Do European fiscal rules make it easier for governments to “sell” spending cuts to their voters? Drawing on a survey experiment in Italy, Alessia Aspide finds such rules have little impact on domestic support for austerity policies. The NextGenerationEU initiative, launched amid the COVID-19 pandemic, with its focus on investments, represented a ground-breaking departure from … Read more
In the Global South, Brics is widely seen as an alternative to the Western-dominated world order. In reality, the group’s leading members often have opposing views on crucial geopolitical issues and the organisation remains rather ineffective compared to Western institutions. Brics, whose acronym comes from its first five members – Brazil, Russia, India, China and … Read more
In the Opinion in Kolin Inşaat Turizm Sanayi ve Ticaret (C-652/22, EU:C:2024:212, hereafter ‘Kolin’), Advocate General Collins has argued that only economic operators established in countries party to international agreements on public contracts that bind the EU may rely on the provisions of Directive 2014/25/EU. This would imply that economic operators established in other countries … Read more
On 11 April 2024, AG Campos Sánchez-Bordona delivered his Opinion in NFŠ (C-28/23, EU:C:2024:306). The NFŠ Opinion is very interesting in three respects. First, in addressing some aspects of the definition of public works contracts that keep coming up in litigation in relation to relatively complex real estate transactions. Second, in addressing the effects of … Read more
As war in the Middle East escalates with Israel’s invasion of Lebanon and Iran’s counter-attack, the global economy faces fresh recession fears after a year of remarkable strength and investor complacency even as Israeli forces swept through Gaza. The past week tells us the balance of power in the Middle East is fundamentally changing and … Read more
