A Berlusconi led right-wing coalition has delivered a shock in the Italian elections, taking 30% of the vote and winning the senate in the key regions of Lombardy, Sicily and Veneto. Berlusconi was trailing…
The threatened renegotiation of Britain’s place in the European Union is considered by many to be a gamble for the UK. Forty years after the UK’s entry into the European Economic Community, this declaration…
Emissions growth in the 21st century was overwhelmingly concentrated in developing countries. My own calculations on “business as usual” emissions for the Climate Change Review Update suggested that in…
You can’t join a football club and then ask to play rugby. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius summed up negative reaction to British Prime Minister David Cameron’s speech about the EU on “the Continent…
British Prime Minister David Cameron has announced an “in/out” referendum for UK voters on European Union (EU) membership, scheduled for 2017. There were few surprises in this, as the full text of his…
In recent years, urban branding has become highly popular. Shifts in global, national, and local economic bases have forced cities and nations to market themselves internationally as cultural hotspots…
On 25 November Catalans will go to the polls in what will be their 11th regional elections since Spain’s return to democracy after Franco’s death in 1975. This time, however, Catalans will be voting much…
Aviation has – and has had for some time – an emissions problem. That problem was illustrated in dramatic fashion last week when it was announced that the European Union (EU) would freeze until late next…
At a meeting in Luxembourg last week, the finance ministers of 11 members of the European Union (Austria, Belgium, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia and Spain) agreed…
There is less than a week to go in the US presidential race, and the candidates are coming agonisingly close in various battleground states. Imagining Mitt Romney in the White House might turn a few Democrat…
I was minding my own business on the London Underground last Friday when I glanced at one of those free newspapers that litter the trains. That’s how I discovered that the EU had won the Nobel Prize for…
In the biggest rally for Catalan independence ever, an estimated crowd of 1.5 million people flooded the city of Barcelona with red-and-yellow striped flags on Catalonia’s national day, the Diada. Tax…
Earlier this week the federal Government announced important changes to the carbon pricing mechanism (CPM). The political and economic consequences have been much discussed, but the less-talked-of legal…
Linking Australia to the European Union carbon emissions trading scheme by 2015 will undoubtedly affect the revenue gained from carbon trading. The question is, how much? One should expect up to 50% less…
You might have thought Australia’s carbon pricing scheme was done and dusted – at least until the next government comes in. Today’s announcement about the price floor and international permit trading proves…
Today Eurozone leaders will meet in Brussels. On the agenda is nothing less than the survival of the euro. Officially, it is about Spain: Spain’s economic and financial woes show the urgency. Moody’s drastically…
European leaders will meet tomorrow and Friday for the EU summit in Brussels, which has been billed as a “make or break” event that will determine not only the fortunes of the eurozone, but of the global…
Later today (European time), Irish voters will be asked to vote Yes or No on the Treaty for Stability, Co-ordination and Governance. The Yes campaign, lead by Ireland’s establishment parties, claim a No…
The special EU summit held in Brussels on Wednesday revamped the discussion on Eurobonds (i.e. the issuance of common government bonds to pool the Eurozone debt liability) as a possible option to address…
Europe is in economic dire straits and the two most powerful economies on the continent are, at least on paper, led by individuals with considerable differences. The previous French President Nicolas Sarkozy…
Professor of International Migration and Forced Displacement and Director of the Institute for Research into International Migration and Superdiversity, University of Birmingham