CADTM - Europe

Europe

Back to the Future of Austerity and Debtocracy!

15 May 2017 - by Leonidas Vatikiotis

The SYRIZA-ANEL made a deal with the creditors, signed in May 2, that was met with a great deal of enthusiasm from the markets. It is an agreement that will increase poverty and over-indebtedness, and will deal a blow to the country’s sovereign rights. The staff level agreement which will be (...)
France, Presidential Elections : Ten Proposals to Beat the European Union

18 April 2017 - by Eric Toussaint, Teresa Rodríguez, Miguel Urbán Crespo, Angela Klein, Stathis Kouvelakis, Costas Lapavitsas, Zoe Konstantopoulou, Marina Albiol, Olivier Besancenot, Rommy Arce

It is again clear from the current election campaign in France that a large proportion of the population wants left-wing radical solutions to exit the crisis. The impressive number of people attending Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s rallies and joining his movement La France Insoumise is evidence enough as (...)
Opening the vaults: the use of tax havens by Europe’s biggest banks

7 April 2017 - by Oxfam

This report from Oxfam on the EU banking sector provides just a glimpse into the harm that tax abuse is causing across the world. The findings are stark: The 20 biggest European banks register around one in every four euros of their profits in tax havens, an estimated total of €25bn in 2015. (...)
2007-2017: Causes of a Ten-Year Financial Crisis

30 March 2017 - by Eric Toussaint

The first institutions specializing in mortgage loans started to default in the US in February-March 2007. According to a report published by the Union of Swiss banks (UBS) in March 2017, “between 2002 and 2008, global debt of the corporate, household, government and financial sectors increased (...)
Summit Statement: A Plan B for the EU and the Euro Zone

28 March 2017 - by Collective

The European leaders commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome while the European Union (EU) is falling apart. They decided to address the EU crisis by preparing for a new Treaty. And meanwhile, boost enhanced cooperation initiatives in a Europe of “multiple layers” as evidenced by (...)
Stop the ECB subsidising climate disaster

8 March 2017 - by Corporate Europe Observatory

Economic policy should contribute to the fight against social injustice and climate change, not support polluters and speculators. Since June 2016, the European Central Bank (ECB) has injected around 67 billion euro into the Eurozone economy to fund corporate bond purchases. This is part of a (...)
The Bail Out Business

22 February 2017 - by Sol Trumbo Vila, Matthijs Peters, Transnational Institute

The Bail Out Business is the most comprehensive and thorough analysis of the steps taken since the 2008 financial crisis to understand who benefits from rescue packages in the EU. Above all, it highlights the role of the Big Four (audit firms) and a small coterie of financial consultancy firms (...)
Ten Proposals to Beat the European Union

21 February 2017 - by Eric Toussaint, Miguel Urbán Crespo, Teresa Rodríguez, Angela Klein, Stathis Kouvelakis, Costas Lapavitsas, Zoe Konstantopoulou, Marina Albiol, Olivier Besancenot, Rommy Arce

This collective text (full list of signatories here) initiated by Eric Toussaint, of the CADTM campaign for the abolition of the debt of the global South has been collectively discussed and co-signed by personalities and activists from more than 15 European countries representing a wide range (...)
The Challenges of the Left in the Eurozone

18 February 2017 - by Eric Toussaint, Miguel Urbán Crespo, Stathis Kouvelakis, Teresa Rodríguez, Costas Lapavitsas, Angela Klein, Zoe Konstantopoulou, Marina Albiol, Olivier Besancenot, Rommy Arce

This important text, signed by more than 70 european personnalities, is available here. Below is the list of signatures. Signatures : AUSTRIA Christian Zeller, professor of economic geography, University of Salzburg BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA Tijana Okic, philosopher BELGIUM Olivier Bonfond, (...)
What to do in Europe? Proposals from the Left

19 January 2017 - by EReNSEP

These are critical moments for Europe. It is clear that the Economic and Monetary Union has irrevocably failed, the economies of the periphery of Europe remain in severe crisis, and the economies of the core lack any impetus. The single currency has become a tool for Germany to implement (...)
The European Union against Europe: Disobeying and Walking

16 January 2017 - by Daniel Albarracín

The purpose of this presentation is to contribute with some elements of the debate, focusing on the strategies that the progressive political forces in Europe has been developing. Debating with them we will try to build a useful proposal to open a path to break with the straitjacket of the Euro (...)
For people’s seizure of power: Ten proposals to avoid a repetition of the Greek capitulation

5 January 2017 - by Eric Toussaint

I propose ten measures for the people’s seizure of power, ascertaining that the experience of the Greek capitulation of 2015 is not revisited. The first proposal: a left-wing government must disobey the European Commission (EC) in a very transparent manner with prior announcements. The party, or (...)
The ECB’s ‘quantitative easing’ funds multinationals and climate change

20 December 2016 - by Corporate Europe Observatory

Corporate Europe Observatory has decoded the list of beneficiaries of the European Central Bank’s corporate bond purchasing scheme. The results are disturbing, unless you think oil, fancy cars, motorways, champagne, and gambling are good places to put public money. In June 2016 the European (...)
The euro and the debt crisis

25 November 2016 - by Eric Toussaint

Copenhagen, 19th November 2016 Internationalist summit for a Plan B in Europe At the beginning of the decade of the 2000s, the integration into the Eurozone generated a huge flux of finances from the core economies to the periphery: Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Spain, Slovenia, etc. The big (...)
Europe: No “LEXIT” without “Another Europe Possible” - based on struggles in/outside/against the EU

22 September 2016 - by Catherine Samary

Since the Greek trauma – both the neo-colonial diktat from the Euro-group and agreement by Tsipras to submit despite the popular OXI – the European radical left has debated “Plans B” without any strategic or tactical consensus. The referendum in the United Kingdom (UK) is the bitter illustration of (...)
Restructuring of Europe: Greece Was the Prologue

29 August 2016 - by George Souvlis, Elias Ioakimoglou

Austerity experiments in Greece set the stage for a radical restructuring of Europe by elites. By now, the story of Syriza’s capitulation to the European creditor institutions is well-known. Syriza came to power in January 2015 with a mandate to resist the imposition of austerity. Instead, (...)
Barroso’s Gold-plated revolving door

25 August 2016 - by Corporate Europe Observatory

Never before has a former European Commission official been criticised as much for their post-EU career as ex-Commission president Barroso since he joined infamous US investment bank Goldman Sachs earlier this summer. Despite its scandalous nature, his move did not come as a complete surprise, (...)
Barroso and Goldman Sachs - a dangerous liaison

29 July 2016 - by Corporate Europe Observatory

The news that José Manuel Barroso will become non-executive chairman at Goldman Sachs did not exactly come as a surprise. This is a man who presided over the European Commission for 10 years and, from the beginning, his leadership followed a corporate agenda, with its close links to the biggest (...)
The International Context of Global Outrage (in 5 parts)

28 July 2016 - by Eric Toussaint

We publish in a single block a series of articles written by Eric Toussaint |1| late 2011 - early 2012 which deals with the international context of global outrage. The text traces the milestones of the altermondialist movement between the early 1990s and 2012. Looking back on the movements (...)
EU / Trade agreements: UN rights expert warns against bypassing national parliaments

27 June 2016 - by United Nations - Human Rights

GENEVA (24 June 2016) – United Nations human rights expert Alfred de Zayas today warned that any plan by the European Union to bypass national parliaments to push through controversial trade deals would violate international human rights norms and standards. “Trade deals prepared and negotiated (...)
Éric Toussaint: ‘If governments do not want citizen debt audits, it is because they are hiding something’

7 June 2016 - by Eric Toussaint, Maialen Mariscal Ruben Plaza

According to Éric Toussaint, States should default on their payments in order to renegotiate and radically reduce their debts. San Sebastian (Basque Country – Spain) – Éric Toussaint staunchly campaigns for the cancellation of a State’s debt every time it is shown to be illegal, illegitimate or (...)
“Economy should serve the people, not vice versa” – UN expert says after assessing EU adjustment policies

6 June 2016 - by Juan Pablo Bohoslavsky

Recent austerity policies are hitting the most vulnerable and are undermining economic, social and labour rights within the European Union, today said United Nations Independent Expert Juan Pablo Bohoslavsky at the end of his fact-finding visit* to EU institutions in Brussels. “I am concerned (...)
Investment Court System put to the test

26 May 2016 - by Transnational Institute, Corporate Europe Observatory, Friends of the Earth Europe, Forum Umwelt und Entwicklung , Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives

The European Commission says that its new investment proposal –the Investment Court System - will protect governments’ abilities to regulate on crucial matters such as public health and environmental protection. But analysis of five of the most controversial arbitration cases in recent years (...)
Local politics enters the global contest

23 May 2016 - by Sol Trumbo Vila

European municipalities join the battle against TTIP to protect sovereignty and public services, demonstrating how to take political initiative and build an alternative economy Opponents of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) see their chances of victory increasing. Local (...)
Blockupy International Coordinating Group, May 15^th 2016

Let’s strike back! Towards a Global debout, against Loi Travail and neoliberal European labor reforms!

17 May 2016 - by Blockupy Frankfurt

Blockupy International supports the convergence of struggles that is currently taking place in France against the Labor Bill and its system and austerity policies which are creating a society of injustice, precarity and inequalities. The movement has continuously grown over the last two months (...)