The European internal market of electricity is not yet uniform, although it has been moving toward this direction for the last two decades. The energy market position of the consumers has been strengthening, the liquidity and the cross-border trade of the European electricity markets has been increasing. The stronger competition limited the wholesale prices. Despite the backsliding or stagnating household and industrial consumption, however, the retail prices and the costs have been increasing. The EU has to carry on reforming the electricity market in order to satisfy the need for more flexible energy-systems, to increase the competition, to make the consumers react to price changes in a more flexible way, to create more cost-effective governmental/market measures to handle price volatilities, to finance investments, and to minimise cost increases. The most recent comprehensive recommendations of the European Committee intend to create a new electricity market model, however, it yet remains to see the reception of these on behalf of the member countries.

Journal of Economic Literature (JEL) code: Q48

Nowadays, the so-called disadvantages of urbanization – the noise, air pollution, overcrowding – receive more and more focus in cities. Vehicles require increasing space to themselves in cities which decrease the quality of living space people need, which is harmful from the point of view of the society and the economy, as well. Sustainable urban mobility can be a solution, which has two elements: the well-known environmentally friendly public transportation and the less known walkability. The latter comes to the front in the course of the preparation of sustainable city development strategies, nevertheless walkability measurements have been taken principally in USA’s and Western-Europe’s big cities. In our paper we search for the answer of the question, how the concept of walkability is interpretable in middle-sized European cities and what kind of city development potentials do all these have. In the course of our research
primary surveys were conducted in Szeged and Valencia to investigate walkability and its improvement opportunities. Our survey verified that the concept of walkability could be a useful city development tool even in middle-sized cities.

Journal of Economic Literature (JEL) code: R42

The purpose of this study is to analyse the institutional environment of the state-subsidised, trade union-managed national voluntary unemployment insurance system (the so-called Ghent-system) that influences the selective incentive feature of this system based on the literature. Another goal is to run cluster analysis in order to show whether Ghent-countries – Denmark, Finland and Sweden – differ from other countries based on this environment. The analysis is based on Olson’s (1965) concept of by-product theory. The essence of this theory is that large groups are able to increase, maintain and thus realize their lobbying activities by applying incentives to individuals. In the case of trade unions, the availability of voluntary unemployment insurance is a significant incentive. Its impact on trade union movement is usually analysed as a dummy variable, but this article focuses on institutions that are important to the Ghent-system.

Journal of Economic Literature (JEL) code: J51

Bekker Zsuzsa, a Budapesti Corvinus Egyetem 2015 februárjában elhunyt professzor emeritája, jeles elmélettörténész munkásságát sokféleképp, számos jelzővel lehetne méltatni. A Közgazdasági Szemlében megjelent megemlékezésben Madarász Aladár a „minőség és mérték” kifejezéssel jellemzi Bekkernek a hazai és nemzetközi közgazdasági gondolkodás területén kifejtett munkásságát (Madarász 2015:353), melynek sokszínűségét kiválóan szemlélteti az emlékére 2015-ben rendezett konferencia anyagát tartalmazó kötet tartalmi gazdagsága.

A Budapesti Corvinus Egyetem 2018-ban több rendezvénnyel is tiszteleg Kornai János előtt, aki januárban ünnepelte 90. születésnapját. Kornai jelenleg a Budapesti Corvinus Egyetem kötelékébe tartozik, az Összehasonlító és Intézményi Gazdaságtan Tanszék tiszteletbeli professor emeritusa, és többek között – 2001
júniusa óta – a Debreceni Egyetem díszdoktora. A 2018. január 18-án tartott egész napos angol nyelvű tudományos tanácskozás házigazdája az Összehasonlító és Intézményi Gazdaságtan Tanszék vezetője, Rosta Miklós egyetemi docens volt.