A French View
Angela Merkel clearly has an undeniable political flair. Faced with apparent danger, she has decided to take action. Of course, this is no time to sing the Ode to Joy or build castles in the sky. Nevertheless Berlin’s new awareness is the first good news we’ve heard in the European Union in a long time. With all the required diplomacy, France must now make the best of this positive change of heart. After all, the idea wasn’t to appeal to Germany for money, but to convince it to spend more for itself.
Libération, October 21
A German View
Strictly speaking, the whole Eurozone is suffering from the impact of the austerity policy imposed by Chancellor Merkel during the euro crisis. Only Germany can still afford to take a different course and invest in growth and jobs. And Germany also just happens to be the country where investments are urgently needed. So from that perspective Paris’s initiative makes sense. Naturally one can’t expect the spending cuts in France to be set off one by one against investments in Germany. But that’s not what [Finance Minister] Sapin and [Economics Minister] Macron meant anyway. Their point is that the Eurozone urgently needs to boost demand…. The Eurozone needs a new economic policy geared towards growth, not a fiscal policy fixated on cuts. Paris has launched the debate with a provocation – merci!
TAZ, October 21
Eric Koch’s new book, New Beginnings, was launched on September 20. The book is available from 
