European editorial: Poverty and social exclusion in Europe

From Athens to Lisbon, from Italy to Cyprus, hundreds of thousands of European citizens have been demonstrating against their government’s austerity policies and expressing concern about their children’s future. In this context, the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), an umbrella group representing radio and television broadcasters in Europe and beyond, is organizing a day of reflection on November 29^th, entitled “Why Poverty?”. TV documentaries, radio programmes, web and social network initiatives have been planned to draw peoples’ attention to the issue of Poverty – from the economic to the spiritual. Vatican Radio will participate by hosting a round-table discussion that will be webcast live, and by offering interviews and reports in various languages on its website.
Poverty and social exclusion in Europe

It’s clear by now that the current crisis is not simply an economic one. It involves social models and the ethics of personal and collective relationships. It’s a crisis that challenges leaders and labourers, politicians and civil servants, the churches and religious communities. The results are often unexpected. It demands that everyone, without distinction, acknowledge their own responsibility – which can be summed up in three words: moderation, justice and charity.
Individual and collective behaviour often succumbs to political, economic and administrative choices. For this reason, mass media is effectively engaged in order to influence such behaviour.
In this context, moderation means respecting the dignity of both people and natural resources, being responsible about how they are employed and ensuring they are used for the common good and not for personal profit.
The statistics speak volumes: in Europe, 80 million people are living in poverty. That’s more than 16% of the entire population of the European Union. Most of these people are women and 20 million are children. (See Note #1)

Justice, according to Benedict XVI in his encyclical “Caritas in Veritate”, is that which “leads us to give to the other that which is his, that which is his due in terms of who he is and what he does”.
Rising unemployment among young people, immigrants and less qualified people, is not just an economic problem either. (See Note #2)
Unemployment denies people a place in society, it inhibits their chances of contributing toward their country’s growth, and it undermines their role as builders of their own and their family’s future. The Italian Bishops have warned that this impasse risks increasing “the outrage of honest people, accompanied by the cry of the emarginated and of all those who feel excluded from society, the voiceless and the unheard.”

The European Union has created a platform to fight poverty and social exclusion and to encourage social and territorial solidarity. Human beings are at the heart of the issue, which is why Charity is such a vitally important element in human relationships insofar as it motivates people to hope while promoting the common good. Benedict XVI reminds us that “the city of man” is not built on rights and duties only, but first and foremost on gestures of selfless giving, acts of mercy and a spirit of community. The future of nations depends on their ability to recognise themselves as one big family that works together as a community, rather than as a group of individuals that happens to live together.

Pietro Cocco, Vatican Radio journalist.


Note #1
The highest percentage of people living in poverty or in a state of social exclusion is in Bulgaria (41.6%), followed by Rumania (41.4%), Latvia (38.1%), Lithuania (33.4%), Hungary and Ireland (29.9%), Greece (27.7%), Spain (25.5%), and Italy (24.5%). In Europe 22% of the workforce still risks poverty or lives in families defined as “very low work intensity”. In this category the countries most affected are Ireland (22.9%), followed by the United Kingdom (13.1%), Belgium (12.6%), Latvia (12.2%), Germany (11.1%), Denmark (10.3%), and Italy (10.2%). Clearly the reduction of economic resources in the fields of education and training have a direct influence and impact on the figures above.

Note #2
In the European Union the average rate of unemployment among young people has reached 21.4% and in eleven countries in Europe it is over 25%.