The global economic crisis is rapidly putting into questions the socio-economic pact upon which has been based the Euroland societies since WWII. On the one hand, the currently depressed economies are limiting the opportunities for the younger generations, while, on the other hand, the aging babyboomers are stressing the whole health and social fabric of our countries. Meanwhile, the decade old Euroland integration has shown that, in time of such an historic crisis, there was an urgent need for further trans-European solidarity in order to keep the European integration on track, and to prevent our populations to be left exposed without the Euro protection to the shocks of this global crisis. Such a situation requires a completely new definition of two pacts at the core of our Euroland social model: the intergenerational pact and the trans-European pact. In both cases, the direction to follow, in order to respect the basic European values of solidarity and to refuse the irresponsible competition which is at the very origin of the current crisis. The big issue will be to find the balanced and efficient processes and policies which will allow this trans generational and trans-European solidarity to rapidly take shape as common policies for Euroland.
Euroland and the socio-economical crisis: an urgent matter of redefining our solidarities.
January 27th, 2012
mrc
Besides a treaty on fiscal discipline, EU leaders meeting in Brussels on Monday will also seek to adopt non-binding measures on employment, in discussions amid what is expected to be a paralysing general strike in the EU capital.”We would like to make sure growth and employment gets the political attention it needs, not that this important issue is crowded out by the euro-crisis,” one senior EU official told Brussels media ahead of the EU summit on Monday.
EU leaders trying to shift focus from deficits to jobs (euobserver)
January 27th, 2012
mrc
The collapse of the post-dictatorship contract and the myths on which this era was established reveals a society that can no longer continue to function as a whole. The dynamic governing the populace, meanwhile, stands in stark contrast to that of the country’s politicians, who have shown themselves incapable of ensuring even the slimmest terms of social consensus.
This growing distance between the interests of the people and those of the country’s leaders and the loss of the sense of community demands a repositioning of stances and priorities. This repositioning can come about through conflict or through the intervention of external stabilizing forces. In the past two years of the crisis, we have seen evidence of both at play: the masses reacting in myriad ways against the governing class, and the foreign element intervening dynamically in order to safeguard the euro currency as well as the geopolitical status quo.
Moreover, in this period, the suffering masses and the foreign factor have agreed on one thing: that the local elite either cannot or will not go ahead with any changes or reforms that pose a threat to its position of dominance.
Toward a new social contract (ekathimerini)
January 27th, 2012
mrc
The moral authority of Libya’s new government was called into question by two international aid groups yesterday as confidence begins to falter that the National Transitional Council, backed by Western governments in last year’s civil war, can deliver on its promises to deliver freedom and democracy.
Médecins sans Frontières (MSF) brought an abrupt halt to its operations in the Libyan town of Misrata after being asked by officials to treat torture victims, in some cases to allow members of the country’s new leadership to abuse the prisoners again.
‘Free’ Libya shamed by new torture claims (independent.co.uk)
January 27th, 2012
mrc
Qui a dit que la France rurale était celle des “sans voix”?
Dans le Limousin, le tapage des enseignants et élèves du lycée professionnel du Mas-Jambost, à Limoges, a résonné, tout au long du mois de janvier, aux oreilles de la communauté éducative. Cet établissement de ZUP (zone à urbaniser en priorité), spécialisé dans les métiers d’art, notamment la porcelaine, était menacé de fermeture pour la rentrée scolaire 2012. Aux “AG”, aux manifestations, aux opérations de tractage, se sont mêlés les enseignants de l’établissement régional d’enseignement adapté (EREA) de Meymac, en Corrèze, dont la fermeture était programmée pour 2013, et ceux d’autres lycées qui devaient perdre une ou plusieurs filières. Avec le même sentiment partagé de colère et d’incompréhension
La France rurale se rebelle contre la fermeture de ses lycées (lemonde.fr)
January 27th, 2012
mrc
Anyone who has been exposed to the soap-opera-cum-cage-match that is American politics will know that there is little upon which both Democrats and Republicans can agree. “American exceptionalism” is, well, an exception to this rule. Put simply (and usually hyperbolically) this is the idea that the US is the “greatest nation in the history of the Earth”; the exact words used by Mitt Romney in a speech to the Republican Jewish Coalition last December. In the same speech, Romney says that he “recognized that the greatest advantage my parents had given me was being born in America.”
Taking exception to exceptionalism (politico.ie)
January 27th, 2012
mrc
This week, the European Union went to war against Iran. There was no formal declaration, of course, nor even any undeclared use of military force. But the E.U. decision to place an embargo on Iranian oil imports, ban new contracts, and freeze Iranian Central Bank assets is effectively an act of war and may very well result in the military hostilities that sanctions are meant to forestall.
It is difficult to imagine that the E.U. members who adopted the decision on sanctions are unaware of this possible dynamic. Indeed, the very fact that British and French warships accompanied the U.S. aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln on its passage through the Straits and back into the Gulf — in brazen defiance of Iranian warnings — imply the opposite: that E.U. governments, especially the two with the greatest force projection capabilities, are perfectly cognizant of the possible consequences and are prepared to deal with them.
And that suggests that the European Union, notwithstanding its economic travails, is experiencing its own “spring” in foreign and defense policy and that those who tended in the past to dismiss it as a flaccid talking shop capable of little more than vacuous posturing now need to carry out a fundamental reassessment.
A Europe-Iran War (nytimes)
January 27th, 2012
mrc
L’Europe patine, l’Asie s’envole, l’Amérique se tétanise, alors l’Afrique noire excite tout le monde. On la disait, il y a vingt ans, mal partie, on lui promet aujourd’hui un avenir radieux. Ce cliché chasse l’autre, mais ne vaut guère mieux.
En Afrique, une démographie explosive annonce, pour 2050, 2 milliards d’hommes, soit plus qu’en Chine. Et les taux de croissance actuels font rêver. Mais les Africains partent du trente-sixième dessous. Et ils n’ont recouvré, chez eux, ni la pleine maîtrise d’une Histoire labourée par deux siècles de subordination coloniale, ni celle d’une géographie d’États découpés à l’emporte-pièce par l’homme blanc.
L’Afrique, terre promise ? (lepoint.fr)
January 27th, 2012
mrc
The British do not have a monopoly on Euroscepticism. But suspicion towards the European project has existed for longer within the British mainstream than anywhere else. It was evident in the lofty mistrust displayed by both Labour and Tory governments towards the EU’s first faltering steps. At the signature of the treaty of Rome in 1957, Britain sent Russell Bretherton, a middling trade official, not even a minister. To observe, not join.
When the then prime minister, Harold Macmillan, acknowledged the strategic error and applied to join in 1961, his wartime ally, Charles de Gaulle, feared Britain would be an Anglo-Saxon Trojan horse and kept it out until 1973. In those early days it was Labour’s leader, Hugh Gaitskell, who raised the Eurosceptic standard against losing “1,000 years of history” as an independent state.
Britain, proud home of Euroscepticism (guardian.co.uk)
January 27th, 2012
mrc
Six grands quotidiens européens – Le Monde, El País, Gazeta Wyborcza, Süddeutsche Zeitung, The Guardian et La Stampa – se sont associés pour créer une supplément commun, “Europa”, qui paraît ce 26 janvier. Dans cet “Etat de l’Union”, comme l’a titré La Stampa, il s’agit de “réfléchir sur l’état actuel de l’UE, jamais comme aujourd’hui au centre de mille interrogations sur son présent et, surtout, son avenir”.
Un journal pour l’Europe de demain (presseurop.eu)
January 27th, 2012
mrc
(fr) Sciences-Po, la chute de la maison Descoings-Pébereau
(en) A Finnish election of see and not hear
(en) 2012 The biggest American political story Europeans haven’t heard of
(en) [Crime & Speculation] Food for fuel, a sure way of creating a hunger crisis
(fr) [Crime & Speculation] Pour une loi de criminalisation de la spéculation alimentaire
(en) Syria : Opportunities and Limits of International Observation Efforts
(en) The Armenian Genocide: What about Turkey?
(en) European Information Society: an avant-garde role for the EU
(fr) [Crime & Speculation] Pour une loi de criminalisation de la spéculation alimentaire
(fr) Megaupload trépasse, le téléchargement passe
(fr) « Indignés » de Roumanie : les raisons de la colère
(fr) [Save Hungarian Democracy] Le côté obscur de la « Marche pour la Paix »
(fr) France, Espagne, Pays-Bas: Monde d’avant, monde d’après - Festival International des Très Courts
(fr) Contrôle du déficit: Bruxelles, Madrid et les provinces autonomes
(es) Control del déficit: Bruselas, Madrid y las autonomías
NewropMag Wekkly - L’Hebdo du NewropMag
January 27th, 2012
mrc
La última polémica entre el Estado central y las comunidades autónomas sobre cuál de ambas administraciones tiene más cuota de responsabilidad en la desviación de las previsiones de déficit público constata, una vez más, que la construcción del estado autonómico dista mucho de estar terminada.
Más bien nos encontraríamos en una fase inmadura y crítica –algunos la califican de guirigay y, los más severos, de desgobierno - dentro de un largo proceso de avances y retrocesos, cuyo «motor» es un conflicto permanente en los ámbitos de las competencias y las finanzas públicas. Algo similar a lo que ha sido, y sigue siendo, la historia del modelo federal alemán.
Control del déficit: Bruselas, Madrid y las autonomías (NM)
January 26th, 2012
mrc
La dernière controverse en date qui oppose l’état central et les communautés autonomes sur le fait de savoir qui des deux a la plus grande part de responsabilité quant au décalage par rapport aux prévisions de déficit public, prouve une fois encore que la construction d’états autonomes est loin d’être terminée.
Contrôle du déficit: Bruxelles, Madrid et les provinces autonomes (NM)
January 26th, 2012
mrc
With concern lingering about the future of the euro zone, Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain donned his salesman’s cap on Thursday and delivered a full-throated pitch to the throngs of executives and bankers gathered here: invest in Britain instead.Taking center stage under a hail of spotlights, Mr. Cameron tried to draw a stark distinction between the euro zone and its ongoing economic and financial troubles, and conditions in Britain’s more open economy, where the government is pushing through what he called an “unashamedly pro-business” agenda.
Cameron Sells Britain to Investors (nytimes)
January 26th, 2012
mrc
To some, British Prime Minister David Cameron’s decision to demur from the new euro rescue plan has made the U.K. irrelevant on the world scene. Yet by moving away from the euro zone, Cameron did something more than reaffirm Britain’s opposition to a German-led Europe: He asserted Britain’s greater, historically grounded legacy as the center of the Anglophone world. This obstinacy could end up maintaining the U.K.’s global importance by shifting its focus away from “the declining and irritable nations of the old world” and toward its legacy as the center of the English-speaking world.
Welcome Back, Britain! Why The U.K. Doesn’t Need The E.U. (forbes)
January 26th, 2012
mrc
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