In April this year, during a visit to Farmleigh House, German Chancellor Angela Merkel spoke about her experience of borders: “For 34 years I lived behind the Iron Curtain,” she said, “so I know only too well what it means once borders vanish, once walls fall.” On November 9, Merkel’s homeland celebrated 30 years since…
On Sunday 10 November, Spain held its fourth general election in four years, after its political parties failed to reach a governing deal in the wake of April’s inconclusive polls. Spaniards elected the 14th Cortes Generales (both houses of parliament) with all 350 seats in the Congress of Deputies up for election, as well as…
This week’s European Council summit began on Thursday, with leaders first reviewing Brexit, before discussing Turkey and EU enlargement. Focus turned on Friday to the next institutional cycle, the EU budget and climate change. Incoming President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen attended the European Council, in order to outline her priorities for…
On Sunday 13 October Poland went to the polls to elect all 460 members of its lower house of parliament and all 100 senators in what has been a divisive election. Having won an absolute majority in 2015, the first since the restoration of full democracy in 1991, the conservative and Eurosceptic Law and Justice…
Introduction: Portugal is one of the few countries in Europe yet to see the rise of an electorally significant far-right populist movement. The recent European Parliament elections confirmed this with the ruling Socialist Party (PS) winning 33% of the vote, the first time in 20 years a governing party had topped a European poll. Prime…
On Sunday, 29 September Austria took to the polls to elect 183 members of the 27th National Council. This snap election was called after a corruption scandal that caused the collapse of the previous right-wing coalition government. Introduction Austria is a federal parliamentary republic consisting of nine states. In the Austrian system, the Federal President…
Perhaps the knottiest conundrum of Brexit are the competing dynamics of movement and blockage represented by exits and borders. Though the UK is the only member-state to activate Article 50, it is not the first to seek to leave the EU, e.g. Algeria (1962), Greenland (1985) and St. Barthélémy (2012). Significantly however, none of these…
What is the European Commission? Following her election in July, European Commission President-elect Ursula von der Leyen announced her team of commissioners, also known as the College of Commissioners, on Tuesday, 10 September 2019. The European Commission is the executive arm of the European Union. It is the sole EU institution with the right to…
The ‘New EU’ is taking shape in the aftermath of the 2019 European Elections, with a new group of EU leaders emerging to guide the Union through a critical time in its development. The European Commission The European Council proposes nominees for several crucial leadership roles, with criteria laid out by EU treaties. These include…
Following the recent European Parliament Elections in May, Greek Prime Minister, AlexisTsipras, called a snap election after his party, Syriza, suffered a defeat of 9 percentage points to the main opposition, New Democracy, led by Kyriakos Mitsotakis. The Greek parliamentary elections took place on Sunday, 07 July 2019. Introduction Prime minister, Alexis Tsipras, was defeated…