Published Tuesday, February 12, 2008 at 13:24
by
Eric 
(1466 views and 2 comments)
Hello again folks,
As your guest blogger this week, I have decided to bring up serious questions, but I also want to bring personal stories into it. I hope this will facilitate things and make the posts more interesting when you follow my train of thoughts. So here goes again:
In 2002-2003 I had one of the best experiences of my life. I was working as a ”research fellow” at a Democratic think tank in Washington DC. The think tank can be traced back to Bill Clinton’s renewal of the Democratic party, but also his great interest in policy. Both Clintons are real policy wonks, if you didn’t know.
Being a ”research fellow” meant that I wrote a few rather serious papers and articles, but most notably it gave me a chance just to hang around at a think tank in Washington DC. I had the opportunity to just be there and learn how the political world works up on Capitol Hill. Hanging out also included a beer or two at the classic über-political hangout ”Hawk and Dove”, as well as a fantastic meeting with senator Paul Wellstone of Minnesota (who tragically died in a plane crash in the autumn of 2002). I was also by far the worst soft ball-player on the team the think tank had, but it was fun to play against other think tanks and to round it off at a bar on the Hill.
One of things that we did at the think tank was to collect progressive policy ideas that had proved to be working out in a good way in different parts of the USA. An education reform here, a health care proposal there, or a smart way to make growth more sustainable: It was all collected, written down, and then spread in a progressive network of elected politicians on all different levels (from senator to dog catcher) across the plains of the US of A. A brilliant idea, don’t you think?
Why do I tell you guys this? Obviously, I think we should do the same in our political family of progressive socialists and social democrats in the EU. We need to collect and spend money on people who are hired to collect good, red ideas. In that way, we can run our countries, regions and municipalities better where we are in office. And in the long run, we can outthink our opponents and win the battle of ideas in the EU, so that we will elections even more often (hey, I know what opposition is like nowdays here in Sweden)
As a matter of fact, there are some good signs. As far as I understand, a PES think tank is being set up in Brussels as we speak. The very useful book ”The New Social Europe”, by my idols Poul Nyrup Rasmussen and Jacques Delors, actually contains an appendix with ”case studies of progressive public policies”.
That’s a good start. But as PES activists, we need to support this idea wholeheartedly and force our parties and trade unions to open up the wallet (and apply for EU-money that might be floating around out there). Because if you start a think tank, it cannot be two people sitting a corner somewhere. We need a powerhouse of ideas that reaches out to academia, NGOs, and all different parts of the wonderful labour movement in Europe – and to the US and other parts of the world where we can steal a good, progressive idea.
One last note on this. I think this think tank should be located in Brussels. It should have a nice bar where I can have a coffee or a beer, check my e-mail thanks to the wireless connection, and run into people I have met somewhere at a congress in our red, European family.
What do you think?
Eric Sundström, editor in chief at "Aktuellt i Politiken", the newspaper of the Swedish Social Democratic Party
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During the next three days (Wednesday, Thursday, Friday), I will move on and comment on the other three parts of the PES manifesto.
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If you have not seen this Barack Obama video yet, be ready. Goosebumps is just a YouTube-click away.
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I saw the movie Rendition last week. I would give it 3.5 on a scale from 1 to 5 (where 5 is the highest), so it is worth seeing. Especially since it poses important questions about the way in which many politicians in the western world forgot all they knew about human rights after 911.
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Primaries in Washington DC, Maryland and Virginia tonight. I spoke with friends in the region yesterday and it seems very locked up for Obama. If Hillary can come close somewhere, it is in Virginia. This is so difficult, I really like both of them! Who do you support?
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Comments
1. Think tanks and independence by helmar
on Tuesday, February 12, 2008 at 16:01
I think the idea of a social democratic Brussels based think tank is excellent. I can already come up with ideas of seminar series, publications and events that there is a need for both here in Brussels, and in the national capitals. However, it is important that we get it right from the start. Since I am working in a think tank myself, I can see the difficulties for a think tank that is too closely linked to a political party.
First, the recruitment of both staff and other contributors needs to be wider than it normally is in political parties. You need to put together the best minds of practitioners and academics. Their ability to come up with, formulate and communicate good ideas should be the qualification not the years of service and loyalty to a political party.
Secondly, to be able to communicate your ideas they need to be controversial and a bit unexpected. A think tank that produces evidence for the merits of the ideas of a certain party is not going to be interesting to anyone else than the leading people within this party.
Thirdly, to be able to have an impact on policy making a think tank needs to have high research standards and always produce evidence based research. A think tank that is solely motivated by ideology cannot play any additional role to what the party is already doing.
I hope that these questions about how to become broad, communicative and trustworthy, is taken into consideration if the PES is thinking of funding a think tank. My suggestion would be to do it together with some unexpected allies within for example the environmental movement and the feminist movement and also within business and corporates.
And until this red think tank is reality, I would encourage all PES activists to take part of publications and events from other European think tanks. You can learn a lot (and sometimes more?) when taking part of ideas that does not necessarily come from your long-term political allies. Here is a list of European think tanks: http://www.eu.thinktankdirectory.org/
2. Think tank independence by Eric
on Wednesday, February 13, 2008 at 15:21
Just a quick note on Helena's three points: I tend to agree with you the whole way, and I would like to underline the benefits a think tank get if the relations with academia is good, and if you manage to build up something with other allies/NGOs. But it cannot be too far away so that our established parties stop to listen... Then a PES-think tank will just be another think tank on that list you mentioned (especially in the eyes of our dear Old Party Bosses...)To be able to post comments you need to be logged in. No account yet? Register here! Lost your password?