Elections, Wars and Summits

Description

July 2024 may end up being remembered for various reasons, such as wars in Ukraine, Israel and Gaza or the launch of the Arianne 6 rocket by the European Space Agency or the floods in Western Europe and the extreme heat in the eastern Mediterranean, all caused by climate change. At this point however, these are the backdrop to another set of events: elections and summits. In this year of elections around the globe it is perhaps unsurprising that two polls happened suddenly: in both the UK and France the heads of government called unexpected elections. In the UK this resulted in a massive won for the Labour Party, ending 14 years of Conservative rule. In contrast in France the outcome was stalemate: no-one won outright. While many in France and outside it are trying to define what this means, NATO members are meeting in Washington to mark the 75th anniversary of the alliance. To navigate these elections and summits, Ilana Bet-El is joined by Jane Kinninmont, Director of Policy and Impact at The European Leadership Network, and Florence Ferrando, producer of this podcast and Senior Consultant in Cyber and Strategic Intelligence at Forward Global.

This episode was recorded on July 11 2024.

Mentions

Jane’s inspiration: Gareth Southgate

Florence’s inspiration: Swann Périsssé show on French elections - Youtube

First past the post elections vs Two round system

UK election results /France election results

NATO Washington summit declaration

Jane's SWP paper on NATO and its southern neighbourhood

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Jane Kinninmont: LinkedIn, Twitter/X

Florence Ferrando: Linkedin

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