So it was little surprise to see the forthright tone of the IMF team when they left Luxembourg on June 7, having completed their analysis of the situation. Their report makes quite a contrast to the gentle reassurances of the eurozone ministers at their meeting on the same day.

The IMF report doesn’t mince its words. It may be familiar language for failing economies in Latin America, but for the eurozone! Take a few phrases: “Policies need to move urgently from crisis management to fundamental reforms”,  “strengthen economic governance of EMU”  “longstanding problem of anaemic growth in the euro area must now be addressed”,  “the euro area fiscal framework needs to be substantially strengthened”,  “more ambitious changes are needed”. And so on, with detail. The fundamental theme is that European countries must transform their economies, slash government spending and drive for economic growth.

The eurozone ministers did formally launch the €440bn European Financial Stability Facility at their June 7 meeting, but that’s definitely “crisis management”. The EFSF has been established as a limited company under Luxembourg law and will work in conjunction with the IMF to guarantee support for eurozone members if their credit position should weaken.

The question still remains as to what the eurozone can do to strengthen its effectiveness and meet at least some of those IMF demands. An intriguing game of smoke and mirrors has been played since the Special Purpose Vehicle and the associated IMF support were announced on May 9, a game designed to convince the markets that Europe is getting a grip of its profound economic crisis. The reality is that everyone has a different idea of what needs to be done and what can be done in the longer term.

Economic government for the eurozone. That’s the catch phrase. President Van Rompuy has used it, French Economy Minister Christine Lagarde has used it and Chancellor Angela Merkel has almost used it – “economic governance” is the closest she has come (also a phrase used by the IMF). President Sarkozy has spoken of a Eurozone Council. But a closer look at how it would work reveals something like a beefed-up version of what already exists.

The argument that a European single currency can only survive if there exists a common economic policy, common fiscal policy and common budget policy may prove to be correct in the long run, but it is clear that this is not what Europe’s present leaders mean when they talk of economic government.

France wants a formal decision-making structure where heads of state and government agree on fiscal discipline and maybe impose sanctions on recalcitrant member countries. Germany in effect argues for a stronger commitment to the stability and growth pact (and has announced budget cuts of €30bn over the next four years to do its part). Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the eurozone group of countries, believes that  eurozone governments should vet each other’s budget plans. But nobody contemplates the transfer of fundamental tools of economic management to a supranational European policy-maker. Maybe the IMF is a different matter?

So what of the euro crisis? At least the decline of the euro is seen as a positive, making European goods more competitive and – perhaps – boosting domestic demand within the crucial German economy. What is also evident is an increased determination to cut government spending sooner rather than later, reflected in the G-20 meeting. And of course these are not challenges faced only by the eurozone; the UK’s new coalition government has a massive challenge ahead in reducing spending and boosting growth. A poisoned chalice indeed!

Michael

The second in our now regular series of blog posts from our lovely French colleagues over in Paris…grrrrrrr.

After the announcement of the “No” on Friday, June 13, Dublin erupted in jubilation. But the next day, Ireland found itself in a situation comparable to the habitually sober citizen who has woken up with a raging hangover after having gone on an almighty pub crawl. A weekend national newspaper referred to an “Oh sh*t, what have we done?” vibe floating around. Opinion polls indicated that paradoxically most Irish support the EU, even if they voted no and found that almost 40 per cent of those who rejected the EU Treaty did so because they did not understand or were not “familiar” with it.

24 hours after the Bastille Day celebrations of July 14, the president of the European council, Mr. Nicolas Sarkozy sparked a general outcry in Dublin by bluntly revealing an open secret… “The Irish will have to vote again”, he said to members of his party. And the media hype began. Immediately, the Irish started fulminating about such arrogance on the part of the Gallic elite. Suddenly, Sarkozy’s four-hour visit in Dublin on July 21 became a much more controversial topic for the Irish than the last Gaelic football game. It became THE story. Actually, to say the least, the reception of the French President could have been warmer…

On his way back to Paris, “the French gaffer” as he is called in the daily French newspaper Le Monde, denied having asked for a second Irish vote. In fact, Mr. Nicolas Sarkozy is all too aware that there is no miracle solution to this institutional crisis at the present time. Irish events could be seen as a perfect introduction to a lecture on “sarkocism”. Lesson 1: raising the roof once more while pretending you are not. It is too early to say if this strategy is actually adapted to the present Irish versus European context. The forthcoming months will determine whether the answer is positive or not…

In what we hope will be a series of regular reflections from our  colleagues at FH Paris on Bld Haussman during the current EU French Presidency, a mail arrives with this guest contribution from Clemence Choutet and Quentin Vivant. Here are their thoughts as the Sarko Show gets well into the first act…

President Nicolas Sarkozy has inherited a Union in disarray but he has grand ambitions at the helm of Europe. He intends to deploy all of his talents and diplomatic skills to pull off the job. In short, he has prepared grand plans for his EU presidency, which began on July 1st, to show that France is back in Europe.

Fastuous ceremonies and foreign guests

The inauguration of a flamboyant presidency was symbolized on June 30, 2008 by the Eiffel Tower lit a dazzling blue with gold stars, representing the EU flag. The festivities include “Europe Bastille Day Balls” and will continue throughout France’s six-month turn in the EU chair. With a budget of €190 million, France aims to dazzle the world’s eyes with stylish ceremonies and the classiest souvenirs, scarves, pens, small bags and other paraphernalia, ever to have been given away at EU summits. Beyond the pomp and style of the opening ceremonies, Mr. Sarkozy is to pursue an ambitious agenda of politico-cultural events centered on immigration, climate change, environment, agriculture, defense and energy. No fewer than ten international summits will take place over the following six months.

Review of the troops

The first and most spectacular event will be the Paris summit on July 13 for about 50 leaders from Europe, North Africa and the Middle East programmed to launch Mr Sarkozy’s pet project for a “Mediterranean Union”. Leaders of all 27 EU members, plus 17 Mediterranean countries, are invited to a jamboree on the eve of Bastille Day to launch a new Union for the Mediterranean. Soldiers from Mediterranean countries that include Libya, Syria and Israel are invited by President Sarkozy to march in a “Euro-Mediterranean Bastille Day” military parade with European troops. The parade is expected to be the biggest yet, and will be followed by a fireworks display and a concert. Sarkozy wishes to turn the Mediterranean summit into an occasion to demonstrate that one of his great ideas has started to materialize.

Sarkozy’s fast-track gambit may pay dividends

Nicolas Sarkozy plans to launch the EU construction projects more or less simultaneously instead of successively, a tactic which he has already employed for the instigation of French social and economic reform. His fast moves dazzle both friends and foe alike. He makes a practice of moving too quickly for his political adversaries. And whatever Sarkozy does, he does it with style. Despite the sarcastic comments made by his detractors, one cannot help wondering whether Sarkozy’s dynamic approach may finally pay off, providing the opportunity to break down the EU’s institutional paralysis and overcome the traditional obstacles which have marred its construction.

To be continued…

Happily, video footage of the incident is all over Youtube. The clip I saw already had over 200,000 hits – see below

A question – is it a good political strategy for politicians to lose their rag on TV? Remember the old adage that there is no such thing as bad publicity. Perhaps this is all part of a cunning plan to use the power of digital to boost Sarko’s flagging Carla Bruni-inspired ratings…

Another example: Type former UK Deputy Prime Minister “John Prescott” into Youtube, the first entry you get is the infamous “John Prescott Punch”.

As one Youtube comment put it: “I think there should be more public vs. minister fights. Imagine the TV ratings.”

In fact, the internet is awash with politicians behaving badly – mass Parliamentary brawls being ever popular with Youtubers. Bolivian, Indian, Jordanian and Russian MPs have all taken their differences a bit too far in the past. But absolutely no-one can match the carnage often seen in the Taiwanese Parliament – see this compilation:

Such a crying shame these scenes are never repeated in the EP. The only fun we have is when Berlusconi comes to town.

EU Institutions

• European Commission – sweaty from the sex sells success, they still lead the way in populating the web with EU content (nearly a million channel views and over 4,000 subscribers).
• European Parliament – one video and about as many regular visitors as this blog.
• Council - does anyone else see the irony in “Council Live“? In any case we couldn’t find the Council on YouTube but the Portuguese Presidency does have a library of press conferences available to download.

European Parliament Political Groups

• EPP
• PES
• ALDE

• UKIP - A small national party rather than a European parliamentary group, we grant you. Despite holding none too popular views in Brussels some of their videos make us chuckle.

Members of the European Parliament

• Richard Corbett MEP (PES, UK)
• Chris Davies MEP (ALDE, UK)
• Dan Jorgensen MEP (PES, DK)
• Syed Kamall MEP (EPP, UK)
• Jules Maaten MEP (ALDE, NL)

There is of course the question of how successful these efforts are in reaching out to potential voters, or even supporters, both on their own and relative to each other.

Happily, we have started to come across tools that will help us map the progress made such as TubeMogul. Once you register, for free, not only can you upload your video to multiple platforms at the click of a button but you can also compile and contrast visitor data over time for your video and that of others.

A visit to the US based Viral Video charts, who offer a tracking and analysis service for a fee to professionals as well as a chart of political videos, reminds us however that the online world can hinder as well as help our politicians.

Our top three European political video bloopers in reverse order:

3. Commission President Barroso comparing Europe to an empire

2. French President Sarkozy appearing to have had a little too much to drink (BTW – he had not)

1. Belgian politician and potential Prime Minister Yves Leterme singing the Marseillaise instead of the Belgian national anthem (BTW – clearly he was joking)

In the EU, we take it for granted that pretty much everyone gets access to healthcare regardless of their ability to pay. Our healthcare systems are designed to provide universal coverage regardless of ability to pay and you’ll be hard pushed to find people who question that principle, even if many of us might criticise the systems themselves.

This means that on-line debate and blogging about healthcare in the EU examines specific issues such as healthcare recruitment and health technology assessment and looks at broader topics such as healthcare reform including how to make health systems more responsive to the needs of individuals (more “consumer driven”), it’s difficult to find anyone seriously suggesting dismantling universal healthcare in Europe.

Here are some examples:

• European Public Health Alliance
• Health First Europe
• Health Action International
• Stockholm network programme on health & welfare reform
• CNE Health on healthcare reform
• e-health news EU
• Medical News – Portuguese Presidency & cancer policy
  
• Nurses for healthcare reform
• EFN on ethical recruitment

In the recent Presidential elections in France, the country whose health system the WHO has rated as the world’s best, no-one questioned the system, although both Ségolène Royal and François Bayrou had some ideas for improving it. However, interestingly enough the web site of the winner, now President Nicolas Sarkozy barely mentions healthcare.

US: Yes or No to universal healthcare?

However, in the US things are a little different. Without going into detail, the US does not have a system of universal healthcare, but instead has a system mostly based on private insurance, with some public health coverage available through programmes like Medicare for retired people and Medicaid for low income families. The result is that around 41 million people are uninsured and many millions more have very limited health insurance.

Not surprisingly, health is a political issue in the US and the issue of the day is whether the problems with US healthcare (the uninsured, spiralling costs) could be solved by adopting a system of universal healthcare provision. This question features in many of the campaigns of the current US Presidential hopefuls, especially the Democrats and debates on the “should we shouldn’t we” question of universal healthcare are vigourously debated on-line in a myriad of fora by academics, think-tanks, civil society organisations and interested individuals.

US Presidential hopefuls and their health plans

Democrats:

• Chris Dodd’s healthcare plan
• Hilary Clinton’s healthcare plan
• John Edwards’s healthcare plan
• Mike Gravel’s comments on healthcare
• Dennis Kucinich’s healthcare plan
• Barack Obama’s healthcare plan
• Bill Richardson’s healthcare plan
• Joe Biden on healthcare

Republicans:

• Joe Biden on healthcare
• Sam Brownback’s comments on healthcare
• Ron Paul on healthcare
• Mitt Romney on healthcare
• Tommy Tancredo on healthcare
• Tommy Thompson’s healthcare plan

Civil society/individual websites/blogs on US healthcare

There are hundreds, possibly thousands of websites and blogs adressing the US healthcare system, some supporting the idea of fundamentally changing the US system and moving towards universal provision, while others preferring to keep a market oriented system which they say delivers more choice to individual Americans.

Here are some interesting sites/blogs that support universal healthcare:

• Cover the uninsured
• The Right to Healthcare
• American Healthcare reform
• Healthcare for all
• Physicians for a national health program
• Mike Moore‘s attack on US healthcare in his latest film Sicko
• Universal health care action network
• Major Conflict – the French way
• The Doctor Weighs in – on healthcare reform

And some sites/blogs that criticise the idea of universal healthcare:

• New School politics on John Edwards’ plan
  
• Drug Wonks on Commonwealth fund report
• WenchyPoo on universal healthcare
• PandaBearMD on socialized medicine
• The Constitution revolution on universal healthcare & Sicko
• Quazen.com on universal healthcare

My search to find examples of social media at work in European politics wasn’t that fruitful – a blog here, a video there – except maybe for David Cameron and his ‘WebCameron’. Instead I stumbled across an interesting US example from CNN.com entitled Netroots activism arrives.

Netroots activism, as the name suggests, stems from a fusion of the terms ‘Internet’ and ‘Grassroots’ to reflect the new age technique of political participation. Coined in the United States, the term is used mainly in left-leaning circles.

Starting up a blog or subscribing to Facebook, is all good and well, especially if the material you post is sensationalist, but if it’s not and you want to create impact, there needs to be a strategy to push it through to the correct target audiences, as Forrester’s recent research on Social Technographics points out.

With tactics like a ‘blogswarm’ (I know! – who makes up these names?), which is a situation in which thousands of bloggers comment on the same subject at the same time; an issue or event can become the “hot topic” of the day in both the blogosphere and mainstream media and as a result, a strong source of influence.

A US Netroots event is actually taking place as I write and ends on the 5 August. It’s the YearlyKos Convention, a political convention, organized by readers and writers of Daily Kos, an influential American political blog. YearlyKos took place for the first time last year – this year the convention is entitled “Building a Netroots Nation”.

Sen. Hillary Clinton will be joining the Presidential Leadership Forum being held on Saturday August 4, along with Sen. John Edwards, Sen. Barack Obama, Gov. Bill Richardson, and Sen. Christopher Dodd. It will be the first ever collaborative presidential forum with both a respected blogger and a leading member of the traditional media as moderators. You can get a chance to see the forum broadcast via CNN and C-Span.

YearlyKos will also have a Netroots gathering in the virtual world of Second Life, complete with live streaming video of key events, interactive breakout sessions, and exclusive Second Life-only sessions. Register for YKSL (YearlyKos Second Life) via the web or Second Life: www.yearlykosconvention.org/yksl.

Now all that remains is for the grass to properly take root over here in Europe. A good article reviewing the uptake of social media in politics – US vs. UK – is from an article in The Telegraph entitled Can I Depend on Your Click?; and another from The Guardian on how two political bloggers from the UK are turning to the US for tips on successful campaigning and fundraising strategies.

Not content with leaving YouTube to iJules, the weirdos and Euronews, the European Commission has decided to get in on the act. The EU’s Communicator in Chief Margot Wallstrom issued a press release trumpeting the arrival of EU tube on Friday 29 June. Dedicated to “sharing the sites and sounds of Europe”, the channel “aims to present new and innovative ways of informing people on the activities of the European Union through video clips that illustrate the main issues facing citizens from across the 27 member states” according to the Commission’s succinct and somewhat tardy press release (the videos were all added three weeks ago according to YouTube).

One video reminds at least some of us of why we came to Brussels in the first place by replaying the history of the construction of the European edifice. Not so, a Polish YouTube contributor Zbigniew, who asks pensively “Is this vid a joke?”.

More interestingly, the Irish lilt on the video seems familiar from the EPP Web TV, could it be that the Irish (and EPP presenter Eimear O’Mahoney) have a monopoly on all voice overs for institutional videos? It seems that Sarkozy’s attack on free and undistorted competition in the internal market has already reached the institutions.

More interactive fun can be expected from the Commission over the coming months according to their work programme, which highlights a decision on a pilot project that will see national and regional parliamentarians link up over cyberspace to discover more about the EU. October will also see a Communication (policy document) that will set out how the EU’s mammoth website Europa will be developed in the future.