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Silvio Berlusconi, the candidate of calm
MILAN — When Silvio Berlusconi exited the public arena to universal relief in 2011, few would have predicted the scandal-ridden politician’s return would be met with the same emotion. Berlusconi’s...
View ArticleEuropean defense vs. NATO: Not the right fight
One year into Donald Trump’s presidency, it’s clear this White House isn’t one for carefully picking its battles. And given the president’s appetite for confrontation, it is only matter of time before...
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Germany’s political identity crisis
BERLIN — The next four years in Germany will be anything but boring. A tectonic shift is taking place in Germany that will either revitalize or paralyze its usually staid political culture. The Social...
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Martin Schulz, the man who could only disappoint
BERLIN — There was a time when it was an unwritten rule that, if you wanted to run for German chancellor, you had to have been the Ministerpräsident of a German Bundesland. But, much like the value of...
View ArticleHow to design an EU budget
The forthcoming negotiations over the EU’s long-term budget will be conditioned by Brexit. In the face of the U.K.’s decision to leave the Union, the so-called multiannual financial framework — which...
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Another reason Scandinavians are the worst
The Rich White People’s Olympics are finally slithering to an end in the South Korean city of Pyeongchang, and, so far, the richest, whitest country in the world is winning. This would seem to be the...
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In pictures: The Greek school with a single student
ARKOI, Greece — If you stand on the eastern shore of the island of Arkoi on a clear day, you can see Turkey in the distance. At 170 miles (about 275 kilometers) — and many worlds — from Athens’...
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Slovakian journalism’s darkest day
Even during the turbulent and lawless decade that followed the end of communism in 1989, no reporter was ever killed in Slovakia. Beaten and threatened, yes — on multiple occasions. But never executed...
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Putin’s worst enemy: Putin
LONDON — There are two certainties in Russia’s presidential election. The first, that Vladimir Putin will walk away the winner, with all major polls giving him around 70 percent of the votes. The...
View ArticleBlueprint for a democratic renewal of the eurozone
In the last few months, the European Commission as well as a group of 14 French and German economists have issued new blueprints for strengthening the architecture of the eurozone. These proposals are...
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12 people who ruined Italy
ROME — Italians vote in a general election on March 4 that has prompted jitters in financial markets, European chancelleries and, not least, the Berlaymont building in Brussels. Worries over Italy are...
View ArticleNo winners in Europe’s war against Chinese steel
Europe has every reason to be happy about its steel sector these days: Prices are rising and business performance has improved. But it is wrong to attribute the sector’s recovery to EU trade measures...
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How billionaires learned to love populism
For a while, it looked like one of the great gaffes in a disastrous political year. You probably know the photo: Steven Mnuchin, the ultra-wealthy secretary of the Treasury, smugly holding up a sheet...
View ArticleItaly, Europe’s breakaway province
Once again a European election has resulted in a hung parliament. The difference this time is that in Italy’s case the parties struggling to form a government are not the establishment but the rebels....
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Give populists a chance
BOLOGNA — Italy’s political establishment and European leaders should encourage the maverick 5Star Movement to enter government, despite the economic risks, after mainstream parties took a severe...
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Italy’s howl of nihilism
ROME — Politics can create strange bedfellows, but nobody knows who will sleep with the winners of Italy’s election: Matteo Salvini, the nationalist leader of the far-right League, and Luigi Di Maio,...
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How Ukraine became the Wild East of cryptocurrencies
KIEV — Welcome to Europe’s Wild East. Forty-year-old Pavel Lerner, the CEO of Exmo Finance, a popular bitcoin exchange, was leaving his office on the day after Christmas when he was accosted and...
View ArticleWhen women’s voices are heard
When I first started speaking at major European events two decades ago, my invitations to be on a panel were few and far between — usually they only arrived when a man had failed to turn up. A male...
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Europe’s (not so) free press
Until recently, press freedom groups dismissed the risk of physical attacks on journalists in Europe. They can no longer afford to do so. The shooting last month of the 27-year-old Slovak investigative...
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Putin’s phony arms race
In the early parts of his recent state of the federation speech, Russian President Vladimir Putin offered some hints of openings to the United States. But that has been lost by the response to the last...
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