Questions tagged [europe]
Questions related to the politics of countries within Europe (i.e. comparing aspects of policy regarding various European countries).
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What did Putin mean by "We have [...] withdrawn almost all large and heavy weapons from the European part of Russia" in a 2008 interview?
From a 2008 press conference:
We have eliminated bases in Cam Ranh (Vietnam) and in Cuba. We have withdrawn our troops deployed in eastern Europe, and withdrawn almost all large and heavy weapons ...
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Pension reforms. Why is the debate constrained to raising the retirement age or not, with no intermediate solutions?
This question was inspired by the French pension reform, but also in other European countries the situation is not different. The debate seems framed between the two extremes. Increase or not the ...
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Why have European regions with strong desires for independence not been allowed to have either local parliaments or referendums? [closed]
Is it the fault of the government's progressiveness that regions with strong desires for independence and self-rule, such as Corsica, the Basque region, Catalonia, Bavaria, Moravia, and Sicily, have ...
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Why do some European governments still consider price capping despite the fact that price caps lead to shortages?
Context
Due to multiple causes such as the Russian invasion of Ukraine, most European countries have faced soaring prices for essential products. In some cases, the governments decided to impose price ...
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What is the actual cost and human load (short and long term cost) of immigration across EU countries?
There is currently (November 2022) increased tension between France and Italy regarding the reception of migrants from Africa who were rescued by the humanitarian boat Ocean Viking. The boat has been ...
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Are there countries in Europe where there's a 10% (or similar, but low) numeric threshold for minority language rights?
The ill-fated 2012 languages law in Ukraine (proposed by the Party of Regions, but eventually found unconstitutional by Ukraine's supreme court)
allowed the use of minority languages in courts, ...
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Why are European countries interested in the Indo-Pacific?
The Indo-Pacific has become a new conflict zone these days, with China on one side, and other countries like Japan, Australia, and India on the other side.
Organizations like AUKUS and the Quad have ...
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Why don't we see much enthusiasm in the case of other royal families in Europe?
There are many constitutional monarchies in Europe. However, I never see the enthusiasm people show for them as they show for the British royal family and their affairs.
Why is that?
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In Europe, what happens when an embassy is doing all they can to start a war with the host country? [closed]
If an embassy decides to be troublesome with the host country, causing social issues, blaming people (such as celebrities), looking to bring people to court, and eventually try to start a war, what ...
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Why did (most of) the European NATO members support Ukraine's aspirations to joining NATO?
This article argues an alternative (maybe even complementary) view regarding the cause of the Russian invasion of Ukraine:
(..) Russia’s security concerns are in fact genuine, and NATO
expansion ...
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Why is the left/right spectrum defined so ambiguously? (Europe)
I am currently in Germany so my views are from an European perspective. I never could quite comprehend how the definitions of "left" and "right" are used here.
Right seems to be ...
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How Europeans identify Roma among the Ukrainian refugees [closed]
There have been several reports of discrimination in Poland, Czechia or Germany against refugees of the Ukrainian war who happened to also be ethnically Romani.
I assume that there are no ID documents ...
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How can the EU leaders assure their commitment to the climate goals while they keep investing so much money on fossil fuels?
The REPowerEU plan was recently drafted by the EU authorities to address the energy crisis triggered by the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Among the other things it plans to add 10 Billion Euro to what ...
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Are Estonia, Iceland, Hungary and Greece in a similar economical level? [closed]
I was wondering whether the Estonian or the Icelandic economies, despite being small, are relatively close to the Hungarian and the Greek economies, or whether they are much smaller
Therefore, are ...
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Has any recent academic research been done on the comparative performance of FOIA response speeds by different European governments?
Recently, I took part in a large, international investigative journalistic project on dumps of oily waste water by ships. In that context, I did a FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) request to the ...
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Can taxes diminish Europe's dependency on Russian oil?
Can (higher) excise taxes, as well as taxes on cars with poor fuel economy, diminish the dependency of Russian oil? What are their advantages and disadvantages?
PS: some believe that natural gas is ...
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What are the benefits for strong economies like Germany and France for being members of the European Union?
Recently I was reading things on the European debt crisis. It seems to me that when there is a financial crisis, strong economies in EU, like Germany and France, are supposed to help the countries in ...
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Can the current European sanctions against Russia have a significant effect?
Many European countries and the EU itself have imposed economic sanctions on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine. However, according to this Guardian article citing this study, European nations are ...
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What, if any, groups of pro-Russian separatists are in East-European countries?
Russian separatists in Ukraine have had an important role in "inviting" Russia to invade Ukraine. In order to predict future steps that may be taken by Russia, it may be useful to know: are ...
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Why is Russia not considered a European Country?
Russia looks very much like mainland Europe, it dresses like mainland Europe, but it is not considered part of Europe. This is not a recent phenomenon. Even since the time of the Tzar's, especially ...
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Would NATO intervene in case of an attack outside of Europe and North America?
Today during a special session in the Spanish parliament about the Ukraine war, Santiago Abascal (VOX) claimed that NATO wouldn't defend Ceuta or Melilla if they where attacked. Those two are ...
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Was anything comparable to the current ban on Russian civilian aircraft in various Western countries ever imposed during the Cold War?
I'm curious if there is some historical precedent for this or if this a rather new level of friction that didn't even exist during the Cold War:
Estonia, Latvia, Slovenia and Romania said on Saturday ...
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What's the benefits of US strategic nuclear forces in Europe?
If I understand correctly, the US have long been capable of a retaliatory strike against the USSR / Russia that is powerful enough to nearly completely destroy the target state. (If I'm wrong on that, ...
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What are "original struggles" according to the Belgian Ecolo party?
The name of the Belgian green party "Ecolo" stands for "Confederate Ecologists for the Organisation of Original Struggles" (Écologistes Confédérés pour l'organisation de luttes ...
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What are some political subsets of the EU?
Somebody mentioned a Franco-Italian cooperation in the EU. I know that alliances like the Visegrád Group and the Three Seas Initiative are already around. Are there any other political cooperations ...
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Why does Germany's traffic light coalition seem more likely than ever before?
Even though the parties of the Germany's grand coalition - CDU/CSU and SPD regained majority support in this year's election, according to the commentators, the traffic light coalition has the ...
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Why would the U.S. exclude Europe from the new Indo-Pacific security alliance?
According to the South China Morning Post
The new Aukus security alliance formed by the United States, Britain
and Australia has left France frustrated at being left out, prompting
concerns over the ...
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What are some of the biggest differences between Germany's SPD and The Greens?
At glance, the SPD and green party in Germany seem to pursue agendas too similar for me to see the difference. What are some of the most prominent ones?
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Which countries have the same international importance, influence and power as Sweden? [closed]
Sweden is not a superpower at all and it's not a country with a high level of influence (such as Russia or China). However, it has a relatively large GDP for its population and it's known that Sweden ...
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Did all European countries choose to evacuate their diplomats from Afghanistan?
According to xinhuanet.com:
BRUSSELS, Aug. 16 (Xinhua) -- More European countries said on Monday
that they were evacuating embassy staff and nationals from Afghanistan
following the latest ...
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If a King in a traditional European-style monarchy resigns in favor of his son (and is thus still part of the ruling family), what is his title?
The only instance I found in an admittedly quick internet search of a such an event was Edward VIII of England, but he was given the Dukedom of Windsor and became a Duke quickly after, and I couldn't ...
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Why do some (North Americans) consider Europe socialist?
Recently I see more and more posts on social media (mainly FB) in which people advocate socialism (and sometimes communism) or are anti capitalist.
When mentioning examples (after being asked or when ...
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Have the salaries or benefits of members of the Constitutional Court ever been decreased in an European country?
Background
I have watched an interview with an economic analyst arguing that Romania is in a strange situation ("conflict of interest") because the Constitutional Court members are able to ...
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Why are the Netherlands, Sweden, and Denmark among the countries with the largest wealth gaps in the world?
Wealth Inequality By Country 2021
Here are the 10 countries with the highest wealth inequality:
Netherlands (0.902)
Russia (0.879)
Sweden (0.867)
United States(0.852)
Brazil (0.849)
Thailand (0.846)
...
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Why is the European Peace Facility considered risky?
Recently, I've read a Guardian article, describing the risks of the European Peace Facility:
Despite its name, the European peace facility, worth €5bn over the next seven years, will allow the EU to ...
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Why do most European countries choose to keep their national patent offices when the EPO itself can serve as a patent office?
Patents having effect in most European states may be obtained either
nationally, via national patent offices, or via a centralised patent
prosecution process at the European Patent Office (EPO). The ...
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How do all the different European Union countries maintain their different laws while being a part of the Schengen zone?
How do two countries that share a border in the EU (which are a part of the Schengen area) maintain their different laws regarding customs regulation and price regulation of various commodities (as ...
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Why do white supremacists use the term "Anglo Saxon values"?
I heard on the news about a group called "America First" that supposedly wants to protect "Anglo-Saxon values". Other American and European nativists have also used that phrase.
...
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How did Croatia join the EU without settling the border dispute with Slovenia?
There is a curious dispute between Croatia and Slovenia in regards to their land and maritime border. It appears to be ongoing since the breakup of Yugoslavia.
Noticeably Slovenia tried blocking ...
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Are police in Western European countries right-wing or left-wing?
In America, the police have a reputation for being politically conservative. One rarely sees clashes between conservative demonstrators and police.
In Europe, though, there seem to be lots of clashes ...
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Has any European country recently scrapped a bank/public holiday?
I have tried to find whether any European country has recently (in the past 30 years or so) scrapped a national free day or similar. The closest I could get is the idea of replacing/moving a bank ...
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To what extent have developed European countries utilized strategies that Australia utilized against Coronavirus?
Compared to Europe, Australia has had a low rate of coronavirus infections and deaths. There are a large number of differences between Australia and Europe, such as population density, the ease of ...
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How did the view of Continental Europe on Brexit change between the 2016 Referendum and today?
There are plenty of polls asking the British population what they think about Brexit, but there are hardly any polls regarding Continental Europe's view on it; especially no recent ones.
Judging from ...
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Has any European far-right party managed to enter the legislative body relying almost exclusively on social media promoting?
Romanian has recently held the general elections and a far-right party managed to enter the Parliament. This is not a surprise in itself since the COVID-19 crisis helps rising the popularity of such ...
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Are all EP plenary vote results publically accessible? Where?
Recently I struggled to find the EP vote results in case of this regulation. Although it's marked as adopted on the EUR-LEX website, none of the related votes I could find on VoteWatch ended up ...
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In general, do European right wing parties oppose abortion?
I was wondering about the abortion issue in the US which is a hot topic. Poland just banned abortion and people are protesting against it in the capital. I was wondering about whether or not this ...
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Which, if any, EU28 countries have expressed opposition to the creation of a European Security Council?
There has been some talk about setting up a European Security Council to make collective foreign policy decision more swiftly. For example, an article on the German Institute for International and ...
JJJ♦
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How has the support for integration within the EU changed during the COVID-19 pandemic?
I'm interested in any surveys studying the popular support for EU and EU integration done in the EU memberstates within the period of the coronavirus. How has the COVID-19 pandemic affected the EU's ...
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Does Germany's Union have a significant Eurosceptic faction?
Do the CDU and CSU have a significant Eurosceptic faction (either hard or soft) which is represented at either grassroots or parliamentary level? Or is support for the European project so deeply ...
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What are some representative European political news sources? [closed]
In an effort to become more exposed to perspectives from outside the US, I've sometimes looked for European news sites to read from. I read El Mundo for a while but I think it's a little more slanted ...
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