In terms of „coalitions of the willing“, there is also the long-standing issue of publicly being in favour of a specific drastic policy change in a group, but knowing fully well that it’s not going to happen given broader opposition patterns. The „friends of QMV“ comes to mind.
*honorary
Luckily it didn’t take that long in the end, but at one point the German university suggested to simply give me a honorable MA or some such so that I could get paid the correct amount. 😅
Hah, my LSE PhD didn’t puzzle a Berlin Bürgeramt at all. I had the same happening for employment at a German university though, who wanted that standing conference to confirm that my Cambridge MPhil was good enough to be equivalent to a German MA (apparently having a later PhD doesn’t matter).
It’s not shining…yet! UACES probably engineered this so that as many people as possible stay for all of the panels and don’t go sight-seeing!
As the article itself mentions, Berlin is both a city and a state, and policing and education are firmly in the hands of German states such as the one led by the mayor of Berlin.
Hey @economist.com something seems very wrong with your chart on mayoral powers from your article on Zohran Mamdani‘s plans. The chart implies that the Berlin mayor has little control over things like education or policing, when the opposite is true. economist.com/united-state...
For instance, now that Switzerland is facing 39% tariffs for exports to the US, most articles point out that this is the country‘s most important trade partner, when in reality it is the EU by a wide margin (just not individual EU countries).
It seems like media outlets have a fundamental problem with reporting on the EU when it comes to reporting trade policy and figures. Depending on what sounds more dramatic the EU is either treated as a whole or as individual countries. That makes an already complex topic even harder to understand.
It’s probably too early to judge whether the EU-US trade “deal“ is the best that could be achieved given the circumstances, but its contents as we know them certainly set a bad precedent for upcoming EU negotiations in terms of the EU standing up for its principles and leveraging its strengths.
Aus europapolitischer Sicht sind die Zurückweisungen an den Grenzen nicht nur ein Problem, weil die Regierung damit europäische Nachbarn vor den Kopf stößt. Sondern auch weil sie den Vorrang des Europarechts, einen Grundpfeiler der EU, in Frage stellt.
Kurzer Thread:
While Merz has now been elected, this will be a stain on the chancellorship from the beginning. This 2nd vote today was made possible due to the statesmanship of the opposition Greens and Die Linke groups.
Kann ich das Ampelchaos nochmal sehen?
Discontent with the coalition agreement most likely. There was disagreement especially amongst the youth wing of the Social Democrats over them having had to give up so many of their positions in the negotiations. This is an easy way to signal that discontent without having to do so in public.
In theory the new coalition should have a governing majority in parliament, but since the election of the chancellor is by secret ballot, this allows disgruntled members of parliament of the participating parties to send a signal.
Ouch. Soon-to-be German chancellor Friedrich Merz fails to gain the necessary majority at the first vote in the German @bundestag.de. This spells trouble before the government has even started.
I appreciate EU institutions trying to be „cool“ (whatever the current youth language thing is), but it might make sense to get the language right?!? Crafting items and following a quest are usually two separate things, unless Minecraft uses those terms differently from all other games…
So stellen einige EU-Staaten keine Visas zu touristischen Zwecken mehr an russische StaatsbürgerInnen aus, diese werden aber weiterhin bei Konsulaten anderer Staaten ausgestellt. Somit können russische TouristInnen weiterhin nach Schengen einreisen und dann in alle Schengen-Staaten weiterreisen.
Aktuell besonders spanned ist, dass diverse Medien entdeckt haben das es in einem Raum offener Grenzen unmöglich ist, eine verschiedene Visa-Politik zu haben.
Gestern durfte ich für die Sendung "Europa Heute" im DLF mit Manfred Götzke über den #Schengen Report 2025 sprechen. www.deutschlandfunk.de/schengen-rep...
The trade approach is also significantly less problematic from a legal standpoint. If more and more countries start introducing bilateral sanctions then this could ironically lead to Hungary challenging this in court and ultimately winning given that sanctions are an EU competence.
What a strange piece by Dutch public broadcaster @nieuws.nos.nl on Donald Trump's trade policy. It nicely illustrates that making sense of what's going on requires fundamental explanations of concepts such as reserve currency & comparative advantage, which it doesn't touch. nos.nl/artikel/2563...
Das mit der „Europäischen Gemeinschaft“ war so auch schon im Sondierungspapier. Also sogar zwei verpasste Gelegenheiten das vielleicht einmal gegenlesen zu lassen.
This conflicts w Council Decision 2011/168/CFSP, which aims, inter alia, to promote the widest possible participation in the ICC. It's a CFSP decision, so not subject to CJEU jurisdiction, but it should be added to the list of HU violations of EU values, justifying its suspension under Art 7 TEU.
A similar clause on ICC participation is also contained in various EU international agreements such as the Cotonou and new post-Cotonou one. While formulated to affect all state parties, I don’t think anyone thought of this being meant to incentivise EU member states rather than 3rd countries.
I look forward to seeing the boom of import-export businesses in EU territories such as Guadeloupe which unlike Réunion's 37% and the EU's 20% tariffs only get 10%.
In anticipation of the Trump administration's #trade war there was a fear that the US could deliberately impose different tariff rates on various #EU member states to sow chaos. They now seem to have done this accidentally instead by imposing different tariffs on EU territories such as Réunion.
From the European perspective there is also the not insignificant matter that the EU itself has de facto made membership of the ICC a condition for EU membership and has pushed other countries to join via its trade/political/development assistance agreements with countries such as Ukraine.
Looking at the map, to get to Hungary, Netanyahu would have to (at least) fly over Romania, a member-state of the #ICC.
Has Bucharest said Netanyahu can use their airspace?
My guess is yes, but I can't find confirmation. Romanian President Ciolacu invited Bibi to Bucharest in January.
Thank you! From an EU rule of law perspective that makes it even worse then as he‘ll have to fly over at least one (if not more depending on flight path) EU member state which is a state party of the Rome Statute.