Where are the Zohran Mamdanis of Europe?
A few weeks back, we asked you to weigh in on a question that’s been on our mind a lot lately: Who are the Zohran Mamdanis of Europe, and when, pray tell, are they going to give our beloved, ailing continent a much-needed shake-up? As it turns out, that’s a complicated question. This week’s guest, Brussels-based journalist Dave Keating, says that the decks are stacked against insurgent outsiders like the New York mayor – yet we need them more than ever. We had a long-overdue chat with Dave about what might be preventing a charismatic, insurgent figure on the left from taking off in the EU, and we also talked about a few of the leaders you wrote in to share with us. (Of course, keep us posted of any changemakers cropping up in your country at hello@europeanspodcast.com.)
We’re also talking about a controversial new law in Germany introducing voluntary military service in the country for men under the age of 45. We recorded this segment a few hours before the news that young men will not have to seek permission for long stints abroad after all; you can read updated reporting here. We also unpack Netflix’s failed legal challenge to EU regulations that led to a flood of funding for European TV and film production. A burning question has now been answered: yes, the US streaming giant really does have to set aside a decent budget for francophone Belgian content.
Inspiration Station recommendations:
The viral videos emerging from Zara Larsson’s tour
Juhani Karila’s book Summer Fishing in Lapland
Other resources for this episode:
Producers
Katy Lee and Wojciech Oleksiak
Mixing and mastering
Wojciech Oleksiak
Music
Jim Barne and Mariska Martina
-
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Hello, and welcome to The Europeans podcast, a show that aims to explain, enlighten and hopefully entertain on the topic of Europe.
KATY LEE:
That's a good summary.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Thank you. I thought maybe it sounded a little bit vague. But maybe that's because Europe itself is a bit of a vague thing. Like it's...
KATY LEE:
What is Europe? We've been doing this for a decade and we still don't really know.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
We don't, but maybe that's why we're still here. Because it's so impossible to pin down.
KATY LEE:
We're on a journey.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
We just can't stop having fun each week, trying our best to do that.
KATY LEE:
No one's forcing you to say that.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
No, I don't have a gun to my head. I promise.
KATY LEE:
You are not under duress.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Anyway, I'm Dominic Kraemer in Amsterdam. And that other voice you hear is a Katy Lee in Paris. Hi, Katy.
KATY LEE:
Hello. Thanks for that little summary of what we do. I think it's good to start this week's show with a bit of an explanation, isn't it? Because there might be some new listeners joining us this week. We went viral last weekend.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
We did. We had a very strange Instagrammy Easter weekend where our following on Instagram doubled, which is pretty insane.
KATY LEE:
Over a really specific post about the extent to which Polish, Czech and Slovak people can understand each other. How cool is that?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Who would have thought that it was that that was going to make us so successful on Instagram? Anyway, it did. So hi, new listeners who found us via that Instagram post. I'm afraid we're not talking about language this week.
KATY LEE:
What are we going to be talking about? What are you going to be talking about this week, Dominic?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Well, in the first segment of the show, Good Week, Bad Week, I am going to be talking about a very controversial rule in Germany that means that German men should maybe now be informing the military if they want to leave the country for a considerable amount of time.
KATY LEE:
Sounds drastic.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
More on that later. What about you, Katy?
KATY LEE:
I am going to be talking about a quite juicy little court case in which Netflix is trying to get out of making quite so many films and TV shows in Belgium. It is Netflix versus French speaking Belgians. What more could you want from a court case?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Wow, sounds intriguing. I love a bit of entertainment news when the world is falling apart.
KATY LEE:
It's what we need right now.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
And after that, we're going to be moving on to an interview topic that I am particularly excited about, because it's an interview around a question that I've been asking myself for many months.
KATY LEE:
Yes, you're obsessed.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
I am a bit. Where are the Zohran Mamdanis of Europe? Now, if you have no idea who I'm talking about, congratulations for not paying attention to American news. I applaud it. But Zohran Mamdani is New York's relatively new mayor, a charismatic social media savvy democratic socialist who came out pretty much of nowhere to win the Democratic mayoral primary in New York last summer and then went on to win the New York mayoral election a few months later. To try and answer the question of like, where are the equivalents here in Europe? We're going to be joined by the Brussels-based journalist Dave Keating, an American, Belgian and Italian national, I believe.
KATY LEE:
That's a lot of passports.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
It is. Well done. I need to catch up. Anyway, Dave covered the corridors of Washington before moving to Europe and becoming one of the sharpest and most entertaining observers of European politics. That conversation is coming up later on. But first, of course, it's time for Good Week, Bad Week.
[MUSIC]
KATY LEE:
Who has had a bad week, Dominic?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Well, before I tell you exactly who's had a bad week, I should mention that this is the segment of the show that is produced in cooperation with our radio partners across Europe at Euranet Plus.
And I'm giving Bad Week to young German men, after a change to the military laws came into force that means that men aged 17 to 45 should seek approval from the army if they want to go abroad for more than three months.
KATY LEE:
I saw this headline and I honestly couldn't quite believe it. Like, permission to leave the country if you want to leave for three months. I mean, obviously, there is a big European military ramp up at the moment, but that is a quite fundamental change in terms of like, the freedom of German men to just move around. I mean, like the whole point of the EU is that you should just be able to like, move to Italy at the drop of a hat. Do German men just not have that freedom anymore?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Well, to be totally honest with you, it seems like the headline news is perhaps a bit more shocking sounding than the reality of this rule. So there is still some confusion about how or even whether this law is being enforced already and whether or not it will continue to be enforced going forward. And it's important to know right away that military service in Germany is still entirely voluntary, at least for now.
KATY LEE:
No conscription.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
There's no conscription. And I should also mention that this rule about needing permission to leave the country for longer periods is actually not a new law. The thing that is new is that the change that came into force in January as part of a larger military service act tweaked this existing rule so that it also applies during peacetime, whereas previously it only counted when the country would be at war. So this change in the small print was apparently largely not really noticed until the Frankfurter Rundschau newspaper did notice and published a story about it last week.
KATY LEE:
It's a bit worrying that we're like passing laws now without really understanding the relevance that it takes a newspaper report to be like, hang on a second, guys. What does this bit mean?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, I was also quite shocked by that. And the newspaper article caused quite a big flurry of negative reaction online and a lot of criticism from opposition politicians. But I did find myself thinking, hey, opposition politicians, why didn't you notice this when it was going through Parliament? Anyway, the key thing to realise now to bring the blood pressure of all the young German men listening back down again is that the Ministry of Defence have said that requests for leaving the country for more than three months must in principle be approved because under current German law, military service is still voluntary. However, it is not clear yet what the consequences are if a German young man doesn't seek the official approval and just leaves the country without informing the military.
KATY LEE:
Right. Would you get in trouble for not asking even though the answer is going to be yes? This is very confusing. Like why add this annoying admin step in peacetime for young men who just want to travel? Like, is this just Germany leaning into its hardcore love of paperwork?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Well, I mean, it's certainly confusing. And yeah, I'll come more to the confusion in a bit. But the shift to this law in the military provision does seem to have some reasoning behind it. The Ministry of Defence have said that it's there so that the military has a record of how many military aged men are abroad at any one time. So there isn't currently mandatory conscription. But conscription is definitely not off the cards in Germany. And the military want to have a record of how many young men are abroad if and when conscription does come in. So yeah, there is a serious side to this. And it's really possible that mandatory military service does eventually come back in in Germany. Germany is currently trying to rapidly increase the size of its military personnel. At the moment, they have 182,000 service personnel under arms. And they're looking to add 20,000 by the end of this year, an extra 60,000 within a decade. And here's the biggie. They want to have an additional reserve force of 200,000 people within a decade.
KATY LEE:
Wow.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah. So in order to reach those levels, they're currently running a huge recruitment drive, which does seem to be working quite effectively so far from what I've read. But in an interview with the general at the head of the German army with the BBC recently, he said that if their targets are not met, he will ask the German Parliament to legislate for conscription.
KATY LEE:
Can we talk about you for a second?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Must we?
KATY LEE:
Some listeners probably won't know this, especially hearing your very proper British accent. But you, Dominic, are a German citizen. You are a man and you are under the age of 45. This presumably affects you as well, even though you don't actually live in Germany, or does it?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, that's a good question. I actually don't really know the answer, to be honest. All I would say is that I don't think I'd be a great help to the army. I just want to put that on record.
KATY LEE:
Don't put yourself down.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
I've got terrible hand-eye coordination. I've got a heart rhythm problem. I don't even speak German. I mean, if there's a German army choir, maybe they could put me there.
KATY LEE:
Yeah, you could help keep morale up.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
I guess I could.
KATY LEE:
And make podcasts.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
But yeah, indeed, I think because I don't live in Germany, and I never have lived in Germany, I don't think I have to inform the army that I don't live in Germany. Let's go with that.
KATY LEE:
Sure.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
But if I did live in Germany and then wanted to move again, I guess at the moment I would contact the army to ask for their permission, which, yeah, it feels intense.
KATY LEE:
It's a strange thought. Yeah.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
On the other hand, there isn't conscription yet. And apparently not many people had noticed that this section of the Military Service Act had actually changed to being applicable during peacetime before the article came out. So maybe it's not so important.
KATY LEE:
Sure. Let's just say that laws that we write down on paper are not important now.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Thank you.
KATY LEE:
I mean, if pretty much nobody knew about this until this newspaper wrote about it, presumably very few people had been doing this and actually asking for approval since this law came in. Where did you say? A few months ago?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
At the beginning of January.
KATY LEE:
Right.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, I wanted to know that too. But the Ministry of Defence has not released any figures on how many German men have actually applied for this permission to be abroad long term. I imagine some have. According to various reports in the media, the Ministry of Defence is planning on releasing a clarification as to how this bit of the military law should be followed in practice. And it really sounds like they are going to ease the administrative burden. They said to Politico, ‘The Defence Ministry is currently developing detailed provisions to allow for exemptions from the approval requirement, also with a view to avoiding unnecessary bureaucracy.’ So, yeah, it sounds like maybe young men aren't actually going to have to ask for permission. But it also doesn't sound entirely clear and it's not clear when this update will come in. So for now, there is definitely confusion. And amidst that confusion, there's been a tonne of criticism from opposition politicians. As I already mentioned, the left conservative populist politician Sahra Wagenknecht said that the law was reminiscent of the GDR and Berlin Wall era.
And she actually called for Defence Minister Boris Pistorius to resign in light of this, quote, outrageous legislation. Desiree Becker from Die Linke Party told Ippen.media, the fact that Section 3 of the Military Service Act is now causing such a stir shows above all how poorly drafted this law is. She expresses astonishment that the law now is being clarified retrospectively and says that a clear and legally sound framework should have been in place from the outset.
KATY LEE:
Again, I'm gonna like take all of these criticisms with a pinch of salt.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
You're right. It is extraordinary that this bit of the law didn't receive more scrutiny from the media or politicians. Perhaps it's indicative of the current feeling of political chaos in Germany with the far right AfD party polling joint first at the moment with Chancellor Merz's Christian Democrats. Actually, it's been joint first since last summer. So maybe everyone's just a bit distracted.
KATY LEE:
It is quite disturbing to imagine that the fFD could theoretically come into power at some point in the next decade, just as the German army is really being beefed up.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, that feels like a pretty horrifying scenario, to be honest. But back to this military law. So this little amendment didn't get much scrutiny. But actually, the broader military law did get a lot of criticism when it was going through, especially amongst young people in Germany, because there are some other controversial parts of it. For example, Germany now has voluntary military service and all 18 year old men are required to fill in a questionnaire about whether or not they would be willing to join the military when they turn 18. And from July 2027, there will also be a medical examination to test the suitability of these young men. Because of these changes, there have been two big school strikes across Germany in December last year and last month in March in protest against the military service. Many of those striking think that the slide towards conscription feels pretty inevitable at the moment.
KATY LEE:
So clearly, young people in Germany feel pretty uneasy about the idea of potentially being forced to join the armed forces in some theoretical future. But what about like the broader population of people of all ages? Like, when you look at Germany as a whole, is there higher public support for conscription?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, I mean, you say young people are clearly nervous about it. I mean, some of them are, I don't think they all are. And recent surveys actually suggest that a small majority of Germans support the reintroduction of compulsory military service. And yeah, there's been a huge about turn that Germany's politicians have taken in recent years in wanting to suddenly expand military spending and Germany's military might. For a long time, Germany, like most of Europe, was happy to depend largely on the promise of defence via NATO using the heft of the US military as a deterrent against attacks. Unless you've been hiding under a rock, you probably have noticed that the defence help from the US is no longer looking very reliable for Europe.
KATY LEE:
Oh, man, lucky you if you've been under that rock.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, I wish I was. And if you've somehow ended up listening to this podcast, after coming out of that rock, yeah, welcome to...
KATY LEE:
Welcome back. It's terrible.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Welcome to a horrifying world. Yes. And yeah, I mean, this is all combined with Putin's huge increase in military spending in Russia, his brazen, unprovoked full scale invasion of Ukraine and his increasing threats against Europe, which all adds up to Europe looking quite vulnerable. There are, of course, many different opinions about what should be done in response to that vulnerability. But Germany has gone for rearmament, something that feels symbolically quite extraordinary considering that Germany's military caused so much destruction last century. But Chancellor Friedrich Merz is putting his political weight behind the growth of the military and also a huge amount of money. 95 billion euros were spent on German defence in 2025. And that is projected to go up to 162 billion euros in 2029.
KATY LEE:
Wowza.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Merz wants to build the most powerful conventional army in Europe. So yeah, that's some of the background behind this administrative rule. And yeah, the army say they will accept all requests for now. But is that going to continue being the case long term? The law is there because military leaders and politicians believe Germany may be in a position in the future where they will want to use this law and where they will maybe stop people going abroad.
KATY LEE:
Which is quite a disturbing thought. Which countries in Europe do currently already have some kind of mandatory military conscription?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, good question, because I actually was thinking about it. And there will be people listening to this bad week from many different countries with different military cultures and different rules around military service. For some people, it will be a total shock to even think about possible conscription. But I'm sure we have other listeners who live in countries where it's just totally normal and where listeners themselves did military service. So yeah, to answer your question, conscription is in place for nine European countries in NATO. They are Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Sweden and Turkey. And also in terms of non-NATO European countries, Switzerland, Austria and Cyprus also have compulsory military service. The rules between the types of conscription and the ages that are required vary from country to country. Most are only for men, but not all. Interestingly, the German constitution actually forbids Germany from introducing obligatory military service for women. So German women, you seem like you're gonna be okay.
KATY LEE:
I mean, I'm sort of like, as a woman, like, oh, phew, but also like, does that maybe need updating in 2026? If we're updating other stuff?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah…
KATY LEE:
It's just a question.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Good question. It's also worth stressing that the thing that's extraordinary about this policy is that it's in place during peacetime, because listeners will probably also know that Ukraine has had strict exit restrictions for men since the war broke out in 2022. But yeah, that is a wartime emergency policy, which is quite a different thing to this case. The German establishment might fear having their army drawn into an active conflict, but that is not the case now. So yeah, I'm giving Bad Week to young German men who found out about this travel policy last week, and are probably still a bit confused.
KATY LEE:
But it's a good week for – what was the newspaper that discovered this?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
The Frankfurter Rundschau.
KATY LEE:
Good for you guys. Doing proper journalism over there.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Great work.
[MUSIC]
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Hello, Dominic here. I'm just interrupting the show for a second to tell you that this was recorded a few hours before Germany's Minister of Defence, Boris Pistorius, announced that they are indeed suspending the requirement for young men to inform the military about long travel, during peacetime anyway. So maybe it's a good week for young German men after all. Definitely a messy week for Boris Pistorius though. Back to the show.
[MUSIC]
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Who has had a good week, Katy?
KATY LEE:
I am giving my Good Week to French-speaking Belgians, specifically French-speaking Belgians who work in film and television. So it's quite a specific group. But hear me out. I think this speaks to bigger things that have been going on in the entertainment industry. There's been this interesting court ruling in Belgium's constitutional court. Basically, Netflix challenged some local rules that force the streaming giant to invest some of the money that it makes out of selling subscriptions in the French-speaking part of Belgium back into the film and TV industry, basically to fund the production of local content. And Netflix lost this ruling in the constitutional court. So they've just been told, nope, you do have to actually pay to fund TV and film production in this region. Like, this is a completely legit thing for them to ask you to do. I'll tell you right now that this is not the end of the story. Bits of this law are now going to be challenged in the EU Court of Justice, although there's not even going to be a preliminary hearing in that court until at least June. But for now, we can say that the francophone Belgian film and TV producers are in the lead. Netflix will not have been very happy about this ruling.
By the way, it has been a doubly bad week for Netflix in Europe because an Italian court has also just ruled in a completely separate case that years of price hikes by Netflix in Italy were illegal. And it's going to need to reimburse millions of customers. Some people would need to be refunded up to 500 euros each. So just imagine that times, I don't know, many, many people. So this is going to be hugely expensive for Netflix, but they are appealing it. So that story is far from over, and I figured I would focus on this Belgian case this week.
What is it all about? Well, a few times over the years, we have talked on this podcast about some rules that were brought in in 2018, under which streaming platforms like Netflix and Disney Plus, 30% of what they offer to their European customers has to be European content, 30% of the content that we see when we scroll down the screen. Does that ring any bells? Do you remember talking about this?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yes, and it's actually one of my favourite bits of European regulation. I just think it's really brilliant. So creative. And from what I know, like it's been pretty amazing for the European TV and film industry.
KATY LEE:
Yeah.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
I know quite a lot of actors here in the Netherlands. And quite a lot of them have got a lot of work for like series produced by Prime or series produced by Netflix that I'm sure wouldn't just never have existed otherwise.
KATY LEE:
I mean, that's the interesting question, right? Back in 2018, this was hailed as a really pretty bold move by the EU. It was going up against the world's most powerful entertainment companies, and asking them to probably change their production plans in major ways. And these new rules came in at a time when streaming had really upended the global TV and film industry. So many people were just, you know, not going out to the cinema anymore. Everything was changing. Companies like Netflix were making so much money from Europeans like you and I, who spend way too much time watching television. And up until now, there's been really nothing to stop these giants from taking all of this money back to the US and investing it there, maybe making nothing but American TV shows.
So we could have ended up in a world where even more than we already do, we could all just be watching more and more US TV shows all the time. All the while, less and less money would be going into the production of local shows in our own languages, because all of the money in this industry would be going to the US streaming giants. So that was the fear.
In comes this delightful piece of EU legislation called the Audiovisual Media Services Directive. That law gets passed in 2018. It comes into force in 2020. And this EU law does two things. One of them is indeed that it forces Netflix and the other streaming platforms to offer us as European customers a minimum of 30% European content. So when we log in, theoretically, if we scroll the entire catalogue looking for something to watch, 30% of what passes in front of our eyeballs should have been made in Europe and be in European languages.
The other thing this law does, and this is the important bit, so pay attention, is that this law says that foreign streaming services have to invest a certain percentage of the revenues that it gets from selling subscriptions in EU countries into the production of local content. But, but, but, but, the law also says that it will be up to individual EU countries to decide how much money they want and how they're going to do this.
Now, not every EU country has actually gone ahead and introduced this kind of rule, but they can. And as far as I can work out, I think 16 countries have so far told Netflix and the other streaming platforms what percentage of local revenues they expect to see invested in local TV and film productions. So it's not every country in the EU, but it is most of them.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
What a vague wording in the legislation.
KATY LEE:
Just sort it out, will you?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
I guess it means that in the end, not every country is asking for the same percentage.
KATY LEE:
No.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
But for the countries that have come up with rules about this, roughly how much money are we talking about here?
KATY LEE:
I mean, it really depends on the country. Several European countries have been quite relaxed about this. They haven't forced Netflix and the other platforms to invest that much money raised locally in producing local content. In the Netherlands, where you are, for example, Dominic, it is 5% of the money that they raise from Dutch subscribers. Not that much. 5% of the money that they get from Dutch subscribers has to be invested in making Dutch content. In France, where I am, 20 to 25% of the revenues have to be invested in making French slash European content. So it's a way higher percentage, but they're quite relaxed about some of it being produced in Italy or Estonia, as well as France.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
That's very kind of them.
KATY LEE:
It is. We're very culturally confident about how much of that money probably is going to end up being spent making French stuff.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Arrogant, you could say. And how much of it is in Belgium, where this court case has been taking place?
So here is where the story interacts with the messiness of Belgian politics in a fun way. As you may remember, Belgium is split into three linguistic communities, which have power over some policy areas, including culture. They are the French speaking community, the Flemish community, and the German speaking community.
In Flemish speaking Belgium, Netflix has to invest between 2% and 4% of its revenues in local content production. So not very much at all. Just next door, in French speaking Belgium, it is in the process of going up.
And as of next year, the streamers are going to have to invest up to 9.5% of the that it earns in this territory into making specifically francophone Belgian content.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Which presumably Netflix is not very happy about.
KATY LEE:
They're not very happy about it, no. And in fact, they are so unhappy about it that they have taken this issue to court with the support of Disney. They have complained that the amount of money that French speaking Belgium is demanding, they're saying that that is more than double the amount required by most European countries. I mean, what do you think? Do you think this is unreasonable of the francophone Belgians to demand that 9.5% gets invested in local TV and films?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Don't make me the arbiter of whether or not this is fair. I have absolutely no idea.
KATY LEE:
Judge Dominic.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
I do listen to that American entertainment podcast, The Town, quite often. But yeah, I wish I had a hot take. And it's like, yes, it definitely is. But no, I have no idea.
KATY LEE:
I mean, I don't think it seems like that much. Again, as somebody that knows nothing about anything, this is a small territory with a small TV production and film industry. Only 4.6 million people live in the area covered by Belgium's French-speaking community, which is about 1% of the total EU population. But you could argue, and the territory has been arguing, that the smallness of this territory has made it more vulnerable to the global forces that have been sweeping film and TV production due to the rise of streaming. That an industry of this size needs more protection. Especially when you think about the fact that French-speaking Belgium has a massive neighbour that speaks the same language, aka France. And you know, that's always going to be culturally dominant. A lot of people within francophone Belgium are going to end up consuming a lot of content produced in France.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Makes sense.
KATY LEE:
So I don't think it's that unreasonable to demand that up to 9.5% of local revenues get invested there. Especially when you think about the fact that this content can also be exported. You know, French is the fourth most spoken language in the world. Netflix can very easily make good shows in francophone Belgium that can then be watched in Quebec and in Africa. And yes, next door in France, why not? The other thing that's worth pointing out is that I said they needed to spend up to 9.5% by next year.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Oh, up to. Is that doing a lot of heavy lifting, the ‘up to’?
KATY LEE:
I mean, it really is. So the actual figure is between 2% and 9.5% depending on how much Netflix or whatever streaming platform actually earns in French speaking Belgium. So if they earn less than 10 million euros a year selling their TV subscriptions, they only have to spend 2% of their revenues on making local content. But if they earn more than 150 million a year in this region, then they have to spend 9.5% as of next year. It's a sliding scale. And there was a detailed piece about this on the website Screen Daily, quoting local industry people as saying that Netflix and Disney don't actually make anything like 150 million euros a year from subscribers in francophone Belgium.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Oh, but then if they don't make anything like that amount of money, why bother taking this to court?
KATY LEE:
It's a really good question. This piece in Screen Daily argued that Netflix and Disney might be trying to show in the Belgian courts that this is disproportionate, so that they've got some kind of legal precedent maybe for challenging this kind of legislation elsewhere or in Europe as a whole. And this is probably a good time to tell you that this law, the Audiovisual Media Services Directive, it is currently up for review.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Oh, no.
KATY LEE:
Well, not necessarily. But it does mean that the European Commission is currently looking at this law and saying, is it working the way that it should be? Maybe there should be some tweaks. So if you wanted to be cynical, you could suggest that it is a great time for Netflix to be lobbying the EU. And even if they lost this court case in Belgium, as they did, and the Belgian courts have essentially argued that Netflix is wrong, and they have to keep paying to fund francophone Belgian productions, this court case is a form of lobbying. It is an opportunity for Netflix to argue publicly and at length that this law is hindering it from developing its business in Europe.
One of the things that Netflix has been complaining about is that having to deal with different percentages and different rules, different countries, is really confusing and tedious. And arguably, it goes against what the EU is supposed to be about, which is having a single market with unified rules. I do kind of think that's a good point.
And reportedly, there are some people within the European Commission that think that maybe this whole idea of individual countries being able to set their own rules on this, maybe it wasn't the best idea ever. So it wouldn't be a total surprise if the Commission recommended scrapping or changing that percentage system altogether. They're due to report back on how they think this law is doing, how effective it is, by the end of this year.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Okay, I've already like expressed my bias in like actively liking this regulation. Apologies for that. But I do see that there could definitely be improvements. But I'm scared. Does it mean they're also going to get rid of the idea that 30% of the content we get shown on Netflix has to be European?
KATY LEE:
I mean, I guess they could, but I don't think they would. Famous last words. Don't get me wrong. As you say, this is clearly not a perfect piece of legislation. And another thing that a lot of critics have pointed out is that saying, okay, Netflix, you have to produce 30% of your content here, that incentivises them to produce a bunch of cheap crap, like reality television, just to reach the 30% quota so that they can stop thinking about it. You will also find lots of people in the industry arguing that really the main threat to the TV and film industry isn't coming from streaming platforms like Netflix anymore. It's coming from YouTube. People are watching an absolute ton of the stuff.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, right. I saw a French TV executive arguing exactly that in Politico just the other day.
KATY LEE:Yeah, and there are quite a lot of analysts suggesting that when the law does get reviewed, it might include obligations on YouTube and TikTok to also invest a certain percentage of their revenues in funding content production here in Europe. Watch this space. Anyway, broadly, even as it stands, this piece of legislation, as you said, Dominic, it is seen by the industry as something that has brought vital funding for getting stuff made. According to Netflix's own figures, it invested more than 6.5 billion euros in producing European TV and films between 2020 and 2023 alone. That is a big wadge of cash. But if you're a small territory like francophone Belgium, you might not be so interested in the big sums that Netflix is spending in Europe overall. If loads of it is going to the biggest countries like France and Germany, you want a slice of that money to come to you. And actually, there is quite strong evidence that this whole idea of being able to force the streaming giants to spend a small percentage specifically in your country, it really does work. I saw that France's Centre National du Cinéma, it was citing a study that found that countries that brought in these individual national obligations, they saw a 140% increase in scripted commissions between 2020 and 2024. And just for comparison, in countries that didn't have these obligations, the commissions went up just 1%. So clearly, forcing Netflix to produce stuff in your country, it really does work. And it has now been confirmed by Belgium's Constitutional Court that it is totally reasonable, as the law stands, to ask Netflix to do that.
Before I go, it would be remiss of me not to suggest a couple of things from francophone Belgium that people might want to stream on Netflix. The first is one that I watched a few years ago, Angèle. It is a documentary about the Belgian pop star, Angèle, which I'm pretty sure I recommended on this podcast at the time.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
You did. I remember it, yeah.
KATY LEE:
I did. Okay. It's just a great look at where she comes from. And another show that I haven't seen, but it does have decent reviews: if you like sci-fi, you might want to try the Belgian Netflix show Into the Night. It's got a plane hijacking in it. It has got weird space stuff going on. And apparently, it was inspired by a Polish novel. So it is doubly European.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Sounds great. And before we go, can I mention one French-Belgian thing that I enjoyed recently?
KATY LEE:
Do it.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Close. Have you heard about it?
KATY LEE:
No, tell me.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
It's a film by Lukas Dhont, who also made the big hit film Girl a few years ago. And it's about a friendship between two 13-year-old boys at school. And I won't say any more because it's good if you don't know anything about it. But it's so moving. It made me cry a lot.
KATY LEE:
Oh, I can't wait to watch that.
[MUSIC]
KATY LEE:
After all of that talk about how badly the TV and film industry need funding to keep making stuff we love, would it surprise you to know that the same is even more true in podcasting? About 10 years ago, there was a tonne of venture capital money pouring into narrative podcasting. Loads of philanthropic money, too, actually. All of that money is gone. And what are we left with? A wasteland populated by celebrity interview podcasts. It is cheap. It is easy. It requires basically no research or resources, which is why, sadly, it is basically the only type of podcast that media companies seem to want to invest in at the moment.
How depressing. Despite this miserable state of affairs, there is a plucky little independent podcast about Europe that has managed to survive in this harsh landscape, despite not being a celebrity interview podcast, despite being really carefully researched and beautifully produced each week.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
If you say so yourself, you are producing this episode.
KATY LEE:
I am. See what you think of my editing, listeners. The only reason that we're still here is because of listeners who see the value of what we're doing and see how easily it could disappear if they don't help us to cover the costs of what we do each week. So if you would like to see the European survive until its 10th birthday next year, we would love it if you would consider signing up to send a little bit of money our way each month. For seven euros a month, we will send you an almost illegible handwritten postcard from Paris or Amsterdam. And for 12 euros a month, you'll get an unhinged voice memo from Dominic and me. Does that sound good?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
What more could you want? Huge thanks to our latest Patreon supporters. They are Thomas, Darren, Gavin, MKG, Mark, CP, Molly, Julie and Richard. Thank you all so much. And if you might be able to join them, then please head to patreon.com/europeanspodcast.
[MUSIC/AD]
KATY LEE:
It's interview time. And today we are asking, where are the Zohran Mamdanis of Europe? Zohran Mamdani, of course, being the charismatic, media-savvy 34-year-old who rocketed to political stardom from basically being an unknown to becoming mayor of New York last November. And he did that while unabashedly promoting leftwing ideas, which is something that feels, yeah, quite refreshing in a political moment where internationally, the left doesn't really feel like it's had that much mojo of late. I think it's fair to say that you Dominic have been a little bit obsessed lately with this question of who might be the closest equivalent to a European Zohran Mamdani. Why have you been so consumed by this question?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, well, as I think I've admitted before on this show, I am a bit of a US political junkie.
KATY LEE:
You have a problem.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, I'm definitely doing better than I used to do. I think I only listened to about one American political podcast a week, whereas I used to listen to about three a day. Lately, I've just realised it's felt healthier to take some space from the toxic political world over there. But I did really get drawn into the New York mayoral race last year, which in itself is perhaps strange. Yes, I do love politics, but I don't get drawn into every large European city mayoral race. Honestly, I was hardly even aware that there was a mayoral election in Paris before you announced the results on the podcast. When was it two weeks ago?
KATY LEE:
Yeah, fair enough.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Anyway, all that is to say, I found myself wondering why I found this race so fascinating. And I also found myself thinking maybe it's because of the figure of Mamdani, of what he represented.
And I wanted to know why we don't have political figures like Mamdani, like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in Europe, another young left-wing politician who has a massive following in the US. Or maybe we do, and I've just not heard of them. So I actually asked people a few weeks ago on our social media channels and on this show to write in and tell us who the most Mamdani-like politician is in their country, by which we mean politicians that are unafraid to look left-wing, they are charismatic and building support around their personality, that are killing it on social media. And yeah, I was amazed by how few of these politicians that got sent in I'd heard of.
KATY LEE:
Yeah, me too. There were loads of names from all corners of Europe that I hadn't heard of.
Why is that? Like, why is it that the biggest far-right politicians like Marine Le Pen are internationally famous, but I've never heard of politicians on the left that people have been writing in to tell us about over the last couple of weeks? People like Heidi Reichinnek in Germany, or Li Andersson in Finland?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, I mean, honestly, I thought maybe Zack Polanski, the new charismatic and social media-savvy leader of the Green Party in the UK, might be the closest to a Mamdani we have in Europe. But as you'll hear in the upcoming interview, Dave points out that most people have probably not heard of him outside of the UK.
KATY LEE:
Spoiler alert. Yeah, we thought of the perfect person to help us answer the question of why it is so hard for this kind of political figure, bold, charismatic, unabashedly left-wing, to emerge in Europe as someone who can break out beyond national politics. This guest is someone whose perspective conveniently straddles both sides of the Atlantic. He holds US, Belgian and Italian nationality. As a journalist, he covered US politics earlier in his career, but he spent the last 16 years covering the European political scene. It is Dave Keating.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
It's a great conversation, and definitely one that will wake you up if you're listening to this first thing in the morning. After the interview, we'll be talking through a few of the candidates who have been pitched to us for being European and Mamdani-esque. So keep listening after the interview. But for now, here's Dave in Brussels.
[MUSIC]
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Dave, thank you so much for joining us today on The Europeans. Great to have you here finally.
DAVE KEATING:
Yes, it's good to be here. We've talked about it a bit in the past, so it's great to finally make an appearance.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Now we'll get to talking about some of the politicians who most closely mirror the Zohran Mamdani or Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez brand of left-wing politics a bit later on. But first, I wanted to ask more broadly about the European political landscape. Do you think there's something in our way of doing politics in Europe that prevents these bold, progressive figures from emerging or being celebrated?
DAVE KEATING:
Unfortunately, the reality is that we have a European system that works against the emergence of a bold, charismatic leader like Zhoran Mamdani. It's a topic I write about in my new book, The Owned Continent. In fact, I specifically talk about why European media had wall-to-wall coverage of Mamdani and the New York City mayoral race, and it's impossible to even conceive of that happening for a mayoral race in Paris, in Berlin, in London, etc.
I mean, the problem is we are working with a fundamentally broken European Union whose structures do not allow for strong politicians to rise, and the reason for that is the European Council. That is the upper chamber of the EU's legislature. It is something like the US Senate in the United States or, more aptly, the Bundesrat in Germany, made up of representatives of each of the member states.
This is the most powerful institution in the EU, and yet most European citizens have never heard of it. They have no idea how it works. They don't know that their national governments take decisions in that council.
The reason why we don't and under the current system couldn't have a figure like Zohran Mamdani on a Europe-wide scale is because the Council dominates the workings of the EU, and the Council is made up of national governments who actively block the EU from having more pan-European politics, developing a pan-European political space. For instance, the European Commission president is appointed by the leaders in the European Council, and they have an interest in appointing somebody weak who will not challenge them. They would never appoint Zohran Mamdani, because Zohran Mamdani would challenge their authority.
That's why they pick people like Ursula von der Leyen, the current European Commission president, now serving her second term because member states are perfectly happy with her very weak leadership and her inability to take on the member states. Then, separately, we have the cultural problem, which is that Europeans themselves don't know anything about how the European Union works. Why?
Because their education systems don't teach even basic civics about their confederal level of government, and the media ignores EU politics. So how could you get Zohran Mamdani on the pan-European stage when the citizens don't even know what the pan-European stage is, and the media would never cover someone like that? We have people like that here in Europe who have that kind of charisma, who have that kind of strength, who have that type of vision, but the system discourages that type of figure from emerging in Europe.
KATY LEE:
So you're talking about why we don't have any Mamdanis on the EU-wide level, and you're right, we don't see that kind of charisma. Although occasionally I'll see a clip on Instagram of an MEP talking, and I'll be like, oh, who is this person? And also, why have I never heard of you before?
DAVE KEATING:
Exactly.
KATY LEE:
But even domestically, it feels like we don't have that many Mamdani type figures. And I do wonder, I mean, Europe's political systems often rely on proportional representation, right? We have parties that get a share of seats in parliament nationally that are roughly equal to the percentage of the vote they got. That can lead to loads of little parties being present in a parliament rather than two dominant parties like you have in the US. And therefore, in Europe, we see lots of coalition governments and lots of compromise. Do you think that kind of culture of compromise maybe discourages the rise of charismatic, bold leaders who might thrive in a winner-takes-all system like the US?
DAVE KEATING:
Yeah, I mean, I think in presidential systems, you are more likely to have those characters, because when you have a president directly elected by the people rather than selected by MPs in the parliament, you are more likely to have personality-driven politics. That's a double-edged sword, as we've seen in the United States and other places in mostly the Western Hemisphere that have presidential systems rather than parliamentary systems that can work both ways. It can also be a bad thing.
When you have MPs that are kind of nameless in a parliamentary system, who are only there to provide the numbers to vote for the prime minister, to be whipped into votes that the government is instructing them to whip for, it's very hard to emerge. Usually, a figure like that emerges by becoming a minister in the cabinet in a parliamentary system. Also, most European countries are not federal like the United States, so they don't have these strong positions locally. It's structurally hard, I think, when you're in a unitary state parliamentary democracy to have these names stand out.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
The thing I find weird about this conversation is there are politicians on the right who have managed to successfully cultivate cults of personality in Europe. Figures like Giorgia Meloni, Geert Wilders, Jordan Bardella. Why do you think it is that this personality-focused approach has been working for the European politicians on the right, but not so much for politicians on the left?
DAVE KEATING:
I think, for one thing, it's easier to distil simple messages for an audience on the right, because the far right tends to have messages that are appealing to emotions. But then we have to ask, well, why isn't the far left having so many of these figures? Part of that is that the left, in general, has been out of power in Europe for two decades. I mean, the European Union has been governed by the centre-right since 2004, and that has shifted the entire European political spectrum to the right. So I think part of it is that the left just doesn't have oxygen in general, whether it's the centre-left or the far left. They have been out of power in Europe for so long.
Now, obviously, a big exception to that at the moment is Pedro Sánchez in Spain, the prime minister, who is having a real personality-politics-driven rise at the moment, both domestically and, more importantly, in Europe, because he's been the only European leader willing to consistently speak out against Donald Trump. He opposed the invasion of Venezuela, he opposed the first bombing of Iran, and he came out immediately out of the gate, opposing this Iran war that we're currently in. His fuel is this kind of leftist populist message, and he's really succeeding.
So there's a big debate happening right now on the left about how to emulate that, how to harness that. But yeah, the reason I think that we haven't seen so many figures on the left is because the left has generally been out of power for so long here in Europe.
KATY LEE:
And we've talked a little bit about the media's role in all of this, but I mean, do you think there is a role to play here for the media in not helping those kind of figures to thrive? I mean, in the US, you see figures like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez or Bernie Sanders being amplified by these media systems that thrive on personality-driven politics. Is it simply that we don't have that over here?
DAVE KEATING:
Well, we don't have pan-European media, so any figure like that is going to be limited to national borders. What's interesting is that these far-right figures like Orbán, Le Pen, Meloni, they've been amplified by this far-right international that's been developing with the help of the far-right in the United States that's been spreading these names across borders. But the left doesn't have the same international movement that the far-right has developed.
So you're getting, I mean, you get coverage of Marine Le Pen in German media, but you don't get much coverage of Jean-Luc Mélenchon. The coverage of him, the mentions of are really limited to domestic press, and I would venture to guess that the vast majority of Germans have never heard of him. I would guess 95% of Germans have never heard of Mélenchon, but they've all heard of Marine Le Pen.
And there's a reason for that, because the far-right has been very successful at amplifying their individual national success stories across borders. Because we don't have a pan-European media, we're still getting media that's just looking in silos nationally. And so then you don't have the opportunity for these national, let's say a national Mamdani figure, particularly if they're from a small country.
I mean, let's say you had someone with the charisma and talent and courage and strength of Mamdani who was from Croatia. How is that person going to amplify themselves on a European level? If they were far-right, they could. But if they're far-left, they can't get that oxygen in the national press in Europe, and there is no European press to cover them.
DAVE KEATING:
Yeah, I mean, I don't really want to believe you. I'd like to think that you're wrong, partly because I feel so many people consume their news on social media these days. So I do feel like if there was someone really talented on the left in Croatia, we might hear about them via social media.
I mean, I know lots of my friends here in the Netherlands have heard about Zack Polanski, for example, in the UK, who seems to be kind of uniquely at the moment, one of these Mamdani style figures who's emerging not in the European Union, but just outside. Don't you think there's a chance that as we consume more and more of our news on social media, there might be more of these figures that do emerge on the left?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
It could be. I mean, you're right that so many, especially young people are consuming their news on social media. That is, as I write in the book, an American platform. I mean, they're mostly getting news about America. So that's why they know about AOC and Mamdani is because social media, be it TikTok or Instagram or Facebook, it doesn't even matter who owns it. It is dominated by American news and American culture wars.
So it's hard for European figures to sneak in there, but they do occasionally. Polanski, I think you're talking to some very hyper-connected people in the Netherlands, because I guarantee you if I walked out on the street right now and asked who is Zack Polanski, nobody would know, even here in Brussels. So I think that it's very hard for these figures to rise above the American noise on these social media platforms.
And it can happen. I think there are some figures, but the fact is most of the Mamdani types that young people in Europe know about because of social media are American politicians like Mamdani.
KATY LEE:
But we have nonetheless talked a little bit about Pedro Sánchez. We've talked about Zack Polanski. Is there anybody else that you've kind of caught your eye on who has that kind of charisma, who you think if the conditions were there, if it wasn't so hard to break through, this person would have a shot of being a kind of European Mamdani?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, there are. You mentioned that every once in a while you stumble upon a speech by an MEP in the parliament and you think this person's got it. The problem is they're in the parliament and the parliament is the least powerful of the EU institutions. And it is really hard to get media attention. I mean, one example I can think of is Reinier van Lanschot, who's from the Netherlands. He's from the Volt party, which is the very first pan-European party.
They have a bunch of MEPs from Germany and the Netherlands. It's a growing party. I would urge people to get to know it. He's extremely good, extremely strong. He gives great speeches. We would be blessed to have someone like him as the president of the European Commission. But because he's from Volt, under our current system, that could never happen.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
So up until now, we've been talking about the problems, the barriers for a charismatic left-wing politician to emerge in Europe. But couldn't we also look at it from the other side, that perhaps the fact that these charismatic figures don't emerge is a sign that we have a more collective, less personality-driven approach to politics. And that's not entirely a bad thing.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
I used to say that, actually. 10 years ago, when I would go back to the U.S., and people would ask me, why do you like Europe so much? Why do you have such faith in Europe and not in the United States? That's one of the answers I would give, that Europe's strength was its absence of personality-driven politics. I've changed my mind on that because of recent developments. I mean, we cannot hope to combat far-right, personality-driven politics being amplified by the United States, with this consensus-driven model where parliamentary democracies work on consensus. It's not working. It's very, very clearly not working. The problem is Europe isn't an island. Europe is a protectorate of the United States. And when the United States has gone in this direction of personality-driven, far-right politics, then the existing system in Europe doesn't work anymore. Maybe if Europe was its own sovereign entity, and strong and independent, and wasn't so vulnerable to these waves coming from the Atlantic, we could stick with a system which I think otherwise was working pretty well until recently. But unfortunately, that era has passed.
We need strong politicians to save Europe, because we are desperate. Europe is fucked, to use another word. I mean, Europe right now, the way the EU is structured, does not have the tools to be able to fight this American aggression, because it was built with American support and with American dominance.
So we need a strong leader to make the people of Europe rise up and free this continent from its chains. And we're not going to do that through parliamentary consensus.
[MUSIC]
KATY LEE:
Wow, Dave is not someone who pulses punches, is he? I don't mind, to be honest. I kind of enjoyed the wake-up call.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, I think Dave is good at saying things that people don't want to hear, but probably should.
KATY LEE:
A very refreshing conversation. So thank you for that, Dave. Before we move on, we wanted to share with you a few of the politicians that people flagged up as being the closest approximations that their country has to a Zohran Mamdani type figure. And yeah, those are different names came in, didn't they?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, thank you everyone for your input. I thought I'd start by saying that quite a few people sent in names of centrist politicians who they think fits the mould, apart from being centrist. So people like Rob Jetten, the new Dutch Prime Minister. He's young, gay, good on social media.
Some mentioned France's President Emmanuel Macron. Don't know if you've heard of him.
KATY LEE:
Oh yeah, that guy.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
One listener wrote of him, he's the perfect could-be-your-neighbour anti-establishment man, and he's very much online.
KATY LEE:
What an awful neighbour he would be.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Probably. And there were also some mentions of President of Finland and former guest of this show, Alexander Stubb. Now I get why these people were all suggested. They're all very successful and have something a bit of the kind of anti-establishment approachable person to them, but they weren't quite what we were looking for.
We're really looking for the politicians of the left. Someone who is interesting is a politician from Poland that was suggested by Szymon on Mastodon, Adrian Zandberg. He was also someone put forward by our own producer in Warsaw, Wojciech, actually.
Wojciech said he's a great talker. He's also someone who grew up in Denmark and maybe brings a more Scandinavian instinct for long-term thinking and consensus across divides. Both Wojciech and Szymon pointed out that this is a politician whose party has 5% of the national vote.
So yeah, he's missing the key popularity thing and is probably not someone who's going to be running Poland anytime soon.
KATY LEE:
Yeah, he doesn't quite have that insurgent, on-the-cusp-of-victory type vibe to him, does he?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
No.
KATY LEE:
One politician who I didn't see flagged up by any of our listeners but who I wanted to mention is Marine Tondelier. She is the leader of the French Greens. And again, not necessarily someone who has a massive following right now, but I do think she's really someone to watch. We already got a taste of her burgeoning star quality, I would argue, in the 2024 French national elections.
She was a new party leader at that point. But yeah, those elections familiarised us with her gimmick, which is wearing a green jacket all the time. It's good to have like a trademark item, I think. But yeah, listen to her talk in those elections. It was like, oh, this is someone who knows how to talk in a way that is clippable for social media.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Interesting.
KATY LEE:
A bit like Jordan Bardella does in the French far right. Anyway, she recently announced that she's going to be running for the French presidency next year. And she has also just announced that she is pregnant with her first child.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Oh, congratulations, Marine.
KATY LEE:
Yeah, she talked very movingly, actually, about her struggles with fertility and going through miscarriages and IVF. As someone who has also had a miscarriage, like to hear a politician talk about that, I found that very moving. So yeah, I think she's really going to be someone to watch over the next year. Will she break through and become like someone who sneaks their way onto people's Instagram feeds in other countries during inspiring speeches on the campaign trail with this tiny little baby? I do not know. But I am very intrigued to find out.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, I mean, it worked for Jacinda Ardern in New Zealand. But again, there's this language thing. Maybe me as an Anglophone Instagram user, I hear more about the leader of New Zealand than I would about an inspiring politician in France, which is strange.
KATY LEE:
Yeah, but I'm quite relaxed about that. I mean, how many young people do you know who actually listen to Instagram reels with the sound on? They're all watching stuff subtitled. I think this stuff could cross borders.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
That's very true. Anyway, there were tons of other suggestions. Of course, lots of people mentioning the aforementioned Zack Polanski of the UK's Green Party. There's a really interesting interview with him on BBC's Political Thinking podcast from a few weeks ago that you should go and listen to if you want to find out more about him. Full disclosure, my brother produces that podcast, although he didn't actually produce that episode because he's on paternity leave. So that's okay to recommend, right?
KATY LEE:
Sure it is.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Anyway, yeah, you also mentioned Li Andersson, a Finnish MEP who seems to draw support from outside her party's traditional voter base, according to Pekko, who emailed us from Helsinki. A few Romanians wrote in to talk about Nicu Ștefănuță, but he apparently has become more and more controversial with his takes lately. Anyway, we're going to be putting out more on this topic on our Instagram account. So head to @europeanspodcast to find out a bit more about some of the almost, but not quite, Mamdanis of Europe.
[MUSIC]
KATY LEE:
Time to head to the Inspiration Station. What have you got to recommend for us this week?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Well, this is a bit of a silly recommendation, but I felt like this week, with all the horrors of the world, something silly might be appreciated.
KATY LEE:
Yes, please.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
This is something that's been making me smile a lot recently. The absolutely charming viral videos that have been emerging after each of Swedish pop superstar Zara Larsson's gigs over the past weeks and months.
KATY LEE:
Oh, yeah? I don’t know about this. I've seen that she's been on tour, but I don't know about these videos.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, so you probably are aware of her, like, biggest hit, Lush Life. Do you know it?
KATY LEE:
No, I'm too old.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Okay, well, it came out in 2015. But it's having a bit of a resurgence now, because when she performs on her tour, she invites a member of the audience up onto the stage to do the dance with her. And it's got this really infectious choreography. And she then gives them a t-shirt and it's all really fun. And there are differing standards of being able to dance or not. But some of them are amazing. And everyone just goes for it. And it's really charming, uplifting, and often like quite moving as well. Anyway, I've spent far too much time watching all these videos. But you'll be happy to hear that there is someone who has kindly made a compilation of all the different members of the public dancing along to this summer banger that Larsson released back in 2015, but still feels fresh. So I will share that compilation in the show notes. Zara Larsson is currently touring around the States, but the trend actually started in Europe, and she will be back in Europe over the summer. So go get your tickets if you can, and maybe even learn the dance so that you can get up there on stage and become a viral sensation.
KATY LEE:
Oh my god, that is my worst nightmare.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
But it's also my worst nightmare, to be honest.
KATY LEE:
You're quite good at dancing, though. I think you could give it a go.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
I once got forced by some drag queens to like lip sync in a gay bar to a song I didn't know. And it really was a nightmare. But I did win.
KATY LEE:
What? It's your natural charisma shining through.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Thank you.
KATY LEE:
Maybe you're the Mamdani of Europe.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Maybe I am. Anyway, what have you been enjoying this week?
KATY LEE:
I am still working my way through Drops of God, so I haven't actually got anything new to recommend this week, I'm afraid. But I do have a great recommendation to share from listener Monika, who recently read and loved the book Summer Fishing in Lapland by the Finnish writer Juhani Karila. Apparently the book might also be called Fishing for the Little Pike, depending on what edition you get. But Monica says the book is about a young woman named Elina who returns to her village in very remote East Lapland to catch a very specific fish.
Why must she catch this fish? We soon find out that her life depends on it. Apparently this book is part of a strain of the kind of broader magical realism genre that has been dubbed ‘Finnish weird’, which I love. I have never heard of the sub-genre. Monica writes the name of Finnish weird really fits, but this one is weird in a heartwarming way. It is packed full of Finnish folklore and nature.
Monika said that she read the excellent Polish translation of this book by Sebastian Musielak. If you're reading it in English, you will be reading the work of translator Lola Rogers. I really like the sound of this book. I think I need some Finnish weird in my life.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Sounds very charming and weird.
[MUSIC]
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
For my happy ending, I want to tell you a story about a 13-year-old Portuguese boy who turned a piece of misfortune into something truly good and newsworthy.
13-year-old Francisco Borges broke his leg in two places and was bedridden. But instead of sitting in bed being miserable and bored, he set himself a challenge. During his recovery period, he decided to read 10 books a day.
KATY LEE:
A day?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yes.
KATY LEE:
What is this boy eating that's giving him the power to read all these books?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yeah, well, if I'm totally honest with you, I don't think he was reading like incredibly long novels like Les Miserables or Middlemarch. He actually recommended the originally Italian written books, the Geronimo Stilton series for kids. They were definitely part of his 10 a day.
Anyway, this reading challenge led to Francisco becoming a bit of a star in Portugal, the kind of star that inspires other children to read. He hasn't kept up the 10 books a day since recovering, but he still does average about five books a week. And now he doesn't have a mobile phone yet. That does seem to help. Maybe we should also chuck our mobile phones out and then we'll be reading a bit more.
KATY LEE:
But then how would we scroll our US political content?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
That's true. And how would we feed all our Instagram followers all the content they want about languages? Anyway, he has graduated from mainly children's novels to some more adult classics, including books by Agatha Christie and Charles Dickens. And he's become a real ambassador for the joy of reading. He's going to multiple schools to give talks about how kids can catch the reading bug. And yeah, I read quite a cheering statistic in a news report in Euronews that reading levels aren't as terrible as you might have thought amongst young people in Portugal. A recent study suggested that three in four people aged 15 to 24 in Portugal had read at least one book in 2024. Hopefully with Francisco's help, that number will rise. Thank you to Ne on Instagram for sharing this happy story with us.
KATY LEE:
What a lovely story.
[MUSIC]
KATY LEE:
That is it for this week. A little bird tells me that I'm being replaced next week. What's going on?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
You are. Everyone's favourite Luxembourger Nina Lamparski is going to be back in the co-hosting seat. I will miss you, but I'm happy to have Nina back. And yeah, I'm sure we'll at least in passing be talking about whatever happens in the Hungarian elections that are taking place this weekend.
KATY LEE:
And if you haven't heard it already, our special episode from two weeks ago, is it now?
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Yes.
KATY LEE:
On those Hungarian elections and what is at stake is still well worth your time.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Absolutely. This week's episode was produced by Katy Lee and Wojciech Oleksiak. Thank you both. And it was produced using the European made software of Hindenburg Pro.
KATY LEE:
Nina and Dominic will be back next week. In the meantime, come and hang out on our super viral Instagram page @europeanspodcast. Recent videos by me have been sadly less viral. Come and throw me a like. I'm desperate. We're also on Mastodon, a European social network, which we love. And we have an excellent newsletter written by producer Morgan Childs. It is called Good Week, Bad Week. Do subscribe if you haven't already.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Thanks for listening, everyone.
KATY LEE:
Bye.
DOMINIC KRAEMER:
Doei.
Thanks for listening! If you enjoy our podcast, we'd love it if you'd consider chipping in a few bucks a month (many currencies are available).
You can also help new listeners find the show by leaving us a review or giving us five stars on Spotify.
This podcast was brought to you in cooperation with Euranet Plus, the leading radio network for EU news.
The Europeans is proudly produced using Europe’s own Hindenburg.
Cover image credit: Bingjiefu He. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. No changes have been made.