Following the political and financial crises Belgium is now facing a social crisis, the daily De Standaard warns: "The wave of redundancies that has swept our country in the past couple of weeks is only the first harbinger of the third crisis. ... But the social crisis - job losses, falling purchase power, the spiral of recession - threatens to be much more drastic. It is a crisis in which politics must play an important role, likewise the employers and the trade unions. Only if these three groups deal with the crisis in a responsible way can we limit the damage. ... The irresponsible behaviour of many bankers has certainly not helped to inspire confidence in employers. The senseless day of strikes last week leads us to expect the worst from the trade unions. And the budget that the government  of [Prime Minister Yves] Leterne has cobbled together undermines confidence in politicians". (16/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » Economic Policy, » Belgium
All available articles from » Peter Vandermeersch

Looking at the steep increase in unemployment figures over the past three months the liberal daily The Independent sees Britain facing a recession: "The first thing to note is that this is going to be expensive for all of us. Welfare payments already eat up a good proportion of government spending. Now they are going to have to rise merely to keep the newly unemployed from destitution. ...The second thing to note is that the Government seems rather ill-prepared to deal with rising joblessness. Its present unemployment reduction policies are based on an assumption of strong economic growth. ... We should not be under any illusions. This process is going to be painful no matter what ministers do. In the end, the best most of us can hope is that the recession will not be too deep and that the labour market reforms of the past two decades will help to propel us into better times." (16/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » United Kingdom

The daily Les Echos is demanding that concrete measures be taken to stop unemployment rising: "In the next two years the economy will create hardly any new jobs. That is a U-turn compared with the previous period, in which thousands more jobs became available. At a time when enormous sums are being provided to save the financial system, we should be using that same energy to create jobs. It is not necessarily a question of spending more money, ... but rather of spending it more sensibly. The state should push ahead with the reorganization of the employment office, which has yet to make a tangible contribution. Nor would it be completely absurd to create state-subsidised jobs. The social partners should be doing more to tackle unemployment, which would include addressing changed working conditions (fixed-term contracts, temporary work etc.)." (15/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » Economic Policy, » France
All available articles from » Dominique Seux

In Sweden unemployment insurance is partly linked to the trade unions and is not obligatory. Because of rising contributions, many people have opted out of unemployment insurance in recent years, but now - in a period of economic uncertainty - they have started paying in again. The evening newspaper Aftonbladet comments: "If we can regard changes in the number of people paying unemployment insurance contributions as an indication of a reversal of the trend, then it would be in the month in which 8,000 jobs were officially cut, many of them in industry. If there really is a reverse in the trend of people opting out of unemployment insurance, that is hardly an indication that the problems have been solved. Jobs that only recently were regarded as secure are now under threat, and more and more people are sensing that the time has come to make provisions for the future." (16/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » Sweden

The liberal daily Gazeta Wyborcza comments on the unexpected dual appearance of Prime Minister Donald Tusk and President Lech Kaczynski at the EU summit: "Who won? The president. Who lost? Poland, because there were representatives of two different Polands at this summit: the Poland of the president and the Poland of the prime minister. And both have lost because it's easier to make fun of two Polands ... than of one strong one. This summit will go down in history, firstly, because it was attended by a political leader whom no one had expected, and was thus in violation of EU law. And secondly, because this was the first time since 1989 that a president had so forcefully pushed his way into the domain of government, thus effectively orchestrating a sort of mini coup d'état. And indeed, he succeeded. And what was the meaning of this whole show? Does the president want to rule the country? If so he should just say so rather than staging such a performance abroad." (16/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » EU Policy, » Domestic Policy, » Poland
All available articles from » Jacek Pawlicki

France is refusing to extradite the former terrorist Marina Petrella who has been convicted in Italy of multiple murder because of her state of health. In an open letter published in the daily Corriere della Sera the Italian writer Claudio Magris asks Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to demand an apology from French President Nicolas Sarkozy "for the slap in the face and insult to Italy. [In refusing the extradition request] Sarkozy is implying that Italy is not a state based on the rule of law but a barbaric country in which elementary human rights are violated and sick prisoners are denied medical assistance or even tortured like in Guantamano. It is an insult to our country, which is being written off as uncivilised, incapable of administering justice and bent on revenge. ... Nobody wants revenge, the death penalty or life-long imprisonment. A reprieve may be considered but it can only be granted by the president of the Italian Republic, the country in which the crime was committed and the verdict passed -- not by the president of France." (16/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » France, » Italy
All available articles from » Claudio Magris

Germany wants to extend its soldiers' participation in the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan by 14 months and send an additional 1,000 soldiers as reinforcement. However, gaining the approval of the Bundestag [the lower house of the German parliament] for these plans is only apparently a mere formality, the Danish daily Jyllands-Posten writes: "It is remarkable that Germany's doubts about the war that began as the US's response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks are growing, just as France and the UK are currently refusing to extend the war effort, which the US sees as the only way to inactivate the Taliban. ... The Afghan government, on the other hand, believes that reaching political agreement with the Taliban is the only way to end the war in Afghanistan. Most states in the Middle East share this view." (16/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » Security Policy / Crises / War, » Germany, » Asia

Last week Montenegro officially recognised Kosovo. The daily newspaper Sega contends that Serbia has little room for manoeuvre as regards imposing sanctions on its neighbouring state for this act of recognition. "Not only because for centuries the Serbs and the Montenegrins have been blood relatives, so to speak, but also because at the moment many [Serbs] currently hold dual nationality. It is clear that neither of the two states can afford to allow the torrent of hate to turn into a permanent conflict. The two sides have more things in common than things that divide them. ... The Serbs can complain that the Montenegrins have stabbed them in the back, but they must take real regional and international circumstances into account. Moreover, the rulers in Belgrade are aware that more than 200,000 Serbs live in Montenegro and that the economic systems of the two countries have always been strongly interdependent. This is without doubt a fact that will deter radical action." (16/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » Security Policy / Crises / War, » Serbia, » Kosovo
All available articles from » Novak Novev

In the daily El Mundo Justo Zambrano, an advisor in the Spanish Interior Ministry, compares the economic crises of the past: "After 30 glorious (and Keynsian) years of social democratic hegemony after the Second World War, there followed 30 further years in which the [world] stage was dominated in an equally imperialistic way - this time by neo-liberalism and neo-conservatism. But the crisis of September 2008, which will be put to the test on the first Tuesday in November, may signal the end of this phase. The metaphysics of the free market are over. The traps of the dictatorship of financial capitalism into which it has manoeuvred itself have destroyed all the codes that made it socially acceptable. And yet there is little that is new. The x-ray pictures of the last three crises resemble those of the crises that were decisive for the nineteenth century and the early twentieth century. They were crises of over-supply which went hand in hand with a concentration of capital and an unjust distribution of wealth. This is something that happens every time market capitalism is allowed a free hand because the political doctrine of non-intervention infiltrates the economy. ... It is time for the past that never disappeared to return and for societies with the help of politicians to start to determine their own future again. And this [must happen] quickly, before the planet's ecological limits make the current economic and financial crisis look like a trifling little problem." (16/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » Fiscal Policy, » Environmental Policy, » Economic Policy, » Financial Markets, » Europe, » U.S., » Global
All available articles from » Justo Zambrano

The writer Thea Dorn reflects in the news magazine Der Spiegel on the role of public intellectuals in Germany. "In this country there are no longer any intellectuals of public relevance under the age of sixty . ... Those who have always considered intellectuals to be vain rabble may welcome this development. But for those who are convinced that intellectuals form the brains and the backbone of a democracy it must be rather worrying. ... Of course it would be unfair not to point out how radically the conditions have changed (compared with how Germany used to be) under which an intellectual has to fight to win public influence. ... Heinrich Böll, Ingeborg Bachmann and all the other authors from Gruppe 47 [a forum for German-speaking writers] had readers rather than "users". What is tricky for intellectuals about the Internet, though, is not so much that nowadays anyone can set up a blog and thus pose as a self-annointed intellectual. There have always been bar-room discussion forums - the Internet has simply expanded their sphere of influence. Particularly in times when debates are being conducted at an increasing pace and ever more hysterically, we need intellectuals whose inner impetus, passion, persistance and sense of responsibility drives them to intervene. A critical spirit must not abandon the public sphere to loud-mouths and braggers...If an intellectual does not wish to become simply an onlooker, he must risk getting his hands dirty in the public domain. And at the same time he must develop sufficient far-sightedness and inner resistance not to become worn down". (15/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » Philosophy, » Weltanschauung, » Germany
All available articles from » Thea Dorn

At the summit of the EU heads of state and government there were growing signs of a consensus among the 27 EU states on the rescue plan approved by the 15 Eurozone countries last Sunday. According to the daily newspaper Le Quotidien this has made the European Union into a truly unified whole. "A few months ago the European idea suffered after the second 'no' to the Treaty of Lisbon. ... Not a few European citizens were convinced that Europe was no good for anything and that it just generated a load of extra regulations. ... But all these discussions seem like a long-forgotten quarrel now, because a crisis situation has ushered in the true birth of the Union. Now that European solidarity exists everyone is rushing to take the credit - above all Nicolas Sarkozy. But it's not so important to know who has brought Europe to speak with one voice. What really counts is that this crisis has finally created a true Europe. This is a step forward that the EU now wants to share with its 27 member states." (16/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » EU Policy, » Fiscal Policy, » Europe
All available articles from » Delphine Dard

Some EU governments are using the chaos unleashed by the financial crisis as an excuse to avoid necessary reforms, writes the Austrian daily Die Presse: "They are exploiting the social consensus that existed in environmental, monetary and economic policy. And typically it is those states that have so far been unable to tackle their corrupt, protectionist and sluggish economic systems. This is the reason why in recent days France and Hungary have called the sensible Stability Pact criteria into question, why Italy and Poland are challenging climate goals, and also why they want to adopt new measures to protect their national industries. ... To throw out the baby with the bathwater and set up new rules ... would be reckless from an economic point of view. An unrestricted budgetary policy, a weak euro, new protectionism, and postponing climate protection targets will do nothing for the economy and simply give those who are currently in power more leeway." (16/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » Fiscal Policy, » Environmental Policy, » Economic Policy, » Europe
All available articles from » Wolfgang Böhm

Turkey is the country of honour at this year's Frankfurt Book Fair. The liberal-left daily Süddeutsche Zeitung writes that the presence of so many Turks at the opening ceremony is a sign of how well integration is working in Germany. "How many of the people attending the event were Turks or people of Turkish origin? How many of them went to the concert at the Alte Oper afterwards? 33 percent, 50 percent, or even more? No one knows. But that was the most amazing thing about the evening: there were so many of them but it was only later that one thought about it. It seemed so normal at this ceremony." (16/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » Literature, » Germany, » Turkey

The judiciary and Internet service providers in the Netherlands have agreed to block access to certain websites containing child pornography. The business newspaper NRC Handelsblad writes that this is tantamount to censorship: "The most important argument, however, is that blocking websites without a court ruling is tantamount to exercising censorship. Such measures could also lead to further actions such as the blocking of websites that contain terrorist ideas or sites which in all likelihood violate other laws. It could even lead to access to sites that contain information that damages the commercial interests of the provider being blocked or made more difficult. ... Naturally there is no problem with Internet users setting up their own filters to regulate information. ... But in the end it must be the user who decides what he wants to see and what he doesn't, rather than the government or the provider." (16/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » Online media, » Netherlands
All available articles from » Rob van den Hoeven van Genderen, » Arno Lodder

The conservative daily Rzeczpospolita comments on an international project in which the citizens of a number of cities are complaining about their problems in chorus - literally. "The bad weather, the fiance who turns out to be a failure, or a shortage of money - people anywhere in the world have enough reasons to be frustrated. But instead of having a private moan it's much better to do it collectively. The first choir whose members began lamenting their woes in chorus was formed in the British city of Birmingham three years ago. ... And soon people in Budapest, Melbourne, Singapore, Chicago and Wroclaw began singing about their depressing existence as well. ... Every nation thinks it is the only one with something to complain about. And although we all complain just as much it's always for different reasons. The inhabitants of St. Petersburg, for instance, are fed up with having to wait so long for a visa, while women in Singapore are annoyed because the high level of humidity ruins their hairdos." (16/10/2008)

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More from the press review on the subject » Public Culture, » Poland
All available articles from » Anna Nowacka-Isaksson