there must be even more fundamental structuring principles lying behind sensory experience for it to exist in the first place.

Preface

The sheer amount of information available to today’s psychology student, and the ease with which that information can be obtained, is greater than it has ever been in the past. Though this is no doubt a blessing, it is not without its dangers. In particular, it is easy for the student to become bogged down in a mass of facts and details with little appreciation of how everything fits together. Knowing disjointed facts, no matter how vast that knowledge may be, does not constitute understanding. It is only when that knowledge is embedded within an overarching framework that understanding occurs. Knowledge of the historical and philosophical foundations of psychology provides such a framework.

But in order to achieve this, the historical and philosophical foundations of psychology cannot themselves be presented in a bitty and disjointed fashion. There must be some sort of narrative, not just a bunch of ideas and theories. There must be an indication of how ideas fit together, and of the pervasive influence of certain core ideas that resurface at various points throughout the history of psychology. That is what I have tried to do in this book.

Introduction

The Gestaltists, as we saw in the previous chapter, argued against the psychological atomism that was inherent in both classical empiricism, of which Titchener was the modern incarnation, and Kantianism, of which Wundt was the representative. They were not, however, the only ones to find fault with these views: William James also disagreed with atomism. His approach, however, derived not from the Aristotle-influenced descriptive psychology of Brentano but from empiricism itself. For James, as we shall see, classical empiricism of the type exemplified by the likes of Locke and Hume was simply not empiricist enough. It had claimed to be true to the facts of experience, but had failed to live up to its own principles. It had, for example, claimed that experience was made up of atomistic sensations when no such things were ever actually found in our experience. If only, thought James, empiricists had had the courage of their convictions, they would have seen that our mental life does not consist of discrete elements but is an interconnected flux. It was a more radical empiricism, one that really did try to do justice to the facts of experience, that lay at the foundation of James’s approach to psychology. The essence of this anti-atomistic approach to consciousness is exemplified in James’s central idea of the stream of consciousness.

Preface

The business environment of Europe is dynamic and exciting for companies and their managers, and for students of business who learn about them. For scholars, the topic presents interesting areas of research with respect to the region’s strengths and weaknesses relative to other parts of the world. It is also of interest to European policymakers and government officials seeking to improve the economic welfare of their constituents. And of course, the subject is fascinating for the casual but curious observer trying to make sense of newspaper headlines, and tourists who notice different products, currencies, and shop opening hours. In short, there are many reasons why one might want to learn more about business in Europe.

There are several reasons why this book is well-suited to accomplish this task. The first is the unique approach taken to this subject. As will be discussed in more detail in Chapter 1, Europe is a region under pressure to be both homogeneous and heterogeneous. There are tensions between reducing differences across national business environments through the European Union (EU), while maintaining the characteristics that make Europe a fascinating mosaic of people, history, culture, and values. It is impossible to fully appreciate the complexity of Europe’s business environment by focusing on only one of these levels. There are many excellent books on the political economy of the EU and its regulatory impact on business, but they tend to leave country-level analyses out of their discussion. Other books provide in-depth examinations of a particular country or group of countries, but this focus on specific trees leaves out the broader view of the forest, which gives a student or business executive an incomplete picture of Europe’s business environment.

The business environment of Eastern Europe has changed more rapidly than any area in the region over the past quarter of a century. The end of the Cold War transformed the economic and political systems of a vast swathe of countries, from Estonia in the north to Bulgaria in the south. The end of the Soviet Union’s influence over this region allowed individual countries to experiment with different economic models and political institutions, adapting those that best fit their unique circumstances. The path has been bumpy for most countries. Abandoning decades of communist economic policies and political authoritarianism is challenging, since interest groups that benefited under the previous regimes often sought to resist change, and many citizens have yet to enjoy the benefits of economic reform. But to many observers, enlarging the EU eastward is one of the organization’s greatest accomplishments, since it has peacefully integrated a large portion of the continent into a wider community of countries that share similar values and expectations for the future.

Eastern Europe: from World War II to 1989

During the final months of World War II, Soviet troops marched westward toward Germany. Once the war in Europe ended in May 1945, Soviet troops maintained control over the lands they occupied, much as US, British, and French forces did in Western Europe. With a new rivalry between the US and Soviet Union looming, the stage was set for a division of Europe that would last until the Berlin Wall fell in 1989 (see Map 7.1).

The European Union (EU) is the most complex and influential international organization in the world. In no other organization have member countries agreed to yield as much power and share decision-making in so many areas. Since the 1648 Treaty of Westphalia, the notion of national sovereignty has held that nation-states are the primary units in international affairs, and that national governments are ultimately responsible for the security and welfare of their citizens. But the lessons learned from centuries of conflict, culminating in the tragedies associated with World War I and World War II, have driven Europeans to develop a new model of political organization, economic cooperation, and policymaking. Its basic premise is that cooperation across a range of areas is the best way to improve their citizens’ welfare. While the process of European integration has had its share of setbacks, there is little doubt that, over the past sixty years, the region has benefited tremendously – in economic, social, and political terms – from this novel and courageous experiment. An understanding of the origins, rationale, workings, and influence of the EU is essential to fully appreciate the structure of Europe’s business environment.

Why learn about the EU?

At the university-level, courses on the EU tend to be found in political science or history departments. Some law schools offer courses on EU law. Business schools tend to focus on functional areas (e.g. finance or marketing), with material on the EU usually relegated to a segment of an international business course. But even for students of business, having basic knowledge of EU history and structure is useful for at least two reasons. First, familiarity with the organization’s development and the major milestones in its history allows us to understand what the EU is today and what it may develop into in the coming decades. This matters because the EU’s impact on business is significant and growing, not just within Europe, but globally, given the organization’s impact on trade, investment, regulations, and international affairs. Accordingly, this chapter summarizes the main events that shaped European integration: the reasons for the creation of the EU in the 1950s; successes in its early years; the challenges of the 1970s; its resurgence in the mid-1980s; events following the end of the Cold War; and responses to globalization and the recent economic and financial crisis.