There's a global race to secure EV battery gigafactories & reduce reliance on China.

But not all clean-tech projects are created equal. Some generate good jobs & domestic capacities, others produce ecological harm & low value-added enclaves.

New paper & thread 👇
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Hungary’s Counter-Counterrevolution István Rév explains why Viktor Orbán fell after 16 years of entrenched illiberal rule – and how Péter Magyar toppled him.

'...big German companies, such as Bosch and Siemens, also availed themselves of the Hungarian government’s largess. In a sense, Orbán took Germany hostage, which guaranteed then-Chancellor Angela Merkel’s inaction. Orbán was just too important to the German economy to be allowed to fail.'

🥰

@motyo6.bsky.social @trgn.bsky.social @cornelban.bsky.social @fbulfone.bsky.social @timoseidl.bsky.social

High-road or low-road? Europe’s EV battery rollout and the tradeoffs of green industrial policy in a geoeconomic world The global expansion of clean-tech investment is widely framed as a triple win for decarbonization, industrial renewal, and geopolitical resilience. Yet on the ground, outcomes diverge sharply. Whi...

Here's the link to the article.
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Preprint available here: tinyurl.com/2sddm8e8

I'm so grateful for many colleagues helping along this long project, esp. @motyo6.bsky.social @70sbachchan.bsky.social @luukschmitz.bsky.social @danieldrisc.com @jasperpsimons.bsky.social @trgn.bsky.social @cornelban.bsky.social @vapunkt.bsky.social @fbulfone.bsky.social @timoseidl.bsky.social (etc)

These tensions extend far beyond Europe. As technologically dominant East Asian firms—particularly from China—drive the global expansion of clean-tech manufacturing (Xue & Larsen, 2026), governments across the Global North and South confront a shared dilemma: how to attract strategic investment without locking themselves into dependent positions (Sahay, 2026). Long analyzed in debates on extractivism and postcolonial resource politics (Alami et al., Citation2025; Riofrancos, Citation2017), as well as dependent development (Amsden, Citation1989; Nölke & Vliegenthart, Citation2009)—these conflicts have now migrated into the industrial core. Read in this light, Europe’s battery rollout serves as a cautionary case for green industrialization under conditions of asymmetric technological power, illustrating how difficult it is for latecomers to secure a favorable position in an emerging global ‘green division of labor’ (Lachapelle et al., Citation2017) dominated by China. Europe’s internal divisions erode its capacity to act strategically in this global scramble.

9/ The stakes extend far beyond the EU. @70sbachchan.bsky.social, @mathiaslarsen.bsky.social & others point out: Chinese clean-tech FDI is expanding abroad at break-neck speed (good news for net zero.)

But the key question is how host countries can benefit.

www.phenomenalworld.org/interviews/t...

https://sifted.eu/articles/verkor-northvolt-gigafactory Headline from SIFTED Analysis April 3, 2025 Can French gigafactory Verkor avoid Northvolt’s fate? With the collapse of Swedish gigafactory Northvolt, all eyes are now on France’s Verkor Freya Pratty and Daphné Leprince-Ringuet 7 min read

8/ The few European champions still standing (PowerCo, Verkor, ACC) have something in common.

They are tied to carmakers with not only strong state ties, but direct *state ownership* — allowing for more patient demand & long-term commitments.

Without that, the high road is very hard to sustain.

Horizontal bar chart titled “There is a risk gap between domestic and foreign projects.” It shows the share of EU battery manufacturing capacity by project risk status (online, low risk, high risk, cancelled), split between domestic and foreign firms. Foreign firms dominate operational capacity, accounting for 84.8% of projects that are online (vs. 15.2% domestic) and 65.2% of low-risk projects (vs. 34.8% domestic). The gap narrows among high-risk projects, where foreign firms hold 56.1% and domestic firms 43.9%. Among cancelled projects, the pattern reverses: domestic projects account for 86.0% of cancellations, compared to 14.0% for foreign firms. Overall, the chart highlights that foreign-led projects are more likely to reach completion, while domestic projects are disproportionately represented among stalled or cancelled investments.

7/ There is a clear risk gap between domestic and foreign battery projects in the EU.

Foreign-led projects dominate what gets built. Domestic ones are far more likely to be high-risk or cancelled.

(Unsurprisingly, projects without subsidies are also much more likely to stall.)

Comparative table of EV battery industrial strategies across five countries: Hungary, Poland, Germany, France, and Sweden, evaluated along three dimensions: climate, industry, and geopolitics, plus an overall model classification. Model row: Hungary is “Minimalist”; Poland is “Minimalist/mixed”; Germany is “Mixed”; France is “Maximalist (with fiscal and viability risks)”; Sweden is “Defunct Maximalist.” Climate row: Hungary relies on a gas-dependent power sector with ecological damage. Poland and Germany both have high-emission power sectors, with Poland also associated with ecological damage. France has a cleaner power sector. Sweden has the cleanest production profile, based on 100 percent green energy. Industry row: Hungary and Poland are fully FDI-based with low value-added production; Hungary has a shallow domestic ecosystem, while Poland has a somewhat stronger one. Germany combines domestic players (such as PowerCo) with foreign investment and has a strong domestic ecosystem. France follows a domestic champion strategy (including firms like Verkor and ACC) combined with FDI under technology-sharing conditions. Sweden’s model is fully domestic with local R&D. Geopolitics row: Hungary shows dependence on Chinese and Russian inputs. Poland lacks domestic capacity but avoids Chinese FDI in downstream production. Germany hedges with domestic players but remains exposed to China and Hungary. France combines geopolitical hedging with a balanced presence of Chinese involvement. Sweden relies on domestic capacity.

6/ So far, low-road pathways dominate, with Hungary & Poland hosting 80% of online capacities. Germany combines low-road & high-road elements. France is the closest to a consistent high-road approach, but fiscal & viability risks loom large. Sweden’s (1st) high-road attempt collapsed with Northvolt.

Slide titled “Not a trilemma – a fractal geometry of compromises.” On the left is a triangle labeled at the corners “Climate neutrality” (top), “Industrial competitiveness” (bottom left), and “Strategic autonomy” (bottom right), representing the standard trilemma. On the right is a table comparing “Minimalist path (Subversion risk)” and “Maximalist path (Viability risk)” across three dimensions. In the ecological trade-off, the minimalist path involves rapid rollout on fossil-heavy grids with weakened environmental standards, while the maximalist path emphasizes sustainable production with low-carbon inputs and minimal local harm. In the late development trade-off, the minimalist path delivers jobs and output via weakly conditioned, low value-added foreign direct investment from East Asian firms, while the maximalist path focuses on long-term domestic capabilities through national champions and/or disciplined FDI. In the geopolitical trade-off, the minimalist path achieves physical localization of production but ignores ownership and control, while the maximalist path reduces geopolitical exposure through domestic ownership and alignment.

5/ The clean-tech roll-out is often narrated as a trilemma between climate neutrality, competitiveness & strategic autonomy. But this is too neat. Each of these goals is a bundle of sub-goals, and the trade-offs multiply as they are operationalized.

We're closer to a fractal geometry of compromises

4/ The 2 cases point to a broader problem. Europe has high-road ambitions, but this is costly & risky & undercut by the low-road strategies within the same single market.

EU subsidy policy is strikingly incoherent: member states simultaneously fund EU champions & their foreign competitors.

Financial Times headline: "There was so much promise": How Northvolt tumbled into bankruptcy

3/ Contrast this with Northvolt, Europe's battery poster-child & a very different model: cleaner production, domestic ownership, higher value capture. Yet it collapsed, as buyers like BMW shifted to cheaper suppliers (e.g. in Hungary.)

The high-road pathway proved much harder to sustain.

Planned 2030 battery manufacturing capacities by company HQ announced gigafactory projects (GWh/a, maximum capacities). Hungary leading before Germany.

Hungary's FORMER autocratic leader Viktor Orbán in 2022, announcing plans to turn the country into a "battery superpower".

Man with "STOP BATTERY FACTORY" sign in Debrecen, at one of the protests against CATL's planned factory.

2/ Take Hungary. Orbán set out to turn it into a “battery superpower”, leading the pack in committed investment.
But rapid rollout brought ecological devastation, low quality jobs & domestic backlash.

Russian gas-fueled, Chinese-owned factories were still praised by the EU as "strategic autonomy."

There's a global race to secure EV battery gigafactories & reduce reliance on China.

But not all clean-tech projects are created equal. Some generate good jobs & domestic capacities, others produce ecological harm & low value-added enclaves.

New paper & thread 👇
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Why do Public Debates Escalate? Trigger Points and the Moral Dynamics of “Hot Politics” Escalating, emotionally charged, and moralized forms of controversy are a central feature of contemporary politics. Our study develops a framework for understanding how political debates between ordi...

Knife crime! Pronouns! Meat bans! Some political issues lead to "hotter", more emotional and polarizing debates than others. We show how these "trigger points" reveal a contested structure of moral expectations and how they get weaponized by polarization entrepreneurs. OA @bjsociology.bsky.social 🧵

"In retrospect, basing the entire global food system on fossil fuels may have been a poor idea." -- @benehrenreich.bsky.social
www.ft.com/content/3634...

168 hours ago 🥹

Yeah, oil is irrelevant unless you count transport, plastics, the bulk of the agro-industrial chain. Eating is over-rated.

Crown the King 👑 🇪🇬 #LFC #Liverpool #Redsky

The House of Orbán: Neo-Royalism—or Just a Dynasty? Stacie E. Goddard and Abraham Newman’s neo-royalist framework not only captures the logic of Viktor Orbán’s rule, but also goes a long way toward explaining why it is unraveling.

Why did Orbán lose? The external scaffolding of his regime is often underappreciated—and parts of it started to come undone. I wrote this before the election:

brettoninthewoods.substack.com/p/the-house-...

Congrats on “opening” a strait that was open six weeks ago, and all it cost was at least 13 dead service members, thousands of dead Iranian civilians, tens of billions in taxpayer dollars, our loss in global standing, and the Iranian regime’s increase in power. Phenomenal work.

Tragedy of the horizon on steroids: the green transition and credit ratings How do financial markets influence the green transition? Advocates of harnessing markets to foster the green transition claimed that market rationality is a reliable mechanism to channel investment...

Publication alert! 🔔

My new article in @ripejournal.bsky.social shows that the way in which credit ratings assess climate risks is detrimental to chances of the green transition.

www.tandfonline.com/eprint/DEWKJ...

1/n 🧵

I was born in Ózd & grew up in Borsodnádasd right next to it. Sad indeed, we're not ready for regime change yet, haven't even recovered from the last one. 😞

Magyar needs the EU but the EU needs Magyar, too. And in this mutual dependency, neither should lose sight of the rule of law. That's what I'm arguing in this @financialtimes.com op ed www.ft.com/content/8800...

Here is a longer analysis from me on what Magyar's victory means for Hungary and Europe and what to expect going forward👇

What does Orban’s departure mean for #Hungary and for the EU? 🇭🇺 🇪🇺

New @centreeuropeanref.bsky.social insight by @zecsaky.bsky.social

Read here: buff.ly/xfjtSOf

Incredible 🥰

so yeah. update. 😊
bsky.app/profile/palm...

Our student protest against Viktor Orbán’s autocratic takeover in December 2010. The banner reads: WE ARE THE FIRST GENERATION WHO GREW UP WITH THE RULE OF LAW — LET US NOT BE THE LAST ONE.

BBC headline: Hungary to create new media watchdog. Students rallied for freedom of speech in Budapest.

Orbán took power in April 2010. We organized our first protests against him that December. I was 22, in undergrad, lucky to be in a community of students ready to resist.

Looking back, no wonder this moment feels so heavy. 🧵