Democracy

After a recent visit to Washington, Sergey Lagodinsky, head of the EU/North America Department at the Heinrich Boell Foundation in Berlin, reflects on Americans’ understanding of the European refugee crisis and the failure to anticipate long-term repercussions for US foreign policy interests.

We asked Noel Quiñones, an AfroBoricua activist, writer, and poet from the Bronx, New York for his thoughts on the Puerto Rican debt crisis, independence, and the upcoming Presidential elections on the mainland. He responded with this poem and accompanying article. To read the original German-language version of this piece in our US-Elections blog, "Route 16," click here. 

Media Fellow Dawid Krawczyk reports on workers' self-organization in New York's Chinese community, showing that unions are not the only way to represent workers' interests. 

With thousands of refugees coming to Germany every week, local administrations are overstrained with the provision of basic needs. In many cities, civil society groups have stepped in to the fill the gaps.

In the United States, it's normal for cars to be connected to each other through data exchange. It's considered safe and practical--until hackers get involved. Today, even police cars aren't safe from outside interference.

In a speech in November 2014, President Obama announced the increased deportation of illegal immigrants with a criminal record because they threatened the security of Americans. He emphasized that this only concerned felons, not families - but felons have families, too, counters the organization Families for Freedom.

Engulfed in an environmental scandal about lead-contaminated drinking water, the city of Flint, Michigan, has come to epitomize the decrepit state of America’s infrastructure, environmental racism, and mismanagement at the hands of public authorities.

A few weeks ago, Germany erupted in outrage over reports of sexual harassment and attacks on women during the New Year’s festivities in Cologne and other German cities. But new legislation in the German Bundestag highlights just how short-lived the commitment to women’s rights and so-called “German values” really is.

Integration practitioners to share best practices and develop concrete efforts to establish welcoming infrastructures in local U.S. and German communities: hbs North America, in partnership with Welcoming America and Cultural Vistas, is pleased to announce the Welcoming Communities Transatlantic Exchange! 

The New Year's Eve attacks and the subsequent anti-migrants protests in Cologne have refueled the debate about German values, whether all of the migrants that have entered the countery share those values, and if they can be successfully integrated into society. Yet what exactly these values might be remains unclear - to many Germans and asylum seekers alike.