debating progressive politics in Europe and beyond
One of the dirty secrets of economics is that there is no such thing as “economic theory.” There is simply no set of bedrock principles on which one can base calculations that illuminate real-world economic outcomes. We should bear in mind this constraint on economic knowledge as the global drive for fiscal austerity shifts into [...]
The European Commission recently announced proposals to enhance economic policy coordination and strengthen EU economic governance (here). They start from the right premise: ‘the crisis has shown that they [economic policy coordination instruments] have not been used to the full and that there are gaps in the current governance system’. Concrete measures are proposed, all [...]
This issue is of persistent concern for investors worldwide. Holders of European government bonds believed that they knew what they had bought. Sure, there was no such thing as a eurozone sovereign security. But German, French, Spanish, and even Greek bonds all carried roughly the same interest rate, so they were deemed equivalent. Investors now [...]
By his own definition, Barak Obama is the US’ first „Pacific“ President. Indeed, raised in Hawaii and Indonesia there are few “Atlantic” ties to be found in his biography. Obama’s remarks, delivered during a visit to Asia, may be only intended as a polite gesture; nevertheless they indicate a shift of attention away from Europe [...]
Russia and the European Union are geopolitical neighbors. Whether or not their relationship is in fact neighborly, rather than tense and confrontational, is of critical importance to both. Unless it modernizes its economy and society, Russia can forget its claim to status as a world power in the twenty-first century and will continue to fall [...]
It was an unexpected move and a surprise for many observers of Europe’s climate policy: German Environment Minister Norbert Röttgen, French Environment Minister Jean-Louis Borloo and UK Energy and Climate Change Minister Chris Huhne jointly called for a more ambitious European climate target in international newspapers two weeks ago. A reduction target of at least [...]
The new Social Europe Journal Vol. 5 Issue 1 is now available as pdf download for those of you who prefer a pdf version to reading individual articles on this website. The new journal includes contributions by Norman Birnbaum, Klaus Busch, Milos Pick, Vera Glassner, Andrew Watt, Uwe Fink, Nick Crook, Karolina Stegemann, Udo Rehfeldt, [...]
Euractiv reported about a new Franco-German declaration to the task force charged with working up a mechanism of economic governance for the EU/Eurozone. Completely ignorant about the ongoing debates about how counterproductive early fiscal austerity could be the document states: Member States would be expected to enact national laws that formalise the public finance recovery [...]
The global macroeconomy is at a juncture; some economists argue for continued fiscal stimulus to avoid a double dip recession while others argue for fiscal prudence. In this column, one of the world’s leading macroeconomists argues for continued stimulus combined with a plan to ensure long-run sustainability by reforming the funding of pension liabilities. The [...]
The mandate of the European Central Bank has been a source of controversy since before the start of monetary union in 1999. A battle raged between those who wanted to focus exclusively on ‘price stability’ and those arguing for a broader mandate, taking in growth and employment on a formally equal footing, as is the [...]
The Pew Global Attitudes Project has recently published a very interesting piece of research investigating attitudes towards the full Islamic veil. The results show a remarkable difference between Europeans and US citizens. Even though Damian Green, the UK immigration minister, says a ban of the Burka would be “un-British” the vast majority of Brits seem [...]
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