About President Michael D. Higgins

Michael Higgins is the ninth President of Ireland.

ILO As Global Catalyst

by President Michael D. Higgins on 15th June 2018

Of all the institutions established by the international community in the wake of that cataclysm that was the First World War only one has endured to this day, the International Labour Organisation. That it has done so is testament to the moral vision and indomitable hope that is contained within the preamble to the constitution […]

Solidarity In Europe – Achieving Authenticity In The European Street

by President Michael D. Higgins on 18th May 2018

Despite the history of our continent, many centuries of which were tarnished by war, suffering, expropriation of resources and exploitation of colonised peoples, the European Union today faces a unique opportunity and responsibility to assert, indeed where necessary reassert, its founding values of democracy, human rights and the rule of law in a world in […]

Restoring Social Cohesion: A Project For 2018 And Beyond

by President Michael D. Higgins on 12th January 2018

Addressing the changes and the fracture in the relationship between the citizen and society has been a matter of great importance for me throughout my Presidency. It is a relationship that was fraying long before the onset of the Global Financial Crisis, but it has markedly lost cohesion in these last ten years, aggravated by […]

The Discourse We Need And The Role of Trade Unions

by President Michael D. Higgins on 14th July 2017

Your movement with over 700,000 members in over 40 affiliated unions, is Ireland’s largest civic society body. Your contribution to the evolution of politics, economic and society in every part of this island has been essential and it has been emancipatory in so many ways. I am also pleased to be speaking here in Belfast […]

Sustainable Equality Report. Well-being for everyone in a sustainable Europe

Our societies are in the midst of political, economic, social and ecological crises, which permanently feed into each other, and already undermine democracy. Progressive politics with a common and strong vision are crucially needed. Ahead of the next European elections, the Sustainable Equality Report championed by the S&D Group through its Progressive Society initiative addresses this need, resulting in more than 100 concrete policy proposals by thirty policy-makers and renowned experts.

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Work in the platform economy

This paper presents a case study of the food delivery platform, Deliveroo, in Belgium in 2016-2018. The case offers insights on the nature of platform work, the workers who perform it, the preferences of workers, the strategy of the platforms, and the role of local regulations. Interestingly, Deliveroo in Belgium employed workers through an intermediary, SMart, and we also observed the termination of their co-operation in the period under analysis. Using administrative data provided by SMart and a survey of workers, we analyse patterns of work and also focus on pay.

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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.

The Positive Economic Impact Of Germany's Statutory Minimum Wage

With the empirical analyses of the macroeconomic effects of the introduction of the statutory minimum wage in Germany, the IMK tries to determine the short-term and expected medium- to long-term growth, price and employment effects with the help of a macro-econometric model. As a result, economic growth tended to be stimulated by the introduction of the minimum wage. This was mainly due to the higher wages of the minimum wage beneficiaries and a spillover effect on adjoining wage groups. In particular, this benefited people whose low savings rate led to a particularly strong increase in real private consumption. The price increases triggered were negligible on a macroeconomic scale.

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Societal change and trust in institutions

Overall trust in institutions such as national governments, the legal system, the EU, and the media has rebounded in Europe following the recent economic recovery – showing that the ‘crisis of trust’ in European societies following the Great Recession was largely temporary. However, in a number of the Member States most adversely impacted by the crisis, trust in national institutions has still not returned to pre-crisis levels. This new report details the different factors in maintaining and developing trust in institutions in Europe, including the important role of improving the quality of public services.

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