In this episode, we talk about democratic backsliding and why does it matter for the EU, the issue with Bulgaria and Romania, EU tools to address democratic backsliding among its members, and whether the EU is capable of using its tools more effectively to prevent it.
In 2021, public expenditure per capita in Poland for the first time exceeded the amount of PLN 30,000. It accounted for 44.2% of GDP – less than the year before when the pandemic hit, but still much more than in 2019. Since 2015, public spending in Poland has increased in real terms by over 35%.
In this episode, Leszek Jażdżewski talks with Gerald Knaus about the enlargement policy of the European Union, new potential EU members, the “New Cold War”, and the future of the European project.
The question of whether to leave a successful career behind to enter politics and try to change the political trajectory of one’s own country is central to the new documentary by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom – “Politics Is for Other People”. The documentary “Politics Is for Other People” features remarkable stories of representatives of liberal parties from Austria, Hungary, Slovakia, Poland, Romania, and Bulgaria.
Any pandemic is not only a threat to the health and safety of the people but may also lead to other significant threats to them. In times of great national uncertainty, the government is called upon to act, and the present pandemic is no exception. In responding to the COVID-19 pandemic exigencies, governments around the world have taken vast and unparalleled decisions to contain the spread of the COVID-19 virus and protect lives.
Since the 2015 refugee crisis onwards, the yearly quota of working permits for Third Country Nationals (TCNs) offered by the Romanian Government has gradually increased, reaching 25,000 in 2020. An important category of TCNs working in Romania are people from South Asia, mainly Indian, Bangladeshi, Sinhalese, or Nepali migrants.
The Council of the European Union as voice of the member governments and as main legislative body of the EU alongside with the Parliament, had a key role in these debates which worth to recall.
In mid-June, hundreds of thousands of Czechs took to the streets of Prague calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Andrej Babiš in light of both a criminal investigation in the Czech Republic over alleged fraud, and an EU investigation over the abuse of EU funds by his Agrofert conglomerate.
The governing coalition of PSD and ALDE, elected in December 2016, seems indecisive in exercising executive power. The declining voter turnout, the street protests of February, and the curious change of prime minister in June raise legitimate questions about Romania’s flawed democracy.
Recent developments in Hungary and Romania have prompted a question that once would have been considered fanciful at best: could there be a dictatorship inside the European Union?
