These are times of change in Europe, but what do they have in store for social Europe?

Today, some major questions are facing those fighting for stronger workers' rights in the European Union,

for higher employment standards, for greater social support and for better health protection.

What have we achieved so far and what is left to do?

Amidst the many anxieties of the moment, the ascent of the far right, the threat of another round of austerity,

the uncertainties facing our climate, How can we actually push even further

for a stronger social Europe? I sat down with Bart Vanerker, research director here at the

European Trade Union Institute and Sotteria Theodoropoulou, our head of European economic

employment and social policies, to talk through the analysis of two recent

flagship publications, benchmarking Working Europe and social policy in the European Union

state of play. I'm your host, Bethany Staunton, and you're listening to ETIP podcast, Voices on the

World of work.

Hi Bart and Soteria. Thanks so much for coming on to the podcast today to talk about EU social policy. So we're sitting here now just a little while after the EU elections, where there

was indeed as predicted a shift to the right, obviously with some nuances in that, which we can get into a bit more later, perhaps.

But before we get too much into the present moment, I actually want to first take us back to 2017

and the adoption of the European pillar of social rights. But this is an EU instrument that you and many others have identified

as having been a driver of EU social policy in recent years.

But you've also said that you've actually been quite surprised

by the extent to which it's been a driver.

So why is that?

Thank you, Beth, and thank you for having us also on this podcast. So, yeah, thanks for

taking us all the way back to 2017. It seems ages ago. We're in a bit of a different world back

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