debating progressive politics in Europe and beyond
We all know that global wealth in very unequally distributed but it is really difficult to show HOW unequal the planet we live on is and why this cannot be sustainable. In the video below, the campaigning group The Rules does a very good job in doing just this.
The debt sustainability analysis (DSA) along with other documents related to the program for Cyprus was leaked today on the wires first by Reuters and then the actual documents were published in the Brussels blog of the FT. The DSA is as expected based on massaging numbers and ignoring risks to arrive at a baseline scenario with [...]
German economic policy doesn’t exactly have a glowing reputation on the European Centre-Left. Deservedly so. Obsession with micromanaging inflation. Stupid fiscal rules. A belief that everything will be fine as long as everyone runs export surpluses. All these are often portrayed,with some justification, as products with Made in Germany stamped on them. Particularly in recent [...]
Watch Ole Busck of Aalborg University disucuss sustainable job growth in a ‘degrowth’ economy. This talk was recorded at the conference ‘From (un)economic growth to future well-being’ organised by the European Trade Union Institute (ETUI) and the European Public Service Union (EPSU) in Brussels on 15th and 16th October 2012.
Watch Agnes Hubert of the Bureau of Economic Policy Advisers (BEPA) talk on the EU’s Strategic Framework for Sustainable Well-Being. This talk was recorded at the conference ‘From (un)economic growth to future well-being’ organised by the European Trade Union Institute (ETUI) and the European Public Service Union (EPSU) in Brussels on 15th and 16th October 2012. [...]
At the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro, the global community discussed which environmental objectives have been achieved over the past 20 years and the sustainability strategy needed for the decades ahead. 40 years ago, the trade unions launched a debate on “qualitative growth” and “quality of life”. At the time, however, the congress “Quality of [...]
It’s time to stop perpetuating perceived practical constraints, insists Matthias Machnig. New progress calls for political initiative, debates about the future direction of policy, and a passionate commitment. At stake here is nothing less than a more just society. The hope was that technical advances would also enable us to achieve social progress for people [...]
Social justice, equality, solidarity, freedom or sustainability; all these words are present in socialist discourses throughout Spain, from the smallest local federation to the highest level of government. Some of these values were enunciated in the times of Pablo Iglesias, the PSOE founder, and were modulated and completed over the last decades. They have now [...]
The unanimous political response to the crisis across Europe today is that of austerity and budgetary discipline. Cutting pay and social welfare, attacking bargaining mechanisms and making employment contracts ultra-flexible: that is the current paradigm, the Berlin/Brussels consensus, offered as the only way forward. This solution is not working and will not work. It stifles [...]
The former General Secretary of the Fabian Society and former adviser to Gordon Brown, Michael Jacobs, dealt with this question in his talk at the “Sustainability in a Good Society” conference that took place in London in December 2011. The conference was organised by the London office of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, Compass and Social Europe Journal. [...]
The sustainability question needs to be answered. In this phase of economic development, its impacts on a number of domains need to be considered. Environmental problems, both in the form of global warming and also economic and social issues, are the primary concern. The political implications are also crucial. Both domains have specific and common [...]
The heart of the sustainability debate is not philosophical but scientific. There is a massive body of evidence about climate change, pollution, resource depletion and other negative effects that stem directly and indirectly from human activity – more specifically, from much of conventional economic activity. (See, for example, New Scientist’s basic introduction). It is impossible [...]
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