debating progressive politics in Europe and beyond
Following the financial crisis of 2007, Eurozone countries have been separated into two large blocks dependent on their capacity to honor their domestic public finance constraints. The predominant view, and that of the EU institutions, is built upon a questionable causation, national fragility and profligacy. Hence, reestablishing credibility and the survival of the common currency [...]
Business lobbies and conservatives have become extremely good at hijacking progressive policy concepts and perverting them into something that suits their own agenda. European economic governance is a perfect example of this. In the nineties, trade unions and progressive politicians were staunch defenders of economic governance. At the time, the idea was that if all [...]
Three times in my life (so far), I have concluded that my understanding of the world was substantially wrong. The first time was after the passage in 1994 of the North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), when the flow of finance to Mexico to build factories to export to the largest consumer market in the [...]
Neoliberal restructuring and the economic crisis have led to increasing inequality, social polarisation and societal disintegration. That austerity politics fosters these developments is widely acknowledged. Its gender effects, however, are mostly neglected, though, in contrast to the public rhetoric of equal opportunities and gender mainstreaming, gender inequality is rising. This contribution, therefore, focuses on the impact of [...]
Bye bye Neo-liberalism, Guten Tag Ordo-Liberalismus. After his infatuation with Blair’s brand of Neo-liberalism in the first few months of his Presidency, then his flirt with Keynesianism and “dirigisme” at the height of the financial crisis and great recession, Nicolas Sarkozy seems to have succumbed to the charms of Ordo-liberalismus. It is a conclusion which [...]
The world financial crisis of 2008-2009, which did not turn into a ‘Great Depression’ only because central banks and governments worldwide prevented a complete ‘meltdown’ of the financial system and more severe repercussions in the real sectors, has left the public finances of many countries in dire straits. In the EU, the period of financial [...]
European monetary union has always been haunted by a spectre. That spectre is the irresponsible member country with an uncompetitive economy and a large budget deficit, building up too much debt and having to be bailed out. This bogeyman had a strong hold on the imagination of policymakers from the start, especially in Germany. Hence [...]
President Obama has chosen to fight fire with gasoline. Republicans want America to believe the economy is still lousy because government is too big, and the way to revive the economy is to cut federal spending. On Sunday Republican Speaker John Boehner even refused to rule out a government shut-down if Republicans don’t get the [...]
In the wake of the recent Irish debt crisis, the UK Coalition government decided not to take part in a new rescue fund for troubled eurozone members, suggested by France and Germany. This decision comes in spite of the UK’s pledge to support the EU-IMF rescue efforts for Ireland through a bilateral loan of more [...]
With a considerable delay, I am now sitting in the Berlin S-Bahn (city train) on my way to work, reading – quite astonished – an article about Wall Street investment bankers yet again receiving astronomical bonus payments, as if nothing bad ever happened. What went wrong? Have we learned nothing from the severe economic and [...]
From the very beginning of the crisis, the Irish Government’s response has failed to protect vulnerable people and has damaged the long-term prospects of the economy. To put the scale of Ireland’s austerity measures into context, about €30 billion worth of austerity measures (cuts to public spending and tax increases) have occurred since the crisis [...]
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