Tag Archive for 'European Union'

Th!nk About It – Cateva resurse cool

Published on January 29, 2009 in Miscellaneous. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , .


View my page on TH!NK ABOUT IT

Revin cu mai multe detalii despre Think About It. De regasit online cu tag-ul “Th!nk”. Timp de doua zile ne-am reunit la Bruxelles aproximativ 70 de jurnalisti si bloggeri din intreaga Uniune Europeana. M-a suprins faptul ca Europa a reusit, neintentionat, sa creeze o identitate europeana prin mobilitate. La un moment dat stateam la o masa cu 7 alti oameni, din 7 tari diferite, niciunul din ei nelocuind de fapt in tara de origine. Studii, slujbe, proiecte, lumea se misca. Si noi cu ea, banuiesc.

Despre ce este vorba in proiect? 3 bloggeri din fiecare tara membra UE, Centrul European de Jurnalism, Comisia Europeana, Parlamentul European. O noua comunitate de bloggeri si o competitie paneuropeana. Incepem pe 2 februarie, fiecare din tara lui, sa scriem despre Uniunea Europeana si ulterior despre alegerile pentru Parlamentul European din iunie. Scandalos sau nu, tematic sau nu, partinic sau nu. Scrieti baieti, numai scrieti!

Nu va plictisesc pe acest blog cu ce se mai intampla prin Uniune. Pentru asta voi inaugura in cateva zile un blog separat, in engleza.

Vroiam doar sa va semnalez cateva persoane/ proiecte interesante de care m-am izbit la Bruxelles:

  • Jon Worth, editor web specialist in afaceri europene, consultant, blogger si totodata initiatorul unei campanii ateiste foarte originale din Marea Britanie (practic, sute de autobuze cu mesajul “There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life”)
  • Kosmopolito (alias Andreas Muellerleile) un blogger specialist in afaceri europene, care isi da doctoratul in politica externa a Romaniei! :)
  • Clo Willaerts, probabil unul dintre cei mai cunoscuti specialisti europeni in blogging si social media
  • Center for European Policy Studies – un think tank european extrem de profesionist si un loc de munca ideal
  • Tocmai s-a lansat primul agregator de bloguri cu tematica europeana: http://www.bloggingportal.eu/
  • Bruno van den Elshout, un fotograf, investment consultant si jurnalist olandez, care si-a luat un an de pauza de la viata si a calatorit cate doua saptamani in fiecare tara membra UE; rezultatul a fost US Europeans, un proiect foto foarte interesant pe care speram sa il adopte institutiile europene

Oricum ar fi, mult networking si un inceput de saptamana absolut incantator.

Think About It – The Start

Published on January 26, 2009 in Miscellaneous. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , .

Asa cum va spuneam si mai demult, pasiunile mele legate de blogging si politica s-au materializat recent prin participarea la o competitie europeana de blogging, initiata de Parlamentul European si de Centrul European de Jurnalism cu ocazia alegerilor europene din 2009. Asadar, ma aflu acum la Bruxelles, alaturi de o multime de oameni interesanti din media europeana, Parlament, Comisie si EJC. Un mix extrem de interesant de personaje, de la online gurus la studenti si consultanti. Va tin la curent… acum tocmai incep prezentarile.

Can Europe Laugh at Itself?

Published on January 15, 2009 in Miscellaneous. 5 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , .

 Later Edit: Bulgarians insisted to have the squat toiled depiction of their country covered up, so now Bulgaria is a black cloth on the European map. Totally ridiculous and shows how patriotic intentions can have the reverse effect! Read more about it here.

Romania by Entropa

Romania as seen by Cerny’s Entropa

Bulgaria by Entropa

Bulgaria as seen by Cerny’s Entropa

If you’re in any way art-sensitive or art-educated, the shortest of visits to Prague will get you familiar with two very controversial Czech artists: David Cerny and Jan Saudek. As a photographer, the latter could not overpopulate the public space with his allegedly immoral creations. However, the former is well-known for his daring public displays, by painting for instance a Soviet tank in bright pink.

Cerny stroke back in glory this time, with a work titled Entropa, commissioned by the Czech EU Presidency, that’s currently displayed in the lobby of the European Council in Brussels. Supposedly a collage bringing together artistic visions of artists representing all 27 EU countries, in reality it is an exclusive work by Cerny that whole-heartedly mocks stereotypes European nations have of one another.

Thus, Italy is displayed as a football match between the North and the South, France as a big strike, Romania as a huge Dracula park and so on and forth. Bulgarians seem to have been the most offended, as Cerny envisioned their country as a Turkish toilet – reminding us all of the Ottoman yoke in the region. As a result, the Czech ambassador in Bulgaria was called up for official explanations.

Not surprisingly, Romanian newspapers are profoundly “offended” by this piece of art, which reminded me of the fuming controversy around the Romanian Cultural Institute in New York this summer. You can read more info here and here.

The international media seems to have a rather moderate stand on the issue, with BBC News simply telling the story behind Entropa and with the International Herald Tribune being equally objective.

Czech officials seem to be discontent with Cerny’s petite joke – namely doing the work all by himself, and not by working together with 26 other actors, but they don’t seem to pick at the content of the installation. Actions are pending, so I wonder if their broad mindedness will take into account the fact that 2009 is the official European Year of Innovation and Creativity…

Think About It! – European Blogging Competition

Published on December 18, 2008 in Miscellaneous. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , .

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I’m very excited to be part of a very interesting blogging initiative launched by the European Journalism Center and the European Parliament. I found about “Think About It” from Daniel Antal, a fellow blogger whose entries on politics in Central and Eastern Europe from Blogactiv are really insightful. It’s basically a blogging competition where 3 bloggers selected from each EU member states meet together in Brusells and than blog regularly about the coming European elections. I’ll be visiting Brusells in January, hopefully meeting some interesting people and extending my network in the international blogosphere. Also, it would be great to know who the other 2 selected Romanian bloggers are…

2008: Honour Killings in Turkey

Published on December 10, 2008 in Miscellaneous. 2 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , .

womeninthefrontlineYesterday, I attended one of the events of the campaign of combating violence against women launched by the United Nations Organization in Romania. I had written about the campaign at its inception, but it was only yesterday that I got to see two movies of the campaign. They were both part of a wider UN campaign titled “Women in the Frontline”, with Annie Lennox as front cover. The first of the films I saw explored one of the many forms of violence against women, namely human trafficking. Viewers were confronted with the bleak realities of Nepal, were thousands of women are smuggled overborder in Indian brothels, by their brothers, fathers or husbands, sold and turned into prostitutes, ostracized in their home communities, and all these happening sometimes to girls as young as 10 years of age. With incredible levels of poverty and virtually no way of feeding their children, women are simply trapped in a society that has found very few solutions to breaking the poverty cycle.

However, for me as an European the second film showed yesterday – portraying the situation of women in Turkey – was the one that really had me going. Apparently, in South-Eastern Turkey women are still brutally killed by their closesest male relatives in the name of honour. Dressed in black, they are taken in remote places of the village, shot at or simply stoned to death by their fathers and brothers. Because of European Union pressures, Turkey has modified its penal code and increased sentences for crimes of honour to life imprisonment (until 2001, evoking the family’s honour was a circumstance that could reduce one’s conviction in front of the court). However, 40% of men in rural areas are still supporting honour killings, which indicates that legislative measures were not supplemented in any way by cultural and educational changes. I’ve always spoken not necessarily against Turkey’s accession in the European Union (I am not against enlargement per se), but I’ve always warned that Turkey still has unsettled issues that will remain unsettled for a long time. However, I was simply baffled by yesterday’s movie. Really now, how can the Turkish government pretend Turkey is a modern, 21st century Westernized country? And by this, please don’t understand less terrible phenomena occur in Western Europe…

Facebook Political Protest in Croatia

Published on December 4, 2008 in Miscellaneous. 2 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , .

I have visited Croatia and I have a couple of very good Croatian friends. To me, their level of development seemed quite high and they seemed rather Westernized in everything from economics to political views. Thus, I always thought the fact they were left out of the European Union was merely bad timing and that things will be sorted out soon. Latest news was that they were scheduled to join the EU as early as 2009.

However, a couple of days ago worrisome events occured in Croatia. Political opponents of the current regime (Prime Minister Sanader) were arrested by the Zagreb police for political protests via Facebook. A Facebook group called “I bet I can find 5,000 people who dislike Sanader” became the main proof of anti-establishment behaviour :)   I believe such judiciary practices are obviously not fit for an EU member, to say the very least. I’m curious on the results of the investigation commissioned by PM Sanader…

Government Pending

Published on December 3, 2008 in Miscellaneous. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , .

Sunday was parliamentary elections day in Romania. Few Romanians left their cosy apartments for a trip to the ballot box (a bit less than 40% of them , to be more precise), and there’s worrisome statistics indicating that only 15% of the voters had higher education. This year we’ve also had a new voting system – a mixed member proportional representation, supported by a fairly large majority of the political spectrum (the liberals and the social-democrats), and opposed by the President’s party. As any proportional system, there were quite a few dissatisfactions with the way mandates were redistributed, but overall the system seems to have achieved its purpose.

The social democrats scored 33.6%, the democrats (allegedly a right-wing party, though their political programme seems to be the opposite) 33%, and the liberals 18.7%. The new voting system – with a 5% electoral threshold – eliminated extremist parties from the Parliament, which is great news. However, Sunday’s results leave us with a huge dilemma, as we do not know who will form the Government. Most probably, intense political negotiations will last till the end of December and our President will definitely take advantage of our semipresidential political system to veto plenty of government formulas that don’t suit him.

Unfortunately, the end of the year also reminds us we’ve done too little to curb corruption (one of the elected MPs this Sunday is actually in detention for fraud) and to absorb European structural and cohesion funds properly. With political strife prevailing over efficient administration, there are chances we will end up in the same situation of aid freezing as our Bulgarian neighbours…

Europe’s Financial Crisis – The Basics

Published on October 7, 2008 in Miscellaneous. 6 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , .

euro_reverse.jpgFew were imagining last week how Europe’s finances would look like in just a couple of days. As a matter of fact, last Tuesday I was disagreeing with Michael Berendt’s entry on Blogactiv, while claiming that Eurozone (and Europe in general) will have to face the storm really soon. And so they did. Mr. Berendt himself acknowledged his hasty judgment! To (over)simplify things, the subprime crisis sent American banks into bankruptcy, which consequently did the same with European ones. Germany gave out state guarantees for all private savings accounts, and other European countries followed suit. Moreover, Ireland offered similar guarantees for corporate actors; simply put, the state nationalized banks and other financial institutions. Surreal in 21st century Europe, isn’t it? Continue reading ‘Europe’s Financial Crisis – The Basics’

EU Enlargement and its Corrupt Offspring

Published on July 23, 2008 in Miscellaneous. 2 Comments Tags: , , , , , , .

Interesting pronouncements from the European Commission coming in today for Romania and Bulgaria. It looks like the Commission will once again criticize the lack of progress in fighting corruption and in the administration of justice in the EU’s newest members. However, it looks like Bulgaria will be chastised worse this time, due to mismanaging European funds (basically financing political campaigns from offshore bank accounts instead of giving Sapard money to Bulgarian farmers), with two huge operational programmes most likely to be interrupted in Bulgaria. When it comes to Bulgaria the allegations of their deputy prime minister against the Commission for leaking off information to the media (the Bulgarian official saying it is this tip-off that will affect Bulgaria’s image abroad, not the corruption itself) seem to me most strange. Continue reading ‘EU Enlargement and its Corrupt Offspring’

Fortress Europe Secures Its Walls

Published on June 25, 2008 in Miscellaneous. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , .

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Photo: European Commission

June 20th was World Refugee Day. Plenty of celebrations all over the world. Cool things happened all over the world, even in Romania – where, surprisingly to some, there are quite a bunch of refugees, some living here for many years now (15000 refugees have received protection from the Romanian government since 199), and having become more attached to Romania than Romanians themselves. EVZ presented some of their stories, in a very nice Sunday article. Last week however was also the week when the European Parliament passed an highly debatable new laws on illegal migrants. Continue reading ‘Fortress Europe Secures Its Walls’