About Alberto Alemanno

Alberto Alemanno is Jean Monnet Professor of European Union Law at HEC Paris, founder of The Good Lobby and author of Lobbying for Change: Find Your Voice to Create a Better Society (Iconbooks, 2017).

A European Super-PAC To Take On Bannon’s Illiberal Shock Troops

by Alberto Alemanno on 24th July 2018

The 2019 elections for the European Parliament boil down to a war between supporters of EU integration, multilateralism and liberal values, and those who aim at a Europe of illiberal polities, often coupled with state capitalism and ethno-nationalism. In both camps, initiatives are mushrooming. Both sides have political champions and corresponding visions: French President Emmanuel […]

Davos Of The Many For The Few

by Alberto Alemanno on 29th January 2018

It is easy to dismiss Davos as nothing more than a talkfest among greedy CEOs, cheerful philanthropists and photogenic celebrity activists. Yet this narrative – which is annually recited by mainstream media – fails to do justice to what the Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) is really about. The coverage of Davos […]

To Build Europe We Need Citizen Lobbyists

by Alberto Alemanno on 5th September 2017

While public sentiment about the European project has rebounded, Europeans remain largely dissatisfied with whether their voices and concerns count in Brussels. Despite recurrent calls for radically reforming the European Union to ensure a greater involvement of EU citizens, little is expected to change between now and the next 2019 European Parliament (EP) elections. The […]

The platform economy and social law: Key issues in comparative perspective

This Working Paper brings together two parallel but complementary approaches to the impact of the platform economy on working conditions and social law. The first part of the study shows that the business models of some platforms is a combination of technological disruption and social evasion. The second part of this working paper confirms that it is in the gaps and ambiguities in social legislation that platforms are trying to legitimise a business model abrogating all social responsibility. It is in this sense that we can talk about the risk of “social evasion” of several major platforms, exactly in the same way as fiscal evasion.

FREE DOWNLOAD

There are high levels of optimism for the future in most EU candidate countries – including for future generations. However, current material hardships, deprivation, urban-rural disparities, gender inequalities and demographic ageing are fundamental challenges, and could undermine the current positive climate and future social cohesion. Eurofound’s European Quality of Life Survey (EQLS) provides unique insight into life in the candidate countries, based on a detailed analysis of a range of indicators on living conditions and quality of society. This new report, and associated working life country profiles, present these findings in detail, and serve as a comprehensive source of information on life and society in the candidate countries.

CLICK FOR MORE INFO

Zygmunt Bauman was a towering intellectual who saw and analysed – right up to his death in early 2017 – the great socio-political changes, often convulsive, in modern western society long before his peers. Here we highlight his prescient insights into what he dubbed ‘liquid modernity’ with 24 chapters on topics ranging from online loneliness via precarity/poverty/inequality to migration, fear of the ‘Other’ and the decline of the nation state. Chronicle of Crisis, 2011-16, written by one of the great chroniclers of our times, will be read and re-read for decades and more to come.

Time for substantial minimum wage rises and a European minimum wage policy

Minimum wages in most European Union (EU) countries were increased at the start of 2019, with an median increase of 4.8 % compared with the previous year, continuing the recent trends towards faster minimum wage growth. Much of this is accounted for by substantial increases in Eastern Europe together with efforts to undertake permanent and structural increases in minimum wage levels in countries such as Spain. There is also a growing debate over the role of minimum wages for the concept of Social Europe, which is expected to play a significant role in the 2019 European Parliament elections. In this context, the German government has indicated that one of its priorities during its EU Council Presidency in the second half of 2020 will be elaborating a framework for a European minimum wage policy.

FREE DOWNLOAD