The European Council on Foreign Relations

ECFR this week: 8th June

Date: 8th June 2012  |  Author: Andreas Mullerleile,

Categories: ECFR this week ,
Tags: eu, euro crisis, iran, israel, spain

Last week ECFR’s annual Council meeting took place in Berlin where around 100 council members discussed solutions to the euro crisis and a range of foreign policy challenges. Here is a blog post by Hans Kundnani summarising the main issues of  the meeting (hint: euro crisis, role of Germany)

At the same time, speculations about a Spanish bailout have dominated the political agenda this week. José Ignacio Torreblanca analyses the Spanish situation and makes the case that focusing on national interests will not get us out of the crisis. 

In another blog post, José Ignacio Torreblanca argues that the current crisis is in fact a crisis of democracy and that our democratic systems are in need of reform:  

“The crisis is largely due to the incompleteness and defects of the EU. But it also shows up the defects of our democracy: the weakness of the state, vulnerable to hijacking by sectorial interests — private, or grouped around political parties” 

More on the euro crisis:

• Dáithí O’Ceallaigh analyses the reasons why Ireland voted yes to the Fiscal Compact 
• A deal between the government and the opposition is a precondition for the ratification of the Fiscal Compact in Germany. Sebastian Dullien criticises the negotiation strategy of the German left.
• Our office in Madrid interviewed Andrés Ortega Klein about the Spanish crisis. (podcast in Spanish)  

Middle East and North Africa: 

• Julien Barnes-Dacey looks at the deteriorating situation in Syria and argues that the capital Damascus is increasingly turning on the Assad regime.  
• EU diplomacy is not known for fresh thinking regarding the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. Yet that is precisely what just happened – writes Daniel Levy. 
• In another piece, Daniel Levy argues that the Iran nuclear talks succeed just by continuing. 

Euro 2012

• After months of controversial debate, the Euro 2012 in Ukraine and Poland start this week. ECFR’s Andrew Wilson recently published a short paper in which he argued that the EU needs to take a more proactive approach towards Ukraine.