Marius Ostrowski

Marius S Ostrowski is a Max Weber fellow at the European University Institute. His publications include Left Unity (2020) and the edited series of Eduard Bernstein’s Collected Works (2018-). He is deputy editor of the Journal of Political Ideologies,.

Marius Ostrowski

A European basic income?

Marius Ostrowski 25th March 2022

An EU-wide scheme could address progressives’ concerns.

Quo vadis, Cohesion Policy? European Regional Development at a Crossroads

European Union Cohesion Policy is on the back foot. In a time of war, trade rivalry, climate change and digital transition, with a raft of new policy priorities and yet tightening fiscal room for manoeuvre, a fundamental discussion on its relevance and direction is under way. Europe’s structural policy to improve economic, social and territorial conditions with long-term planning horizons seems barely to have a place in a world where policy-makers feel the need to react to crises swiftly.

Yet Cohesion Policy is relevant to most of the crises and problems Europe faces by focusing on preventive measures, providing a framework to guide action now, instead of waiting for the next crisis to erupt. So why is the EU’s longest serving investment instrument under so much pressure to justify its existence? This new policy paper from the Bertelsmann Stiftung gives an overview of the debate and the various trade-offs of potential reforms.

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Artificial intelligence, labour and society

The rapid expansion of artificial intelligence is unparalleled, establishing it as a ubiquitous element in workplaces and our daily lives. The era when AI was exclusively associated with robots and intricate algorithms for the technically proficient is over. This marks a significant paradigm shift, with profound implications and changes regarding the world we live in. This book proposes an analysis of this transformation, and does so by bringing together the reflections of more than 20 high-level academics and research activists from across the world.

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Becoming adults: Young people in a post-pandemic world

Eurofound's new report, Becoming adults: Young people in a post-pandemic world, explores young people’s wishes and plans for the future—and the wellbeing outcomes related to these plans—in the context of the current labour market and housing situation and progress on the implementation of the European Union’s reinforced Youth Guarantee. It finds that, while there are positive signs for young people in terms of employment, many young people in Europe find themselves locked out of the housing market and unable to establish the independence required to have families of their own.

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Join the event ‘Computer in Command’ on the consequences of algorithmic management for workers!

On October 16th, join us online or physically at the European Economic and Social Committee for an engaging debate on the impact of artificial intelligence at work, organised by FEPS and the EESC. The renowned speakers will include Nicolas Schmit, outgoing European commissioner for jobs and social rights; Brando Benefei, Socialists and Democrats MEP; Lucie Studničná, president of the EESC Workers’ Group, and Isabelle Schömann, deputy general secretary of the European Trade Union Confederation.

We shall present key findings from the research ‘Computer in Command’, based on a survey of over 6,000 union members in Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland. We shall also examine EU legal provisions on AI in the workplace, identifying critical areas that require a reassessment of its application, the potential actions trade unions can take and necessary legislative interventions.

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WSI European Collective Bargaining Report 2023/2024

Real wages in the European Union continued their decline in 2023—despite an acceleration in nominal wage growth and falling inflation rates. For the current year, there are tentative signs only of a slow recovery of the purchasing power of wages. A resumption of real wage growth would stabilise the functional distribution of income and strengthen domestic demand. However, even under this benign scenario, the crisis is not over from workers' point of view: they have borne the brunt of the real income losses associated with the energy-price shock resulting from the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The lingering reduction in real wage levels means that wage policy still needs to catch up to contribute to a fairer distribution of the burden between labour and capital.

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A European basic income?

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