Social Europe articles on politics

Social and political tensions in Europe are reaching new heights. Fear of migrants fuels nationalist sentiments and religious animosities are becoming serious. Many people are tempted to break away from what they see as dysfunctional: old political elites, Schengen, the euro, or ‘Brussels’ in general. After fretfully accepting a million asylum-seekers last year, almost all […]

The prospect of a summer referendum on Britain’s membership of the European Union is drawing closer. At least this is the timetable David Cameron hinted at when he recently said he is “hopeful” of concluding a renegotiation deal in February. If the UK prime minister – who is often considered a lucky politician – does opt for a […]

The climate agreement that world leaders reached in Paris last month has been widely celebrated for establishing the ambitious target of limiting the increase in global temperature to well below 2º Celsius above pre-industrial levels. But the agreement is just one step, albeit an important one. Policymakers now must figure out how to achieve this […]

The idea that public investment in infrastructure – roads, dams, power plants, and so forth – is an indispensable driver of economic growth has always held powerful sway over the minds of policymakers in poor countries. It also lay behind early development assistance programs following World War II, when the World Bank and bilateral donors […]

It is hard to imagine life without digital search and the internet. This is as true for me as for anyone else: the greater ease of obtaining and checking relevant facts and data has transformed the life of the columnist. Pulling books from library shelves and turning their pages was never an efficient search technique, […]

The extent to which the world has become Orwellian is reflected in the widespread use of the term `human capital`, as if it were a humanizing concept, whereas it´s really a contradiction in terms. What is human about capital in the 21st century? Any attentive reader of Picketty, Sadler or Stiglitz gets my point. In […]

The fact that western capitalism is in a severe crisis is now so commonplace that it’s become almost a cliché. In 2008 the global financial system stood on the brink of collapse and the rescue measures undertaken by panic-stricken governments will burden their economies for years to come. Economists and analysts of a neo-conservative, economically […]

We are sitting in a car going 35 miles per hour. It’s a nice day and the road is straight. But the map tells us that we are approaching a densely populated area where we know we’ll have to slow down to 20 mph, maybe less. There are no other roads we might turn onto; […]

The upcoming referendum on the United Kingdom’s continued membership in the European Union, almost certain to be held this year, could turn out to be yet another major catastrophe to hit Europe. If, as seems increasingly plausible, British voters chose to leave, the result would be a profoundly destabilized EU – and a shattered UK. […]

In 1973, US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, following a period of American preoccupation with Vietnam and China, declared a “year of Europe.” More recently, after President Barack Obama announced a US strategic “pivot,” or rebalancing, toward Asia, many Europeans worried about American neglect. Now, with an ongoing refugee crisis, Russia’s occupation of eastern Ukraine […]

2015 will probably be seen as the year when the terms ‘EU’ and ‘crisis’ became inextricably linked. Yet 2016 may prove more challenging still. Chronic instability persists on Europe’s frontiers and both the turmoil in the eurozone and the chaos engendered by the arrival of waves of migrants and refugees look set to recur. Moreover, […]