Managing the unavoidable impact of climate change
While doing all it can to arrest climate change, the EU must place workers and their concerns at the heart of its adaptation strategy.
Society
Social Europe is an award-winning digital media publisher driven by the core values of freedom, sustainability, and equality. These principles guide our exploration of society’s most pressing challenges. This archive page curates Social Europe articles focused on societal issues, offering a rich resource for innovative thinking and informed debate.
Can we change the climate on climate change?
Karin Pettersson is impressed by a fictional account of the existential challenge humanity faces.
Fewer Italians than Swedes hold anti-feminist views
New research from anti-extremism charities reveals ‘unexpected patterns’ of opinions towards feminism across Europe.
Ursula von der Leyen’s mission ‘to the moon’
The European Green Deal rests on the commitment of the 27 member states. The fate of the renewable-energy directive shows the scale of that challenge.
Green intentions, brown outcomes
If the EU does not address its role in domestic deforestation it will never reach its goal of carbon neutrality.
EU-Mercosur free-trade pact risks irreversible destruction
With environment issues rising quickly up the EU agenda, it’s time to get trade and ecological policies into coherent alignment.
The false scarcity of vaccine trade tensions
The row over the EU introducing vaccine export controls has occluded its rejection of a temporary waiver on intellectual property rights.
A rail renaissance for Europe
The European Year of Rail can support the Green Deal and sustainable recovery. Europe needs more international trains with easier booking.
Big Tech media and the EU’s weak reed of ‘competition’
The attack on the US Capitol revealed the dangers of Big Tech media platforms—but envisaged EU competition laws won’t fix them.
Must try harder: recovering from educational inequality
School closures during the pandemic have hit socially excluded students hard. The EU needs to ensure every child can reach their potential.
Culture, creativity and coronavirus: time for EU action
The pandemic has highlighted a longer-term failure adequately to address the working conditions of cultural professionals in Europe.
No time to spare for the Paris climate promise
Having squandered past opportunities and shirked previous commitments, we now must start making up for lost time.
Not part of Europe anyway?
The language of the Brexit stand-off is of a ‘level playing-field’ versus ‘sovereignty’. But beneath that, it’s about divergent social models.
Care, capitalism and politics
The coronavirus crisis has highlighted how the welfare state of the future must be built on an ethic of care rather than self-interest.
Greater equality: our guide through Covid-19 to sustainable wellbeing
The pandemic has reinforced the case for egalitarianism to define the ethos of the welfare state.
Legal hurdles facing a green and just transition
The irony of genuinely ‘free trade’ is only regulation enables it. Europe cannot lead the ecological transition without recognising this.
How good journalism can drive out bad
With a Digital Services Act in the offing, regulation of platforms can make public-interest journalism sustainable again.