The Greece referendum is generating all sorts of fascinating writing about Life and Diplomacy. The issues are deliciously complicated. Where to direct most derision? So many fat targets to choose from. Feckless Greek socialists? Mean German technocrats? Clueless top EU bullies? The bloated pretensions of More Europe? Technical blunders in […]
Back again. Here’s my latest Commentator piece, on the Greek referendum: Greece has long been seen as a disaster waiting to happen, and that disaster is now happening. Greece for far too long (a) has spent beyond its means, but worse (b) has not invested borrowed money wisely, and worst […]
Blogging and generally thinking something interesting continues to be meagre these days, as I rush from one masterclass to another. Last week it was back to Warsaw for two days of Drafting Skills and Negotiation Skills. Tomorrow back to Vienna for another Negotiation class at the IAEA. The IAEA is a […]
My latest piece at DIPLOMAT has another gallop round some of the issues surrounding Mass and Velocity in diplomacy: The EU’s common foreign policy is particularly prone to piling on Mass but losing Velocity. Lots of European countries intoning the same policies, but struggling to take decisions to implement any […]
Responding to my piece pondering the calamitous performance of Ed Miliband, long-time reader Nigel Sedgwick offers some excellent points on electoral reform in the UK. Posted previously as a comment, but worth looking at properly: Charles writes: “Here in the United Kingdom our “first past the post” voting system produces […]
On Sunday Poland votes in the second round of the 2015 presidential elections, with current president Bronislaw Komorowski fighting to fend off the challenge of a younger Andrzej Duda. My account of the first round is at Poland presidential elections 2015. On Sunday evening I’ll be at the excellent Topolski Bar […]
++ UPDATE ++ Haha never believe opinion polls. According to the exit polls Duda has won the first round (35% or so) with Komorowski failing into second place (32%). Kukiz scored a mighty 20%. A huge battle will ensue for the second round run-off in two weeks’ time… * * […]
If you are in London on Tuesday and sick of the UK general elections, have fun thinking about Poland’s Presidential elections instead. You can watch the Polish Ambassador Witold Sobkow and me in discussion with Liam Halligan on the always interesting subject of Poland’s transition from communism to what it is now. […]
The UK general election takes place soon. In years gone by I used to follow every twist and turn of the elections process. Now? Not so much. Some sort of strange fragmentation is happening, so that our trusty mainly two-party system erodes into something that might well be more ‘democratic’ […]
This one is interesting. Just when we thought that nothing else in the wider Balkan region could astonish us, up pops a brand new country. No, not Kosovo. Not Vojvodina. Not even Eastern Republika Srpska. Liberland! The basic ingenious idea is that, as luck has it, there is a tiny patch […]
