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Brussels Playbook Podcast

The Anxious Continent: Social media bans and boozy trade deals

Brussels Playbook Podcast

POLITICO

News, Politics, News Commentary

4.4204 Ratings

🗓️ 30 January 2026

⏱️ 39 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Europe is testing how far it’s willing to go — at home and abroad. In this episode of EU Confidential, host Sarah Wheaton talks to Jonathan Haidt, author of the best-selling "The Anxious Generation." His research is inspiring social media bans for kids in countries including France and Australia, even as tech companies and some researchers strongly contest his conclusions. Alongside him is MEP Veronika Cifrová Ostrihoňová and POLITICO tech reporter Eliza Gkritsi, who is reporting on EU deliberations on protecting teens' mental health. Later, Sarah is joined by POLITICO’s Nick Vinocur and trade reporter Camille Gijs, who was on the ground in New Delhi for the signing of the EU–India trade and defense agreement — dubbed by Ursula von der Leyen the “mother of all deals.” Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

AI is incredible. They can teach you how to fry an egg and even write a poem, pirate style.

0:07.0

But it knows nothing about your work. Slackbot is different. It doesn't just know the facts.

0:14.0

It knows your schedule. It can turn a brainstorm into a brief and it doesn't need to be taught.

0:20.0

Because Slackbot isn't just another

0:22.4

AI. It's AI that knows your work as well as you do. Visit Slack.com forward slash meet Slackbot

0:28.8

to learn more. This week, the EU was testing what it really means to stand by its own internal rules

0:35.4

and its wider external ambitions.

0:39.3

At home, the European Commission has opened a new probe into Elon Musk's ex, after its AI tool, GROC, was linked to a surge of images of people's real faces on top of AI-generated naked bodies.

0:54.3

It's landed right in the middle of much bigger anguish about social media,

0:58.4

what they're doing to children, to mental health, to democracy,

1:02.2

and whether governments, and the EU itself, should go further.

1:06.3

One big option on the table is banning social media for kids,

1:09.8

as France and others are now proposing.

1:13.0

That debate has been given fresh momentum by Jonathan Haidt, an American social psychologist,

1:18.7

author, and a prominent critic of social media's effects on children. His work has helped

1:23.8

push these questions into the political mainstream. His conclusions, as well as his prescriptions, are still subject to fierce debate,

1:32.3

not only among tech companies, but also among researchers.

1:36.3

He was in Brussels this week and joined us in the studio, alongside Slovak MEP Veronica Sifrová Ostrichoniova.

1:43.3

They both argue that teen screen time isn't just a cultural or health issue. side Slovak MEP, Veronica Sifrová Ostrichoniova.

1:49.1

They both argue that teen screen time isn't just a cultural or health issue, but one with long-term consequences for Europe's economy as well.

1:54.0

And abroad, EU leaders have been in New Delhi, amid all the pomp and pageantry, finalizing

2:00.8

a major trade and defense deal with India.

...

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