Read all posts for ‘romania’

There is a striking contrast between the breadth and scope of austerity measures in Europe and citizens’ perceptions of them. I recently moderated a debate organized by the Bertelsmann Foundation on what Europe can learn from Latin America in terms of managing a debt crisis. The audience was composed mostly […]

As a European, a tech geek and a fan of free trade I’m all in favour of the proposed EU-US free trade area. But as with any big agreement there are quite a few caveats to be added: net neutrality activists are claiming that TAFTA is just another backdoor for […]

Workers used to be the most valuable resource of any industrialized country. Photo: Paul Stang   No good can come of it when proper planning is lacking is how we could sum up the past 20 years of Romanian industry. Until 1989, Romania was the fourth country in the world […]

The strawberry season started late this year in Romania as the winter has been long and damp. A couple of days ago I went to the market next to my house and struck up a conversation with the strawberry seller. He was praising the fruit: “They’re grown in Romania, madam. […]

Although primarily an economic union forged with the aim of bringing long-lasting peace to a continent devastated by bloody wars, the European Union soon became an identity-centered construct. European citizenship brought about fundamental individual freedoms and there has been hope that decades of integration would successfully shape a single identity, […]