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I Was Wrong – This Might Be the End of UKIP
Back in March, before the referendum campaign that would ultimately eject Britain from the European Union, I wrote an article arguing that UKIP had successful transcended its status as a single-issue party. Like other groupings across Europe that began as protest movements against supranational integration, UKIP had broadened its appeal to become an expression of…
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How the EU Global Strategy Reshapes Democracy Promotion
When Federica Mogherini took the stage on June 28, the vast majority of politicians and journalists were still buzzing around Brexit. Instead of joining the debates about the demise of the European project, the EU’s High Commissioner Mogherini went on to lay out a clear vision for the union’s further interactions with the world –…
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Whose Failure is the Rise of the Far Right?
In recent years several EU countries have been facing a growing support for far right parties. Slovakia, my home country, is not an exception here. A couple of years ago the Slovak Prime Minister and leader of the social democratic party Smer, Robert Fico was asked if he felt any personal responsibility in this matter.…
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Dungavel Detention Centre Closure – a New Beginning for Asylum Seekers in Scotland?
You can tell a lot about a country by the way it treats asylum seekers whose applications have been rejected. Often these people are held like criminals with no rights, safety or a place to call home. In Germany those who do not leave voluntarily lose the right to visit the country in the future…
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TV Licensing in Greece: Concealed Censorship or Appropriate Solution?
For 27 consecutive years private TV channels have been operating in Greece with temporary licenses provided by the Greek Parliament in 1989 and extended since then either by law or by ministerial decisions. In 2015 the SYRIZA government decided to give a definite solution to this matter and to regulate the telecoms sector appropriately. In…
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A Dual Struggle for the Present and Future of Europe
Back in 2013, in his provocative article ‘The Latin Empire should strike back’, Giorgio Agamben revived the idea of a union of southern European countries, a proposal first launched by another philosopher, Alexandre Kojève. During the ongoing economic crisis, we have read and heard many times about the north-south divide within the European Union or…
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Why Aren’t We Using Low Growth as an Opportunity?
Earlier this month, leaders of the world’s biggest economies met in Hangzhou, China, for the annual G20 summit. The main item on the agenda was a predictable one: how, given the prolonged slump, can countries work together to restore the growth levels of the global economy. In June, the World Bank revised its annual forecast…
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For UK Politics, Brexit Is Set to Be a Slow Grind of Contradictions
On Monday 5 September, over two months since Britain voted to leave the European Union, the new Brexit minister David Davis stood up to address Parliament on the government’s plan for the upcoming negotiations. Many of us who voted Remain were curious to see exactly what sort of consensus had been reached within the cabinet…
