The presidency of the Council of the European Union is responsible for the functioning of the Council of the European Union, the upper house of the EU legislature. It rotates among the member states of the EU every six months. The presidency is not an individual, but rather the position is held by a national government. It is sometimes incorrectly referred to as the “president of the European Union“. The presidency’s function is to chair meetings of the Council, determine its agendas, set a work programme and facilitate dialogue both at Council meetings and with other EU institutions. The presidency is currently, as of July 2020, held by Germany. Three successive presidencies are known as presidency trios. The current trio (2020–21) is made up of Germany (July–December 2020), Portugal (January–June 2021) and Slovenia (July–December 2021). read more…
(Latest update: 9 December 2023) Over the coming months, the world will now experience not only how individual states will deal with the global coronavirus pandemic, but also how governments can or cannot intercept the consequences. It can be observed in real time how a real and worldwide crisis is reacted to, who has made provisions and built up reserves or has only wobbled. Already the unemployment numbers and the number of bankruptcies in the first few weeks will provide sufficient information and thus also give an answer to which social and state systems are viable even in crises and take their weakest with them instead of having to leave them behind. It can be assumed that the countries will cope best with the crisis, that are regularly accused of charging too high taxes and having too strong social systems in “regular times” (some Americans would even call it “pure socialism” until a big crises hit in. Then more and more people are questioning why the richest country in the world cannot provide as excellent social security as Germany has for decades – everything always has its advantages and disadvantages), because these countries can now set their full strength come into effect and let it unfold. Whatever the outcome of this “competition” will be, let us all remain prudent, relaxed, reasonable and show solidarity and, of course, let’s stay at home if possible, because the more people abide by the rules, the sooner we can get this spook under control. Even if it will take months before a vaccine will be available, we shouldn’t give the virus the pleasure to let destroy us socially and economically. Stay healthy and #flattenthecurve #StayHomeSaveLives #Coronavirus #covid19 (Coronavirus warning app for Germany) read more…
(Latest update: 23 August 2022) The European Union’s climate policy is a European policy area that aims to limit global warming to 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and to transform European economies into a low carbon economy. On the one hand, the EU’s climate policy aims to reduce its own emissions of greenhouse gases (mitigation), for example through the emissions trading system that has existed since 2005. However, since limiting anthropogenic climate change can ultimately only be achieved at the global level, the EU is also actively involved in the negotiations under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. The EU’s climate policy also pursues the goal of limiting the effects of climate change (adaptation), for example through civil protection measures in Europe or through conflict prevention in developing countries. read more…
(Latest update: 23 August 2022) It is actually unbelievable: the wall fell, fortunately the Soviet Union failed in its own right, as a result of which most of the Eastern Bloc gained its freedom. There was great hope for democracy, freedom and the rule of law. Especially in the eastward expansion of the EU, which only knows freedom from history lessons, the hope for freedom and democracy was huge. It is all the more surprising that parts of the populations have once again been seduced by nationalist demagogues. From the east, this nationalistic nonsense finally arrived in East Germany, which was formerly part of the Eastern Bloc. Where the journey will eventually lead to remains open by now. It will certainly not be pleasing for a while. Overall, this blog can be understood as “counter medicine”, especially since it becomes clear that there can be “the best and most beautiful place in the world” individually, but that there is actually a very large number of “best and most beautiful places in the world”. One can hold monologues for hours on this or just let a lot of photos and films speak for themselves. In order to make clear that hatred and extremism are anything but the norm, on the contrary, they are abnormalities, this article was created, which bundles various forms of abnormalities on the one hand and thus on the other hand seperates them from normality shown in our other blog entries. The dramatically accumulating “individual cases”, which they are obviously not, were also reason enough to refute the myth of the “lone wolf” (individual perpetrator). It is much more a question of failure of society as a whole. Entire networks are behind the perpetrators, often enough in so-called “social media”, which, however, are anything but that. read more…
In the 8th century, the Iberian Peninsula saw the arrival of Arabs and Berbers who mixed with the Roman-Visigoth inhabitants, engendering what was known as Al-Andalus. This successful medieval Muslim civilisation extended, at its peak, to most of what is today Spain and Portugal, until its downfall in the late 15th century (Reconquista). Today, the importance of Al-Andalus to Western Europe is all too often underestimated, or attempts are made to downplay the effect of this medieval “multicultural” approach on the development of Europe. It was the numerous innovations that the Muslims brought with them (enriched with knowledge from ancient Egypt and ancient China) that gave Europe an unexpected boost in development, both in the sciences and of course in the culinary field. Try depriving Europeans of their morning coffee and you’ll find yourself dealing with an ill-tempered continent. While science and the fine arts were already being established in Al-Andalus, we northern Europeans were still on the move as “uneducated and inhospitable woodworms”. This slowly changed with the spread of knowledge from Al-Andalus to the north. At the same time, one cannot understand today’s Andalusia and its appeal without knowing the impact of Al-Andalus. read more…
(Latest update: 23 August 2022) Brexit, not even legally binding (insofar, the Brexit vote has about the same weight as if the British would had voted on the weather, with the result that from now on the sun would have to shine 365 days a year over the island – but at least there would be a chance to get upset about heaven’s mistakes, instead of trying to blame Brussels for any wrong decision by the British government) and at best a recommendation (while the actual conduct of the referendum was a big foolishness by David Cameron, just to calm down a few ultranationalistic backbenchers from within his own party (YouGov, 24 February 2015: Record support for staying in the European Union, Forbes, 20 January 2016: Brexit Is All About Taxation And Regulation Without Representation, The Guardian, 31 August 2017: Will Brexit boost or hurt the economy? (“Economists for Free Trade”, a pro-Brexit lobby initiative), The Guardian, 17 January 2019: So what is David Cameron really doing now?)), already causes some turbulences even before the actual execution (once scheduled for 29 March 2019), not least because the British government doesn’t have enough experts to negotiate Brexit adequately. Negotiations with third countries are negotiated by Brussels for the EU, so that member countries were able to reduce their competences (in the United Kingdom, 30,000 additional civil servants have to be recruited following Brexit. That’s another reason why the Tories should actually have serial heart attacks). In the case of an exit from the EU, this obviously has a very unfavorable effect on the future third country. read more…
(Latest update: 9 March 2020) From May 23 to 26, 2019, the European elections took place. By far the biggest surprise is that, despite Brexit, the United Kingdom took part in the elections because the country voted to leave the EU by a very small majority, but ultimately was not able to find the exit in time. The motto “Brexit means Brexit” is obviously not as easy to implement as the Brexiteers falsely propagated before the referendum, because the political camps define the exit very differently, making the inner-British process of exit preparations look grotesque, comedic, outrageous, outlandish to ludicrous and leaves the country deeply divided. Although it has been reported more frequently that participation in the United Kingdom’s European elections could be seen as a second Brexit referendum, it is more likely that the British outside Greater London used the election as a “rage vote” to slap the Tories and Labour for various reasons, while the biggest liar on the part of Brexiteers, Nigel Farage (besides Boris Johnson, Jacob Rees-Mogg and others), emerged as the winner of the election. A result that is just as unbelievable as the entire Brexit preparations on the part of the British. read more…
(Latest update: 22 August 2022) First, there is not THE real estate market – not national and certainly not international. In fact, the market situation is very fragmented due to the general conditions, in other words, many individual markets, collectively referred to as “the market”. Metropolitan Area A faces different challenges than Metropolitan Area B and Metropolitan Area C can not even understand what A and B are talking about. Where there is comparability, is the housing situation in the “affordable segment” in urban centers in all western EU states, the US and Canada. This is where the call for the state, which should intervene regulatively, quickly becomes louder. In free market economies, however, this is on the one hand not wanted and therefore on the other hand, only limited possible. That’s pretty okay, because the market is inherently profit-oriented and that’s just what it will stay, otherwise investment incentives for new construction would sooner or later be completely absent. The “rental price brake” (Mietpreisbremse) exemplifies the problem. At the same time, more and more social housing is being let out of the rental price brake without replacement investment being made. In the following, single aspects are examined in more detail using the example of Germany, whereby the scenarios also apply to other western countries such as the EU states, the US, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, but also, e.g., to Dubai and Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates, Hong Kong, Singapore, Seoul in South Korea, Tel Aviv in Israel and other emerging metropolitan regions around the world. read more…
The Museum of European Cultures – National Museums in Berlin – Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation came from the unification of the Europe-Department in the Berlin Museum of Ethnography and the Berlin Museum for Folklore in 1999. The museum focuses on the lived-in world of Europe and European culture contact, predominantly in Germany from the 18th Century until today. The museum, together with the Ethnological Museum of Berlin and the Museum of Asian Art, is located in the Dahlem Museums. The building was named after the architect Bruno Paul (1874 – 1968) and is located in the modern district of Steglitz-Zehlendorf. The museum’s exhibition rooms occupy the oldest building in the Dahlem Museums. The current Museum of European Cultures was established from several previous institutions which arose at the beginning of the 19th century and are due in part to private initiatives as well as governmental foundations. read more…
The presidency of the Council of the European Union is responsible for the functioning of the Council of the European Union, the upper house of the EU legislature. It rotates among the member states of the EU every six months. The presidency is not an individual, but rather the position is held by a national government. It is sometimes incorrectly referred to as the “president of the European Union“. The presidency’s function is to chair meetings of the Council, determine its agendas, set a work programme and facilitate dialogue both at Council meetings and with other EU institutions. The presidency is currently, as of July 2020, held by Germany. Three successive presidencies are known as presidency trios. The current trio (2020–21) is made up of Germany (July–December 2020), Portugal (January–June 2021) and Slovenia (July–December 2021). read more…
