In March 2012, the Lithuanian Free Market Institute joined an EU-wide Initiative for a Free and Prospering Europe, an informal and non-political group of European think tanks and other non-governmental organizations, policy analysts and opinion leaders, representatives from economic and other sectors, and European citizens.
The main aims of this initiative is to raise European society‘s awareness about the real threats and negative consequences of a deepening political and economic centralization in the European Union, at the expense of individual liberty and responsibility, and the prosperity of people, as well as to propose alternative solutions to the European debt crisis.
Within the framework of this Project, the main political leaders of EU member states, representatives of the European Commission, ECB, and other key players will be called on to stop trying to solve all European economic problems through centralization, including of the creation of a European fiscal union and a European economic government.
Members of the initiative will propose alternative solutions to solve the euro debt crisis that will include the elimination of the causes (not just symptoms) of the debt crisis, based on sources of freedom, responsibility and prosperity (e.g. free markets, property rights, competition, hard backed honest money, and small and responsible administrative governments).
The initiative also aims at the initiating a discussion about alternative solutions to the European debt crisis and the political and economic conditions necessary to transform the EU in a community of free citizens living in prosperous countries.
This initiative was started in January 2012 and unites around 20 public policy centres from the United Kingdom, Slovakia, Poland, Austria, France, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic and Belgium.
In its own turn, LFMI starts actively analysing the issues of the euro debt crisis in Lithuania, launching a Project on Euro and Europe. Our goal will be to disclose the fundamental problems of the euro as of a political project, as well as its potential and most likely future scenarios, relating the euro’s problems with the crisis of the European credit market and the government-pursued monetary and fiscal policy. We will explain what repercussions the European monetary future may have for Lithuania and what strategy in monetary policy would be most beneficial for our country.
Within the framework of this project, LFMI has already introduced a new rubric in its website in Lithuanian „Euras ir Europa“ where information from other countries and Lithuania, related to the euro zone crisis and solutions will be posted.
On April 3, LFMI will organise an international conference “The Eurozone in Crisis: Solutions and Future Prospects.“ During the event, we will discuss the fiscal policy of the European Union countries and the future of euro. We invite politicians, representatives from business, experts from Lithuania and foreign countries, and the media to participate.
LFMI will actively comment and provide opinion on the issues of the eurozone crisis in Lithuania, seeking to reflect the intensive and stormy life of the eurozone.
LFMI‘s Senior Fellow Rūta Vainienė will head the institute’s work in the area on euro and Europe.
Early this year, LFMI has been recognized as one of the top think tanks in Central and Eastern Europe for the fifth year in a row. According to the study of the world‘s top think tanks done by the University of Pennsylvania (USA) in 2011, LFMI was ranked 13th among 30 key think tanks in Central and Eastern Europe. The compilers of the index evaluated 6,545 public policy institutes from around the world and 537 centres from Central and Eastern Europe.
