Poverty and inequality
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Romania: Forgotten miners in the Valley of Tears
13 January 201210716 Die Tageszeitung Berlin -
Social crisis: Spain losing the roof over its head
2 December 20114049 El Mundo Madrid -
Solidarity : Countries cutting off Europe’s poor
21 September 20112279 La Libre Belgique Brussels -
Greece: Eating from bins - the new make do
19 September 20114297 To Vima Athens -
Economic crisis: Youthful members of the full-time precariat
15 September 20119664 Polityka Warsaw -
United Kingdom: Austerity increases homelessness threat
31 August 2011PresseuropThe Guardian -
Food poverty: EU cuts funding to the poor
1 July 20111971PresseuropLe Soir -
Germany: Not so poor kids
6 May 2011PresseuropFinancial Times Deutschland, Financial Times Deutschland -
Portugal: After the rich man's club, what now?
14 April 2011781 Visão Lisbon -
France: Grim picture of life in the suburbs
16 December 2010PresseuropLe Monde -
Austerity: Hard-up families in affluent Austria
15 December 2010PresseuropDer Standard -
Portugal: Half a million working poor
2 December 2010PresseuropJornal de Notícias -
Debates: Mind the pay gap
15 November 20102122 The Times London -
European of the week: Florence Aubenas, undercover on the crisis
26 February 2010102 Le Monde Paris -
Economic crisis: Drop the European way of life
25 February 2010186 Rzeczpospolita Warsaw -
Germany: Dignity becomes a constitutional right
10 February 2010PresseuropSüddeutsche Zeitung -
Haiti: EU reaction-time criticized
15 January 2010PresseuropDe Standaard -
Haiti: A manmade disaster
14 January 2010652 The Guardian London -
Belgium: Cold snap revives national conscience
18 December 2009PresseuropDe Standaard -
France: Suburbs on the brink, again
1 December 2009PresseuropLe Monde -
Economic crisis: Spaniards cheerfully ignore poverty
28 October 2009PresseuropABC -
Spain: A shop where everything is free
16 October 200912PresseuropAdevărul -
German elections: The big sleep
25 September 2009Der Spiegel Hamburg -
Social Benefits: Poland's welfare in a state
8 July 20091PresseuropDziennik Gazeta Prawna
In Ceausescu's times thousands of Romanians, drawn by high wages, flocked to the coalfields of the Jiu Valley. Today many of the mines in the valley are closed and the miners have been left to fend for themselves. Many are sliding into criminality.
Victims of unemployment, the housing bubble and bank loans too easily offered, thousands of families have been forced to abandon their homes. A symptom of the crisis that has rocked Spain, but also the crisis of a system in need of reform. 
Six member States refuse to allow funds from the Common Agricultural Policy to be used as food aid to the poor. On 1 January 2012, the budget for assistance to 18 million Europeans may drop from 480 to 113.5 million euros. It's a possibility that revolts La Libre Belgique. 
On 19 September, the Greek government announced new cuts designed to convince its partners to hand over the 6th tranche of international aid. Meanwhile in the streets of Athens, more and more people are searching for a cheap way to feed themselves. 
The crisis has accelerated the emergence of a new social class in Europe. Dubbed "the precariat" by sociologists, it is made up of young people with no prospect of a decent job or a reasonable standard of living. 
The strings that will come attached to the bailout plan from the IMF and the EU leaves two solutions to the Portuguese: go back to the way they lived before the Union came along, or roll up their sleeves. An editorialist calls on his countrymen to make the effort, and to do it with optimism. 
Both on the left and right, consensus in growing that the ever widening gap between executive pay and ordinary wages is squeezing out the middle class, and undermining our democracies, writes Times columnist Anatole Kaletsky. 
Journalist and former hostage in Iraq, Florence Aubenas spent six months immersed in the world of precarious employment. She wrote about her experiences in a book which reveals a little known aspect of the reality of life in Europe.
The belief that we can recover from the economic crisis without compromising our "European Way of Life" is quite simply a pipe dream argues, Polish columnist Marek Magierowski. 
As the international community scrambles to the aid of Haiti after the January 12th earthquake, Peter Hallward in the Guardian points out its complicity in the island’s enduring economic devastation, which leaves hundreds of thousands all too easily exposed to large-scale natural disaster. 
The big issues have been given a wide berth in the campaign for Germany’s general elections on 27 September. It’s a shame the big parties are so afraid of unsettling the electorate, bemoans the novelist Elke Schmitter. After all, politics is also about trying to change the world we live in.