From 1929 to 1933,governments all over the world rushed to adopt self-destructive "beggar-thy-neighbour" policies, in a futile attempt to devalue each other's currencies and to reduce their imports in retaliation, forgetting that one country's imports are the other country's exports. The consequence was that the value of world trade contracted by two-thirds, going from $ 5.3 billion to $ 1.8 billion.

The idea according to which the EU should consider a 'Buy European Act' as a retaliation measure against the 'Buy American Act' recalls the protectionist policies that help to drag down the world's economy in the 1930s. The EU isn't going to find its way out of the recession by throwing walls up around particular industries or pursuing protectionist policies. 

Five Indian states have been going to the polls for the past couple of months (given the size of India, elections are conducted in stages). But the results were announced last Tuesday (6 March) and the impact has been immediate.

The elections were for the state assemblies, so the results should  technically not affect the composition of the Lok Sabha, the lower house of the Indian Parliament. But the next general elections are due in 2014, and last Tuesday's results are an indication of how they will turn out.

Today is International Women's Day (8 March). It represents the struggle of women to participate in society on an equal footing with men.

On this occasion AALEP is pleased to celebrate Women Lobbyists. Women have made great strides in recent years in lobbying and across the political and government board. As the ranks of women lawmakers have widened, more organizations have sought women lobbyists. Women lobbyists have some inherent strengths in this political game, because they are great mediators and facilitators. Indeed lobbying may be a more natural instinct for women.

Lobbying is not just a rich-country phenomenon. It is already present in at least some of the less developed countries and is slowly replacing bribery as a means of influencing government policies.

Many foreign investors find that frequently, they have little or no control over external events which can adversely affect the commercial viability of their investments and future business plans in foreign countries. These developments include:

The new proposed EC Regulations aim at drawing a line under the eurozone debt crisis by granting Brussels sweeping new powers to scrutinize national budgets and in extreme cases "administer" countries struggling with uncontrollable debt levels.

Once adopted by eurozone member states, these new regulations will be directly applicable under national law

The views and proposals for restoring growth in the EU endorsed by 12 countries including the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Ireland, Italy, Estonia, Latvia, Finland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden and Poland which together represent half of the EU population are not included in the draft text of the European Council Summit. And yet the proposals made called for clear targets and timetables setting outy dates and accountability. Just in the international area, the plan for growth highlighted definite objectives for delivering open global markets e.g.

According to the latest Eurostat report for January, there are currently 16.92 million people unemployed in the eurozone. This represents 10.7% of the active working population. 1. Spain (23.3%) 1 person out of 4 is without work 2. Greece (20%) 1 person out of 5 is without work 3. Ireland and Portugal (14.8%) 1 person out of 7 is without work 4. France (10%) 1 person out of 10 is without work 5. Italy (9.2%) 6. Germany (5.8%) 7. Luxembourg (5.1%) 8. Netherlands (5.0%) 9. Austria (4.0%).

The Russian concept of sovereign democracy is centred around two core ideas. First is the idea of sovereignty. This concept is understood as non-interference from the West. Second is the idea that Russia has its own set of values. These values are democratic but they emerge from Russia's unique historical experience, and they are distinct from what the West understands as democracy. Thus, Russia's democracy should not necessarily corresponds to Western standards of democracy. The idea of 'sovereign democracy' has a number of functions.