Articles

In an interview, Dr. Franziska Brantner MdB comments on the results of the “Actually European!? Citizen expectations of the next German government’s EU policy” study and makes the case for greater German engagement in the fields of climate protection, tax policy and ensuring the rule of law.

The Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung European Union and Washington, DC offices hosted a transatlantic online discussion that addressed discrimination of LGBTIQA+ and racial groups through content moderation. Amid the EU discussion on the draft Digital Services Act (DSA) and of the US debate on reforming Section 230 of the US Communications Decency Act, the event presented the e-papers "The state of content moderation for the LGBTIQA+ community and the role of the EU Digital Services Act" by Christina Dinar, and "Algorithmic misogynoir in content moderation practice" by Brandeis Marshall.

"Algorithmic misogynoir in content moderation practice" from Brandeis Marshall, offers an intersectional perspective by exploring the discrimination specifically faced by Black women in the United States.

"The state of content moderation for the LGBTIQA+ community and the role of the EU Digital Services Act" by researcher Christina Dinar, focuses on the challenges faced by the queer community in Europe and offers detailed recommendations for the forthcoming EU Digital Services Act.

In the age of Tinder, a so-called friend with benefits is defined not so much by the friendship between the partners, but by the fact that they get all the benefits of a romantic relationship without having to be in one. But the relationship between Ankara and Washington, which has cooled off considerably in recent years, has evolved into a partnership in which both sides regularly and openly express doubt as to whether it even is a partnership and whether there are any benefits to it at all.

The UK government has some good ideas for improving the rail network, says Ros Taylor. But cheap fuel, costly buses and a deep-seated aversion to road pricing have driven people away from public transport – and that was before the pandemic.

As the federal elections in Germany draw nearer, Angela Merkel’s time as Chancellor, and thus an era of German EU policy-making, is coming to an end. A new German federal government will step onto the EU policy stage – mere months after a united response to the Covid-19 crisis was found in the shape of the EU Recovery Fund, but also after criticism was levied at the EU for its vaccine procurement strategy. This year’s “Actually European!?” study examines the expectations that citizens have of the next German government’s EU policy. Moreover, the long-term study, now in its third year, surveys what Germans perceive to be the country’s role within the EU.  

Turkey and multilateral institutions alike, including the European Union, were already struggling with political and economic crises in the years before the pandemic multiplied the sense of catastrophe. As they seek to pull themselves out of the depths of Covid-19, it is time to set aside the divisions that have long stalled progress for all of them, and seek recovery in cooperation and mutual benefit.

The need for cross-border data sharing throughout the Covid-19 pandemic has shown that the future of multilateral threat management will hinge on steady yet flexible open-data publishing norms and multilateral data-transfer agreements. In many ways, India typifies the perspectives and needs of emerging economies related to data sharing, data flows, and related commercial regulation.

The absence of an integrated digital market and a unified political vision for tech policy in Latin America and the Caribbean puts the countries of the region at risk of dependency on a foreign private sector for their digital transformation. The investment that will be required to recover from the pandemic offers a unique chance to break out of the current market logic and treat technology as critical social infrastructure that must be sustainable and requires citizen participation.