Geopolitics

Climate change represents a unique opportunity for Europe’s green parties to “lead the way” by developing a sound strategy for “greening” Europe’s foreign and security policy – and in the process revamping this stagnant dimension of European integration.

How can we explain the stalling of talks and postponement of real action towards nuclear disarmament, and what are the obstacles holding back the EU from being a leader by example?

Medication and water bottles have numerous advantages in a crisis situation, but it’s quite sure that they cannot be used to stop ISIS. The greatest dilemmas of European Greens are rooted in a conflict of values, as well as in the difficulty of reconciling theory and practice. To overcome them, Greens need to work on a political solution.

The Kurds have conducted a remarkable democratic experiment in the north of Syria: Their “Canton-based Democratic Autonomy” is a pursuit of freedom, justice, dignity and democracy led by principles of equality and environmental sustainability. Nevertheless, protecting this area with weapons and the blood of martyrs shouldn’t be applauded.

An interview with Isabelle Durant. Great upheavals have occurred and are still occurring in the Middle East: the successive revolutions and counter-revolutions of the Arab spring, the lightning emergence of ISIS, the agonies of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the stagnating civil war in Syria. How do the Greens analyse the situation?

While the traditional European way of peace-making was based on separating peoples, the Green European way of peace-building should be based on power-sharing and trust-building.

In the most recent conflict with Russia, the EU has tried to find a solution that avoids war. The EU considers military action only as the last resort – and that should not change in the future, even if we accept that the world won’t become an entirely peaceful place from one day to next. An interview with Rebecca Harms.

Over the past decade, an ongoing reshuffle in the balance of global power has seen China change scale from regional to world actor, Russia reassert its ambition to be treated like a major player, and calls emerging for Europe to play a more active role in world politics.

Foreign policy, as is generally known, is the extension of domestic politics. With Minsk II threatened by its collapse only days after the agreement was reached, stern warnings have been voiced on both sides of the Atlantic on the looming possibility of a transatlantic rift in case the U.S. would decide to arm the Ukrainian government with defensive military equipment. But where do the German and U.S. public stand on this issue?

Viktor Orbán’s evolving relations with the oligarchs both in Hungary and the wider region are having serious effects on Hungary’s energy strategy. Now, Putin is in town for meetings that will no doubt result in a new contract for the supply of gas, a development which will be to the benefit of a minority and to the detriment of most of the population, and which could also lead to tensions arising with the EU.