Guarantee security for young people in flexicurity concept by Nils Hindersmann, Ecosy Vice-President

The EU Commission has recently published a communication called "Towards common principals on Flexicurity - more and better jobs through flexibility and security." With this document the EU Commission has started a debate about the mostly in the Scandinavian countries adopted combination of evitable necessary labour market flexibilisation and additional social security. Only by using the term flexicurity a lot of political reflexes have been generated already, although it is not clear yet which concrete political measures will be undertaken.
Thus, we as ECOSY - Young European Socialist clearly state that further flexibilisation of European labour markets alone will lead to more precarious working conditions in many European countries. It is not a secret that young, female and migrant workers are those who are mainly affected by precarious working conditions. The amount of limited working contracts in the EU has risen from 63 million to 104 million in the time period 2002-2006. This is an increase of 10 million limited contracts per year. A new generation of working poor has been created in Europe. In many European countries many young people in certain branches of the service sector work for less than the guaranteed social benefits. Although an economic downturn has hit many European economies in the recent years, the employment rate has risen. But the jobs, which have been created, are paid low, are part-time and are on a limited contract basis. In addition the productivity of the labour force has recently not increased as much as in other economies. That shows that the flexibilisation of working time and working contracts has neither led to better jobs nor led to higher productivity rates compared to other economies. But still the EU Commission is claiming in their recent communication that "a more flexible labour market" is needed for the "employers and employees".

The EU Commission claims also that the dynamic, successful knowledge based European economy needs to adapt more rapidly to change in a globalised world. For us as ECOSY - Young European Socialists this objective can only be achieved with a well educated, highly skilled and socially secured workforce. In order to achieve this social minimum standards are necessary. Although the Commission admits that more social security is an important factor for highly productive workforce, concrete political measures which should be undertaken are missing. Thus, we as ECOSY - Young European Socialists call for a European minimum wage and a maximum working time of 32hours. It seems also necessary to develop further instruments to combat chains of limited working contracts and a better protection of interns who are mostly highly skilled young workers without being paid or any social security.

In addition to this, a review of the Integrated Policy Guidelines of the Lisbon Strategy is necessary. For the next three-year-cycle of the Lisbon Agenda stronger guidelines linked to employment and social policy are needed. Thus ECOSY - Young European Socialists call for:

· more support for new skills, lifelong learning and modern education/training systems which is granted for free,
· more vocational training
· a youth guarantee (job offer or training activity),
· and promotion of an active migration policy,
· a parental leaf systems, which allows parents better re461
entering of the labor market,
· more investments in childcare.

Additionally, the broad macro-economic guidelines of the next three year-cycle have to be readjusted. Thus ECOSY - Young European Socialists call for:

· more investments in research and development as well as in innovations,
· integrative policy-led approach between the reformed Stability and Growth Pact and the new generation of IPGs
· more high-quality public spending for more sustainable development,
· strengthening and broadening coordination within the Euro-area.

Cheers for Obama!

Three Cheers to Obama for leading the vote in Iowa against Edwards and Clinton. The first steps towards the first african american presidency are there.

Here you have both the moment and the reason me and thousands of other people started wondering: "Hey, why isn't thát guy running for president?". And now he is! Obama for president!

A little late, but that doesn't make it less of a... Happy New Year!

Had a great time at New Year's Eve.




I hope you did too. I wish you the very best for 2008!

Time for a New American Soft Power by Dexter Thillien

In a recent special edition of Newsweek dealing with America’s future role in the world, a few contributors argued for the need of the USA to renew its soft power and the power of its ideas, especially in the Middle East; and to prove their point, they took the examples of the role of the USA in Eastern Europe during the Cold War, such as the role of Radio Free Europe for instance.
However, I believe that this is an erroneous analogy to make, as the Middle East is nowhere like Eastern Europe under communism, but is actually much more like Latin America during that period.
Let’s first see why I believe the Middle East is a totally different proposition than Eastern Europe was during the Cold War.
Firstly, as opposed to the Soviet Union, the Middle East does not offer a monolithic enemy bloc. At moment only Syria and Iran are considered to be rogue states by the American administration, the rest being allies on different levels; furthermore some of these allies, such as Saudi Arabia or Egypt, heavily backed by the USA, don’t exactly fit the model of promoting democracy that has been the rhetoric of American diplomacy.
Secondly, the hatred that existed towards communism and the Soviet Union during the Cold War is not matched by a hatred of Islamism in the Middle East; we can take Hamas in Palestine as an example.
Thirdly, I do not believe that the Islamic terrorist threat comes from states as such (with perhaps the exception of Iran), but from transnational organisations.
With these main differences, I believe that the Middle East is much more similar to what Latin America was during the Cold War and this is why:
Firstly, the USA prepped up authoritarian regimes to safeguard its interests, akin to what is happening in the Middle East in relation to oil; however, at the same time, it continued to have a rhetoric about promoting democracy in the world, there is an hypocrisy there.
Secondly the USA has not been shy about intervention to enforce their interests as they did in Irak, with differing success; examples are Guatemala in 1953, Cuba in the early 1960’s, Chile in 1973 and the Central American nations of Nicaragua, Grenada or El Salvador in the 1980’s.
The USA can learn 2 lessons from this; firstly that the way Latin America democratised itself in the 1980’s and 1990’s during the 3rd wave was much more an internal process than an external one, and that in some nations that process allied itself with anti-americanism which we can still see the remnants of the Bolivarian alternative of Hugo Chavez; and secondly that using the methods that may have worked in Eastern Europe will not work in the Middle East as the USA is seen more as an hypocritical power than a beacon of liberty.
It is time for the USA to have a new soft power, not reuse obsolete ways from a past that’s gone.
Dexter Thillien is a French freelance writer and journalist. His main interests are the European Union and general political questions, especially in France, the UK and Spain.