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# A world tour in summitry: May 14 - 20 on openDemocracy
- URL: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/world-tour-in-summitry-may-14-20-on-opendemocracy/
- Published: 2012-05-31T14:05:39.000Z
- Updated: 2026-04-23T01:03:48.000Z
- Description: The creation of the European Union is arguably the most noble and positive achievement of deliberate international political construction since the end of the First World War. Now it could collapse like the Soviet Union: Ivan Krastev’s careful, masterful comparison is free of all the usual banalit
- Author: openDemocracy Supporters
- Tags: The Week in 1 Minute, #Migrated, #en, #Import 2026-04-09 17:19, #appended-excerpt

In a period of breakdown will Europe’s **public service media** survive? [Dan Hancox welcomes us](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/7d1a268e73&ref=opendemocracy.net) to a new debate page [OurBeeb](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/d7426a3b5b&ref=opendemocracy.net) hosted by OurKingdom as the UK's most important cultural institution, **the BBC,** appoints a new head. What should he (or she) do? Greg Dyke, the Director-General purged by Blair in 2004, is the first to rise to the challenge in [*Change or Die*](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/9f421f34a8&ref=opendemocracy.net).

Who does the BBC represent? It’s a question that links to **the revival of Rousseau** \- of the passionate General Will rather than the rational Social Contract. He haunts a [fascinating hour long podcast](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/13b8cda973&ref=opendemocracy.net) by Simon Critchley and Tony Curzon Price, as they pick their way across the neoliberal debris asking if we need a ‘civil religion’. How to deal with internet rumour from government and people once the Fukushima reactors blew their tops, leads [Fabian Schäfer ](https://www.opendemocracy.net/fabian-sch%C3%A4fer/fukushima-rumours-emotions-and-rousseau%E2%80%99s-general-will-in-digital-age)into an extended reflection on how democracy needs to mobilise the passions. And in our [Uneconomics](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/156b8d4b5c&ref=opendemocracy.net) debate, Paul Anderson shows how [the market cannot value nature](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/079ef8b572&ref=opendemocracy.net), while in the UK [Aaron Peters](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/1735ef7887&ref=opendemocracy.net) argues it does not value humanity either.

A [video of Charles Tripp’s inspiring lecture](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/6f64889f44&ref=opendemocracy.net) on how art, as a school of the emotions, prepared **the Arab Awakening**, reinforces the Roussean moment. But [Albena Azmanova](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/e1f79ddf36&ref=opendemocracy.net) sees western style, corporate democracy defeating itself in the Arab Spring… and Meriem Dhaouadi, in a [wry short post](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/1b58e5a86f&ref=opendemocracy.net) shows how a Tunisian can now look at the French.

Nowhere else can you take **a world tour of summitry**: from [Non-proliferation](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/6815d5c4ad&ref=opendemocracy.net) to [Sustainable Energy](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/52816732a1&ref=opendemocracy.net), via [the G8](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/47b2538668&ref=opendemocracy.net) and the [UN’s Rio Summit](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/9fab9f63bf&ref=opendemocracy.net) not to speak of the [Millennium Development Goals High Level Panel](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/b5e554fe57&ref=opendemocracy.net) or [Tribunal 12](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/0a16324275&ref=opendemocracy.net) as it puts Europe’s migration regime on trial; and in a series of articles, on the [intervention in Libya](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/6cc37956ba&ref=opendemocracy.net) and [on future partnerships](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/94dcf47b96&ref=opendemocracy.net), discuss NATO in the run-up to [Chicago](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/4c9a2cf357&ref=opendemocracy.net).

And the great Theda Skocpol says the [**US presidential election**](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/9adfc712c9&ref=opendemocracy.net) could be the most important ever.

**Before our links from elsewhere: have you forwarded an email to a friend this month asking them to join? If not** [**please send this link**](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/bd19ea9023&ref=opendemocracy.net)

Three links you don't want to miss:

[The harms of hate speech legislation](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/5232f08112&ref=opendemocracy.net)

[Will reform bring Burma peace?](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/4b44117829/all=true&ref=opendemocracy.net)

[The science of human conflict](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/9f33921487&ref=opendemocracy.net)

The creation of **the European Union** is arguably the most noble and positive achievement of deliberate international political construction since the end of the First World War. Now it could [collapse like the Soviet Union](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/d772a96149&ref=opendemocracy.net): Ivan Krastev’s careful, masterful comparison is free of all the usual banalities of pro and anti-EU rhetoric and is a ‘must-read’ for our time. It is reinforced by [Nick Pearce](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/b580984837&ref=opendemocracy.net) on from the Pirate Party to Le Pen while Mario Pianta provides a [relentlessly detailed survey](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/1b4c22fd81/b5696a98c8/31f1bb0eca&ref=opendemocracy.net) of the staggering growth of inequality in Italy.