Commentary Pieces
Paradigm changes in Swedish politics
The nationalist Sverigedemokraterna (Sweden Democrats) ended up as the biggest winner when the Swedes went to the ballot boxes the 11th of September, in an
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The nationalist Sverigedemokraterna (Sweden Democrats) ended up as the biggest winner when the Swedes went to the ballot boxes the 11th of September, in an
A new scandal in which Credit Suisse has recently been implicated creates a new threat to the commercial prospects as well as to the political and moral reputation of Swiss banks. Over the last three decades, Credit Suisse has faced several penalties and sanctions for crimes such as tax evasion, money laundering, and fraud, collecting a total of over $ 4.2 billion in fines or settlements. Each time Credit Suisse has been entangled in scandals, it has promised to do better. Despite the bank defending itself against accusations of wrongdoing, this recent massive leak suggests that rounding goes much deeper than anyone knew.
It was on Monday 7 December 1970 that language failed German Chancellor Willy Brandt. While on an official visit to Poland, with his government in Bonn hanging by a thread due to his divisive foreign policy with Eastern Europe, Brandt visited a monument commemorating the German occupation-era Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. After laying a wreath at the foot of the monument, Brandt fell to his knees, lowered his head and remained still for half a minute, while dignitaries, and more importantly the press, watched on. He was not implicated in any Nazi crimes after spending the second war in Norwegian exile. Further, having no religious affiliations, the catholic symbol of kneeling at a Jewish memorial was irrelevant. The result? International media attention for an action that what would later become a ’paradigm for a successful ’conciliation gesture‘, offered by Germany’s leader of state to those affected by the crimes of their Nazi past
Now it is official, an old period will come to an end, meanwhile a new period is about to start. After having served Germany for more than 15-year, chancellor Angela Merkel will resign, leaving a tremendous heritage behind, as many more challenges to be dealt with.
Anti-immigration, nationalist and anti-establishment sentiment (Rathgeb, p. 2021, p. 646, Meret, p. 2021, p. 187) lies at the heart of the modern-day Austrian Freedom Party’s (FPÖ) political identity. Where other parties with similar ideologies struggle to threaten mainstream political entities in other Western European democracies, the FPÖ has continually enjoyed political success for the past 30 years. How is it then that a self-proclaimed patriotic, populistic political party (Agar, 2014, p. 226) is consistently the third-largest party in the Austrian political establishment, and has formed a part of three separate governments since 1999 (Federal Ministry of the Interior, 2019)?
For months, the lives of citizens all over the world have been marred by uncertainty. As for those in Germany and the European Union, this uncertainty has existed in stark contrast to the certainty that the end of an immutable force of German and European politics is on the horizon: as of 27 September 2021, Angela Merkel will no longer be chancellor of the Federal Republic. Though Merkel announced this over two years ago, it is still unclear how the political vacuum that is soon to be left in her wake would be filled.
In June of this year, a series of Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests and demonstrations took place all around Europe, in solidarity with the eponymous movement that has just been reignited in the United States following the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police. In virtually every major European country, thousands gathered despite pandemic-related restrictions. In Berlin, Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels, Lisbon, protestors numbered between 10 and 20,000 and reached up to 50,000 in Vienna. Often, after chanting the names of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, did some of the European protestors add the name of local victims of racism and police brutality, the most prominent of which was Frenchman Adama Traoré who was murdered by the police in 2016.
As Brexit talks still seem to flounder, the European Union (EU) will be left with many questions that require answering to, including the military nuclear issue. Indeed, France will remain the only nuclear-weapon state within the EU. Many have wondered whether this change would dramatically impact the credibility of the EU amid a growingly hostile world, where nuclear proliferation appears to be on the rise, and arms control treaties lack political impact and true military limitation.
While the world’s attention is riveted to the pandemic of coronavirus, leaders all over the world consider these hard times as an opportunity to grab more power. These weeks of severe hardship could raise the autocracies to the skies – and could unseat them. Meanwhile, they hope the citizens will barely notice their efforts, like Andrzej Duda and the “Law and Justice” party, try to do it in Poland. In case of success, Polish conservatives will solidify their hold on power, despite the possible risks of their decisions to society.
Last February, at the Munich Security Conference (MSC), political leaders from all around the world met to discuss questions of international security. At this occasion, French president Emmanuel Macron recalled his strong will to build a proper European defence. This time however, he even declared being impatient with the achievement of a genuine European dynamic in this strategic area. Some headway has been made in the recent years, as witnessed by the creation of the European Defence Fund (EDF) in June 2017 and the European Intervention Initiative (EII) in June 2018. But for now, one can only deplore the lack of common political will in the EU in support of a European defence. The project is not limited to the sole ambition of a European army: it reflects a dynamic – mainly driven by France – to establish a European strategy. MSC was the perfect meeting to understand each state’s position regarding global security matters. The different speeches raised concerns for the future and showed how urgent it is for the Union to gain its political and strategic independence.
