Centralized information about austerity and the protest against it in Europe
Overall situation
While the general outlook remains broadly unchanged, with the Troika still pushing for severe austerity and national governments continuing their acts of window-dressing, another important issue has become increasingly prominent: corruption. As we see major scandals in many European countries, corruption seems to be not only a national problem, but rather connected to the current crisis and the economic system. However, there are also positive developments: ongoing resistance spreads everywhere, not only on the national level, but also on the European one. In this context, many citizens movements are calling for a European week of action from 15 to 17 May. More information will follow soon, see the Blockupy [en] website.
European level
When the last European Summit took place in Brussels, thousands of activists took to the street. The D19-20 citizens alliance [nl] [fr] [de], a broad coalition of NGOs, trade unions, farmers, students and people of all ages blocked crossroads to protest against austerity policies and the planned EU-US trade agreement TTIP.
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Spain
Citizens collectives are making efforts to fight corruption in many ways, for example by creating citizen legal initiatives against bankers [es] or against the preference participations [es] scam.
The struggle against privatisation has also seen a success: a court recently decided to freeze the privatisation [es] of six hospitals in Madrid. The ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed by the Afem doctors association, accompanied by widespread protests against the privatization process.
Another victory of civil disobedience, is the new occupation [es] of an empty building by families (owned by CaixaBank), organised by the citizen Platform of Affected by Evictions (PAH [es]), a citizens initiative that holds support from more than 80 per cent of Spanish society.
From the 2nd newsletter of
troikawatch. Excellent information, especially about Spain and Portugal. Wouldn't it be nice if there were actions in more nations, that week in May?