Böll-Stiftung: The Italian constitutional referendum: a victory for democracy and civil society

First of all, with 68,48 percent the participation rate was astonishingly high, both with respect to previous constitutional referendums (34,05 percent in 2001 and 52,46 percent in 2006) and also compared to the recent European election in 2014 (58,69 percent). This is surely an important signal for the ‘health’ of our democracy, which had been eroded by an alternation of ‘technical governments’ and government reshufflings. It underlines the desire of people to be part of the political debate, especially when relevant  topics such as the constitution are on the table. [...]

On the one hand, there was Renzi and his coalition of centre-left and centre-right parties; on the other hand, a diverse group made up of antifascist partisans, trade unions, constitutionalists, radical left movements, Lega, Forza Italia and the 5 Star Movement. The convergence of extremely different political positions and the temporary closeness of various political groups on this topic was something completely new for the country. Obviously, behind this ‘muddle’, as the opposition was contemptuously named by Renzi, there were noble and less noble political motives An example for the latter is, typically, Berlusconi who became a ‘No’ supporter after having signed an agreement on structural reforms (Patto of Nazareno) with Renzi in 2014. [...]

If we look at the regional distribution of the votes, it is interesting to see that ‘Yes’ reached the majority only in Emilia Romagna, Toscana and Trentino Alto Adige, whereas ’No’ won in all the southern regions and also reached the 63,32 percent of votes in Lazio. Particularly interesting is the result in the southern regions (all governed by Renzi’s Democratic Party), where Renzi attempted to collect votes and gain support through several visits during the last weeks. Moreover, if we link the regional outcomes with the first provisional data on the age composition of the vote, we get further interesting insights. It shows that young people, the ones who should represent the ‘new’ according to the rhetoric of Renzi, have been the strongest opponents of the reform. [...]

These examples show that Renzi, the leader of the biggest left-wing party of the country, was (and formally still is) running a government which embraces a neoliberal ideology, even if pretending to act for the wellbeing of the nation.

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Böll-Stiftung: The Referendum in Hungary: “A Clear Foreign Policy Debacle and a Temporary Domestic Setback for the Government”

It is difficult to state with certainty why so many voters stayed away from the polls. Several factors were probably at play, in particular the opposition parties’ campaign to boycott the referendum, although their options were very limited. Another factor was certainly that the aggressive tone and extent of the government campaign had gone too far for many people. In addition, Hungarians seem to be tiring of the immigration issue. The government has been pushing this topic since early 2015, even though Hungary hasn’t been directly affected by immigration since the closure of its southern border. Instead of focusing on immigration, Hungarian voters would apparently prefer that the government address other pressing issues, such as employment, education, the health care system and corruption.

The bottom line is crucial: although the overwhelming majority of Hungarians expressed their opposition to refugee quotas in opinion surveys and despite the government’s massive campaign, which exceeded in its extent all previous political campaigns in Hungary and which cost more than both the Leave and Remain campaigns in the Brexit referendum combined, the Hungarian government failed to mobilise 50 percent of eligible voters. The number of “no” votes was scarcely more than the number of votes cast for Fidesz and the extreme right-wing Jobbik party in the 2014 parliamentary elections.

Although the composition of those who voted “no” is not known in detail, we can surmise that Orbán was unable to massively mobilise voters of the opposition parties for his purposes. At the same time, the government played up expectations too high, with Fidesz politicians stressing the importance of a valid referendum until two weeks before the vote.

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Böll-Stiftung: The European Union and its Southern Neighbourhood

Prior to the Arab Spring, the policies pursued by the EU and most of the Member States were focused on dealing with the regimes. In most cases, European governments shied away from dealing directly with the small, courageous and genuinely independent civil society movements or groups of individuals who campaigned for human rights. The EU’s interlocutor was the status quo. Moreover, the EU really had no unified, coherent long term strategy towards the region. As for the Member States, they had their own network of bilateral economic and trade ties built up over many years. [...]

At the time, the aim of the ENP was to foster stability, security and prosperity in these countries. It reflected the EU’s first European Security Strategy drawn up by Javier Solana. That document referred to establishing an arc of stability, from Europe’s east around to Europe’s south. Clearly for those campaigning for democracy in the MENA countries, neither the ENP nor the EU’s Security Strategy addressed the underlying tensions in the region: the irreconcilability of authoritarianism and democratisation; that the kind of stability prevailing in the MENA countries was inherently unstable.

The Arab Spring could have and should have provided the EU with a new and bold opportunity to radically overhaul its policies toward the region as a whole and towards particular countries. Certainly, in the immediate aftermath of the Arab Spring, the EU did realise that its previous policies had been flawed. But because of the sheer scale of the upheaval engulfing that Syria, Tunisia, Libya and Egypt particularly, the EU scrambled for a reactive policy. [...]

The long term consequences of Europe’s role as bystander in the Syrian war is extremely damaging. Salam Kawakibi summed it up in a piece he wrote for Carnegie Europe. He argued that if the Europeans do not take the Syrian conflict seriously, other global actors will not take the Europeans seriously either. Indeed, one wonders if European governments now see its southern neighbourhood through the lens of security and stability in order to ensure the security of EU citizens. [...]

Echoing the Commission’s Review, the official insisted that the EU’s policies would be able to reconcile security and stabilisation with promoting good governance, ‘democracy, rule of law and human rights.’ But as the Commission itself states throughout the 21-page long review, it is the security and stabilisation issues that take priority.

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Böll-Stiftung: Nord Stream II: Shaking Hands with the Devil

Doubled to 110 bcm, Nord Stream would be able to handle all of Russia’s gas exports to Western Europe. But what would the consequences of such a development be? Within a very short time, both the Brotherhood and Yamal pipelines would go out of business, and without continual maintenance and investment they would soon fall into disrepair. Stripped of important revenue sources, Poland, Slovakia, Belarus, Ukraine and their 100 million people would become economically weaker and more vulnerable to separate “deals” with Moscow.

The big winner would indeed be the Kremlin, securing more European money flowing to Moscow for a longer period of time. Western investment into Nord Stream II would commit Europe to Russian natural gas for longer, while intensified lobbying by the Western gas companies involved in the deal could discourage more aggressive energy conservation, encourage waste, and delay the transition to renewables.

The aim of corporate and Russian propaganda is for the German public to believe that the “only” losers in a Nord Stream II deal would be Germany’s eastern neighbours. They would certainly be losers: an important Kremlin objective is, without a doubt, to increase pressure the EU’s eastern flank and on Ukraine in particular. An economically weaker eastern EU periphery and an economically and socially more polarised EU are exactly what the Kremlin is hoping for in its quest to destroy the European Union and re-establish the good old world order of the first half of the 20th century. Nord Stream II would make anti-EU propaganda and subversion much easier in an economically, socially and politically more polarised continent. A poorer Ukraine would be even more vulnerable to Russian occupation and military aggression, and Putin’s hold on Belarus would become even firmer.

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Böll Foundation: What has Pegida changed? Everything

Pegida is the first radical right political party in Germany which managed to successfully act outside the neo-nazi ghetto. This party managed to establish all the ultranationalist and racist positions in the public debate which were not accepted beforehand in the wider society. This party is heterogeneous and holds internally contradictory demands, but that does not hinder its political activism. One can see in Pegida's racism, antiestablishment-resentment, chauvinism and fear politics what Umberto Eco called the pre-fascism. Pegida is probably not the last format of mobilization of the racism and ultra-nationalism, but only the first element in the coming chain of conflict situations. A lesson for the extreme right is that it is important to rely less on the verbalization of the enemy, and more on emphasizing privileges of those who consider themselves to be victims of political developments.

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