Welcome to Frances Cowell’s website.
If you’re in Europe, you’ll no doubt be thinking about the upcoming EU elections. Like many people in EUrope, its been on my mind for a while too, and here’s why:
Several years ago, I found myself in discussions about how the EU “isn’t really democratic”, but when I asked in what way is it not “democratic”, nobody could give me a coherent answer. I honestly hadn’t thought about it all that much, but when I did begin to seriously reflect, I realised how little I knew about the second biggest democracy in the world (after India).
If everyone else was as ignorant as I was, I reasoned that it was unsurprising that so many voters sent Euro=sceptic MEPs to Brussels, who were having the desired effect of gumming up the legislative works and ensuring the irrelevance of the EU.
So I decided to find out for myself how things work in Brussels. It wasn’t hard, as all the information is there on the EU Parliament and EU Commission websites. But to make sense of it, you needed some serious analytic skills. Which it turns out I have. I then reasoned that lots of other people might find the information useful, so I wrote me Guide to the 2019 EU Elections That was very well received, so this year I updated it for this year’s elections.
If you’d like an easy-to-read, genuinely independent guide to who’s who in the political groups – and how things work, than you could do worse than to spend €4 on my Guide. You can get it on Amazon.
#EUelections #2024Elections #PoliticalTransparency
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The rest of the website is a collection of articles and short stories I have written over the years, some of them published, many of them not. The subject matter varies, and many defy categorisation. Nevertheless I have grouped them as best I can.
Other Views are observations about what I – and perhaps you – see going on about us. Some but not all of it has a political tone or even argument. Many of the articles you see have been published on TheEuropeanNetwork.eu, an online publication that I have been doing some voluntary work for the last few years. Those articles include mention of The European Network or its predecessor, United Europe, at the end of the article, and can now also be viewed on TheEuropeanNetwork.eu. I have also submitted a couple of articles in French to L’Institut du Pacifique – InstitutduPacifique.org, and you can see the English language version here. Again, these articles show, at the end of the main text, the site where they were first published.
Investment-land is a collection of some of the articles I’ve penned over the years, recording my experiences and observations about investment management. Although written some time ago, I believe much of what I wrote then remains pertinent. Over a 30-year career in the field, one thing that strikes me most about it is how little things change! The items you see include some that were published, in which case that is indicated, and others that I don’t think were.
Publications is a sort of bibliography of work that’s been published over the years. Just for the record.
The Odd Life is a collection of (mostly) short stories that I have scribbled at the request of friends and family. The page could equally have been called Truth is Stranger than Fiction, as some of the yarns are indeed weird. All are true.
About is, well, a bit about my background.
