Out of control: Inflation

By: Casper de Vries, Erasmus University Rotterdam

How single minded monetary policy contributed to today's financial mess.

Time to stop forecasting, and to start thinking

By: Wolfgang Münchau

Forecasts that Obama will win the presidency, and that inflation is falling have in common that they mean nothing at all.

Serbia's big step towards EU membership

Arrest of Radovan Karadzic a big step towards pre-accession treaty entering into force; IMF says global imbalances are there to stay; Greece might be forced to revise its fiscal goals; housing crisis might wipe out most of US financial sector capital; the latest constitutional changes in France, meanwhile, still make a referendum on Turkish EU membership highly likely.

EMU: Divergence or Convergence?

By: Nouriel Roubini, New York University and RGE Monitor

Has the process of monetary unification in Europe led to economic convergence or economic divergence in the Eurozone since 1999? The experience has been mixed. While growth divergence has not increased since 1999 there are a number of strains in this monetary union: asymmetric shocks, asset bubbles caused by common monetary policy, labor market rigidities, lack of adjustment of real exchange rates, limited role of risk insurance through financial channels, lack of risk sharing via federal fiscal policies.

What about Core Europe?

The Treaty marks and masks the growing division of Europe. Core Europe has always been an inevitability, the only question was how it would come about.

Europe's drift into mercantilism

By: Wolfgang Münchau

Forget the "reform treaty". It is a done deal. The next, and far more important battle in the EU, is over Nicolas Sarkozy's mercantilism, which he plans to bring to the EU.

Ireland's Jamaica Coalition

By: Marc Coleman, Sunday Independent

Ireland now has a coalition of Fianna Fail, the Progressive Democrats and the Green Party. There are some uncanny parallels to German politics.