“Cyprus should leave the euro. Now.” — Paul Krugman
By Nikos Chrysoloras It is now official: Cyprus will pay a heavy toll for turning its economy into an offshore financial haven and allowing its banking sector to hyperinflate. But if the purpose of the dramatic eurozone all-nighters was not just to punish and make an example of the island, but to solve the issue, […]
Euros arriving by truck to Cyprus from Brussels.
The Economist has published this excellent assessment of the aftermath of the Cyprus deal last weekend. More might be said of the political fall out, which will surely be felt more intensely as the economic situation in Cyprus deteriorates. “The euro zone bail-out agreed for Cyprus means that the worst possible outcomes have been avoided: […]
“The modern conservative is engaged in one of man’s oldest exercises in moral philosophy: that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.” — John Kenneth Galbraith
This weekly feature offers a glimpse of what is happening in and around Thessaloniki. Compiled by Laura Strieth. Fri 29th March- Hugo Race- A prolific and visionary performer, Hugo Race, will be performing music from his latest album, Fatalists. Drawing inspiration from all his travels, he has created a mix of rock ‘n’ roll, soul, […]
From today’s Greek Reporter, a story on how Greece ranks next to its EU partners in terms of relative poverty. “Greece is one of the poorest countries in the EU according to a research published today by a German think-tank. The country is third only to Bulgaria and Romania which are poorer. Some 20 percent […]
By David Wisner Researchers Robert Epstein and Ronald E. Robertson have prepared a paper in which they argue that an Internet search engine, not Google necessarily but “a future Google,” might be able to manipulate search results in such a way as to impact the outcome of an election. “In a controlled experiment,” they write, […]
By Alexander Besant The office of Greek app-maker Taxibeat is located in a modern building, surrounded by shuttered shops and streets with cracked pavement, in the upscale Kolonaki neighborhood in Athens. The contrast between the office and its surroundings is more than aesthetic—it’s the difference between where Greece is, a low-tech economy based on tourism […]
By Maria Mavrommati The first episode of British Channel 4′s mini-series Black Mirror (2011) explores the nature of modern democracy in the most colorful ways. The dominance of image (with “image” meaning both a visual representation of something and a popular conception of someone), television language and conventional understanding of the essence of truth and […]
“… we still have a system that treats you better if you’re rich and guilty than if you’re poor and innocent.” — Bryan Stevenson
By Logan Harper For many, Gov 2.0 is about putting government in the hands of citizens. Whether it’s a mobile app alerting residents to a local meeting or checking social media networks to see which roads are clear for the morning commute. The term should be defined primarily by its utility in helping citizens or […]
2012 World Map of the Index of Economic Freedom (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2012_World_Map_of_the_Index_of_Economic_Freedom.PNG).
“Obama is very possibly a world-historical political figure, and until those who oppose him come to grips with this fact, they will get him wrong every time.” — John Podhoretz
By David Wisner Several months ago one of my Greek undergraduate students wanted to do a bit of research on the incidence of ministerial amendments to Greek legislation. We asked a renowned specialist, who informed us that governmental personnel act anonymously and are not required to make such information public before a plenary vote, implying […]
Alexia Tsotsis has written an engaging review in TechCrunch of the neighborhood social media service Nextdoor. The platform is a de facto neighborhood support group among subscribers. Nextdoor now serves some 10,000 neighborhoods and roughly 1 million households, and has a very savvy matrix for developing a local network to its optimal level. Users explain […]
“So what does it mean when a company institutionalizes altruism? It means more students are mentored and tutored, more afterschool programs funded, more books read, better grades and test scores, and more poor families helped.” — Julia Wade (Domus Kids)
This is, unfortunately, not an April fools joke. “Greece’s record 27 unemployment rate – which some analysts said could soon hit 30 percent – could even undermine the government if social unrest increases because 60 percent of the jobless have been out of work for more than a year and have no benefits,” according to […]
“[T]ransparency, participation, and collaboration are best viewed as instrumental to the accomplishment of democracy in that they enable citizens to enact their various roles as citizens. That is, transparency is not an end citizens pursue for its own sake. Citizens may desire their government to be transparent, but that is largely because something else is […]