I do not want to make a post about which, very obviously opinion, were the highlights of the Spanish Presidency and what are their weaknesses. I do not think it's time before it will read, sift and reason all the information about already being broadcast and will air both institutional channels, the press or media.
I think such an assessment deserves a detailed analysis later, and even fields. A point of interest for me regarding cultural policies, of which I'll talk a later post.
Now I want to make a thinking aloud about what has made this presidency, which has had a double feature for which has been special. The fate and destiny have wanted two things come together very noticeable in it, from one side of the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty and other global crisis stage and the special situation of our country on the world stage.
Starting at the end, no doubt, the crisis has been a very minor factor of the ambitious project of work that the Government of Spain had prepared for this semester just ended. The disaster of the Greek economy which put at risk the very survival of the EMU and the financial imbalance produced by the continuous speculative attacks on Spanish sovereign debt (among which are those of the Deutsche Bank!) and I must say , poor credit you have when our government to act strongly to these dollar vultures, who long to put in check the Euro .
But in addition, this semester started with another, "problem?. I refer to the arrival on the scene of another counter in the complex EU institutional structure, far beyond the committee to use. I refer to the existence of a three-headed political power: the President of the European Commission, Durao Barroso, the President of the Council of the rotating presidency, José Luis R. Zapatero and the President of the European Union, Van Rompuy. In this complex way of managing the power of the EU, I think the Spanish presidency marked an important milestone, there has been no fanfare, no outbursts, everything has flowed in semblance of normality for all European citizens (though I imagine, that printing will not be the same in the services of Cabinet and Protocol paths institutions). However, despite the problems, that there must have been, this has not been an issue of the Spanish Presidency, so this marked the path of how it has to work with the new structure. Imagine for a moment what would have happened if the launch had been in the hands of Berlusconi, Polish President Sarkozy or (shiver, right?).
Another question would be about the continuing absence of High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy of the EU, Baroness Ashton. Does anyone know what they do?, You know it you have to do?
But to return to this brief analysis of views. There are two issues I want to stress. An excessively worrying. At a time when the public is increasingly away from politics, and also see it as an evil to be endured (feeling sick concern), this was an opportunity to bring the concept of citizenship in Europe . But this has failed main thing, the communication link between citizens and institutions: the media. Continue ignoring the role of European institutions in the daily political work. There is no pan-European vision of the measures and news coming out of Brussels. Only when reports of meetings of the European Council or the Ecofin, the rest does not matter. Big mistake, in Europe everything is decided affects us daily, and this message does not reach the public. Only when the public perceives that sense, the EU will leap forward in the democratic deficit that has yet.
I can not conclude without pointing out two things about this presidency. Within the activity that has been deployed, people have tried to create nodes in the 2.0 space to try to move opinion on Europe. Initiatives such as: We talked about Europe , European or Challenge 2030 , are an attempt to socialize the European policies in civic networks . It is a road that has marked this presidency and I hope to continue the rest of the Presidencies, especially those of the rest of the Trio , now the Belgian and the first half of 2011 the Hungarian. Furthermore, this work not only remained in the section on digital agitation, was a hit to make a special call for the European Third Sector in Malaga, last May in the European Civic Days 2010 , an action which I hope will be repeated future presidencies.
Finally I want to remember a milestone of this presidency to respect for citizen participation and involvement in Europe. The impetus for the start-up, definitely the European Citizens' Initiative . A real opportunity to bring Europe closer to citizens, giving the word effectively and openly.

Perhaps one of the most remote of active citizenship (when really it is) is the view of the social, the changes and developments within the public policy areas are given in relation to policies for R & D, or be more specific on Science and Innovation, extending this to all branches of knowledge involving the development of new processes and products, which collectively improve quality of life of citizens.
Without doubt, this is a space for public debate rather unobtrusive and full of "opaque zones" preventing, mainly because of its complexity, that all citizens can forge a collective opinion on the matter. And is that, much as is done for the sake of popular science, and although a majority of the population of this country for decades since the advent of private television stations on the scene, declared fan of the documentaries of the 2 to noon, the fact remains stubborn, and research and development policies continue to be seen as something far removed from the population.
If so, we can imagine that it is a challenge for any section of the governments of each member state, you do not make a great effort of imagination to understand how complicated it can be to unravel the politics of R & D + i of the European Union . Indeed, one of the most ambitious public level (if not the most ambitious) of this world called Earth.
In fact, I do not know for sure, but I suspect that if the street were to ask, what is the Seventh Framework Programme of the EU, I doubt that there was a considerable level of responses that might be acceptable. So the fact is that the Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology (FECYT), the Ministry of Science and Innovation (MICINN), with the company Synergy Value and the advice and active coordination of the great specialist (and assets) European affairs and member of the Committee of Experts of the European Commission: Susana del Río , have developed action "Citizens Agenda for Science and Innovation" , in operations under the Spanish Presidency of the EU 2010.
What is it? It is the commitment of the Spanish Presidency, by bringing the efforts being made in the field of R + D + i for a better future not only for European citizenship, but for the rest of the planet. It is defined with the participation of citizens, what should be the great challenges in science and technology that Europe has to make in the next two decades. That is, connect and align the feelings and needs of the population, with public policy objectives in research, without entailing a loss of those projects that do not have a massive support from the population.
Note that the most voted initiatives (the initiative just eat their career) are the realativas to medical science, biotechnology and environmental, as opposed to rest. The EU presents us with challenges of the future 14, developed by a committee of experts in each field and spokesmen for each of them, an outstanding personality of this field of study. This does not end here, because the web presents us with future actions which have thought our complicity.
I have voted for a challenge, which I believe would change everything: "Unifying all theories of physics, something that is already running with the LHC . I think it sounds strange, do not see it useful. Let me give an example: If Maxwel l had not, in the early twentieth century, developed the mathematical theory of unification of the electromagnetic field is more than likely that I would not be writing this post now, is we would have no TV, no mobile phones , nothing to base its operation in the transmission of any wave. Unification Theory aims to unite the field, the weak nuclear and gravity, ie Physics PostEinstiana invent and develop a new physical interaction space and energy. It could be the beginning of a new era of sustainability and progress for humanity unparalleled, and this is being developed in our European Union, shared and collective effort of thousands of scientists. It is the beauty of the European Union.
I invite you to learn this exciting initiative and participate actively. I hope we can comment in the space 2.0 on it, I can not think of a better scenario.

Yesterday, we saw as the EU, finally gave the green light to measures of support (bailout, unfortunate name, I believe) to shore up the battered financial budgets and the battered Greek (not to mention the structure of public services). This is the culmination of a series of big mistakes (not the plan itself) on how to reach a destination that seemed in this way, but that no institution was willing to undertake.
And now, the situation is irreversible. The Greek situation is if the sum of a series of historical conditions that led to this situation, and that however much you want to match a certain Anglo-Saxon press, is not comparable to the rest of the that this "serious" and "brainy" press wants to do with the rest of what they named, contemptuously, as PIIGS (Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece and Spain).
The situation becomes Greek from its early entry into the EU in 1981 (then EEC), mostly because of American pressure within NATO to carry natural boundaries of this organization to the eastern Mediterranean and control access step Soviet fleet in the Bosporus and the Caspian.
Therefore, these requirements did not require a thorough overhaul of its economic and institutional structures, as they were called later to Spain and Portugal as we enter 1986. And here come some of the current problems. That and the demonstrated tendency of all Greek governments of the last two decades of whitewashing over their public accounts (which is well known in all the gossip of Brussels). But this is not the point I want to bring up in this post.
The point is that the Greek situation is left worse because no institution has sought to address the situation. From 11 February to 25 March, there have been no high-level meeting of the EU or bilaterally with other countries which did not refer to the Greek crisis to try to minimize it and try to seek the confidence of the markets. And here again our heroes encounter. Europe is not only to convince the markets, Europe is also convincing the public. And this is again a deficit.
Europe's population does not perceive a need to rescue together. Moreover, many voices (who mistakenly complain) that are against what each country will contribute to the rescue, with a 5% loan of 30,000 million euros (on a plan for a period of 18 months). A citizenship have to explain what that means, telling it without restrictions, without demagoguery and without treatment so childish.
These moments are to be used for citizenship, to seek a joint involvement of 27 and to remind the rest of the world, the worth of building a common space based on solidarity, respect and the joint construction of a future. And in this back to fail.
We have seen that there have been threats of resort to the IMF, if the 27 did not come to help (I refuse to use the word rescue, dear Eurosceptic media) to Greece, and this can not be. The EU has returned to give the impression of drift. Drift, because it believes in one of his associates, and that the bulk of the population sees it, since from the Standing Commission and the Presidency have not taken steps in this regard.
The lesson: Europe must draw a clear consequence of this situation. Irremediable situations, they demand a forceful response to the pair of integrator which would give confidence to the population and not throw the "ghost" of the interim decisions, which are the leitmotiv of the current Barroso Commission. Urge the EU to be able to cope with a strong intergovernmental decision-making mechanism (the Treaty of Lisbon, have these devices) and a o-Gov, that sense of security and transparency to the public.
The future of EU institutions pass through them "visible" and "transparent" to the people, otherwise we will face a chimera, that as the Greek case is just, I fear, the First Act.

Dear friends of this blog, this time I write a short post to introduce a citizens' initiative in Europe, where I have the honor to participate actively and I joined from the beginning to contribute my bit to bring my sphere of influence (low, but very select), the debate on European initiatives, both public and institutional perspective, which occur in our environment and therefore affect us.
These European want to build a meeting space and continuous public debate based on exchange of ideas and diverse political positions, but through the prism of active Europe.
We propose and highlight the need to promote a new impetus to public debate on the future of the European Union and the policies being developed in their environment and taking account of the opportunity, and visibility, which gives us the Spanish Presidency of the EU this semester. Far from using this milestone as an end, we want to use as a means to achieve a free digital space citizen meeting to discuss and make proposals on these issues.
To facilitate this meeting have enabled citizens own space on the web that is:

And besides, we have created a fan page on Facebook , where everyone would be feasible to interact with our proposals, comment, share, etc.
Now we just need you.
I hope for you, for Europe.