Tuesday 27 November 2007

Three Nobel Prizes will help draft the electoral manifesto.

Jesus Caldera the Minister for Employment and Social Affairs and the person in charge of drafting the electoral manifesto for PSOE has announced a new team of high-profile advisors for the campaign:

  1. Joseph Stiglitz.- Economics Nobel Prize Winner in 2001 and former Chief Economist and Vice-President of the World Bank.
  2. Wangari Maathai.- Peace Nobel Prize Winner in 2004, founder of the Green Belt Movement in Kenya and environmental activist.
  3. Helen Caldicott.- Peace Nobel Prize Winner in 1985 for her campaigning on nuclear disarmament
  4. Nicholas Stern.- Former Chief Economist and Vice-President of the World Bank, present holder of the IG Patel Chair at the London School of Economics and author of the widely-praised Stern Review on the economic cost of climate change.
  5. Torben Iversen.- Harold Hitchings Burbank Professor of Political Economy at Harvard University.
  6. Jeremy Rifkin.- Founder and president of the Foundation on Economic Trends in the US.
  7. Maria Joao Rodriguez.- Portuguese Economics Professor.
  8. Barbara Probst-Solomon.- US writer and columinst.
  9. Philip Pettit.- Irish philosopher and political scientist.
  10. Andre Sapir.- Brussels-based economist and expert in European convergence and globalisation.
  11. Marie Duru-Bellat.- Sociologist and Education Sciences specialist at the University of Rennes (France) and former adviser to French presidential candidate Segolene Royal.
  12. Guillermo O'Donnell.- Hellen Kellog Professor of Government at Notre Dame University (US) and prominent theorist on democratisation theory in Latin America.
  13. George Lakoff.- Linguistics Professor at the University of California Berkeley.
  14. Wolfgang Merkel.- Professor of political sciences at the University of Heidelberg.
The announcement produces a double effect for PSOE. Firstly, it will help draft a strong and coherent manifesto for 2008 as well as future government policy. And secondly, it shows the appeal Zapatero's government has among progressists across the globe.

You might ask yourself, who is willing to volunteer for PP's electoral team? Well, the answer is no-one. Its electoral team tried to spin this failure to attract any international adviser by putting out a PPB claiming their team is made of common Spanish people with everyday problems...well, moving, but shows PP's lack of appeal both nationally and internationally.

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