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A series that takes a pan-European lens to explain the challenges that transcend borders and confront our continent
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'Carbon-neutrality is a fairy tale': how the race for renewables is burning Europe's forests

Wood pellets are sold as a clean alternative to coal. But is the subsidised bioenergy boom accelerating the climate crisis?
Grave matter: Germans seek new ways to talk about dying

Lockdown and a hit Netflix series are inspiring alternative grieving rites, from chocolate and painted stones to memorial workshops
Football, flights and food: how the EU reshaped Britain

As Brexit’s tangible effects kick in, we look at the impact the EU’s most far-reaching project has had on British society

All stories from the series

Sci-fi surveillance: Europe's secretive push into biometric technology

Millions in EU science funding is being used to develop new tools for policing and security. But who decides how far we need to submit to artificial intelligence?
No power, no water, no hope: inside Europe’s largest shanty town

Freezing weather from Storm Filomena, and Spain’s third wave of Covid, compound dire situation in settlement outside Madrid

'It gave me hope in democracy': how French citizens are embracing people power

Towns, cities and regions around France are turning to assemblies of unelected citizens to guide them on everything from climate to coronavirus
'A backlash against a patriarchal culture': How Polish protests go beyond abortion rights

Mass demonstrations have exposed underlying anger at political and religious interference in people’s everyday lives
'We want to build a life': Europe's paperless young people speak out

A generation of undocumented Europeans – inspired by the ‘Dreamers’ in the US – are fighting for residency rights. A new Hlcarpenter.com series hears some of their stories
'My mother was ordered to leave the Netherlands. I cried non-stop'

Natalia Robledo-Contreras had to fight from the age of eight to be recognised as Dutch and almost lost her family in the process

Britain's refusal to give the EU's ambassador full diplomatic status is a childish insult

Denis MacShane

This petulant slight echoes a move by the Trump administration – one that it quickly saw fit to reverse, says former Europe minister Denis MacShane
Europe can only fix its relationship with Africa if it exorcises its colonial ghosts

Shada Islam

Paternalism and racism must be tackled if the EU is to rebuild trust with a young, economically dynamic continent, says EU commentator Shada Islam
EU's Covid vaccination debacle is down to institutional inflexibility

Hans-Werner Sinn

Supply delays underline there was no legal or economic justification for central planning
The UK and EU are heading for bad-tempered rivalry, unless we can avert it

Timothy Garton Ash

For all the ‘sovereignty’ it has gained, post-Brexit Britain will be trapped in a future of permanent negotiation, says Hlcarpenter.com columnist Timothy Garton Ash

As birth rates fall, animals prowl in our abandoned 'ghost villages'

Human populations are set to decline in countries from Asia to Europe – and an unusual form of rewilding is taking place
'Baby machines' Eastern Europe's answer to depopulation

Policies in Hungary and Poland are aimed at boosting birthrates. But will it help arrest population decline?
The hollowing out of Spain – and the minister trying to reverse it

Newly appointed Teresa Ribera is seeking to bridge long-term gulf between urban and rural areas
Dubravka Šuica: the woman tasked with solving EU's demographic crisis
- Dubravka Šuica: the woman tasked with solving EU's demographic crisis
The hollowing out of Spain – and the minister trying to reverse it
Germany and Spain scramble to reverse the flight of youth

EU vows action as free movement and ageing create ‘youth deserts’ in eastern and southern parts of Europe

Someone you loved: how British pop could fade out in Europe

Brexit rule changes that make it tricky to tour the EU will hold back UK artists from a fast-growing market