You were ‘nice’? Here is a reward. You were ‘naughty’ – here is a punishment. There is a kind of a social contract between an individual and Santa Claus. This simple and intuitive logic is not uncommon in many cultures. But I cannot help at wonder: what would Santa Claus be like if he was a government figure?
The mass scale of the social response to what Law and Justice is doing, the Committee for the Defence of Democracy, which within two days gathered over 30,000 supporters may be just a preview of a massive political force that shall defend the rule of law, its sense of belonging to Europe and liberal democracy which it deems indispensable, or even ‘holy’.
More than 20 representatives of NGOs, Roma employment organizations, journalists, politicians, embassies’ representatives, among others, attended a seminar organized by INESS on December 15, 2015 devoted to describing the existing barriers on the labor market, which are the result of existing legislation and discuss possibilities of their removal, or change.
Nowoczesna is a party of the responsibility for the public finances, of the sensible management of the resources – a party that promotes entrepreneurial spirit, creativity, innovativeness and free market. It is a clear antithesis of the vision of Law and Justice – which Civic Platform clearly is not.
On November 18 in Budapest, the Free Market Foundation together with the Uninvited Network and the Civic Platform organized a conference on education. Teachers, students, parents, recruiters and education policy experts worked together during the event to identify the issues of the education system and to formulate responses and solutions.
Although Bulgaria has officially been in a budgetary consolidation phase during the entire 2013-2015 period, public expenditure went out of control on several occasions. Yet again the newly presented medium-term budget framework provides for decreasing deficits, while current expenditures (and thus deficits) are being hiked.
Slovakia’s example is emblematic of how a government trying to patch up fiscal loopholes turns to targeting incomes of the most vulnerable, using their limited means to solve societal problems. From the government’s perspective, this is often the easiest way to procure the necessary funding.
In considering the extent to which the state should be relied upon to promote social cohesion and virtue, one must keep in mind the potential associated pitfalls as well as the other possible means to accomplish the same desired ends.
Hopefully, PiS will moderate its economic programme after the election and renounce some of its harmful pre-election promises. If the new government decides to choose the “Orbánisation” path it will be harmful for Poland, the region and the EU
The more powers, functions and mechanisms concentrated in the hands of a government, the more etatistic its policy with the people more restricted by, and subordinated to, the government. And vice versa, in a country where the government has very few functions, people live, act, study and work more freely.
