Social Europe articles on politics

Gordon Brown’s exchange with Gillian Duffy on the streets of Rochdale was a defining moment in the UK’s 2010 general election. It also revealed much about the evolution of political parties of the left in the past 50 years. Mrs Duffy told Mr Brown, then Labour prime minister, of her life-long commitment to his party […]

In recent months, the Slovak government has been strongly criticized by EU-member states for its anti-migration attitude and European media have commented on the refusal to take in 800 refugees via the EU relocation scheme. Slovakia – along with other Visegrad (V4) countries – has been accused of failing to show solidarity with other member […]

17 May is International day against homophobia, transphobia and biphobia. Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people face distinct disadvantages in the labour market ranging from discrimination in recruitment, wages or promotions to harassment and bullying in the workplace. Such problems are present across the entire EU and on average, 19% of LGBT employees feels […]

UK Labour has suffered another bad set of election results. But the failure of Labour is not the fault of the Corbynites or the Blairites. Social democracy is in crisis the world over: obliterated in Greece, failing in government in France and in retreat almost everywhere else. Nowhere are social democrats ideologically, programmatically or organisationally […]

Why, in 2016, has the European Trade Union Confederation found it necessary to start ringing alarm bells in defence of basic trade union rights in the EU? The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, agreed in 1948 as a reaction to the horrors of the Second World War, states: “Everyone has the right to form and […]

German finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble famously remarked that “elections change nothing”. He was talking about debt and public finance. The European Commission now seems intent on confirming Schäuble’s maxim when it comes to ensuring the protection of public health and the environment. Voting in the European Parliament, public opinion and credible, independent scientific research appear […]

Ideas spread fast, bad ideas spread faster. Over the last few months, the European Commission has tried to give new impulse towards achieving a ‘Social Triple A’ rating. At the beginning of March, Employment and Social Affairs Commissioner Marianne Thyssen launched a social package comprising an outline of the European Pillar of Social Rights and […]

Since 2009, when the financial crisis that started in America in 2008 shook the eurozone to its core, crisis management has become Europe’s new normal. Indeed, crisis has followed crisis in Europe, and this is unlikely to change anytime soon. Europe has had a financial crisis, a Greek crisis, a Ukraine crisis, and, since the […]

The European Union (EU) has strong legislation in place that protects workers from being exploited and also enables businesses to engage in fair competition. Workers are mobile and can move freely within the EU single market across borders – without being dependent upon traffickers. Yet, the latest Eurofound report shows that trafficking for labour exploitation […]

A lot of hype has built up around digitalisation, in some Member States as well as in Brussels. On one side, the over-enthusiastic camp bases its assumptions on wishful thinking: digitalisation will bring a circular economy with less waste, better use of resources, fantastic opportunities for information, communication, connectedness and transparency, easier reconciliation of life […]

The resistible rise of the Far Right in Austria. The presidential election is on a knife-edge before the deciding round of at the end of May. It did indeed come as a shock that moment when the blue bar on the TV screen last Sunday at 5 pm shot upwards: 35 per cent of the […]