debating progressive politics in Europe and beyond
Major portions of the democratic left always had mixed feelings regarding the state’s power. For the democratic left’s instinctive anti-authoritarian tendencies, the leviathan that is the modern state today should be inherently suspect. Though such doubts do flare up occasionally – especially among the liberal intelligentsia and young leftists (i.e. the non-working class segments of [...]
Reviewing and improving its climate protection strategy will be one of the main challenges facing Europe over the next couple of months. Generating new ideas and ensuring adequate preparation are essential before the world resumes negotiations in Mexico. During her hearing in the European Parliament’s Environment Committee, the new Commissioner for Climate Action, Connie Hedegaard, [...]
In the official account of the unfolding Greek tragedy the villain is readily identified, the plot is clear, and the dénouement inevitable, tragic, but ultimately both just and morally uplifting. The villain of the piece is Greece itself: a bloated and inefficient public sector, rampant corruption, and decade-long fiscal incontinence partially shielded from public scrutiny [...]
The problems Greece and some other eurozone countries are experiencing have highlighted a design flaw in the euro: it is ill-prepared to deal with asymmetric shocks because its balancing mechanisms, as Paul Krugman says, are inadequate. But in the case of Greece, there is also no doubt that serious fiscal irresponsibility combined with creative accounting ideas from [...]
In the debate about Greece and the Eurozone analogies have been drawn with various other currency unions, but the most significant has gone unnoticed. The Franc Zone has been linked to the European currencies for over sixty years. The relationship between the French Treasury and the governments of Francophone Africa displays many of the structural [...]
Today the Campaign for a 0.05% Tobin tax was launched by a series of NGOs under the label “Robin Hood Tax”. Here is what they are about: The Robin Hood Tax campaign is a movement bringing together dozens of organisations that work to reduce poverty in the UK and overseas, and campaign to tackle climate [...]
Social Europe Chief Editor Stephen Haseler took part in a discussion with Jagdish Bhagwati (Columbia University) and Peter Ghavami (Troika Dialogue Investment Bank) on Russia Today’s Crosstalk programme discussing the subject: “Bankers: The real Terrorists?” Apart from the rather strange title it was a lively discussion.
In 2002 I published an article on a maximum wage in the centre-left theory journal Renewal. The idea of putting a ceiling on what people could earn was left-field, to say the least. It was more a thought experiment than a serious attempt to influence political debate. The article and the idea sank without much [...]
All Content