Revolting Europe
Latest Post
A young Communist mayor in Mafia land
IN THE RADICAL PRESS / controlacrisi.org Interview with Valerio Marletta He took office in Palagonia on May 23, the province of Catania, Sicily. Valerio Marletta is the town’s first communist mayor. A member of the Young Communists, Marletta has a track record in the movement, campaigning on social issues and in the battle against the … Continue reading
Featured Posts
A million Spanish teachers went on strike Tuesday to protest against savage government cuts to education budgets. Parents and students joined teachers in action that resulted in the almost total shutdown of state schools, nurseries and universities where makeshift tombs were erected to symbolize the death of the country’s schooling system. Students held protests as … Continue reading
IN THE RADICAL PRESS / IL MANIFESTO 17.05.2012 It is plain to all: monetary union is dividing Europe. The divide is political, social, economic in particular. The euro was designed as a tool to cement European political union and to anchor German prosperity to the rest the Continent. Instead, it has served to highlight the … Continue reading
Rajoy’s strategy on the banks: privatise the gains, socialise the losses Six months ago Mariano Rajoy pledged not to give ‘a single euro of public money’ to the banks. Last week, this promise went the same way as his pledges on not raising tax: in the shredder. Spain’s right wing prime minister has unveiled yet … Continue reading
Gruel for the masses, cream for the lucky few. A familiar tale. Inequality of wealth, and the greed and excess of France’s 1% was a significant theme in the French Presidential election. The highest paid executives of the top 40 listed companies in France had been provided with a slap up 39 million-euro meal for … Continue reading
The Socialists are set to wrest back the Elysée Palace from the Right after a gap of 17 years in Sunday’s Presidential poll. Francois Hollande has maintained a consistent and comfortable lead over Nicolas Sarkozy in opinion polls and the incumbent’s increasingly desperate swing to the far right appears to have failed to shore up … Continue reading
IN THE RADICAL PRESS / IL MANIFESTO Wages have decreased between 25 and 30% in a year. There are virtually no collective agreements. And over 33,000 Greeks on individual contracts who have had their pay cut between 20 and 28%. And last Saturday, there was a new political suicide, writes Argiris Panagopoulos In Greece, the vote … Continue reading
IN THE RADICAL PRESS / MEMOIRE DES LUTTES Interview with Peter Mertens by Jean Bricmont, professor in theoretical physics at the Université Catholique de Louvain Another book on the crisis of the European Union? A Belgian Marxist author has attempted the challenge of writing an essay that is well researched, accessible and full of stories of Europe … Continue reading
Thirty five French economists have signed a joint statement backing Jean Luc Melenchon’s programme. In the statement, the economists from Bordeaux IV University, People’s University of Caen, Lille-I,-Paris XIII, Paris I, Toulouse Toulouse I and II, Paris School of Economics and IEP Paris among other universities, dismiss claims by rivals and large sections of the media … Continue reading
Friday is supposed to be crunch day in talks between unions and employers over public sector pay. Verdi, one of the largest trade unions in Germany, earlier this month rejected an offer of a 3.3% pay rise staggered over two years for around two million public sector workers. Its claim was for a 6.5% pay … Continue reading
Socialists say voters have given the Government ‘the bill’ for austerity programme They presumed victory in Sunday’s elections but in the end the Popular Party that swept to national power in November failed to win enough votes to govern in Spain’s largest and most populous region. An outright win in Andalucia could have strengthened prime … Continue reading
Prime Minister Mario Monti is struggling to get various parties to agree on labour reforms amid an upsurge in unrest. Italian factory workers began walking out in protest on Thursday. In La Spezia and Genoa, workers from shipbuilder Fincantieri declared a strike and occupied one factory. In Turin, 800 employees from the aerospace company Alenia blocked … Continue reading
Crisis leads to poverty: EU-imposed austerity policies have sent Spain and the whole region into recession, say unions The EU is ‘stubbornly’ continuing ’evidently failed policies’ that are ‘causing devastating effects on employment and on the level of poverty and social cohesion in Spain as well as many other countries in the EU.’ This was … Continue reading
The same day the European Central Bank chief Mario Draghi delivered his bombshell declaration that the European welfare state was no more, the Continent’s Great Power, Germany issued orders to stop welfare payments to non-German nationals. Whether coincidence or not, the move by the Federal Labour Agency on February 23 has helped put some flesh … Continue reading
IN THE RADICAL PRESS / Il MANIFESTO The most unsafe place for Italian women is the home, figures show The number of women killed by men is growing in Italy: 127 in 2010, 137 in 2011 and already 37 femicides, or femmicidi, in the first two months of the year A study by Bologna’s Casa … Continue reading
Labour reforms make firing Spanish workers cheap. But it’s still a golden hand-shake for their bosses. It’s yet another case of one rule for the many and another for the lucky few. Spain’s right-wing government recently passed changes to labour laws that will make it much easier and cheaper for bosses to fire their workers. The … Continue reading
ECB chief Mario Draghi delivered a Euros 530 billion gift to bankers Wednesday 29 February. Added to the 470 billion euros present in December, this brings the total subsidy to the speculators who caused the biggest crash since 1929 to more than a trillion euros. After handing over Euros 490 billion to private banks for a song in … Continue reading
Public sector managers have become, like other elements of Italy’s political-bureaucratic ‘casta’, a target of public anger at a time when jobs are being slashed, wages frozen and living costs soaring. Take Antonio Manganelli, head of the police, on Euros 621,000 a year, compared to an average income in the country of Euros 1,286. … Continue reading
What with record unemployment, a massive squeeze on incomes and welfare and public services being slashed, it’s tough for the Portuguese these days. Not for all of them, mind you. Not the shareholders and top executives of Portugal’s banks. True, the country’s banks are now in the red, with the largest sustaining collective losses in … Continue reading
750 more people have committed suicides in France since the onset of the economic crisis in 2008, according to Michael Debout, a psychiatrist who is France’s leading expert on the matter. Unemployment grew 648,000 over the same period of 2008-2011. The recession also prompted 10,000 to try and take their lives – suicide attempts increased by 10,780. … Continue reading
The Party of the European Left has called on all social and political forces resisting the ‘ongoing escalation of social destruction and authoritarianism in a national and European level’ to unite in the ‘widest possible struggle’ to bring about a ‘massive change in the balance of power’ and to ‘overthrow the reactionary governments, the troika and … Continue reading
Labour reforms passed today by the right-wing government of Mariano Rajoy will ‘make it easier and cheaper to fire workers, legalise precarious employment and force the long-term unemployed into volunteering,’ according to Cayo Lara, leader of the radical United Left. Spain’s Popular Party government announced a sweeping labour reform that included slashing employees’ maximum severance … Continue reading
Italy’s radical left press, once thriving, is in danger of extinction. ‘Monti is succeeding where Berlusconi failed’ read a headline line in yesterday’s radical il manifesto newspaper. The depressing news announced by the communist title was that liquidators were coming in. The state subsidy that supports the non-profit making press had been cut so much by … Continue reading
IN THE RADICAL THE PRESS / IL MANIFESTO Ahead of a national demonstration on February 11, the new leader of Portugal’s main union confederation, Armenio Carlos, explains why he opposes the country’s recent labour market reforms, why the public debt must be renegotiated and of the importance of ‘giving hope that a different politics is … Continue reading
Italian premier Mario Monti hasn’t been in the job long, but is already the new darling of the European elite. So much so that some political pundits have dropped ‘Merkozy’ – the Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy duo – for the ‘Merkonti’ trio. Certainly, his economists’ training and measured, articulate manner, contrasts favourably with his … Continue reading
It’s a miracle. 41 million in work, the highest number ever. In January German unemployment fell by 264,000 compared to a year ago, bringing the rate down 6 decimal points to 7.3%. The average unemployment in the region’s most populous nation and largest economy in 2011 was 2.9 million, the lowest level in 20 years. … Continue reading
‘Fiscal Pact’ is regime change to a dictatorship of the markets, says Europe’s radical left leader Pierre Laurent, President of Party of the European Left (This statement was issued ahead of the informal summit on 30 January 2011) The EU heads of state will meet today to refine their project for « an international agreement … Continue reading
It was meant to sound tough on business and the banks, friendly to the struggling, man on the street. But despite Nicolas Sarkozy’s talk on TV Sunday of protecting employment and French industry, the President’s plan to get him re-elected this Spring appeared largely a smoke screen for the same old policies that favour the 1%, … Continue reading
Also
- The establishment of the European Monetary Union in the ’90s and the introduction of the euro a decade ago massively strengthened 'finance capitalism', or financialisation' in Europe. Antonio Tricarico argues for a radical response that reverses this process, reintroduces national and regional capital controls and gives priority to public interest policies in favour of labour and the environment Corporate Europe Observatory
- Employees of SCA Packaging Fegersheim in the Alsace region of France went on strike on Monday to protest against the dismissal of the director of their factory. 'We want to stand up for our director Patrick Beranger, who has fought with us every day for the past 10 years," said Sylvie Schuler, CGT. He 'saved us from bankruptcy in 2002' and has since 'assured the survival of the company' said the union official. The dismissal came after a profit-sharing agreement was signed between the unions and the factory management. When Mr Beranger presented senior managers with the agreement they complained that he had failed to consult them and although not questioning the deal, they dismissed him with immediate effect, last week. TF1
- The proposal for a financial transaction tax (FTT) is the first sign that speculation won’t go unpunished European Left MEPs told the European Parliament Wednesday ahead of debate on Common system for taxing financial transactions ended with a majority (of 487) voting to back the FTT. More
- Victor Grossman on the whipping of Angela Merkel's right wing Christian Democratic Union in the recent elections in North Rhine-Westphalia, from People's World
- The Six Lessons of the 6th of May: L'Humanite newspaper on the Second Round of the French Presidential election here
- The French and Greek elections have already shifted Europe's politics. But it needs real change to hold the right at bay, argues Seumas Milne in the Guardian.
- European Left on proposals to reintroduce Schengen border controls and why what's really needed is 'better safeguards to prevent member states from arbitrarily controlling their borders'. Read
- ETUC remembers International Workers’ Memorial Day and calls for 'systematic and substantive improvements in health and safety' in EU where 170,000 lives claimed by work-related accidents and diseases a year. Read
- In unity we on the left have found the strength to stop Sarkozy and derail the politics of austerity, says Jean Melenchon writing in The Guardian
- Not breaking but...ECB chief's vision of Europe amounts to strategic negligence, says European Left Read the statement
- 75 years since the Nazi bombing of Guernica during Spanish Civil War remembered in a video / photo memorial here
- We must now return Sarkozy and Front National to the dustbin of history say France's Young Communists, commenting on the first round Presidential election results. Read
- On austerity and a brewing health 'catastrophy' in Toulouse. Read this article in Humanite
- On Jean Luc Melenchon and 'reinventing politics'. Humanite interviews Christian Salmon of the Writers’ Parliament on the Left Front's novel Presidential campaign more in Humanite
- 'This crisis is about capital against labour and capitalism against the state. It is time for a 'social, democratic and anti-capitalist alternative,' say Spanish Communists. It's time to move towards a new constituent process. More
- Communists (KKE) on the creation of concentration camps for immigrants in Greece More
- Radical opposition Left Party warns EU Fiscal Pact may breach German Constitution More in Der Spiegel
- There is nothing more anti-capitalist than putting the 'People First', says Jean-Luc Mélenchon in a recent interview with l'Humanité More
- A victory in Portugal will be a factor of major importance for the overall European workers' resistance and counter-offensive, says the Party of European Left as it salutes today's general strike More
- EU is 'victimising' the Hungarian people and making an 'example' of them, says European Left. More
- Geerd Wilders' Dutch Party of Freedom is one of a number of unsavoury organisations which has grown in recent years to pollute European parliamentary politics, says Steve McGriffen in the Morning Star. More
- Real wages fall in the Eurozone as inflation outstrips incomes. More
- Left Front leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon talks to Humanité about socialism, humanism, the environment and fixing France. More
- There's no crisis for big business in France, says l'Humanite, as the top 40 companies on the Paris stock exchange post €73 Billion profits More
- European Left on the European Commission's regressive pensions proposals and how they will hit women hard. Video
- Worse than Berlusconi: Italian Communists on 100 days of the Monti government More
- Capitalists now have for the first time a larger share of the nation's wealth than workers in Spain, new figures show. More
- The European Trade Union Confederation sets out the alternatives to the Troika's diktat as the latest figures confirm the Eurozone has entered recession More
- The workers at Eleftherotypia have taken over one of the biggest and most prestigious Greek daily newspapers. In the words of one of the journalists More
- Does France's President elect want to get rid of unemployment or jobseekers themselves? l'Humanite
- Women in Italy's south are bearing the brunt of the economic crisis, new data reveals. More
- Commission work-until-you-drop pensions White Paper 'doesn't meet need of pensioners', says ETUC, which argues for stronger public pensions More
- ETUC General Secretary Bernadette Ségol says latest Greek austerity plan 'offers no perspective towards recovery' and attacks labour rights More
- L'Humanité newspaper discusses whether the nationality of the boss matters if the jobs stay in France. More
- L'Humanité on why the French state is trying to silence two judges. More
- Sarkozy puts the final reactionary and anti-social polish on his candidature. Humanite. More
- How the exploitation of workers in Germany is at the heart of the Euro crisis - ILO More
- How the German Left Party is a victim of continual snooping. Morning Star. More
- Marine Le Pen guest of honour at the “Vampires’ Ball” in Vienna. L'Humanité More
- Council fails to deal with sustainable growth and jobs, says European Trade Union Confederation More
- European Trade Union Confederation rejects new "undemocratic" EU treaty slamming proposals as "more of the same austerity" More
- Sarkozy's plans to privatise social security: analysis by communist newspaper l'Humanité. More
- To face up the financial markets and emerge from the crisis, unite the Left, strengthen the struggles and recover power to the peoples, the Party of the European Left says. More
Blockupy!
RETAKING THE BASTILLE
PIGS AT THE TROUGH
GENDER INEQUALITY IN EUROPE
GERMAN LEFT DEBATES ALTERNATIVES
HUNGRY ROMANS HELP THEMSELVES
_logo.svg/246px-Público_(Spain)_logo.svg.png){kind=logo}
Mundo Obrero
- Diego Valderas aplaza el plan de ajuste y dice que el sacrificio del gobierno y los altos cargos debe ser mayor que el de cualquier funcionario o empleado público
- Jean Ziegler: "Es la primera vez en Europa que una fuerza política transformadora lleva a las instituciones democráticas un ambicioso programa contra el hambre en el mundo”
