John Michaelis

Funny piece about the @eui-eu.bsky.social. While the Hogwarts comparison feels apt sometimes, it gets a bit weird.

Not sure EUI’s remote location justifies the Los Alamos analogy. And beware the Florentine temptations! Might be too distracting for us to produce relevant work…

Netherlands rations electricity to ease power grid stresses Country provides early warning for rest of EU if investments in new cables do not keep pace with shift to greener economy

An extremely sobering piece about the unavoidable costs of the transition to electric power in the Netherlands—which in many ways has been *more* proactive than other European countries (charging points, rooftop solar) on.ft.com/4nNckCL

Grateful for the opportunity to present my PhD thesis outline last week.

Across Europe, populist far-right parties have increasingly mobilized against climate policy, but this opposition is far from uniform.

I aim to understand what drives this variation, and the implications that follow.

Union und SPD einigen sich auf Koalitionsvertrag Die entscheidenden Streitpunkte sind ausgeräumt: Union und SPD wollen am Nachmittag die Eckpunkte ihres Koalitionsvertrags präsentieren. Die Entwicklungen in der Live-Analyse.

There is a new German government coalition!
First surprise: CDU gets the foreign office - which traditionally goes to the smaller coalition partner. Makes a lot of sense and was speculated but I wouldn’t have bet on it. Also means that SPD (Pistorius…) gets defence.

www.spiegel.de/politik/deut...

This is so crazy, wth

A happy ending to the negotiation thriller of the past days:

€100bn of the €500bn infrastructure package will go to climate spending and the legal text will include language on additionality.

Balanced outcome—and a big win for both Germany and Europe.

RND exklusiv: Grüne einigen sich mit Schwarz-Rot auf Finanzpaket – 100 Milliarden Euro für Klimaschutz In den Verhandlungen von Union, SPD und Grünen über das Schuldenpaket haben sich die drei Fraktionen nach RND-Informationen auf einen Kompromiss verständigt. Das dürfte auch die Koalitionsverhandlunge...

The #Greens seem to have won. CDU and SPD agree to make any investment fund "additional" to current investment.

100 of the 500bn will go into a climate fund. www.rnd.de/politik/live...

Exclusive: NIH to terminate hundreds of active research grants Studies that touch on LGBT+ health, gender identity and DEI in the biomedical workforce could be terminated, according to documents obtained by Nature.

NEW: The NIH has begun terminating grants for active projects studying gender identity, DEI, environmental justice, climate change, among other topics.

At least 16 termination letters have already been sent — and hundreds more are coming, people inside NIH tell me.
www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Von der Leyen needs to be decisive on the EU’s climate action course The EU could remain a global leader on climate action. But for this to happen, Ursula von der Leyen needs to commit to transparency in green policymaking

The Clean Industrial Deal proposes a “buy European” policy in areas such public procurement—but this risks alienating partners needed by the EU both for the green transition and in other aspects such as development and security ecfr.eu/article/von-... @ecfr.eu

New research brief out in our PPRN series - one that is quite relevant for current discussions. In the brief, Elsa Massoc documents the strong leeway that governments potentially have for green investments and how they have prioritized other sectors.
politicscentre.nuffield.ox.ac.uk/media/kiunmf...

Von der Leyen has just announced the Commission's "Rearm Europe" plan. The most important parts target national fiscal space: The Commission will activate the national escape clauses in the fiscal rules and put a new loans-based instrument on the table.

Here is what it means:

The Greens are solidly projected to come in 4th, likely dropping from 15% to 13%.

But this disappointment masks that the two fellow governing parties are likely lose a significantly larger vote share compared to the 2021 election.
SPD: 26% to likely 15%
FDP: 12% to maybe not making the 5% hurdle.

The absence of the Greens in this list highlights their irrelevance for most of this election cycle, after being in the 'big leagues' with a real shot at the chancellery during the last election.

Their most important role may be for the CDU: to have an alternative negotiating partner to the SPD.

It’s a loss. As a St. Pauli fan, I tend to agree with the the notion that by taking the anthem and making it ours, it gave this song its own new meaning in line with the club’s values and ideals.

But an anthem’s raison d‘être is to be unifying. It became a source of division and thus had to go.

White House budget proposal could shatter the National Science Foundation “This kind of cut would kill American science and boost China.”…

The US government has been turned over to a group of extraordinarily ignorant people, and they are working to destroy science in this country. Cutting over half the NSF budget would save < 0.1% of the federal budget, but do incalculable harm. Simply heartbreaking.

arstechnica.com/science/2025...

Russia supported sabotage spree in Germany to roil election campaign, report says A wave of car vandalism, initially blamed on climate activists, is now being linked to Moscow.

German investigators believe that a wave of car vandalism across Germany, initially blamed on radical climate activists, is actually part of a Russian-orchestrated sabotage campaign, according to a Spiegel report published today.

Es reicht eine einzige, simple Logikfrage. Wenn der Vorschlag der CDU geeignet sein soll, die extreme Rechte einzudämmen, warum stimmt die extreme Rechte dann zu und klatscht begeistert?

The decline in 2018/2019 is in no small measure related to the Diesel scandal.

Good to remember that 2019 was not a particularly great year for the German economy, which shows that many of the issues it faces have little to do with the (very real) 2022 energy shock, that only hit years later.

What are the EUI SPS department researchers up to? Dear prospective EUI PhD students (and probably also current ones), here is the answer to your question what the EUI is known for. I base my answer on all theses ever defended at the EUI SPS.

New blog! What are EUI SPS department researchers up to? Perhaps of special interest to prospective EUI PhD students. open.substack.com/pub/laurenle...