OpenDemocracy

About openDemocracy

openDemocracy is an independent global media platform publishing up to 60 articles a week and attracting over 8 million visits per year.

Through reporting and analysis of social and political issues, openDemocracy seeks to educate citizens to challenge power and encourage democratic debate across the world. With human rights as our central guiding focus, and open-mindedness as our method, we ask tough questions about freedom, justice and democracy.

openDemocracy aim to help those fighting for their rights gain the agency to make their case and to inspire action.

Brexit can be a good crisis

Anthony Barnett - 03 January 2019

"Brexit is not about Brexit. Certainly not just about Europe. It poses matters both economic and democratic simultaneously as it demands an answer to the kind of country we are."

With his powerful combination of intimate knowledge of the UK, a foreigner’s overview, a passion for democracy and first-hand experience of Brussels realpolitik, Yanis Varoufakis has published a brilliant intervention in the Brexit debate. Calling on us to stop being negative and turn Brexit into a ‘Celebration of Democracy’, he proposes the country holds a three year People’s Debate that puts our own government into order before making a call on EU membership.

His argument has three parts. He sees an eightfold hydra-headed challenge to the status quo in Britain: eight different national, constitutional and economic issues exposed by the referendum over EU membership that combine to form the Brexit impasse. I’ll come back to these. Their clarity, brevity and completeness make them the authoritative starting point for any assessment of what should be done about Brexit.... See more

White is the new black: populism and the academic alt-right

Umut Ozkirimli - 02 January 2019

“It is our duty to expose this moral agenda for what it is, not by 'deplatforming' them – only adding victimisation to their already lavish arsenal – but through reasoned argument.”

Whitewashing, or the habit of casting white actors for minority roles, might have a long pedigree in Hollywood (some outlandish examples include John Wayne playing the role of Genghis Khan in 1956 or Laurence Olivier performing as Othello in blackface in 1965), but the use of the term is by no means limited to American mainstream movie-making.

Tracing its origins to the early eighteenth century, the Oxford English Dictionary defines whitewashing as the “attempt to free from blame; to provide with a semblance of honesty, respectability, rectitude, etc.” In addition to this more familiar meaning, the term also refers to the practice of covering “(the face, etc.) with make-up or a similar substance intended to make the skin look lighter.” One of the quotations OED has chosen to exemplify this particular meaning is quite revealing: “‘Why do you whitewash your face like that?’ he queried. ‘It’s just talcum powder,’ I muttered abashedly.”... See more

Britain is the world centre for private military contractors – and it's almost impossible to find out what they're up to

Iain Overton, Laura Bruun, and Elisa Benevilli - 20 December 2018

Welcome to the murky world of mercenaries and floating armouries...

Yesterday, an American man was convicted for killing unarmed civilians whilst on patrol in Iraq. But he wasn’t a member of the US Army. When the incident took place, he was working for the company Blackwater. Last month, the Taliban carried out a lethal suicide attack in Kabul, Afghanistan. But the compound they targeted wasn’t controlled by the army of any nation. It was run by G4S. According to the Islamist group, the British company constituted an ‘important base of occupying forces’, from which attacks against the Taliban were planned and mobilised.

G4S, one of the UK’s biggest private military companies, provides pivotal ‘operational support’ to Britain’s military in Afghanistan and such incidents bring back into focus the extent that private military and security companies are present – and sometimes directly involved – in combat.... See more

Doctors leaders call on government to halt NHS migrant charges

Joanna Dobbin - 20 December 2018

The Royal College of Physicians have today joined with other Royal Colleges to call on the government to suspend upfront charging of overseas visitors within the NHS, calling them a "concerning barrier to care".

The Royal College of Physicians have today joined with other Royal Colleges to call on the government to suspend NHS upfront charging of overseas visitors. The medical leaders say in a statement issued today that the government policy, introduced in 2015 and 2017 regulations, is a "concerning barrier to care" that is "likely to lead to poorer patient outcomes and contribute to already low morale in our profession." The Colleges raise concerns about the impact on public and individual health, and point particularly to the "detrimental impact" on expectant and new mothers and "cases of children having been denied treatment for various life-threatening conditions".... See more

How Scousers see off the fascists

Roland Clark - 20 December 2018

Recent successful efforts to repel fascist groups draw on a long history of antifascist mobilisation in Liverpool.

A peaceful but surprisingly large group of people from a range of backgrounds crowded around the entrance to Moorefields train station in Liverpool last month. Warmly dressed against the cold and carrying European and antifascist flags, they were there to stage a counter-demonstration against a planned march of the Northwest Frontline Patriots (NFP). A far-right group whose activism revolves around support for EDL-founder Tommy Robinson, pro-Brexit efforts, and claims that migrants are sexually assaulting British children, the NFP had intended to stage a demonstration in support of a strong Brexit. The handful of NFP activists found their way out of the train station blocked by counter-demonstrators and went home early. One group of UKIP supporters who had intended to join them cancelled their plans when news of the counter-protest spread. The antifascist crowd included Liverpool’s mayor, Joe Anderson, and groups such as Hope not Hate, Merseyside Together, and Unite Against Fascism.... See more

Government immigration plans will harm integration and fuel negative perceptions

Rosie Carter - 20 December 2018

Proposals for short term visas, separating families, and income caps will worsen rather than assuage public concerns, say Hope not Hate.

With 100 days to go until Brexit, today’s much-delayed proposal for immigration after Brexit indicates the chaos that lies ahead, with many members of the Government up all night arguing the detail of yesterday’s release.

The immigration white paper is critical, given that immigration was a key driver behind the decision to leave the EU. But with many of the details now announced, it presents yet another case of the Government cutting off the country’s nose to spite our collective face.

This post-Brexit migration system is not “taking back control”. It is attempting to control the immigration debate. Forcing an unworkable control agenda will in fact increase, not reduce, public concerns about immigration.... See more

We need a People’s Government, not a People’s Vote

Asif Mohammed - 19 December 2018

A People’s Vote with a Tory Government in occupation would also be a People’s Vote of the right, by the right, and for the right.

Over the last few weeks Britain has found itself in a high stakes political drama. Political intrigue, threats and plots have become the watchwords of Westminster as small clusters of MPs scheme in the narrow corridors of power.

The Conservative European Research Group set the pulses of political commentators alight with Jacob Rees-Mogg appearing before an impromptu press conference last week in scenes reminiscent of Mnangagwu’s Zimbabwean ‘not-a-coup’. Meanwhile, millions of working people have watched on in despair – knowing full well that despite the lofty rhetoric of our political class, they remain as out of touch as they were at the time of the Brexit vote.... See more

Why we need renters' unions more than ever

Philip Jones - 16 December 2018

What these stories highlight is a more general social truth: to be a tenant is to be precarious, at continual risk of rent rise, legal disputes and being evicted.

In an era of rogue landlords and slum housing, renter unions provide much needed protection and solidarity for tenants.

The current government presides over a private rental market that forces tenants to endure illegal evictions, squalid conditions and harassment at the hands of unlawful landlords. A recent investigation by The Guardian and ITV found that landlords who have been convicted of previous offenses and have failed to pass the basic tests required by housing legislation are continuing to take rents from private property.

The consequences of leaving the rental market largely unregulated are devastating and far reaching. A study by the university of York published in October found that as many as 1 in 3 rental properties at the bottom end of the market are not fit for purpose. More disturbing still, it revealed that 250,000 families in England are raising infants in substandard rental properties. Slum tenure has become an everyday feature of housing in austerity Britain, a grim consequence of failed welfare reforms, insecure employment and a lack of affordable housing - a social ill that the conservative government have neither a solution to nor any interest in tackling.... See more

In the fight against austerity, human rights is not the answer

Mickey Keller - 15 December 2018

Amber Rudd’s rejection of the UN inquiry into poverty in the UK reveals what’s wrong with the discussion around austerity and human rights.

Work and Pensions Secretary Amber Rudd has used her first appearance following her return to frontline politics last week to attack a UN inquiry into poverty in the UK for its “extraordinary political nature”. The inquiry headed by the UN’s rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Professor Philip Alston, was intended to assess the impact of austerity on the UK’s ability to meet its international human rights commitments. Alston ended his two-week fact finding mission by accusing the government of inflicting “great misery” on its people with “punitive, mean-spirited, and often callous” policies.

This is not the first time the government’s record on poverty and human rights has been criticised by the UN. As Aoife Nolan observes in the London Review of Books, seven of the eight UN envoys that have visited the UK since 2010 have raised concerns. For his part, Alston told a press conference that Britain was in breach of four UN human rights agreements. Unlike civil and political rights, these social and economic rights (which include the right to food, shelter and healthcare) cannot be enforced in UK courts and have historically occupied a second-class status.... See more

Writers silenced by surveillance: self-censorship in the age of big data

Nik Williams - 14 December 2018

We asked Scottish writers how online surveillance has impacted on their work. The answers we got were shocking

We know what censorship looks like: writers being murdered, attacked or imprisoned; TV and radio stations being shut down; the only newspapers parrot the state; journalists lost in the bureaucratic labyrinth to secure a license or permit; government agencies approving which novels, plays and poetry collections can be published; books being banned or burned or the extreme regulation of access to printing materials or presses. All of these damage free expression, but they leave a fingerprint, something visible that can be measured, but what about self-censorship? This leaves no such mark.

When writers self-censor, there is no record, they just stop writing or avoid certain topics and these decisions are lost to time. Without being able to record and document isolated cases the way we can with explicit government censorship, the only thing we can do is identify potential drivers to self-censorship.... See more

Digital parties on the rise: a mass politics for the era of platforms

Paolo Gerbaudo - 13 December 2018

The old party system appears in serious distress, faced with challengers using digital technology as a means to achieve the utopian goal of a more democratic society.

In these times of profound crisis and political disorientation an organisational revolution is striking at the heart of western democracies and upsetting the party system.

Political parties seemed, of all the organisations inherited from modernity, the most impervious to the digital revolution that for good and many times for worse has infested all areas of society, as has become all too apparent at the time of Facebook, AirBnB, Uber and Tinder.

Yet, eventually under the combined pressure of a huge wave of discontent at neoliberal politics, and of the disruptive effect of technological change, which has contributed in eroding the competitive advantage of traditional parties, the old party system appears in serious distress, faced with challengers which are threatening to substitute the old parties with a generation of new organisations.... See more

Solidarity with migrants isn’t ‘terrorism’ – the Stansted 15 case shames the UK

Gracie Bradley - 11 December 2018

We should cherish dissenters trying to stop human rights abuses – not imprison them under anti-terrorism laws designed to prevent further Lockerbie bombings.

In March 2017, fifteen people tried to stop a secretive mass deportation to Nigeria and Ghana from Stansted Airport. Now known as the ‘Stansted 15’, they assert that the people on the plane would have faced gross human rights abuses on arrival, and that the mass deportation process was itself barely legal in the first place.

Their wholly peaceful and carefully planned protest was an attempt to protect people from harm, and to bring the issue of secretive mass deportations to public attention.

What the protestors were not prepared for was prosecution under the Aviation and Maritime Security Act. That Act, and the offence protestors have been charged with – ‘ intentional disruption of services at an aerodrome’ - was introduced after the Lockerbie bombing and designed with the most dangerous terrorism in mind. It carries, on conviction, a possible life sentence. So when then Attorney General Jeremy Wright gave permission to use this legislation to prosecute civil disobedience, it was a deeply cynical move, and a dangerous precedent. And it is a damning indictment of our government that today these peaceful protestors have been convicted.... See more

Save Ridley Road – how the community is fighting back against faceless developers

Danny Hayward - 10 December 2018

Whilst the media bemoans the ‘death of the high street’, across London, investors are trying to drive out the kind of local, culturally appropriate small retail that keeps areas alive.

For thousands of people Ridley Road is what makes Hackney possible. It is a place of work for more than a hundred independent traders. It is a place where you can buy good food for little money. It is a place that is full of music and joy and transformation like almost nowhere else in London, and the people who use it know that it embodies more than any archive the complex experience of generations of the people who have moved through the borough and fought to make it what it is.

It is, also, a prime piece of underdeveloped real estate, and it is under immediate threat.... See more

What the Anti-Nazi-League and Rock against Racism teach us about how to defeat the fascists

David Renton - 9 December 2018

The challenge is on the streets, at the ballot box, and through popular culture, as a new history makes clear.

Any readers of the recent “Populism” series in the Guardian might justly have put down their newspaper in a condition of utter disrepair. We were told that 25 percent of Europeans vote for populist parties. To which could be added the success of the far right in the US, India, and now Brazil. Among the many problem with the Guardian’s approach is that it left no space for resistance to the right. The populists have the support of the people, and anyone who disagrees can do no better than vote for the same technocratic and authoritarian neo-liberal politics which enabled the growth of the right.

Here, I want to discuss something different: an anti-fascist movement in recent history which rather than seeing workers as its enemy actively recruited them.

The first main part of 1970s anti-fascism was a musical campaign Rock Against Racism. Launched in 1976 in reaction to an interview with David Bowie in which he called Adolf Hitler the first rock and roll superstar, and a drunken concert in Birmingham at which Eric Clapton announced his support for Enoch Powell, RAR was a collective of musicians, designers and grassroots politicos engaging with the nascent punk scene.... See more

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights at 70

N. Jayaram - 08 December 2018

Heed Monday’s anniversary, for talk of rights is increasingly becoming hazardous to health in vast parts of the globe

In mid-November, a spectacle little noticed by much of world media unfolded in one of the most affluent countries and one which, not only in jest, claims to have “invented human rights”.

Professor Philip Alston, United Nations Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights gave a public dressing down to Britain. Its authorities were ignoring the impact of “austerity policies” on the poor, he said, noting: “Changes to taxes and benefits have taken the highest toll on those least able to bear it.”... See more

Nurses raise concern about Royal College backing for NHS volunteers campaign

RCN Members - 7 December 2018

On Saturday the Daily Mail called for "an army of volunteers" to "transform" the NHS. Royal College of Nursing members have written to Dame Prof. Donna Kinnair, the acting head of the RCN, in response to their involvement in the "Helpforce" campaign.

Dear Professor Kinnair,

We, members of the RCN, have been concerned by the recent articles in the Daily Mail showing that our union is backing the campaign to find an army of volunteers to transform the NHS.

We respect and value the fantastic work of volunteers in our NHS, and believe that volunteers deserve the utmost credit and thanks for their contributions. However, the idea of a volunteer army is not a new concept, nor will this be the last time we see it appear as long as our NHS remains chronically underfunded.

Only a year ago, the Red Cross considered the state of the NHS to be a humanitarian crisis – this is not a job for charity or volunteers to fix, nor will they be able to. As such, we seek a more sustainable approach.... See more

Why grieving families need legal representation at an inquest

Merry Varney - 06 December 2018

Contrary to what the UK government say, many bereaved families need legal representation at an inquest to ensure a full and fearless investigation into the death of their loved one.

In 2013 Nicholas Harry's baby boy Sam, was killed. The police stated that either Sam’s mother Deanne, or her then partner Ryan were responsible. But they both denied it and blamed the other one. There was no other evidence so the criminal investigation came to a halt.

Because Sam’s death was ‘unnatural’, in the absence of any criminal prosecution, the Coroner was obliged to hold an inquest into Sam’s death to establish how he died. In Nicholas’ words, “the inquest was my final chance of any sort of justice….this was my only chance to get answers”.

Despite this, and although bereaved families are supposed to be at the heart of inquest proceedings, legal aid is not routinely available so, unless they have the funds to pay for a lawyer, they will often not be legally represented.... See more

The double standards applied to academic freedom

Nadje al-Ali - 05 December 2018

The political right is not only cracking down on academic freedoms, but has started simultaneously to become a fierce advocate of an aggressively anti-intellectual freedom of speech.

The Central European University (CEU) will move their main campus to Vienna. It has appeared inevitable for a while now due to a crackdown and targeting by Hungary’s far-right prime minister, Viktor Orbán. Yet, the significance and repercussions of this fact are profound and remind us that academic freedom is not only under attack in places far away from home. My own area of interest, gender studies, has been particularly targeted not only in Hungary but more widely in anti-gender studies movements and lobbies, including in Germany where we have also seen the rise of the extreme right.

Until quite recently, academic freedom, or rather the absence thereof, was something other people had to struggle with. Based in London, where I have been working at what is probably the most radical and progressive institution of higher education within the UK, I generally felt privileged and confident in my academic freedom. Meanwhile, I was acutely aware that colleagues elsewhere, mainly those researching and teaching in the Middle East, but also academics working in Middle East Studies in the US, were challenged by many different forms of encroachment on and violations of their academic freedom.... See more

The stories fascist Europe tells itself, and how to correct them

Adam Ramsay - 4 December 2018

Fascists are obsessed with history. Their ideology is less a doctrine about the economy or the future and more a story about identity and the past. It is harvested from half-truths about great victories and cruel injustices, spun into national myths about superiority and struggle, and applied as a bandage to wounded egos in times of trouble. Fascism is a story learnt in childhood, and the fight against fascism is a battle for truth about the past.

In Hungary, the front line in that argument was, for a moment, led by Kálmán Sütö, the homeless former truck driver who sells the country’s street magazine outside the gold-plated national parliament. When Viktor Orbán’s government erected a monument to “the victims of the Nazis” not far from Kálmán’s patch, he made a placard: “Horthy was the biggest Nazi of them all!”, and signed it “Kálmán the historian”. The iconography of the memorial implies that Hungary as a whole was the victim, deflecting from the historical reality that under Miclós Horthy, the country was fascist in its own right.... See more

Stop and search doesn't solve knife crime, so why not try something new?

Kam Gill - 10 November 2018

Stop and Search is to modern policing what bloodletting was to ancient medicine - ineffective, but clung to.

Stop and Search is to modern policing what bloodletting was to ancient medicine. An ineffective ‘cure’, which, in the absence of alternatives, gets tried again and again, despite its propensity to make the situation worse. Each failure causes its proponents to double down and call for more.

This week a sixteen year old boy was killed in Tulse Hill, the fifth in six days, bringing the total number of homicides in London to 119 this year. In response, calls for increased stop and search have become strident. The response from politicians and police has been at best confused.... See more

Labour history shows us where workers “took back control” without building walls

Steven Parfitt - 9 November 2018

Current debates on automation, precarity, identity and internationalism would do well to better observe the lessons of labour history.

Labour history should be a field in demand. Jeremy Corbyn appears as a possible British Prime Minister, and a growing number of Americans see their salvation in strikes and socialism. Journalists write endlessly about the “white working class,” a force with the power to elect Trump, vote for Brexit, and support a slew of rightist demagogues across Europe. Shelves of books anticipate full automation and the end of work, or the casualisation of work, or the rise of a post capitalist order from within the existing system. These events and trends all have a past, and they can and must be found in the history of work, workers, and their movements.

Yet labour history is the subject that dare not speak its name. Unions no longer promote their own history with the old enthusiasm... See more

Why politicians need to 'take responsibility' for children's health too

Al Aynsley-Green - 9 November 2018

This government is betraying children on a grand scale, and making positive ‘choices’ impossible.

Matt Hancock, Secretary of State for Health rightly points out that preventing ill health is crucially important in tackling the soaring costs of health care. This week he exhorts people to “take responsibility” for their health.

But he omits to say that much adult ill health has its roots in childhood. And current government policy is not only failing to give children to the best start in life, but creating an economic environment driven by austerity where parents and families are unable to take control of their children’s health.... See more

Why healthcare for all is a feminist issue

Feminist Fightback - 7 November 2018

Health charges for migrants are hitting women hardest. Yesterday feminist activists changed the sign on the new Millicent Fawcett statue in Parliament square in protest.

Yesterday dressed as suffragettes, activists from Feminist Fightback changed the sign on the new Millicent Fawcett statue in Parliament Square from ‘Courage calls to Courage Everywhere’ to ‘Feminists demand healthcare for all,’ in protest against NHS charges for migrants.

“We took this action because universal healthcare, like universal suffrage, is a feminist issue”, explained Eleanor Smith, who took part in the action. “This year marks 100 years since some women got the vote, but women under thirty and 2 million working-class women who did not meet the property qualification had to wait another 10 years. Today, there are exclusions too. Some people are eligible for free abortion and pregnancy services, which feminists have fought for, while others must pay enormous charges for the care they need.”... See more

Migration complexity requires a less conditional compassion

Georgia Cole - 5 November 2018

We must not replace misleading and dehumanising portraits of migration with mono-dimensional accounts of vulnerability and victimhood, which paradoxically continue to set those on the move apart from us.

At the end of a set of academic talks that dwelt heavily on the UK’s hostile environment for immigrants, an audience member raised their hand. “Why do individuals still want to come to England then if it’s so hard for them here?” One panellist recounted their personal story of how they moved to the UK “for love”, following a family member who had already emigrated from West Africa to the United Kingdom. Others drew on various experiences. They spoke of how the desire to be with family and friends made no journey insurmountable and no sacrifice too much. Our shared need for meaningful and caring human relationships was the overwhelming reason people gave for tolerating appalling conditions in Calais before moving onwards across the Channel... See more

The UK Government must not sacrifice our rights in the name of security after Brexit

Corey Stoughton and Jago Russell - 4 November 2018

Theresa May has made no indication or commitment that she plans to hold onto some hardwon vital safeguards after Brexit.

Whether you are a victim of crime, accused of a crime, or simply someone who believes in the value of fair play, we all have an interest in ensuring rights are safeguarded in the criminal justice process.

When it comes to future policing and security cooperation with the European Union (EU), the UK Government has been singular in its focus on fighting crime. Headlines like ‘Brexit could lead to security threat’ and ‘Brexit will make it harder to bring foreign criminals to justice’ reflect the Government’s fears over maintaining policing and security arrangements and determination to maintain access to the full arsenal of cooperation measures. Theresa May has made it clear, for example, that she is determined to keep the European Arrest Warrant (EAW) – the EU’s fast-track extradition measure – after the UK leaves the bloc... See more

The rising tide of national populism: we need to talk seriously about immigration

Roger Eatwell - 3 November 2018

There is a key democracy argument in this new book which calls for an urgent step change in our liberal democracies and a new type of political leadership.

In National Populism: the Revolt against Liberal Democracy, Matt Goodwin and I examine the factors which lie behind major political developments such as: the Brexit vote, Donald Trump’s victory, and the growth of political parties like the French National Rally (formerly National Front), the Austrian Freedom Party, the Alternative for Germany and the League in Italy, whose entry into government in 2018 has been followed by its rise from third to first place in opinion polls.

Two broad academic interpretations have emerged to explain these developments. The first stresses economic change and its effects on ‘the losers of modernisation’/the ‘left behinds’. The second, and more common, approach holds that the key driver has been cultural. The rise of parties like the National Front began well before the onset of recession, and some of the strongest can be found in rich countries like Austria. For the culturalist approach, support is fired by opposition to immigration and by linked themes like law and order... See more

7 ways the ‘Finance Curse’ harms the UK – how can we lift it?

Andrew Baker - 1 November 2018

The City of London is a huge drag on the UK’s real economy. But we can – and must – lift the 'Finance Curse'.

In the decade since the financial crisis something has gone badly and obviously wrong with the UK’s political economy. Stagnating wages, low productivity and rising living costs have marked Britain out as an outlier in the developed world. Yet its globalised financial sector continues to generate lavish fees and windfall gains for a brilliant few. Now however, some sense of the downside of hosting an overactive financial sector is becoming clearer. The vigour of finance derives precisely from its ability to capture resources from the rest of the economy. Even as the host sickens, the City of London glows with unearthly health. The proposition that Britain suffers from a financial curse needs to be taken seriously.... See more

Why legal aid matters and what you can do about it

Oliver Carter and Charlotte Threipland - 1 November 2018

Cuts to legal aid are causing widespread injustice and likely costing the taxpayer more. The government are reviewing the cuts. We have a final chance to tell them we care.

Between 2010 and 2016, the Coalition government reduced the budget of the Ministry of Justice by 34%. The Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (LASPO) brought swingeing cuts to legal aid, ending financial support for those who rely on vast areas of social welfare law – including most debt, benefits, housing, employment and immigration advice.

The result was an 84% reduction in the number of civil (non-criminal) cases funded by legal aid. Hundreds of thousands of people each year are now denied access to justice as a result of the cuts to legal aid... See more

Why Labour's pledge to "renationalise electricity" doesn't go far enough

Chris MacMackin - 1 November 2018

And how a Canadian province might show the way forward to deliver cheap, sustainable, democratic, planned electricity supplies.

Much was made of the Labour Party’s supposed commitment last year to renationalise energy. Certainly the pledge to return the electricity grid to public ownership was welcome. However, beyond that, there was no promise to nationalise anything. Instead, it pledged to support “the creation of publicly owned, locally accountable energy companies and co-operatives to rival existing private energy suppliers”. Meanwhile, a supplementary industrial strategy document suggests that most generation will remain private, with perhaps some co-operative and council ownership of small renewable projects

The reason most people would favour returning energy to public ownership is to better control prices and the sources of electricity. They seldom have to deal with the local grid company and never have to deal with the national grid. Thus, Labour’s focus on renationalising only the grid can not, on its own, address people’s concerns. Prices and tariffs are issues with the energy suppliers, which Labour has only pledged to compete against rather than nationalise. The source of our energy is an issue of generation, on which Labour has said little at all.... See more

How the precariat – and UBI - can stop neoliberalism from destroying the planet

Guy Standing - 31 October 2018

Taxes on exploiting the commons - both exhaustible and non-exhaustible resources - could be used to give people basic financial security.

Historically, every progressive surge has been propelled by the demands of the emerging mass class. Today’s progressive transformation must, therefore, be oriented to the precariat, driven by a strategy that appeals to enough of all its factions to garner adequate strength.

Unlike the proletariat, which sought labor security, the progressives among the precariat want a future based on existential security, with a high priority placed on ecology – environmental protection, the “landscape,” and the commons. By contrast, when confronted by a policy choice between environmental degradation and “jobs,” the proletariat, labor unions, and their political representatives have given “jobs” priority.... See more

The budget offers the NHS scraps – and fails to see off the privatisers

Kane Shaw - 30 October 2018

There was little on offer in yesterday’s budget to meaningfully help struggling hospitals, health and social care services. So it's up to us to organise.

esterday’s budget was a government playing to the gallery, desperately hoping to distract from its role in creating what promises to be the worse winter crisis since records began.

The Chancellor announced that mental health services would be getting £2bn a year by 2023-24. It’s not ‘extra’, though – it’s part of the £20.5bn already announced by the government in June. An amount that all independent experts agree fails to meet the needs of the health service... See more

Opposing labour market Uberculosis

Ivan Manokha - 30 October 2018

Uber is appealing the ruling that its drivers deserve workers’ rights. Meanwhile its drivers show strike action is possible against ‘platform capitalism’.

French philosopher Michel Foucault once observed that the liberty of men is never entirely assured by the institutions and laws that are intended to guarantee them, as all of them are quite capable of being turned around. Liberty, on this view, is a practice - a constant dialectic between the forces that may encroach on the existing laws and rights protecting individual freedom, and those social actors who mobilize to protect them... See more

The 'Big Four' and the UK government: too close for comfort

Stephen Hornsby - 30 October 2018

In the 'Big Four' accountancy investigations, can independent regulators bite the hand on which central government feeds?

The ‘Big Four’ accountants - an oligopoly if ever there was one as Bill Michael of KPMG has freely admitted - are charged with lowballing statutory audit services to major companies in the UK in order to gain much more lucrative advisory work. As a result (it is said) the audit work is done poorly and this has contributed to the series of scandals such as Carillion and BHS. What is more, it is also said that the 'Big Four' have little incentive to give the sometimes necessary bad news to their client (and therefore the market) for fear of losing the tasty advisory work for which the statutory audit has provided such an unappetising entrée... See more

George Osborne’s Evening Standard under fire (again) over lucrative Uber deal

James Cusick - 26 October 2018

Exclusive: Politicians call on UK advertising watchdog to investigate paid-for content dressed up as news at London’s biggest paper, after glowing articles about the controversial taxi app firm appear – but with no mention of sponsorship in hundreds of thousands of copies of the newspaper

There are widespread calls for the UK’s advertising regulator to mount a fast-track investigation into George Osborne’s Evening Standard following the publication this week of an effusive interview with Uber’s chief executive. The article, presented as news, failed to inform readers that Uber is one of the key partners in a £3 million commercial deal – called Future London – with the London paper for “money-can’t-buy” positive news and comment, as revealed by openDemocracy earlier this summer.

The Standard told openDemocracy that it was "made clear in the article that Uber supported the Future London Initiative." But hundreds of thousands of copies of the paper distributed throughout London on Tuesday made no mention of Future London, the paper’s rebranded commercial tie-in with Uber, Google and other companies.... See more

"Deal" or "Secret Deal" – the EU-UK trade deal looks even more secretive than TTIP

Tamasin Cave and Kenneth Haar - 25 October 2018

While the media focus on the withdrawal deal, City lobbyists are working to set the agenda of the future EU-UK trade deal, whilst the public is kept in the dark.

Since the British voted to leave the EU, corporate lobbyists have been working to ensure any future EU-UK trade deal delivers maximum benefits and as little disruption to them as possible. Not least financial sector lobbyists, who have been lobbying hard to influence a future EU-UK trade deal that serves the sector, not just in London but across Europe as well.

Their proposals include plans that would lead to weakened regulations and specific threats to the public interest, such as ‘special courts’ that allow banks to sue governments if they adopt rules the financial sector finds unfair, such as attempts to introduce a small tax on financial transactions... See more

Twenty years on from devolution, the UK’s fiscal and economic model is still broken

Eurfyl ap Gwilym - 25 October 2018

The ‘deficit’ is unevenly distributed, with investment in R&D, transport and the arts still heavily skewed to the South East. Post-Brexit, is it time for a change?

Anniversaries and major events often give us pause for thought: a time to reflect on the past and to look forward to the future. Next year sees the twentieth anniversary of the people of Scotland and Wales voting in favour of devolution. At the same time the UK is expected to leave the European Union. So, how have Scotland and Wales fared economically over the last twenty years? Have the fiscal arrangements worked? And could the repercussions of Brexit be a catalyst to deliver better economic and fiscal outcomes in the future, not only for the two devolved nations but also to many regions of England?

Brexit is expected to have a major impact on the UK economy with the effect being markedly different in various parts of the UK (1). While there is much debate and disagreement regarding the medium to long term economic impact of Brexit a useful exercise is to look at the current state of the UK economy and how the picture differs across the nations and regions. Such an analysis offers a good starting point for consideration of the fiscal strategy that should be pursued by the UK Government post Brexit... See more

The populists: what is to be done?

Robin Wilson - 24 October 2018

It is all too easy to throw up one’s hands in despair at the advance of the populists. Easy, but wrong.

The United States, Hungary, Poland, Turkey, Italy, the Philippines … and shortly Brazil: radical-right populists are now in power in big and powerful states around the globe. ‘Brexit’ was a conjunctural victory for them in Britain which they hope to render permanent by ensuring the UK leaves the European Union – however unpopular that may become and at whatever cost.... See more

Upfront NHS charges one year on - 6 reasons why they harm us all

Ed Jones - 22 October 2018

And what can we do to stop these harmful charges?

When you’re expecting a baby the last thing you want to be thinking about is whether you can afford over £6,000 to go into hospital for the labour. For most people in England this isn’t yet a consideration but for the past year it has been the reality for many migrant women.

A year ago today, the government introduced upfront NHS charges for certain migrants as part of its 'hostile environment'. Before that bills were sent after people received medical care. Primary care (i.e. GP visits), visits to accident and emergency, and treatment for some infection diseases remains free for all. However, secondary care (such as being on a ward in the hospital or X-Rays), community care (including midwifery and abortion services), and care deemed ‘non-urgent’ is now liable for upfront costs for many migrants... See more

Trying to milk a vulture: if we want economic justice we need a democratic revolution

Adam Ramsay - 22nd October 2018

This is the concluding chapter of openDemocracy’s e-book New Thinking for the British Economy. You can download the full e-book here for free

“It is not possible to build democratic socialism by using the ancient institutions of the British state. Under that, include the present doctrine of sovereignty, Parliament, the electoral system, the civil service, the whole gaudy heritage. It is not possible in the way that it is not possible to induce a vulture to give milk.”

As the forces of entropy have continued to pull at the threadbare remnants of Britain’s empire state, Neal Ascherson’s claim in 1985 has become more potent than ever.... See more

 

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