Rubrics » Bridging News
Blue-Blooded Red Ideologue
No. 59, May-Jun. 2026 I had a laugh with a friend the other day, wondering how many Labour peers there are in the House of Lords. We rather naively assumed there weren’t any. When we checked, we were stunned: the answer is 225 members of the House. More
Romania, Third Among EU Members Regarding the Risk of Poverty or Social Exclusion
No. 59, May-Jun. 2026 In 2025, the highest share of people at risk of poverty or social exclusion among European Union member states was recorded in Bulgaria (29.0%), followed by Greece (27.5%) and Romania (27.4%), according to data published by Eurostat. More
Positional Power Plays between the USA, China and Russia: The Case of Iran and Venezuela
No. 59, May-Jun. 2026 February is usually regarded as the month to celebrate love, especially with February 14 being celebrated as Valentine’s Day in many countries. Yet, with the fourth anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24 and the United States’ recent joint strikes on Iran alongside Israel on February 28, February might well be remembered for something else altogether. They do say that everything is fair in love and war. But war, politics and geopolitics, as stated as far back as Thucydides, have never been about fairness. It all boils down to pragmatism, setting goals, calculating odds, and taking chances deemed worth taking. Geopolitics is hardly an exact science, but there are some general rules and principles that guide the strategic actions of the players, each manifesting differently depending on the context. Thinkers from Sun Tzu to Thucydides to Machiavelli have all commented on the general principles underlying the decisions of actors in a variety of contexts, from warfare to court politics. Across time and place, their understanding of international politics reflected the anarchic realist school of thought focused on the use and pursuit of power as the foremost vector weaving the threads of conflicts and treaties. Realism has dominated international relations since as far back as history can record, and despite the fact that its application has varied according to geographic and historical context, its logic remains the same throughout time and space. Today, we witness China ramping up its military presence in Taiwan and the South China Sea, Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine, and, most surprisingly, the United States’ significantly more aggressive attitude when it comes to international affairs. We’ve witnessed US military strikes against Iranian nuclear sites on 22 June 2025 in the context of the twelve-day war between Iran and Israel, leading to a ceasefire. We’ve seen the United States amping up its aggressive stance towards Venezuela, culminating with its January strikes on the country and the capture of President Nicolás Maduro and his wife. The US had previously launched strikes against Venezuela as well. In addition, the US has also bombed Islamic State (ISIS) positions in Syria and Iraq. Now, we are witnessing the United States and Israel launching relentless strikes against a Russia- and China-backed Iran. More
Romania’s EU Funds Absorption: Between Capacity and Conditionality
No. 59, May-Jun. 2026 Romania’s absorption of EU structural and investment funds from 2015 to 2025 demonstrates a trajectory of gradual administrative maturation constrained by persistent governance rigidities. Despite measurable improvements in contracting efficiency, digitalisation, and procedural simplification, systemic vulnerabilities – particularly high staff turnover, inconsistent procurement capacity, and fragmented institutional coordination – continue to inhibit full realisation of the country’s absorption potential. Drawing on Eurostat datasets, European Commission monitoring reports, PNRR implementation data, and ministerial performance indicators, this article employs a mixed-methods analytical framework to explain the drivers of Romania’s uneven absorption patterns. The results underscore how EU conditionality has functioned simultaneously as a stabilising mechanism and a catalyst for reform. Ultimately, the findings highlight the necessity of embedding durable administrative reforms capable of sustaining performance beyond cyclical political pressures. More
Romanians in Malaysia: International (Temperate) Economics Lectures in An Intellectually Warm (Equatorial) Climate
No. 59, May-Jun. 2026 The visit of Professor Octavian-Dragomir Jora, Ph.D., and Associate Professor Mihaela Iacob, Ph.D., under the Erasmus+ Staff Mobility for Teaching (STA) scheme, to Universiti Malaya (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, April 6-10), was conceived from the outset as an exercise meant to move beyond the constraints of mere comparability, highlighting instead the deeper scientific compatibility of the nowadays world. Beyond the inevitable need for mutual translation between distinct cultural and intellectual frameworks, what ultimately prevailed was a shared vein toward knowledge and critical inquiry – mediated by economics and empathy. In the lectures “Artificial Intelligence and Artistic Imagination: Rethinking the Cultural Economy of Industrial Revolutions” (Political Economy) and “The Market for Ideas amid Social Settings and Institutional Infrastructures: A Glimpse from Economics+” (Critical Thinking), layered meanings of the inescapable contemporary acronym “AI” – “artificial intelligence” and “artistic imagination”; “agoras of ideas” and “accelerated internationalization” – were revisited, across times and spaces, featuring as subtle junctions between technology and sensibility, as well as between sciences and consciences. More
The Bulgarian Doom Loop and Political Instability in Eastern Europe
No. 58, Mar.-Apr. 2026 Bulgaria held its eighth parliamentary election in five years on April 19, 2026. The Guinness Book of Records might soon find itself in competition with the Central Election Commission in Sofia for the most reliable chronicle of Bulgarian political milestones, but the result was, for once, reasonably decisive. Former President Rumen Radev, who resigned his largely ceremonial office in January in order to enter the murkier but more consequential arena of parliamentary politics, led his freshly minted Progressive Bulgaria coalition to a result not seen since 1997: an outright majority, 131 seats out of 240, enough to govern alone and, in principle, enough to silence, at least temporarily, the revolving door that has been the defining institutional feature of Bulgarian public life since 2021. More
What Makes a Good Life: The State, God, or Money? (Part II)
No. 58, Mar.-Apr. 2026 Following the exploration in Part I of the historical interplay between religion, state, and economic life, this second part turns to the Eastern trajectories and, in particular, to the Iranian case as a revealing study. It concludes by returning to the central question: what truly makes a good life possible? More
The Liquid Sun: Bridging Ideology with Infrastructure through the Siret-Bărăgan Project
No. 58, Mar.-Apr. 2026 In the sun-drenched landscape of the global south and Eastern Europe, a quiet revolution is taking place at the intersection of two ancient necessities: water and energy. The most striking laboratory for this transformation is the Siret-Bărăgan Canal – a massive, unfinished legacy of Romania’s socialist era that may finally find its purpose through the most modern of capitalist mechanisms. More
Beyond the Stats
No. 58, Mar.-Apr. 2026 At first glance, we might be tempted to think that the career of a two-time world champion is defined entirely by success and fulfilment. And, to some extent, that is true. Yet what remains far less visible is the effort behind the scenes. “Dan Carter. The Autobiography of an All Blacks Legend” (Headline Publishing, 2015) stands, above all, as a testimony to effort and resilience. More
Why We Don’t Have Memorable Characters Like Hercule Poirot?
No. 58, Mar.-Apr. 2026 “Hercule Poirot, a Belgian detective who became internationally famous, has died in England. His age was unknown. Mr. Poirot achieved fame as a private investigator after he retired as a member of the Belgian police force in 1904. His career, as chronicled in the novels of Dame Agatha Christie, his creator, was one of the most illustrious in fiction. At the end of his life, he was arthritic and had a bad heart. He was in a wheelchair often, and was carried from his bedroom to the public lounge at Styles Court, a nursing home in Essex, wearing a wig and false moustaches to mask the signs of age that offended his vanity. In his active days, he was always impeccably dressed. Mr. Poirot, who was just 5 feet 4 inches tall, went to England from Belgium during World War I as a refugee. He settled in a little town not far from Styles, then an elaborate country estate, where he took on his first private case.” More
Forecasts and Reality
No. 58, Mar.-Apr. 2026 Economic forecasts rarely materialize exactly as expected, as economic reality is highly complex and full of surprises. Macroeconomic models used to produce forecasts are simplified representations of the economic system; the data they rely on are not always available in a timely manner, and economic developments are often affected by unforeseen shocks. More
Romania, Second Lowest Level in the EU in Labour Costs Last Year
No. 58, Mar.-Apr. 2026 Romania remained at the second lowest level in the EU in terms of average hourly labour costs for 2025, according to data published by Eurostat. In a context marked by significant gaps between EU countries, the lowest hourly labour costs were recorded in Bulgaria (€12), Romania (€13.6, up from €12.5 in 2024), and Hungary (€15.2), while the highest were observed in Luxembourg (€56.8), Denmark (€51.7), and the Netherlands (€47.9). More
