Sharan Burrow, author at Social Europe

About Sharan Burrow

Sharan Burrow is general secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation.

A new social contract

by Sharan Burrow on 24th June 2020

The 2020 ITUC Global Rights Index exposes the failings of the world’s economic model—a new social contract can help us build a new one.

UN treaty on business and human rights vital for economic and social justice

by Sharan Burrow on 28th October 2019

How can transnational corporations be held to account in a world of nation states? A binding UN treaty would be an important step.

For a Sound Fiscal Policy

The public sector in Germany has massively neglected its investments in the past two decades. The result is a public capital stock that does not meet the requirements of a modern economy and is inadequate to meet the challenges posed by the imminent demographic change and the international commitments for decarbonisation. If the requirements in the areas of education, transport, communication networks and decarbonisation are added together, the additional public investment or public investment promotion required over the next 10 years is around €450 billion, i.e. around €45 billion per year. From a macroeconomic perspective, this amount can be shouldered well, but it is unrealistic to finance these investments solely by redeploying funds in existing budgets. For this reason, the debt rules in the Germen constitution should be extended to include a golden rule allowing borrowing to the extent of net investment. Until such a rule is implemented, room for manoeuvre should be used, for example through extra-budgetary entities. It is also important to provide sustainable debt relief for municipalities, which play a central role in public investment, especially in transport infrastructure.

FREE DOWNLOAD

Essential but unprotected: highly mobile workers in the EU during the Covid-19 pandemic

Zane Rasnača

The pandemic has shown highly mobile workers are irreplaceable during a public-health crisis yet often remain the least protected. EU law has failed to protect them and guidance and policy actions by the European Commission have failed them too. A significant (upwards) convergence of social and labour law standards is needed. A pan-European social safety net for crisis situations should be created and targeted emergency measures adopted.

FREE DOWNLOAD

Living and working in Europe 2019

Living and working in Europe, Eurofound’s 2019 yearbook, provides a snapshot of the latest developments in the work and lives of Europeans as explored in the agency’s research activities over the course of 2019. The range of topics as a result is broad, from the growing diversity of employment across EU regions to rising trust in national institutions to developments in minimum wages. This overview also describes how Eurofound's activities connect with the policy priorities of the European Commission.

CLICK FOR MORE INFO

Social Europe Volume Two

This book brings to you some of the best contributions published on Social Europe over the second half of 2019 in easily accessible ebook and paperback formats. The collection is newly edited with a thematic focus on the rise of populism and also includes in text-form previously unpublished material from Social Europe Podcast. This second volume brings together contributions by Cas Mudde, Dani Rodrik, Peter Verovsek, Branko Milanovic, Sheri Berman, Paul Mason, Bela Galgoczi, Mariana Mazzucato and Ngaire Woods.

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.

MORE INFO

A new social contract

UN treaty on business and human rights vital for economic and social justice

FREE DOWNLOAD

FREE DOWNLOAD

CLICK FOR MORE INFO

MORE INFO

MORE INFO

More about Social Europe

Independent Media Accelerator

.EU Web Awards