Uploaded May 2020 | Updated September 2026, 52 minutes ago
The second of a series of interviews of European Left leaders "Meeting the Left".
Walter Baier and Cornelia Hildebrandt interview Katja Kipping. At the end of the interview questions from the audience were taken.
Bulgarian and Romanian subtitles made available thanks to the cooperation with en.baricada.org/!
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Katja Kipping, co-chairperson of the German Left Party, Die LINKE, alongside Bernd Riexinger. She belongs to the German Parliament, the Bundestag, since 2005. In 2003, she had been elected chairperson of the PDS (Party of Democratic Socialism) the predecessor party of today’s Left Party.
Walter Baier, an economist in Vienna, was National Chairman of the Communist Party of Austria (KPÖ) from 1994 to 2006. He was an editor of the Austrian weekly Volksstimme and from 2007 he has been the Political Coordinator of transform! europe.
Cornelia Hildebrandt is Vice Director of the Institute for Critical Social Analysis of the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation (RLS) and its consultant on parties and social movements. She is responsible for the structuring of party research within the foundation as well as the development of the ‘Left Politics’ project as part of transform! europe.
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The Corona-virus has hit the EU unprepared, but in different ways and with different effects depending on the countries. Most tragic were the effects on those countries whose healthcare and social systems have been emaciated by decades of austerity policies. Thus, the pandemic has increased inequalities not only inside the states but also between the Member States of the EU. This presents the parties of the radical left with a challenge and calls for a re-examination of their strategies.
We have seen that the EU’s failure to address the health crisis and provide support to the most affected states has changed the way the Union is perceived in parts of Europe. To what extent and with what consequences does this apply to the countries whose parties our interviewees represent? How can the left cope with the economic and social crisis and the recession that is very likely to come in its wake? How do the left parties connect their national strategies to global problems, in particular the influx of refugees and the answers urgently required by the global environmental crisis.
The focus of these interviews is the impact of the pandemic on the economic, social, political, and cultural life of particular countries.
***
To stay informed on other events hosted and articles published by transform! please subscribe to our newsletter (available in English, French, German, Greek and Spanish): please go to the site of transform! europe: transform-network.net/en/#subscribe-newsletter
The second of a series of interviews of European Left leaders "Meeting the Left".
Walter Baier and Cornelia Hildebrandt interview Katja Kipping. At the end of the interview questions from the audience were taken.
Bulgarian and Romanian subtitles made available thanks to the cooperation with en.baricada.org/!
***
Katja Kipping, co-chairperson of the German Left Party, Die LINKE, alongside Bernd Riexinger. She belongs to the German Parliament, the Bundestag, since 2005. In 2003, she had been elected chairperson of the PDS (Party of Democratic Socialism) the predecessor party of today’s Left Party.
Walter Baier, an economist in Vienna, was National Chairman of the Communist Party of Austria (KPÖ) from 1994 to 2006. He was an editor of the Austrian weekly Volksstimme and from 2007 he has been the Political Coordinator of transform! europe.
Cornelia Hildebrandt is Vice Director of the Institute for Critical Social Analysis of the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation (RLS) and its consultant on parties and social movements. She is responsible for the structuring of party research within the foundation as well as the development of the ‘Left Politics’ project as part of transform! europe.
***
The Corona-virus has hit the EU unprepared, but in different ways and with different effects depending on the countries. Most tragic were the effects on those countries whose healthcare and social systems have been emaciated by decades of austerity policies. Thus, the pandemic has increased inequalities not only inside the states but also between the Member States of the EU. This presents the parties of the radical left with a challenge and calls for a re-examination of their strategies.
We have seen that the EU’s failure to address the health crisis and provide support to the most affected states has changed the way the Union is perceived in parts of Europe. To what extent and with what consequences does this apply to the countries whose parties our interviewees represent? How can the left cope with the economic and social crisis and the recession that is very likely to come in its wake? How do the left parties connect their national strategies to global problems, in particular the influx of refugees and the answers urgently required by the global environmental crisis.
The focus of these interviews is the impact of the pandemic on the economic, social, political, and cultural life of particular countries.
***
To stay informed on other events hosted and articles published by transform! please subscribe to our newsletter (available in English, French, German, Greek and Spanish): please go to the site of transform! europe: transform-network.net/en/#subscribe-newsletter
