American”, says Loren Balhorn, a party member and editor of the German edition of Jacobin, a left-wing journal. There have been growing pains. Rows over Gaza have been especially brutal. Some older figures have quit over what they regard as a tilt to antisemitism. The party’s fissures will be tested at its annual congress in Potsdam this weekend. Some arguments will be familiar: over whether MPs should cap their own salaries, for example. But with state elections looming, perhaps the toughest debate will be over whether the party sees itself as a protest outfit with a political wing, or should position itself as a power player. This question has acquired fresh urgency in Germany’s east, where the strength of the AfD—shunned by every other party—has squeezed the space for viable coalitions. The CDU also excludes coalitions with Die Linke, but sometimes needs its votes to stay in office. This is hard to swallow for those in Die Linke who do not see it as their job to keep conservatives in power. But others believe nothing matters more than fighting the AfD, even as they seek to seduce its voters. The AfD could win an outright majority in the eastern state of Saxony- Anhalt, which votes on September 6th. If not, Die Linke will probably be needed to elect a CDU premier. A brighter prospect beckons in Berlin, which votes two weeks later. There, the fragmented vote gives Die Linke a chance of forging a left-wing majority. Its signature policy in the capital— the expropriation of residential properties from corporate landlords—appeals to some in the Greens and the SPD, the parties with which it would seek to govern. Some corporations are deeply worried. Everyone in Die Linke can agree on raging against heartless conservatives, and Mr Merz’s government is happy to oblige. It wants cuts to welfare and health care, and a bitter row over pensions looms once a state-appointed commission reports this month. Kathrin Gebel, an MP who sits on Die Linke’s board, promises “a scorching hot socialist summer” of protest. ■ To stay on top of the biggest European stories, sign up to Café Europa, our weekly subscriber-only newsletter. This article was downloaded by zlibrary from https://www.economist.com//europe/2026/06/17/germanys-left-wing-die-linke-party- has-won-over-the-young
Albania’s flamingo protests target Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner’s beach development brings trouble for a prime minister June 18th 2026 JUST LAST year, Edi Rama was comfortably re-elected to a fourth term as Albania’s prime minister. Yet in recent days the usually sunny ex-basketball star has seemed increasingly nervous. Every day since May 31st, thousands of protesters have appeared on the streets to oppose plans for luxury beach developments involving Jared Kushner, Donald Trump’s son-in-law. Because the projects threaten to damage a delicate lagoon, the demonstrations have been dubbed the “flamingo revolution”. The protesters say that the threats to the environment, and the risk of corruption, are so serious that Mr Rama should quit.
The Albanian press began reporting in 2024 on plans by Mr Kushner and Ivanka Trump, his wife, to develop two swanky resorts on Albania’s southern coast. One is on the Narta lagoon, a protected conservation area located where the Vjosa river flows into the Adriatic. The other is on Sazan, a nearby island and former military base. The lagoon is home to flamingos, pelicans and mosquitoes. Sazan has no fresh water and is littered with unexploded ordinance, as is the sea surrounding it. At the end of May workers began fencing off a beach at the lagoon, and on May 30th a group of protesters and security guards clashed at the site. That touched off bigger protests in Tirana, the capital. Albanian media have been investigating who owns the Narta land under development and how they obtained it. Apart from Mr Kushner, two Syrian brothers living in Qatar have been linked to the project. The Albanian investors include a powerful oligarch. On June 12th Albania’s independent anti-corruption agency issued an arrest warrant for an Albanian living in Miami, which included allegations of fraud relating to title deeds in the lagoon area. Olsi Nika, head of EcoAlbania, an environmental organisation, says the violence at the lagoon was the spark that set off an explosion of accumulated grievances. He notes a general lack of “transparency and accountability in government”: in 2024, the law on protected areas was quietly changed to allow luxury resorts to be built inside them. The protests are diffuse, says Diell Grazhdani, a marketing executive: “People are talking about everything from LGBT rights to pelican rights.” But they all demand the arrest of Mr Rama—and of Sali Berisha, the main opposition leader. Some call the protests a Gen Z revolt. Mr Berisha first became president of Albania in 1992. He and Mr Rama have dominated politics for so long that no one under 40 can recall a time without them. “They see all of us as old- fashioned and an establishment which has to go,” says a friend of Mr Rama. Mr Rama faces no serious challenge from inside his Socialist Party. “He only has servants but no collaborators,” says Gjergj Erebara, a journalist. As for Mr Berisha, the country’s anti-corruption agency is trying him on charges of corruption. (In 2021 America imposed sanctions on Mr Berisha, but on June 11th the State Department lifted them, citing “compelling national interest”.) Other politicians charged with corruption include the
mayor of Tirana and Mr Rama’s former deputy prime minister. All deny the charges. The protesters range from liberal anti-corruption activists and environmentalists to nationalists calling for a Greater Albania including Kosovo. They have united against their country’s political elite. What they will achieve is less clear. Some see similarities to protests that have rocked Serbia in recent years. Those were touched off by concern over environmental damage from a proposed lithium mine, and later turned against another plan linked to Mr Kushner (since abandoned) to transform a designated historical monument in Belgrade into a luxury hotel. As in Serbia, Albania’s new protest movement is dominated by the young. They are venting their anger against an elite that flaunts its wealth. The Narta lagoon’s flamingos have given them a blazing pink symbol of dissatisfaction. But demonstrations without strong leaders and concrete plans may end up achieving little. ■ To stay on top of the biggest European stories, sign up to Café Europa, our weekly subscriber-only newsletter. This article was downloaded by zlibrary from https://www.economist.com//europe/2026/06/16/albanias-flamingo-protests-target- donald-trumps-son-in-law
Europeans should learn to love the air-conditioner Green electricity means never having to say sorry for lowering the thermostat June 18th 2026 AMERICANS AND Europeans differ loudly on many issues, from health- care policy to gun-carrying etiquette. But a quieter division appears every summer when they visit each other’s continents. Europeans touring America complain that shops and restaurants are so frigidly air-conditioned as to require a jacket; step outside again and your glasses fog over. Yanks holidaying in Europe expect cool comfort, and grow surly on finding that many old-world buildings require them to sweat and bear it. The divide is rooted in both climate and culture. Long before General Electric began cooling using circulating chemicals, southern Europe was built to handle heat. In traditional houses, white paint and shaded courtyards
keep things cool. Windows are thrown open and rooms aired in the mornings. Shutters keep out the midday sun, and siestas allow one to skip the hours when it is too hot to do much anyway. Europe’s southerners think coddled Americans don’t know how to cope with heat naturally. Northern Europe, meanwhile, is mostly spared the problem: June days can be cold enough for a Scandinavian knitted sweater. Flinty northern Protestants regard buying an air-conditioner for the year’s few scorchers as an expensive environmental sin. These days, climate change is putting such attitudes to the test. Europe is expecting a broiling summer, in part thanks to the El Niño weather event. As it is, heat contributes to around 175,000 deaths a year on the continent, the UN reckons. Yet Europeans who think first-world lifestyles are largely to blame for global warming may feel pangs of carbon guilt about equipping their houses with air-conditioning, or using it if they have it. They needn’t. The impressive build-out of renewable energy in Europe’s hottest places means that judiciously dialling down the temperature will not do much to melt the glaciers. Take Spain, where solar capacity has grown nearly tenfold in the past decade. Readers sweating it out in Seville can head to apps.electricitymaps.com to reassure themselves: on June 10th a kilowatt- hour of Spanish electricity produced just 86 grams of CO2 equivalent. In the American state of Georgia the figure was 442. On a sunny summer day at noon, only about 10% of Spain’s electricity comes from fossil fuels; around half comes from solar. Portugal does just as well, and France better still, thanks to its dozens of nuclear reactors. Italy is a laggard, getting 30-40%of its electricity from gas. But its 224g of CO2 per kilowatt-hour is positively verdant next to much of America. Not all of Europe can congratulate itself. Poland remains heavily reliant on coal, making its electricity mix about as bad as America’s. Germany’s rash decision in 2010 to eliminate nuclear power left it dependent on coal and gas, producing three times as much CO2 per watt-hour as Spain. Britain, depending on the weather, falls between Italy and Iberia. There are also unexpected bright spots like Albania, which sometimes gets 100% of its electricity from hydroelectric dams. Latvia is the greenest of the Baltics, thanks to more solar power than you might expect.