What Iceland’s election tells us about post-crisis European politics

Posted on April 29, 2013 by Kevin Lees

Iceland was supposed to be different. In allowing its banks to fail, neo-Keynesian economists have argued, Iceland avoided the fate of Ireland, which nationalized its banks and now faces a future with a very large public debt.  By devaluing its currency, the krónur, Iceland avoided the fate of countries like Estonia and others in southern Europe [...]

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How would Italian politics function under a ‘French’ electoral system?

Posted on March 6, 2013 by Kevin Lees

Former center-right foreign minister Franco Frattini is far from the fray of Italian politics these days — he didn’t run in last week’s Italian elections and he’s currently a candidate to replace Anders Fogh Rasmussen as the secretary general of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Nonetheless, Frattini (pictured above) spoke in Washington yesterday to the American Israel Public [...]

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‘La bataille des chiffres’: EU leaders agree new budget deal

Posted on February 11, 2013 by Kevin Lees

Guest post by Michael J. Geary European Union leaders reached agreement Friday on the EU budget (the multi-annual financial framework or ‘MFF’) for the period from 2014 to 2020.  After months of bickering, the 27 member states signed off on a deal totaling €908.4 billion, and the European Parliament will vote on the budget in March. [...]

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British, French governments poised to pass gay marriage into law

Posted on February 6, 2013 by Kevin Lees

Amid a flurry of parliamentary action in the United Kingdom and France, two of the largest countries in Europe and, indeed, two of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, are set to legalize gay marriage in the coming months. The joint result gives an incredibly burst of global momentum for the [...]

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François Hollande’s triumphant visit to Timbuktu — and next steps for Mali

Posted on February 4, 2013 by Kevin Lees

Earlier this weekend, French president François Hollande flew to Timbuktu in Mali, where French forces have only in the last week cleared the historic city of Islamist control. I was quick to argue that the intervention in Mali wasn’t some neocolonial retreat to Françafrique, and for a three-week military campaign, I’ll be the first to [...]

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Who is Jeroen Dijsselbloem?

Posted on January 17, 2013 by Kevin Lees

Most indications are that the next Euro Group head will be a relative newcomer to the group of eurozone finance ministers — Dutch minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem, who declared his formal candidacy for the job today. As I noted at the beginning of the year in my piece on 13 up-and-coming politicians to watch in 2013, [...]

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Mauritania warily eyes internationalized conflict in neighboring Mali

Posted on January 16, 2013 by Kevin Lees

If Mali had two decades of practice with democracy and rule of law and still couldn’t prevent a northern revolt that’s torn the country apart, leading to this week’s French military action to salvage the secular government in Bamako, it’s downright fortuitous that Mauritania, with virtually no experience of progressive, liberal democratic government, has so [...]

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M. Hollande’s little war — and what it means for French-African politics

Posted on January 15, 2013 by Kevin Lees

Over the weekend, France found itself engaged in a new, if limited, war — and a new theater of Western intervention against radical Islam. French president François Hollande confirmed that French troops had assisted Mali’s army in liberating the city of Konna — in recent weeks, Islamist-backed rebels that control the northern two-thirds of the country [...]

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Four reasons why Cope’s narrow Sunday win of France’s UMP leadership could be ruinous

Posted on November 20, 2012 by Kevin Lees

After a tense Monday during which both candidates declared victory and accused the other of fraud, it appears that Jean-François Copé (pictured above) has emerged as the presumptive leader of the French right. With just a 98-vote margin, Copé won the election for general secretary of the center-right Union pour un mouvement populaire (UMP, Union for [...]

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The French right prepares to choose Sarkozy’s successor (maybe)

Posted on November 16, 2012 by Kevin Lees

France’s center-right Union pour un mouvement populaire (UMP, Union for a popular movement) will vote on Sunday, November 18 to choose its next general secretary in what’s widely seen as a fight to get the upper hand on the UMP’s presidential nomination in 2017.  The UMP will choose between two key figures — former prime minister François [...]

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Final thoughts on French parliamentary runoff results

Posted on June 19, 2012 by Kevin Lees

As noted in the immediate aftermath of Sunday’s parliament elections, the French left looked likely to take a narrow absolute majority of seats in the Assemblée nationale. As it turns out, the Parti socialiste of François Hollande did even better — it and its allies took 314 seats, not including the 17 seats that its electoral partner, France’s Green [...]

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French election results show Hollande’s Socialists with narrow majority; Marine Le Pen, Bayrou and Royal lose contests

Posted on June 17, 2012 by Kevin Lees

It appears that the Parti socialiste of newly elected French president François Hollande has won an absolute majority in today’s parliamentary elections — they will control 290 seats, a slim majority, in the Assemblée nationale.  This will give Hollande, and his prime minister, Jean-Marc Ayrault, a clear path to implement their pro-growth program of higher taxes and fewer [...]

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Big weekend for France, Greece and Egypt

Posted on June 16, 2012 by Kevin Lees

It’s another big weekend for elections! Voters in Egypt go to the polls today and tomorrow to choose a president in the final runoff between the Muslim brotherhood’s Mohammed Morsi and Ahmed Shafiq, a former Air Force commander and the final prime minister of former president Hosni Mubarak, in what is seen as a Hobson’s choice [...]

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Tweet sets off ‘battle Royal’ between first lady and Hollande’s former partner

Posted on June 13, 2012 by Kevin Lees

At first, everyone thought her Twitter account must have been hacked. But no: here was the new first lady of France, Valérie Trierweiler, the companion of President François Hollande, tweeting her apparent opposition to Hollande’s previous partner and mother of Hollande’s four children, Ségolène Royal, who was also the Parti socialiste‘s 2007 presidential candidate.  Royal is [...]

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Final French parliamentary election results for first round

Posted on June 12, 2012 by Kevin Lees

France has now had a full day since learning the results of Sunday’s first round of the French parliamentary elections (France votes again in the second round this coming Sunday), and there’s really not much surprise in the aggregate result. Much as predicted: the Parti socialiste of newly inaugurated François Hollande narrowly led the first round [...]

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