Equality bodies are national institutions that tackle discrimination in society. Building on Equinet data, OBCT has developed an Index to assess the effectiveness of these institutions.
Over the last twenty years, European directives have facilitated the creation of equality bodies. The majority of these institutions are still not very familiar to European citizens, but there are some exceptions in south-eastern countries.
Sweden does it without a law, France does it with one. The proportion of women in European parliaments and cabinets is determined by a number of different factors. A comparison.
Security guards in Croatia suffer from harsh working conditions: extremely long work shifts, poor equipment, minimum salary. They are overburned and cannot have a proper private life, but they have little alternatives. Yet security business is flourishing in Europe, and companies make millions of revenues.
Lithuania is the EU country with the highest rate of inmates in relation to the population, but prison overcrowding is the highest in Hungary.
Thirty-three countries out of 49 in Europe have not legalised same-sex marriage. Most Central and Eastern Europeans oppose same-sex marriage whereas most Western Europeans favour it.
Set up by the WHO, the European database on health in prisons (HIPED) includes data on prison mortality, disease screening, and the prevention and treatment of diseases.
On June 20, the Legal Affairs committee of the European Parliament will vote on a proposed directive for Copyright reform. Sounds obscure? It is actually a hotly debated topic: the new directive may well shape how the internet will look like in a few years, among other things changing how linking and uploading of contents works.
Locked for years in digital alienation, the EU has set a new standard on data protection and privacy, wrestling back some control from Silicon Valley. But with the coming of age of AI-based applications, Chinese firms strive in turn for a piece of the colony.
Reporters Without Borders’ 2019 Index shows that journalists’ working conditions in Europe are declining year after year, and that the death of four reporters in two and a half years should sound as a warning signal for those who care about democracy and freedom of the press.