Welfare State and the European Nations

“The phrase ‘welfare state’ was first used in the late 1930s, to distinguish between the policies of the democracies and the war state of European dictators” (Spicker, 2003). From the late nineteenth century, features of a welfare state began emerge in parts of Western Europe. The first European country to put in place a welfare state was Germany in 1883. The then Chancellor Otto Von Bismarck introduced a mandatory national accident and sickness insurance law. The insurance was financed by state subsidy (Spicker).

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Gaza, Israel and Egypt

Ben Gurion’s return as minister of defence in 1954 following the Lavon affair was immediately followed by the Gaza raid which Gurion explained necessary to “teach Egypt a lesson”. This was the most gruesome conflict since the 1948 war, it “changed the nature of the Middle East…the countdown to war began.” It was to mark the return of Ben Gurion and his controversial reprisal policy which Sharett had essentially stopped, Gurion saw Sharett as cultivating “a nation of cowards”. Following this incident Nasser gained notoriety, the arms race between Egypt and Israel began and what was once a regional dispute between Arabs and Jews became an area of superpower competition.

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Petroleum Price Oil and the Economy

The vulnerability of oil-importing countries to higher oil prices varies markedly depending on the degree to which they are net importers and the oil intensity of their economies. According to the results of a quantitative exercise carried out by the IEA in collaboration with the OECD Economics Department and with the assistance of the International Monetary Fund Research Department. Euro-zone countries, which are highly dependent on oil imports, suffered the most in the short term, their GDP dropping by 0.5% and inflation rising by 0.5% in 2007.

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