Europe defines recessions the way that we used to define them

GDP declining seems like a pretty broad measure to me. It also seems like a lot more objective measure that can't be played around with for political gain. From the WSJ:

. . . . A rule of thumb, particularly in Europe, defines recession as two straight quarters of declines in gross domestic product. It usually takes a few more weeks for Europe's statistics agency to compile GDP figures than its U.S. counterparts. Third-quarter figures for the euro area won't be released until mid-November; in the U.S., they're already out. Assuming euro-zone GDP contracts in this quarter and the start of 2012, the earliest anyone would know would be when final GDP first-quarter figures are released in late spring.

"Even if it's very clear, it takes three-quarters of a year to confirm there was a broad-based decline in activity," says Harald Uhlig, who heads up the recession-dating committee at the Centre for Economic Policy Research, a London-based think tank that is Europe's equivalent of the U.S.'s unofficial recession arbiter, the National Bureau of Economic Research.GDP isn't the last word on recession. The NBER looks at other indicators such as employment and industrial production to gauge whether a broad-based drop in U.S. activity has occurred, as does Mr. Uhlig's committee of eight economists. . . . .