311 sorterade idéer
africa
ambitions
art
beauty
book
business
change
communication
create
culture
death
economy
EU
europe
evil
fear
free
freedom
history
human
ideas
identity
innovation
journalism
Kapuscinski
knowledge
language
life
literature
live
man
mankind
media
migration
mind
motivation
numbers
people
planning
power
reality
risk
society
spain
story
strategy
success
sweden
talent
technology
time
travel
trends
understanding
usa
war
work
workplace
world
writing“In those days, the 1960s, the world was very interested in Africa. Africa was a puzzle, a mystery. Nobody knew what would happen when 300 million people stood up and demanded the right to be heard. States began to be established there, and the states bought armaments, and there was speculation in foreign newspapers that Africa might set out to conquer Europe. Today it is impossible to contemplate such a prospect, but that time, it was a concern, an anxiety. It was serious. People wanted to know what was happening on the continent: where was it headed, what were its intentions?”
Ryszard Kapuscinski, “The Soccer War”
Wolf Dieter Enkelmann, director of the Institut für Wirtschaftsgestaltung (institute for business structuring) considers what makes Europe what it is and comes up with the following thoughts:
“Europeans are eccentric in the literal sense of the world. This shines vividly through most of the history of the world. But unbeknown to them. So strongly has this become second nature even to those for whom respectability has pride of place. They seek their identity in their aims, their centre in alienation. Hard-line defenders of the status quo look quite different. Europeans see chances where others see only abysses and the end of all justice. What would Europe be without the migration of peoples, without its adventurers and soldiers of fortune, its refugees and expellees, those who have betrayed their fatherland or lost their homeland, without all those who found Europe intolerable? A longing for distant shores: it is tempting to think of this as a European invention. Eccentricity is a hallmark of Christianity, but it was already written into the original mythology which the peoples of this continent invoke through their common name.”
“They all say that if they could earn in Romania even half of what they earn in Spain and elsewhere, they would come back. But there are no jobs here,” says the mayor.
Hundreds of mayors in Romania and Bulgaria are in the same position as the two countries prepare to join the European Union on January 1. So are many of their counterparts in Poland, Slovakia and the Baltic states, which were among the 10 countries that became EU members in 2004. (…)
Mihai-Razvan Ungureanu, Romania’s foreign minister, says he is happy to see young Romanians going abroad but – like the mayor of Feldru – hopes that one day some will return. “I know some Romanians think emigration is a brain drain but I don’t. Romanians living abroad maintain their identity. They work hard and bring Romania a good name. What would be really interesting would be in future to attract back people from abroad as investors.” (…)
For Romania and Bulgaria this gap is even larger than for the 2004 entrants. Average incomes in purchasing power terms are just 28 per cent of the west European level, compared with 45 per cent in central Europe. (…)
An estimated 2m Romanians are employed abroad – about 20 per cent of the working-age population. (…)
After lurching from crisis to crisis in the 1990s, the Romanian economy is now among the fastest-growing in Europe with an expected real increase in gross domestic product for 2006 of 7 per cent. (…)
Migrants, too, are playing a role in boosting the economy, contributing an estimated €3.5bn ($4.4bn, £2.3bn) to €4bn in remittances – enough to cover almost half the country’s 2005 current account deficit. (…)
But there is still a long way to go. Some 40 per cent of Romanian workers are nominally employed in agriculture (…)
Economists estimate that at current economic growth rates it could take 20 years before Romanians reach the living standards of today’s west Europeans. (…)
As the figures show, most migrants leave their children (…) usually in the care of grandparents. (…) school examination results have declined sharply, with just half of those aged 14 and 15 passing their year-end tests in 2006, compared with 80-90 per cent in the past.
FT.com
Dyab Abou Jahjah, leader of Arab European League (AEL) in Antwerpen, Belgium: What we believe is this: European society, especially on the continent, is fundamentally monocultural. Everything reflects this. What people propose as the pre-conditions for inclusion or “integration” seem to us primarily cultural in nature, rather than socio-economic or political. If you do not want to give up what makes you different – forgo your own identity – then you are socio-economically and politically excluded, and the attempt is made to justify this exclusion.
Of course you need to have a socio-economic platform of demands. But that is not enough for us. We must also mount a defence of our own identity. This is more than a response. It is the core issue.
One example? Belgium needs unskilled labour. It rejects Moroccan unskilled labour, preferring to import unskilled Polish labour. Why?
Jeffrey Phillips, of the software and services innovation consultancy OVO: “What became clear is that while firms on both continents are seeking to become more innovative, their methods and approaches are relatively different.” …”Europe has a more collegial, collaborative approach to innovation”, whereas the US innovator seems more likely to try to “go it alone”.”
Innovate on Purpose
Gilles Kepel: “Det är framför allt i Europa som det finns en rimlig möjlighet att förlika islam med demokrati. Här har vi en ung generation muslimer med invandrarbakgrund som deltar fullt ut i Europas demokratiska samhälle. Erfarenheterna av detta kan i bästa fall återexporteras till deras ursprungsländer. Så det är inte i New York, Gaza, Riyad eller Bagdad utan i Europas förorter som den långsiktiga striden kommer att stå och som kan få ett slut på kampen om och inom islam (…)”
DN Kultur
Bernard Henri Levy om vad europeisk identitet är, man “betraktar platsen för vilka en resor kommer att utgå”.