Democracy

In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the EU Action Plan on Human Rights and Democracy was adopted. What is the role of civil society and the future of EU democracy support in the context of the Covid-19 crisis?

In Israel, as in other parts of the world, the COVID-19 virus crisis is not only a health challenge.

The Covid-19 pandemic has exposed and further exacerbated many inequalities - especially the ones concerning woman. 

Britain is in the midst of finalising the Brexit transition process while also being hit especially hard by the Covid-19 pandemic. The German Council Presidency has to protect public health all over Europe while also preventing another financial crisis from happening. But this might also give new momentum to systemic change towards a more sustainable economy.

The Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung's offices in Belgrade, Sarajevo and Berlin have estalished a Strategy Group tasked with conceptualizing and presenting to EU decision-makers policy proposals aimed at revitalizing the EU Accession process of the Western Balkan countries in line with progressive, green, and gender-sensitive values. The Group consists of prominent Civil Society representatives from each of the WB countries, and is subdivided into working groups.

The direction has been pointing constantly downwards since 2015. In the international ranking on press freedom by "Reporters Without Borders", Poland was 18th at the time, but has now slipped to 62nd place. 44 places in five years. The changes in the media landscape are admittedly occurring more subtly than in Hungary, for example. But restrictions on the work of journalists in the country are becoming increasingly noticeable.

COVID-19 uniquely affects women. Here are many of the ways it does.

On 2 March 2020, Senegal reported its first case of coronavirus. This new form of COVID-19 has spread around the globe, with the declaration of a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO) on 11 March. The public health crisis is wreaking havoc upon all social and economic aspects of people’s lives in every corner of the world, including a notable impact on gender inequality. 

With a series of digital measures introduced in response to the coronavirus pandemic, Morocco is creating a trade-off between ways to provide rapid support and the parallel development of digital control.