Can Navalny take down Putin?
Today’s protest movement has a charismatic and sympathetic leader but Putin has spent the last decade consolidating a police state.
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.
Have you met Dan Gertler?
Europe needs to step up its fight against money-laundering.
Will Biden restore worker and union power?
Joe Biden was the most pro-labour presidential nominee in years. But he’s fighting a pandemic and faces the antiquated US political system.
Why such an imperfect union?
US political dysfunctionality is put down to partisanship and polarisation. But Sheri Berman argues it’s the issue agenda that counts.
Algorithmic control
Work in the social sciences on algorithmic systems can inform how unions address their impact on the power balance between workers and employers.
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.
Bitcoin lacks a unique selling proposition
Peter Bofinger identifies the cryptocurrency’s Achilles heel.
From moonshots to earthshots
The pandemic has created a huge opportunity to restore mission-driven governance in the public interest.
It is the ECB’s job to close spreads
Spreads in a single market with a single currency distort trade flows and competitiveness. The European Central Bank should close them.
The problem with the Covid convergence
A surprising global trend in the pandemic is reduced inequality across countries—but the convergence reflects losses at the top, not gains at the bottom.
Time to act on pay transparency
The pandemic provides no excuse for inaction by the European Commission on gender pay transparency. It should be the incentive.
A time to celebrate … or worry?
Branko Milanovic worries that in the new global constellation a second cold war—with China—could be in the offing.
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.
‘The day of liberation is a bit like a second birthday for me’
Knut Dethlefsen offers a personal reflection on the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.