Union Matters.

Chances and Risks of “Protectionism” for the European Social Democracy

2006-09-10T22:44:00.000-07:00

After years on the defensive, Europe’s Social Democracy is surprisingly feisty and rejuvenated in 2006. The public has developed an awareness that growing economic and social insecurities are primarily caused by neoliberal policies; and that the neoliberal agenda – performed by liberal, conservative and social democratic governments alike – has gloriously failed to deliver its promises. Stephen Haseler writes in ‘Social Europe’: “The signs and symbols of a growing resistance to ‘neo-liberalism’, and of a major reappraisal of its relevance, are all around us. (…) (There is) a growing sense that the dominance of neo-liberal ideas is now coming to an end.”

In the current political setting, the dominant theme in political discourse is insecurity. Political ideologies provide different explanations of what the sources of insecurity are, as well as how to provide protection against it. Insecurity may span from economic and job-related to social and even cultural fears. The concept of “protectionism” is primarily used in a limited economic sense, but can have a wider meaning. Social Democracy currently is in a strong position to shape the concept of “protectionism”.

“(Now) the centre-left has natural advantages, as citizens identify the state as the collective means of insurance against the perils of globalization and social turmoil.” writes former Blair-adviser Patrick Diamond. The emerging concept of a “Social Europe”, for example, is building on a reasonable economic regulation and secured social security, thus laying emphasis on stronger protection of the societies and its citizens.

In the following paragraphs I will examine some main elements of this “protectionist” concept , but will also point out its downside, focusing on immigration, trade and enlargement policies.

1. Economic Protectionism
In the past, neoliberals like President Barroso have frequently warned of “protectionism” to ward off policies aimed at softening the effect of the Union’s liberalization and privatization agenda. Although the latter has never been popular, Europe’s governments (and also socialist parties) have so far followed the Commission in this matter. But recently, protectionism has gained much appeal. For once, multiple governments are trying to prevent cross-boarder mergers in crucial industries: Enesa (against E.on) in Spain, Suez (against Enel) in Italy and BPH (against UniCredit) in Poland, to name the most prominent examples.

Meanwhile, this form of protectionism in itself is not a sufficient antithesis to neoliberalism, as the example of Suez shows. The merger with the publicly owned Gaz de France would mean reducing the share of public ownership significantly. Moreover, public ownership is an insufficient safeguard if the company is acting within a liberalized market. The aggressive business-strategy of EdF (Electricité de France) of recent years proves this point.

Protecting national companies from foreign take-overs is hugely popular. Regular news of multinational companies shutting down domestic production and firing thousands of employees make people fear that these companies threaten the stability of our society. Social Democracy is now in a strong position to provide a vision of a “protectionist” economic structure that 1) ensures stability, 2) provides a fair give-and-take between companies and society, 3) provides growth that benefits the people (and not only the corporate shareholders).

A concept like this addresses the whole spectrum of causes of economic insecurity, in contrast to the political postering performed by, most prominently, the conservative French government. “Economic patriotism”, as Nicolas Sarkozy calls it, is restricted to the question of the nationality of the firm’s owners.

In contrast, Social Democracy needs to emphasize that economic development can only be healthy if the needs of the community in which companies act are sufficiently considered, e.g. by public oversight and democratic regulation that is flexibly adjustable to the different needs of different regions or nations. In one of the most exciting developments of the past year, PES MEP’s have embraced this idea when they intervened in the legislative process of the Service Directive (Bolkestein Directive). This considerate form of protectionism takes the different needs of the European countries into account. It has been successful in mobilizing the public, NGOs and unions on a national an European level.

2. Risks of Protectionism: Immigration
As immigration is seen as a growing threat to economic stability and security, parties from both the right and the left have toughened immigration laws radically. This crackdown on immigrants is probably the most appalling and shameful of the European policies of recent years. Since 1993, more than 7000 people have reportedly died while attempting to enter the EU. Considering undocumented deaths, the number of fatalities may well be triple that of official statistics. Europe is haunted by the images of dead men, women and children on Spanish and Italian coasts and the murderous violence against immigrants in Ceuta and Melilla in 2005. NGOs report a frightening rise of violent acts against immigrants inside Europe, making the Union an ever more hostile and dangerous environment for immigrants. The continuing toughening of immigration rules and border policies grow more and more inhumane and lay the seeds for further exploitation of immigrants.

All advocates of sensible immigration policies acknowledge the need of the Union for regulating the immigration movement (e.g. HRW World Report 2006). But the planned common system for immigration and asylum focuses almost exclusively on ever tougher deterrence by violent means and deportation beyond judicial control.

It is illusionary to believe that the stream of immigrants trying to enter the EU can be halted by increasingly excessive means of violence. We must counter this dangerous claim vigorously. Policies relying on violent deterrence will only raise the death toll, but won’t stop immigration. We need to acknowledge the fears of people that immigration destabilizes security and the economy, but need to counter simplistic and polemic protectionist trends. We need to set straight cause and effect: It is police violence and disfranchisement of immigrants that create criminality and deteriorating job markets. Destabilization through immigration is not a sign that our rules are not tough enough, but rather that our immigration policies have failed.

In the United States, labor unions have taken up the cause of immigrants and fight for a sensible and omprehensive immigration reform. They understand that a humanely regulated immigration protects both immigrants and the domestic workforce alike from exploitative corporations and anti-labor laws. In Europe, Social Democracy still has to find the courage to stand up for immigrant rights.

3. Risks of Protectionism: Imperialist Trade Policy
Much emphasis has been laid on the argument that within a Europe of free markets, but of different social standards and rates of taxation, nations are down-competing each other in a race to the bottom. Countering this development is an important task of European Social Democracy and the labor movement in future years. The free market and common external trade policies have also made the Union into one of the most predatory economic forces in the world. The EU, not the US, was pursuing the most aggressive liberalization in the WTO’s Doha-round. Since the collapse of Doha earlier this year, the EU has been following the US example by establishing bilateral trade agreements with third countries ever more aggressively. It has been argued even by free trade advocates that those agreements between a huge trade block on the one side and a weak developing economy on the other is putting the latter in a tremendous disadvantage.

“That is why a neoprotectionist strategic approach will only work in a Europe-wide context.” writes Stephen Haseler (Social Europe, vol. 2, I. 1, 2006). But these protectionist economic policies, proposed by some socialist commentators, are putting the EU at risk of becoming an even stronger trade aggressor internationally than it already is. Growing dependence on gas and oil imports are adding to Europe’s explosive economic role. Without developing solutions to the negative impact of a both protectionist and imperialist trade policies we are not only exporting poverty, environmental problems and instability to other countries, but we are also aggravating our own problems, eg. concerning immigration.

4. Risks of Protectionism: Enlargement
A mayor victim of growing protectionism might well be the Union’s enlargement process. Since the enlargement of 2004, voices against further enlargement have dominated in politics and in the public discussion. Many on the Left argue that further enlargement will make reforms of the current status quo – seen as serving mainly business interests – even more difficult. Before further enlargement, they argue, we first need to advocate integration in social and institutional matters.

But both conservatives and Social Democrats follow yet another, mostly unsaid, argument: that neither the remaining Balkan and ex-Soviet countries nor Turkey are seen as desirable future Union members. The most common arguments are that the accession of even poorer countries will put huge pressure on the EU economies and labor markets, bring the Union even closer to the world’s crisis regions of the Middle East and the Caucasus and – in the case of Turkey – bring in a huge Muslim population. It seems that, given the current public mood, politicians have little to gain and much to lose from supporting further enlargement.

But populist rejection of enlargement jeopardizes the most precious achievement of the European Union: stabilizing, reforming and democratizing its current and future member countries, as it has successfully done throughout its history.

The case against further enlargement is fuelled by a variety of misconceptions. First, enlargement and institutional reform function cumulatively, not exclusively. Prior integration processes happened because enlargement made them necessary. Maintaining the status quo is the biggest threat to institutional and social reform. Without the necessity to reform, the Union’s institutions and governments will have no incentive to change the current power structure. The concept of a “Social Europe” will lose most from this stalemate. Second, it isn’t wrong to demand a long and thorough integration process for the accessory countries, as long as it is not impossible for them to finally get in. An accession of Turkey in 15 years will leave plenty of time for reforms, but keeps the incentives to actually do so intact.

Social democracy does not need to outcompete Conservatives in anti-integration polemics if we can explain that the biggest threats for our job markets are not the accessory countries but a Union that remains blocked in its current neoliberal setting.

Allah made me the way I am.

2006-06-17T19:41:00.000-07:00

The campaign sujets of SoHo, the Social Democrat LGBT organization. The text says " "Allah made me the way I am." You belong to us! - equal rights for equal love". The campaign raises the issue of tolerance and inclusion of Muslim migrants in the LGBT community. Damn, I like it.

It's my party and I cry if I want to.

2006-06-14T19:06:00.000-07:00

The Austrian Labor Union (ÖGB) is crumbling, the chances for a left government in autumn is shrinking. Union president Hundstorfer should step down - and take all his old boy friends with him.

These days, my party gives me lots of reasons to cry. And cry and cry. Some months ago, the union-owned bank BAWAG stumbled over the crash of the US investment speculator Refco. It was an incredible humiliation when the union - one of the few big bastions of the Social Democrats (SPÖ) - had to beg the conservative banks and the conservative government to step in and save not only the bank but also the union from ruin.

Corruption and Incompetence
I don't shed a tear for Verzetnisch, the back-then president of the union who had to step down after the scandal got public. The union leadership held on to an incompetent and corrupt bank management, and even profited themselves (Verzetnitsch had his downtown-penthouse right next to the manager's). The new president, Rudi Hundstorfer promised reform. Instead, he tried to cover up again and thought it would be enough to blame Verzetnitsch. Turns out that there are much more open debts, and that Hundstorfer himself knew of the finance scandal and even signed relevant papers.

The new crisis management? Denial. He wasn't present at that meeting, or thought he would sign something else.

Cover-up
The idiocy and corruption of the old and new leadership is outrageous. To try and cover up his knowledge of the scandal is the most stupid thing Hundstorfer could have possibly done. Who does he think he's dealing with? That this wouldn't come out? That the conservatives would leave him be?

6 years ago, going into opposition should have been the sign for both the party and the union to reorganize and regain their strength. Now this scandal is destroying our chance to win the elections this autumn.

Against the wall
Some months ago, I wouldn't believed that something as big and mighty as a union could ever shatter. Now I now it can. And it doesn't even need a Margaret Thatcher. The old and the current leadership are just doing fine.

Hundstorfer should step down today, and he should take his whole crew of old boys with him. If he has feeling of responsibility for the union, the party and our values, that is.

From zero to hybris in 10 seconds?

2006-06-14T11:02:00.000-07:00

Is the liberal blogosphere really “changing the face of the Democratic party”? Or is it more of the same? How the “netroots” could do it better.

Political blogs have been around for quite some time now, and some of them have developed a considerable readership and influence, even if they still fall short of the established media (huffingtonpost.com or dailykos.com, the biggest liberal blogs, are still trailing the websites of traditional media like nytimes.com or cnn.com).

Big Ambitions
Some of the most prominent figures of the liberal Blogosphere have turned into political celebrities, publishing books, delivering soundbites for newspapers and even advising potential presidential hopefuls like Mark Warner. The first-ever gathering of the Dailykos-blogger community, YearlyKos in Las Vegas, welcomed a number of high-profile Democrats (Mark Warner, Harry Reid, Wes Clark, to name a few), a sign perceived both by the bloggers and the media as finally being taken seriously.

On the commercial for Dailykos-founder Markos Zuniga’s book “Crashing the Gates”, a crowd of people are ropepulling with a donkey, not being able to pull him anywhere. Zuniga walks by them and kicks the donkey in the butt. It is pretty descriptive for the self-declared goal of this section of the liberal blogosphere of making the Democratic party change direction ("Changing the face of the Democratic Party"). But it also shows the growing confidence of the liberal Internet community.

Everbody is a political strategist
These days, DailyKos.com looks more like a online forum for wannabe-politicians than a discussion platform. Every day, latest polls of various races throughout the country are published and donations for supported races are collected.

The level of self-reference is astounding. Almost every day another comment of a politician about the liberal blogosphere is published; and those races deemed important by the blog are described as if Dailykos itself would be on the ballot. One of today’s entries predicts DailyKos to be as relevant as the NYTimes in five years’ time.

The Smell of Sweat and Blood
Some of the races are dealt with in an especially agressive way. DailyKos’ current arch-enemy is Joe Lieberman, Gore’s runningmate in 2000, described as “Bush’s favorite republican” for his pro-war voting record in the Senate. His opponent in the Democratic primaries, Ned Lamont, a businessman virtually unknown only a few months ago, may score up to 40%, according to recent polls. He is strongly supported by DailyKos and other blogs.

In this very martial setting, Ned Lamont’s own politics is less relevant than the fact that he might unseat Joe Lieberman, the current anti-christ of the liberal blogosphere. And even though it’s (unquestionably) important to send a strong anti-war message to Democratic politicians, this point tends to be already overshadowed by the fact that DailyKos sees Conneticut’s Democratic primaries in August as a payback-day for everything they hate about the Democrats in Congress right now. But revenge is, I think, seldom a healthy political strategy.

Will the netroots grow up?
The uniting factor for this part of the blogging community is hate for the government and Anti-war sentiments, but other traditionally left points of concern (like minimum wage, health care, labor rights) receive little attention. The reason is that the self-declared “netroots” are not connected to social movements like labor unions, and both their proponents and their audience is – that’s what has been argued – white middle class, which is traditionally more concerned with the war-issue than with social issues.

But also, the style of Blogs – it’s speed, the little attention span for articles – doesn’t allow much more than a sometimes too simplistic scheme of good-vs.-bad-guys.

Some of the groups that were the new kids on the playground in the presidential election 2004, eg. MoveOn.org and Howard Dean’s Democrats for America (DFA, formerly Dean for America) have grown up: they learned from their initial shortcomings, established real (offline) chapters and poll their members on candidates and policies to support. Last week’s YearlyKos convention aimed in the same direction, even featuring not-so-sexy issues like energy independence.

The stars of the netroots like Zuniga or Jerome Armstrong from MyDD.com are right in many aspects of their political focus, and I appreciate the efforts to get their feet on the ground and work on establishing lasting structures, which many deem (rightly, I think) as the key to electoral success (and even more important for social change in the long term).

More influence for the influencial?
The netroots like to see themselves as rebels. In many ways, though, the liberal netroots have a lot in common with the big-boy league of politics. The fixation on the big electoral politics in contrast to group- and issue-building is one.

Another is the following: one of the big standard themes of the blogosphere is how the Democrats disregard the ordinary people and how they should listen much closer to what they (meaning: the netroots) want. But this is problematic. In many respects, the outspoken, educated, liberal, middle-class, white group is the one group most listened to by the Democratic party. For working families, unions, african-americans, latinos and latinas that’s different. In fact, the blogosphere’s white and middle class constituency is demanding more influence although they already are the most influencial group around.

The netroots already feel the seduction of power, but they haven't made their homework yet. This smells a bit like hybris to me. It would be good for the netroots to connect their important anti-war-issue and their organizing capabilities with the also very important social issues of the social movements (union, immigrant rights, etc). This could also be a healthy way of bringing the netroots back to a more reasonable and less over-the-top approach.

Parliament's strong voice against own governments in CIA scandal

2006-06-13T10:48:00.000-07:00

The draft resolution of the Council of Europe (CoE) on the CIA scandal has been published last week and will be voted upon by the Parliamentary Assembly in two weeks time. The final report of special rapporteur Dick Marty from Switzerland is courageous and strong.

"Spider's Web of Detentions"
The CoE draft resolution opens a view into one of the darkest stories of EU collaboration with the US illegal policies. The US, the resolution states, supported a "spider's web of detentions" that has "entrapped hundreds of persons (...) in some cases when they were merely suspected of sympathising with a presumed terrorist organisation."

European collaboration proved
The resolution proves beyond doubt the collaboration or tolerance of various EU countries in the illegal activities of the CIA. Did Marty's first report only spoke cautiously of the lack of control mechanisms by the states, the new report lays bare the extent of collaboration of various EU countries.

The Start, not the End of real investigations
The CoE investigation suffers from lack of collaboration by national governments and high EU representatives, as the resolution states. The same is true for the parliamentary commission by the European Parliament (EP). It's head, Spanish MEP Carlos Coelho, has criticized today the head of the Spanish intelligence service CNI, Alberto Saiz, who has not yet appeared before the commission despite invitation. (El Pais, 6/12/06) The Commission also tries to block the investigations.

As the conservative Financial Times wrote: "They amount to a moral capitulation by liberal societies and a surrender of the rule of law in the face of jihadi totalitarianism. If we behave like this, what exactly are we defending?"

The Spanish supreme court (Audiencia Nacional) today allowed a case on CIA torture flights via Palma de Mallorca to be opened. (El Pais, 6/12/06) Various cases on CIA kidnapping are under judicial investigation, eg. in Italy and Germany.

Globalizing the fight
An American court heard today by the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) against the CIA to disclose "documents authorizing it to detain and interrogate terrorism suspects overseas." (NYTimes, 6/12/06) Through this case, the ACLU wants to prove that the CIA does in fact have a principal policy of extraditing suspects illegally to torturing third countries.

What values are we fighting for?
The collaboration with the CIA torture system risks to destroy our most important values. The fight to restore the faith in the righteousness of our system and our values has just started.

In this sense, the role of the conservative (EPP) members of parliament who tried to block a report by the EP is simply outrageous. (EUObserver, 6/12/06) What's their agenda? That we shouldn't care if a foreign country kidnaps our citizens? Lies to our authorities? Tortures people? Risks our security and endangers our values? It's a good sign that despite the resistance of the EPP, the Commission and various EU countries the EP will continue the investigation for at least 6 months.

Can you talk an economy down? (just look at Germany)

2006-06-10T20:04:00.000-07:00

Now, now. Germany as the most exciting place to invest in Europe? Huh, I must have missed something here. "Germany comes out top because of its infrastructure, educated workforce, political stability and dedication to research and development." Those fascinating news are revealed by a recent study by Ernst & Young, a consulting company.

For years, Germany has been described as the "sick man of Europe", the Kassandras of doom being legion. The reforms proposed and adopted, though, did not focus on either infrastructure (budget cuts) nor an educated workforce (tuition fees) nor in political stability (cuts in healthcare and unemployment benefits below the poverty line), and I'm not even talking about dedication to research and development. It was about long years without increasing wages, major cuts in public investment and social security.

So now we know that a good infrastructure and an educated workforce is not so bad after all. And somehow this has even been understood by business leaders (The "study" is in fact a survey of 1,019 CEOs). Good.

I blame the conservative hysteria-machine of being partly responsible for what has been going on in the Westeuropean economies. The politics of reform have heavily depended on an "argument of crisis", creating a completely exaggerated feeling of crisis, that in turn could be mended with neoliberal "reforms".

This is, one might argue, politics. If a group can better convince the public of it's world view, then they deserve to push through their policies. But the sad truth is that the so-called reforms are brutally and outrageously failing. The German Hartz-reforms of the labor market are so costly and so ineffective that the German government will have no choice than to reform the reforms.

And as the huge cuts in social services and the outrageously wrong results of the last tide of reforms have created wide-spread insecurity that led to restraint in domestic demand and let to years of slow growth, the fact that they fucked up the political systems and the labor market so much that the chaos and insecurity will be bound to even grow.

The ongoing creation of fear by the neoliberal hysteria-machine has not only led to "reforms" that are ineffective at the least, it had also a negative impact on the economy that, in my opinion, cannot be overestimated. The fear-politics that dominated German economic policies in recent years has failed gloriously, except in one thing: they managed to talk the economy down. Even Ernst&Young's CEO-poll shows this. Now it's about time to bury the imbecile policies of neoliberalism.

Rising from rags to riches in Europe

2006-05-31T21:21:00.000-07:00

First, a confession: every week, it's hard to resist the temptation of commenting "The Economist" on EU issues. But this week I do.

The chance of social upward-mobility is exceptionally bigger in Europe than in the US, the Economist reports.

"Aroud three-quarters of sons born into the poorest fith of the population in Nordic countries in the late 1950s had moved out of that category by the time they were in their early 40s. In contrast, only just over half of american men born at the bottom later moved up." - "The Nordic countries are distinctive in one further way: (...) Nordic countries have almost completely snapped the link between the earnings of parents and children at and near the bottom. That is not at all true of America."

"The obvious explanation for greater mobility in the Nordic countries os theiir tax and welfare systems. (...) The other part of the explanation seems to be their superior education system." (The Economist, 5/27/2006)

The Economist seems almost surprised of the fact that a deregulated economy like the US provides much lesser chances of upward-mobility.

Finally, it seems, the message is starting to get through. A fair welfare system does not hinder economic growth (as the Nordic countries prove in every statistics), but connected with a well-financed and progressive educational system it's simply unbeatable. Rising from rags to riches seems to be not the American but the European way of life.

It's about time to implement this lesson in Continental Europe and in Brussels.

Here are the links to the respective studies the Economist quotes:
"Non-linearities in Inter-generational Earnings Mobility"
"American Exceptionalism in a New Light"

How the Conservatives just dumped the Constitution. And what this means.

2006-05-27T19:34:00.000-07:00

The EU foreign ministers have agreed on a roadmap for institutional reform, as Dutch foreign minister Bernard Bot told reporters (EU Observer 5/27/06).

The foreign ministers have obviously found a compromise only on the basic question of institutional adaptions needed for small-scale enlargement, but not more.

The Consequences
This strenghtens the assumption of my recent piece on this issue on the same issue: 1) no big enlargement step after Romania, Bulgaria and Croatia. This will especially mean a "no" for the Turkey accession by the Conservatives. 2) No further institutional or political integration. This means especially a "no" to policies related to a "Social Europe". 3) The minimum version will probably be stripped of most symbolic "constitutional" elements.

Why this shouldn't make the Left happy
As I have indicated earlier, this is not a bad trade-off for the Conservative governments. But the Liberals and the Left should become cautious: a "no" to the Turkey enlargement is a threat to EU foreign policy as we knew it, and this means a threat to the influence of stability, democracy and peace the enlarging Union had. If the Union starts to close itself off from the neighboring regions (following the US example) this could mean that the already 50-year old growth of peace may come to a hold.

Also, to pursuit a "social Europe", further integration in democratic, social, economic and judicial matters and changes in the budgetary and monetary policies is needed.

The end of the Constitution therefor is nothing that the Left needs to be particularly happy with.

How German Reforms fuck up Europe (and Germany, too)

2006-05-23T09:48:00.000-07:00

This is a response to beatroot, who commented on my recent piece on the constitution : "I doubt that liberalisation is on many agendas at the moment. (...)Even Merkel has gone quiet on those much needed German reforms."

Believe it or not: Germany most competitive and profitable big country of Euro.
Evidence strongly suggests that the mantra "Germany needs reform" has already become true long time ago. Germany is again the biggest exporter of the world, and the German companies are profitable beyond historic precedent. The competitiveness of an economy is measured in unit labor costs. They get cheaper when productivity outgrows labor costs. That is what has happened in Germany. In fact, Germany's unit labor costs have remained at the same level since 1995, whereas eg Spain's have risen about 30%.

German reforms itself and fucks up European economies
The reason is an already decade-long restraint in wage increases in Germany. In fact, wage restraint has made Germany so competitive that it damages the other economies of the Euro-zone, as a study of the Paris institute OFCE suggests. Economist Robert von Heusinger argues in Die Zeit that Spain, France and Italy would have to outbalance Germany's reforms with long years of wage restraint and social cuts of their own or - leave the Euro-zone.

Profit doesn't mean growth
So, why is there still so little growth in Germany although the exports roar and the companies are profitable like hell? The answer is that with all social cuts and wage restraints the domestic demand - usually creating the biggest share of growth - could not grow.

So, the message of the economists is out (and some European national parties are finally responding): liberalization per se does not fix anything. At the moment, misguided liberalization policies are mainly responsible for the lack of growth in the Euro-zone.

German labor reforms more expensive and less effective than old system. But unemployed people are punished nontheless.
Talking about misguided liberalization policies: "Hartz IV", the German labor market reform is now proven that it not only pushed part-time workers and folks without job beyond the poverty line, but also costs more than the old system and is less effective in putting people in jobs, according to the German Court of Audit. (Sueddeutsche, 5/22/06)

Left Euroblogs, where are thou?

2006-05-18T18:31:00.000-07:00

I've spent quite some now looking for other blogs commenting on the EU from a left point of view. I'll put them in my blogroll sometime soon, but the results have been pretty disappointing so far. That's particularly troublesome as the Conservatives and the Right euro-critics (mainly British) are already well-positioned in the blogging world. Meanwhile, here's one of the nicer exceptions: European Tribune, a Dailykos-style blog (some of the contributors will be familiar to those reading Dailykos).

CIA sources prove European goverments' involvement in torture scandal, Parliament says

2006-05-17T08:57:00.000-07:00

The Parliamentary Commitee investigating in the CIA scandal on torture and extraordinary rendition reported that CIA sources support the allegations the various EU governments have been involved. Parliamentarians (MEP) are currently in the US for investigations on the CIA scancal.

At least 30-50 people have been illegally transported by the CIA, Italian MEP Claudio Fava said. At least 7 torture and detention sites ("black sites") have been operated by the CIA in foreign countries, among them some in Europe, according to Fava. (EU Observer, 5/17/06)

An interim report presented by the Commitee last month concludes that the CIA operated at least 1.000 flights over Europe carrying illegally abducted and detained persons.

Cooperation by EU governments has been insufficient so far, with few top-officials willing to give testimony.

The involvement of EU-governments in the illegal CIA activities is shocking. But how countries like the UK, Germany, Poland and Italy and even the highest EU officials (like Javier Solana) try to obstruct the EP investigation, thats a true scandal of its own.

Morales on Nationalizations in EU Parliament | Financial Retaliation against Bolivia?

2006-05-16T20:59:00.000-07:00

Evo Morales defended the nationalization of Bolivia's gas reserves at the European Parliament yesterday. Morales: “I understand that your companies need a return on their investments, but you cannot own the resources – the state will control them. Companies will be our partners but not owners of natural resources. I regret that some parts of the media trying to create confrontation.” (EP)

Financial Retaliation against Bolivia?
Before the LAC/EU summit this weekend, Morales accused the Spanish government of reneging on the promises made during last year's election campaign of doubling aid funds and debt relief. The Spanish foreign minister Miguel Ángel Moratinos responded that Spain would keep its promise but that it would take time. (El Pais, 5/11/2006)

Negotiations between the Spanish and the Bolivian government on the legal handling of the nationalizations concerning the Spanish-Argentinian company Repsol-YPF started two weeks ago. During the summit in Vienna Zapatero emphasized that he aims at keeping the bilateral relation amicable. This is positive in comparison to his initial comments in March.

Repsol-YPF has threatened to reconsider its investments in Bolivia. It faces a class-action lawsuit of stakeholders in the US in connection with the changed political situation in Bolivia. Some major finance groups have already handed over the shares of those companies that are to be nationalized. (El Pais, 5/16/2006)

Despite some consiliatory words from the Spanish government and Brazil's Lula it remains to be seen if the involved governments and companies or the usual international supects will put on the financial thumbscrews on Bolivia in order to force Morales into submission.

Latin America, Europe and the Left: Enthusiasm and the Challenge ahead

2006-05-14T19:06:00.000-07:00

Hugo Chavez and Evo Morales were the unchallenged stars of the Latin-American/Carribean States (LAC) summit in Vienna this weekend. The European Left was successful in shifting the focus on the Union’s aggressive international trade policy and may well have created one of the first truly European focal points for the Left. The revolutio-romantizism of the alternative summit reveals, on the other hand, the challenges of the Left that still lie ahead.

1. The Left finds its first European objective, finally
As a driving force of a neoliberal international trade politics the EU is playing side by side with the USA, as many NGOs like Attac or Oxfam have argued in recent years. (Also see my piece on WTO-EU). In some cases the Union has in fact taken over the role as the main villain, for example in the Hong Kong WTO Doha round in December 2005. The vision of the EU being or becoming a “soft world power” can, therefor, already be discarded as phantastic or simply wrong.

This weekends major effort of an alternative summit paralleling the LAC-EU meeting has finally succeeded in creating a public focus on the Union’s aggressive trade policy. But there’s more to it: it could well be the first left issue that truly gets a grip on European politics and be a focal point for the whole left spectrum (from unions to greens) and pan-European. It’s concrete, visionary, long-term and not too reactionistic.

One example: the tribunal-technique of publicly accusing specific big companies for their unethical business strategy has been used at the Alternative summit for companies like Suez. It has proven successful in a variety of (mainly American) campaigns (Killer-Coke, Nike Anti-Sweatshop, etc) and can prove interesting for unions, student groups and consumer-advocates.

2. Lessons learned from older European campaigns
There have been, of course, some recent examples of more or less successful European Left campaigns: Anti-GATS, Anti-Bolkestein and Anti-Constitution, to name the most important. But all of them have had their flaws: GATS was very technical and couldn’t reach wide publicity despite the involvement of some major labor unions. The Anti-Constitution campaign could, after all, not find a concrete Left critique of the Constitution that would have been able to unite the Left of both the old and the new member states (not mentioning the rift in eg the French Left itself) and instead relied on a blurry Anti-feeling that some Eastern European commentators have dismissed as coded xenophobia (and, to some extent, rightly so). All of the mentioned campaigns have in common that they were only a defensive reaction to a (hostile) policy.

The issue of the Union’s trade policy, on the other hand, has the potential to overcome those childhood-illnesses of European left campaigning. It is to hope that a similar development will take place for other pressing issues (Social Europe, civil rights and security, etc.)

The three keys to a successful European campaign could be described as follows: 1. Concentrate on specific policies instead on “neoliberalism” as such. 2. A successful European campaign needs to include and be attractive for the whole European Left (and not only the Western European Left). 3. A concrete policy we favor over the policy we fight.

3. Solidarity with Latin America? How?
The current left-swing in Latin America has been described as probably one of the most important left developments of today. This may well be true for Latin America, and I deem it important to sustain a feeling of solidarity towards the Left movements. After all, it isn’t too long ago that the US supported a putsch against the elected president Chavez. A conscious European public is important as a counterweight to another similar attempt.

4. The erratic First-World Left
On the other hand, the first-world Left is an erratic and moody bitch. Before the current Chavez/Morales hype there was a similar Lula-hype, but after his corruption scandal he fell from grace with the first-world Left and is now seen as something like a Latin-American Tony Blair.

The first-world left is keeping a deep sympathy for anything that smells like Che Guevara, Latin America or popular uprising (and there’s nothing wrong with that).

But here’s the problematic part: the socio-romantic semi-knowledge of what’s going on in Latin America is sometimes deeply unrealistic, as the case of Lula shows: could we really expect an instant overturn of a deeply rooted parlamentary system of corrution? Or have the high expectations rather been proved naïve and unrealistic? Now, parts of the first-world Left apply a similar black-n-white scheme on Venezuela and Bolivia.

I say that there’s a 50:50 chance that the Lula-destiny awaits Chavez, too, and that the first-world Left will find find yet another new hero to first love and then loathe. The reason for this is that Left aocio-romanticism is, I claim, still structurally racist (reminding of Edward Said’s analysis of Orientalism). As Lord Byron was disappointed that the Greek revolutionaries weren’t as pittoresque as the antique statues he knew, we are bound to find out again and again that the Latin American Left is as much trapped in the context of their system as we are by ours.

5. Working along with Chavez and Morales
This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t be responsive to the developments in Latin America. The alert solidarity mentioned above is certainly needed and useful. But the true lesson learned from Chavez and Morales is about applying their critizism of the economically imperialist West in our European policies. This means change in the CAP (Common Agricultural Policy), democratization of the foreign trade policy (possibly handing over the real responsibility and oversight from the Commission to the European Parliament), investment in alternative energy, and democratic supervision and possibly nationalization of water/gas/power/petrol companies. That sounds like a lot of boring and not-at-all-revolutionary-feeling work. True. But that’s what solidarity with the Left movements in Latin America is really about.

Why the Conservatives will dump the Constitution

2006-05-10T11:26:00.000-07:00

After the self-imposed “year of reflection” the European governments are once again buzzing with ideas how it should go on with the Constitution. Despite some differences in the tactics, the conservative strategy for Europe is now becoming clear: most probably no Constitution for now. But most of its content will come anyway.

The five conservative heavyweights – Barroso, Schuessel, Chirac, Merkel and Kaczynski – have proposed different ideas of how to – or not to – pursue with the Constitution. Whereas Schuessel and initially Merkel want to give the Constitution a second try, Barroso and Merkel recently favored continued reform on a low level without reviving the Constitution for now. Chirac prefers “cherry-picking” those propositions that do not need a referendum. The Polish President Lech Kaczynski wants to rewrite the Constitution with a less integrationist approach.

Behind those disaccords, the Conservative leaders share a common idea of how the next couple of years in the Union should look like:

1) Enlargement’s over
Integration (symbolized by the Constitution) and Enlargement are seen as the two biggest turn-offs for the European population. Key of the new strategy is to upset the Europeans as little as possible. So, Merkel, the French government and the European Parliament (EP) have made it clear that they want an enlargement stop for now. It's likely that after Bulgaria, Romania and Croatia they plan to make a (very) long break. Merkel, like Sarkozy and Schuessel, have expressed their doubts about a full membership for Turkey.

2) Cherry-picking
The Commission’s recent proposal to use a bridging-clause to transfer of large numbers of police and criminal matters from the third pillar (unanimous vote) to the first pillar (majority vote) resembles the relevant clause from the Constitution. It seems that the cherry-picking, proposed by Chirac, has begun. This means the implementation of parts of the Constitution through the back door.

3) Focus on further liberalization and security-related issues
A partial stop of integration is nothing the Conservatives are particularly afraid of. Contrary, for the conservative leaders (like Kaczynski) a deepening of the Union (especially in social matters or taxation) is a frightening perspective. Without a Constitution further integration in those areas will be posponed for years. Further liberalization, on the other hand, is easily possible in the current treaty structure. Security-related and criminal matters can, as proposed, be transferred into the first pillar that doesn’t require unanimous vote.

This turn from last year’s grand-project-approach of the Constitution to a comfortingly slow, but consistent pursuit of neoliberal policies finds its expression in the Commission’s paper “A Citizen’s Agenda”, published today. “The clear message we receive,” the paper says, “is that citizens want a Europe of results. A Europe that delivers for them.”

The British are likely to play along, especially as the Labour government is weakened and will not invest political capital in pushing an unpopular Constitution. And Britain has never been overenthusiastic about the Constitution anyway. This means Europe's big four: France, Germany, Poland and the UK will most likely not further push the Constitution. This could mean posponing and probably changing the Constitution - or a long kiss goodbye into oblivion.

The only real woe of the Conservatives is that without the Constitution further integration of a common foreign and military policy will have to wait. But, it seems, that’s something the Conservatives can live with for now.

Plan D

2006-05-09T12:43:00.000-07:00

Now that I call creative: to mobilize against the current effort to revive the Constitution, ID (Independence/Democracy Group), one of the European Parliament's groups organizes a ... bus tour through Europe. The Italian Lega Nord, the Polish League of Families and the British Independence Party are members of ID. The bus tour shall promote it's campaign against the Constitution. (Plan D campaign website). "Plan D", initially that was a Commission diction: "Plan D for Democracy, Dialogue and Debate”. ID, meanwhile, assumes it stands for "dead", referring to the Constitution. Yawn, rightists. Without all the bus-tours pro and contra the Constitution that have taken place in the last 2 years, we probably could have reached our Kyoto-goals for Carbonmonoxide.

Football's coming home

2006-05-04T09:29:00.000-07:00

The Parliament held a hearing on "Professional Football" last week. Football, the Parliament concludes, "offers a model for social integration". That's a damn charming perspective. Thinking about who is now the Austrian champion I think it's far-fetched, but charming nontheless (EU Parliament).

War on Iran II: The case of Iraq

2006-05-03T13:56:00.000-07:00

In the first piece of this series I argued that by taking over major responsibilities in Afghanistan, Europe is easening the overall burden of war of the United States. My argument in this text is that – contrary to the common view – Europe has played a major role supporting the Iraq war.

The “Coalition of the Willing” is dropping apart. After the withdrawal of Spain, Norway and Hungary in 2004, Portugal, Moldova, Netherlands, Ukraine and Bulgaria in 2005 and 2006 now Italy’s likely Prime Minister Prodi has announced to pull out the 2,600 Italian troops ASAP. The UK will reduce its troop number from 8,000 to 7,000 this month. Only Poland’s conservative Prime Minister Marcinkiewicz, reversing his predecessor’s decision, will keep the Polish force of about 1,500 troops stationed in Iraq, together with a few other European countries like Romania, Georgia and Denmark.

European death toll
The European death toll, as of April 10, is 207 soldiers is 8% of coalition’s total casualties: 103 of them British, 27 Italian, 18 Ukrainian, 17 Polish, 13 Bulgarian, 11 Spanish, three Slovak, three Danish, two Dutch, two Estonians and one Hungarian, one Latvian and one Kazakh. Relatively to the overall troop strength the Iraq war has been as deadly for Europe as for the US. (The image shows relatives of killed British Private Phillip Hewett at a remembrance service at Downing Street on April 26)

That’s a bitter end for a war that many European countries and definitely the majority of the European population did not want. The lack of a unified position within the Union (“old” and “new” Europe) has been interpreted as a split in between the member states, but in fact the role of the Union in Iraq is more complex.

The I-wanna-be-your-friend dilemma
Both in the built-up of the Iraq war and later most of the European governments have expressed the need of keeping the credibility as allies of the US. Especially Eastern European governments, both members and non-members of the Union, have been under pressure: if they want to stay friends with the Bush government and have their share in the obvious benefits of being an US-ally, they have to be supportive of the war. Even the most outspoken critics of the war, Germany, obviously felt the need to take back its capital NO to the war on informal levels of cooperation: German intelligence officers in Baghdad supported the invasion with crucial information.

Gimme all your money
Similar to Afghanistan, the Union has turned into probably the biggest civilian donor to Iraq. The Commission has been the prime donor of the elections in 2005, and European countries and the Union pay for the biggest share of the International Donors conference by far (731 million dollars of 1.3 billion). (IRFFI)

The Bush government, meanwhile, is pulling out of its aid responsibilities. For 2006, USAid has a budget of 360 million dollars for Iraq, down from 2,2 billions in 2004 and 660 millions in 2005. (USAid)

Shared Burden
As seen in Afghanistan, the Iraq war is far from being a US game with no European players on the field. Despite huge criticism from both the European population and many governments, Europe has undoubtedly taken a more than fair share of responsibilities in Iraq.

Europe has played along with the US both in its security objectives (terrorism as the major international threat, immigration, energy supply) and the means (war in Afghanistan and Iraq, containment of Hamas, the torture system). Those myriads of “trans-atlanticists” who demand that Europe shall live up more to America’s expectations may find out: that is exactly what Europe has already been doing in the past few years.

But: has this done the Union any good? Did the means of the past – especially the Iraq war - help achieve the Union’s objectives?

Javier Solana, the Unions top foreign policy official, named the following as the Union’s most pressing issues: Energy security, terrorism, human rights, failed states, non-proliferation (Javier Solana, Sound of Europe, 1/27/06, Salzburg). This set of objectives may be a problem in itself as it partly follows a “we-against-all” (or realist) foreign policy paradigm. But aside from this criticism, I think I’m on the safe side saying that the means supported by the Union have not made the world a safer place. Quite the contrary is true: the handling of post-war Afghanistan, the invasion of Iraq and the following strategic mistakes and the outrageous US/UK torture system are threatening both international and the Union’s internal security in the most blatant way imaginable. And, sad to add, predictably so.

What’s on your list, Javier?
The UN has to clean up the mess in Iraq. That’s how it was done in Afghanistan, with very disappointing results, but there’s no other way. Solving the Iraq problem will need not only loads of money, troops and infrastructure support from the Union, but also heavy support for the African, Iranian and Middle-Eastern UN troops who should be the core of a UN peace force. If we don’t want to administrate another pile of debris like in Afghanistan, this will take years and billions.

Be a partner. The Union’s best time always is when it treats countries like partners, not subordinates. Meaning: Turkey and most of the Arab Mediterranean states are already woven into a network of contracts and agreements with the Union, both politically and economically. They are a huge opportunity. The current process towards those countries needs to be restarted on a fair basis. Plus: strong signals towards a membership of Turkey are needed.

War on Iran I: The case of Afghanistan

2006-04-25T10:18:00.000-07:00

As the US is preparing for a new war, this time against Iran, the European countries have once again to assess where they stand. I will subsequently argue that, this time, the Union is all set for the fullest support possible for the next US war. In three pieces I want to look at the Union’s role in Afghanistan and Iraq, and how Union’s participation in a disastrous Iran war can be prevented.

Afghanistan: the Silent War
In stark contrast to Iraq, Afghanistan has gently slipped out of the public consciousness since the overthrow of the Taliban in 2002. In absence of major occurrences the deployment in Afghanistan is now seen, if at all, as a success.

Political and (the few existing) media reports, though, paint a grim picture: the security situation stays troublesome, both the central government and the international forces lack control over most of the country, and the Taliban is regaining momentum. Major relief organizations have pulled out of most of the country, most of the population is left on its own.

The sad reality is that Afghanistan has simply slipped out of control and is yet another country to be added to the list of failed states. Different to cases like Somalia is the fact that it’s not only part of a region that the Western countries deem crucial for international stability. It’s also been the first major spot of the US-led so-called “War on Terror”. The fact that it has devastatingly failed should give some thoughts about the Western anti-terror strategy.

The EU in Afghanistan
What’s so crucial about Afghanistan is that is has turned from a US problem into a European one. Widely out of sight from the general public, various European nations have deployed troops in Afghanistan under different missions, so that they now account for about 50% of the international troops stationed there.

The UN-mandated and NATO-led mission ISAF has 10.000 soldiers in Afghanistan. The biggest troop contingents are sent by Germany (2600), Italy (2000), UK (500), France (500) and Turkey. Additionally, France and the UK participate in the US mission Enduring Freedom with about 1300 soldiers.

With such troop deployment, Europe has taken over responsibilities from the US, which has in recent years constantly reduced its troop numbers.

Additionally to military deployment, the European Union is probably the most important financial donor to Afghanistan. (This is an assumption, as the financial numbers available for me don’t allow a full comparison)

Dangerous Afghanistan
European public opinion towards warfare in the last 15 years is constant and clear: While Europeans usually support limited humanitarian and peacekeeping missions, they widely oppose broad and offensive warfare.

The most obvious problem is that Afghanistan still is one of the most dangerous countries: with about 80 US casualties in the last year Afghanistan has been as deadly as Iraq, compared to the troop numbers (16.000 US-troops in Afghanistan, 160.000 in Iraq). (Due to bad public documentation of the various European countries, I did not manage to calculate a realistic number of European casualties so far.)

Taking into account the current level of financial, military and political involvement, the international involvement in Afghanistan shows all signs of resignation.

Political dilemma
The European Union is in a difficult political situation: it’s of course not in the European interest to let Afghanistan become a pariah-state. Additionally, the European governments want to reclaim their position as the most important allies of the US and are therefor eager to show their worthiness and support. And the war in Afghanistan has not been a contested question in 2002: willing to lend support to a furious post-9/11 US, there has been no major critique of European governments towards the attack and overthrow of the Taliban.

But that’s not the whole picture as the war in Afghanistan is connected in virtually all levels to the ongoing war in Iraq. It’s not an overstatement to say that the European involvement in Afghanistan relieves the US of a military and financial burden. Which is, in turn, very much welcomed by a politically and financially overburdened United States.

Betrayed public
It is obvious that this is not what the European population wants. The vivid opposition to the Iraq war and the involvement by European governments is constantly strong. And it’s not only about the fear of losing own soldiers – it is an opposition against war as a way of politcs, and it’s an opposition against the hit-the-head politics of the US in the Middle East.

Lessons learned
An assessment of the Union’s involvement in Afghanistan should be part of an assessment of the “War on Terror”, the concept that has guided both the US’ and the Union’s international policies since 9/11. I will try that in the third article of this series. Nevertheless, Afghanistan provides some lessons in itself:

1) The European public is simply not aware of the ongoing warfare in Afghanistan (the number of air strikes has constantly risen in the last years), the high number of casualties and the rising European involvement in Afghanistan (only last autumn Germany added another 800 troops to its contingent). That form of low-key take-over of the main burden in Afghanistan from the US and its implicit support for the ongoing war in Iraq and a future war in Iran is wrong, and the European public wouldn’t agree to it.

2) The way Afghanistan is handled by the coalition at the moment simply means to give it up. If the “war on terror”-strategy is not able to secure and pacify Afghanistan after 4 years, then it means that it does not work. But if the “war on terror”-strategy makes Afghanistan an even less safe and more dangerous place, then the strategy is outrageously dangerous.

CIA scandal cont.

2006-04-21T11:32:00.000-07:00

Craig Murray, British ex-ambassador in Uzbekistan and outspoken critic of the US/UK system of torture gave evidence yesterday to the parlamentary commission. Murray: "Under the UK-US intelligence sharing agreement, the US and UK have taken a policy decision that they will get testimonies obtained under torture in third countries. I say that with regret and with certainty." (EP Website, 4/20/06) Murray hints that at least the German intelligence service might also be involved in the torture system.

The Union's counter-terrorism Coordinator Gijs de Vries is quoted by yesterday's newspapers saying that the allegations on CIA activity "(do) not appear to be proven beyond reasonable doubt." He faces wide criticism by the MEPs. Kathalijne Buitenweg, a Green MEP from the Netherlands: "the circumstantial evidence is stunning. I'm appalled that we keep calling to uphold human rights while pretending that these rendition centers don't exist and doing nothing about it." (New York Times, 4/20/06)

The inquiry into CIA torture activities and it's connections to Europa are now in a crucial stage: it's simply not very smart of the governments and the Union to claim that their passivity towards the American torture system will solve the problem. The unwillingness to fully undisclose all information simply shows how strongly a revision of the European security and intelligence policy towards the US is needed.

Murder of LGBT people in Iraq | EU Asylum protection of LGBT people

2006-03-24T14:40:00.000-08:00

This piece of news brings the shocking developments in Iraq horribly close to me: death squads in Iraq target homosexual and transsexual people, as the Gay City News reports.

At least four gay people have been murdered in the last week alone, as the group "Abu Nawas", an Iraqi gay refugee group based in London reports. The Badr corps, the military arm of the Supreme Council of the Islamist Revolution in Iraq is the primary group targeting and executing people for their sexual orientation.

The leader of the Supreme Council, the Shiite Ayatollah Sistani has issued a fatwah demanding the killing of homosexual people in late 2005.

EU Asylum for LGBT people
An EU directive (2004/83/EC) that includes persecution of homosexuality as a reason for asylum (though indirectly) will enter into force in October 2006. From then on, every EU country will have to provide the possibility to request asylum for LGBT people.

Various countries, one of them Austria, already provide the possibility of granting asylum for LGBT people. Despite this, effective protection of LGBT people is often lacking, as the example of Austria shows: to my knowledge less than 10 people have successfully requested asylum under this provision in recent years. A main reason is that the risk of persecution for sexual orientation or gender identification is often a general threat. Asylum procedures, on the other hand, want the asylum seeker to prove and document a personal or individual threat. (See guideline of ILGA-Europe)

The focus for future work, therefor, will lie on loosening the burden of proof, especially if the asylum seekers are from countries where the danger for LGBT people is as obvious as in Iraq.

2006-03-22T14:00:00.000-08:00

The hard-guy approach of the French government towards the union and student demonstrators has led to the severe injury of Cyril Ferez, a unionist on saturday, who currently is in a coma. Ferez was, as various eye-witnesses report, severely injured by the CRS, a special police commando. Risky and violent actions are usually decided upon by the interior minister himself, Sarkozy.

Le Monde
Telepolis

Spring Council 2 | Jobs and Growth

2006-03-22T12:15:00.000-08:00

As this week's European Council meeting will concentrate on growth and employment (additionally to energy, that I've already tackled), I want to take a closer look at the current European strategy for jobs.

The neoliberal premises to job growth are now in practice in some countries for about 10 years or more. The experience with it is finally here. If we look at the European best-performers (Sweden, Finland, Denmark, UK), they proof the neoliberal premises astonishingly wrong. And here's why:

Premise 1: Monetary stability
Monetary stability (=low inflation) means budget restraint, and budget restraint means few public investment. This scheme is true for many countries since more than ten years. Those countries that spent more on public investment (which is, after all, investment in the future) are now doing particularly better both in jobs and in growth (Scandinavian countries, UK). Moreover, monetary stability blocks new private investment.

We should, therefor, push for a reform of the European Central Bank (ECB). Growth has to become a Bank's goal equal to monetary stability. Public investment shall no longer be punished by the ECB.

Premise 2: Competition in political structure
The Barroso commission sees downwards-competition in taxes, labor regulation and social services as beneficial in a global context. In fact, the European countries are not competing against the world, but primarily against themselves (the European trade balance is positive and growing, meaning it is very competitive).

Cutting in social spending has not turned out to be an incentive for growth and jobs. In fact, the countries that kept up a good social security are again best-performers.

Countries shall have the right to compete. But instead of obviously unsuccessful down-competing social standards (that shall be secured europe-wide), a more flexible macro-economy (see premise 1) can ensure that differently developed economic regions take different actions.

Premise 3: well-paid jobs cost growth
In many countries, wage raises have widely trailed the raise in productivity for the last ten years or more. This has severely damaged the economy, as less money is spent by the employees. Cheap jobs may make European products more competitive internationally in the short run, but keep in mind: more than 80% of European trade happens within the Union. Sacrificing internal consumption for exports is therefor a bad deal and hurts our export competitiveness in the long term severely.

Countries that keep wage increases in line with inflation and productivity have therefor been more successful.

Premise 4: liberalisation
Liberalisation in power, gas and telecommunication has shown two phenomenons: higher consumer prices and creation of huge monopolies (EdF, GdF, E.on, etc.). Both are counterproductive, hurt the economy and endanger access to public goods. The EU has to make regulation of the liberalised markets more democratic and more attentive. New markets (like pensions) should not be opened, as the effects (less growth and fewer jobs) will probably be similar.

Doing good politics means learning from experience. If the Union and the Barroso-commissison has any plans to do successful growth and jobs politics, they will follow the Swedish, Finish (and to some extent) British example.

Barroso's outworldly comments on the French students

2006-03-20T19:27:00.000-08:00

José Manuel Barroso seems to be not entirely satisfied by his job as the Commission's president. Seemingly unhappy with the somewhat technocratic character of his position, he enjoys himself in the role as the neoliberal posterboy of the Union. Not to his benefit, sad to say - and definitely not to the benefit of the Commission and the Union.

Commenting on the French protests against the CPE of this weekend he states that Europeans show "nostalgia for revolution, but fear of reform", as EUobserver.com reports. Barroso has shown a great interest in producing soundbites that depict him as an uncompromising fighter for social cuts and corporate benefits. But this latest quote reveals more: not only is it ridiculous from a theoretical point of view (revolution is, if nothing else, more, and not less than reform). It also show's the complete disorientation of Barroso and his neoliberal sidekicks as soon as they are confronted with the voice of the European population.

His hard-boiled sacrifice-more-and-get-less rethorics works only when the European electorate is shut out. Confronted with public reaction to his politics he is not at all able to find support for even the most basic elements of his politics.

After all: even from a liberal perspective is is simply not comprehensible what the benefit of tying up young adults in disadvantageous forced contracts could possibly be.

The French public now makes the democratically questionable and politically wrong approach of the Barroso-Commission obvious for the second time within a year.

And Barroso plays a risky game: the quixotic and widely unpracticable character of his politics widely antagonizes the European public and risks its willingness to move out of the status quo. If Barroso doesn't change course now he will be the prime culprit for a motion-less Union for years to come. It's not the French students being outworldly - Barroso is.

Netherland's Rita Verdonk threatens LGBT asylum seekers

2006-03-17T09:06:00.000-08:00

In the beginning of march, Dutch Immigration Minister Rita Verdonk threatened to end a six-month moratorium on deporting LGBT asylum-seekers back to Iran.

Deporting LGBT asylum seekers to Iran where they face torture and execution would be a serious breach of the Netherland's legal obligations, as Human Rights Watch pointed out in a recent letter to the minister.

The European Social Democracy has widely abandoned the fight for the right of people who are persecuted in their homeland to seek asylum in the Union in recent years. This was for strategic reasons: the weakest are always the first target of the right, and many Social Democratic parties followed them in the bashing of immigrants, asylum-seekers and muslims. We leave the stage to small-scale Eichmanns like Rita Verdonk.

The right readily reacts to this left misconception of "strategy" by cracking down on a new group of people (this is how real "strategy" looks like). If we give up support for one group of people, we'll weaken support for the other issues we care for, too.

Johanna Dohnal, social democratic Austrian women minister once said: "To hold one's horses for tactical reasons usually turns out to be a mistake." It's heartening to read that maniacs like Verdonk now face stiff opposition in the Netherlands.

EU forgeign policy | UN Human Rights Council | Belarus

2006-03-16T10:46:00.000-08:00

Today's decision of the UN General Assembly to replace the infamous Commission on Human Rights with a new body, the Human Rights Council, marks a major success of the Union's forgeign policy.

Despite the resistance of the US (who, together with Israel and 2 pacific island states voted against the Council) the Union pushed successfully for a reform of the UN human rights structure. The new body will hopefully allow to keep frequent human rights violators out and voice critizism more frequent and substantiated. Finally, term limit will keep the US out of the new body after it had a seat in the Commission since its existence. This will make human rights politics less dependent on the US' partisan interests.

The EU has recently faced criticism for not making a stronger stand for human rights, eg. in the 2006 Human Rights Wach report. The support for Kofi Annan, the cooperation with NGOs like Amnesty and the firm push for the reform is a good response of the EU. Good job, Javier.

Thumbs up also for Benita Ferrero Waldner, the Union's foreign relations commissioner: the incredible dictatorship right in the heart of Europe, Belarus, gets finally more into the focus of the Union as the elections come close. Last month saw the kick-off for the Union's dissident broadcast service for Belarus. The commissar now voices regularly criticism on human rights abuses in Belarus, most recently the arrest of opposition member Anatoly Lebedko and various NGO representatives. Also positive: US and EU's cooperation on the issue.

That's how European foreign policy should look like: strong internationalism within the boundaries of the UN and firm standing for human rights in the wider European region.