Journal of Security and Sustainability Issues

The study includes an analysis of the functioning of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises during the COVID-19 pandemic from the perspective of financial security management of these entities. The article covers the identification of threats in the area of finances of the discussed enterprises that arose during the pandemic, as well as the assessment and approach to financial risk management in these entities. As a result, the key categories of threats to the financial security of enterprises, arising during the COVID-19 pandemic, were presented, as well as the assessment of the effectiveness of state services responsible for ensuring financial security. The study focuses on multidimensional data analysis in terms of their grouping and unraveling in terms of comparing the considered variables in terms of dynamics. Initial studies were performed by comparing several variables, and the data were analyzed not only during the COVID-19 pandemic, but also in the pre-pandemic period in terms of observing their fluctuations in dynamic terms, and the relationships between them were also examined.

The energy security of the Visegrad Group countries is a derivative of their energy potential resulting from the lack of strategic natural gas and crude oil resources, limited fuel storage capacity and limited access to the transmission network. This causes a dependence on supplies of raw materials from Russia, which is not even, but applies to each of these countries. The Czech Republic and Slovakia have small deposits of natural gas and crude oil. Hungary and Poland have greater potential, but it is still not enough to achieve energy independence. The energy market of the V4 countries is of interest to the Russian Federation, but it is not a priority for it as it accounts for a small part of Russian transmissions. Russia aims to keep the market for crude oil and natural gas at a uniform level, but the actions of the V4 countries in terms of diversification of supplies, aimed at increasing the level of energy security, effectively hinder the implementation of this goal. The threat to the energy security of the V4 countries is related to their dependence on gas supplies from Gazprom. The terms of the contracts contain unfavorable clauses that negatively affect the sale of surplus Russian gas, as it is necessary to pay fees for the ordered gas regardless of the scale of its use. The differentiation in the energy policy of the Member States is also worth noting. An example is the lack of clear opposition from the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia to the plans to expand the Nord Stream and Turkish Stream gas pipelines. These states show interest in participating in projects, which, in fact, constitute the implementation of the Russian concept of building new transmission routes. Poland takes a different position, consistently preventing the implementation of Russian energy projects.

International migration is a functional component of modern societies, both wealthy and poor. In a way, one can see that migration solves the unequal distribution of people and opportunities. Despite the political pressure to control immigration, almost all changes in politics have broadened the scope of legal immigration to allow for settlement by refugees, farm workers (in case of urbanrural migrations), “illegal” immigrants with long-term residence in the country, and workers in great demand to move around freely. Our main research objective is to demonstrate, using the available data as well as the analysis of the metadata and the research literature, that migration, especially labour migration, has a narrow connection with the issues of national security. Large outflows and inflows of people might bring about security threats linked to organized crime, terrorism and the spread of radical ideas. Moreover, migration is responsible for the brain drain of young and well-educated people who are searching for higher wages and better opportunities abroad depriving their own home country of valuable human capital. Our paper analyses the phenomenon of international migration perceived from the angle of migration culture that goes hand in hand with recent globalization trends all around the world. We come to a solid conclusion that migration policy should be treated as an important element in establishing well-ballanced national security policy in the globalized world. It might be of a particular interest for the migration scholars, labour market economists and stakeholders and policy-makers dealing with the issues of national security, public and migration policies, as well as sustainable economic development.

Security of societies has become one of urgent issues in contemporary world. Too frequently we started encountering one or another form of malicious behavior, criminal activities or terrorism. New and complex threats highlight the need for further synergies and closer cooperation at all levels. Awareness, preparedness and resilience of societies emerge as key preconditions of further secure and sustainable economic development and general well-being. A special attention in those conditions has to be paid to development of theoretically grounded approach to protection of critical infrastructure (CIP), damage or disruption of which can be immensely harmful to unprepared and therefore vulnerable institutions and society. The aim of this paper is to lay theoretical foundations for theoretically grounded approach towards research in CIP area, in order to formulate, ultimately, an approach towards action, which, employing leadership societal stakeholders would allow to enhance awareness of society actors about the threats, i.e, to develop ability to recognize, prevent, and, in case of disaster, to resist to consequences of critical infrastructure infringement. Hence, enhanced resilience of society to critical infrastructure infringement is and ultimate goal of fostering of leadership for critical infrastructure protection.

The objective of the research is to define the development of constitutionalism and socio-cultural challenges related to the formation process of the European Union’s legal identity. To achieve this goal, the concept of constitutionalism and its changes during the period of the European Union’s development are examined. Tendencies of the European Union Member States’ constitutionalism process are analysed and socio-cultural tensions of the formation of the contemporary European Union’s legal identity, which arise between security and freedom, order and justice and government and society are identified. The article states that the sustainability of public democratic processes and the functioning of the European Union is possible only if the constitutional values are protected. The reseach also reveals that the further evolution of European constitutionalism and legal identity still needs to enhance the development of the rules which could influence the creation and activities of the independent, self-governing EU’s political community.