Earning and belonging: Labour sets out a new direction
Labour must be about more than 'earn and own'. A quiet revolution is ousting the remote, condescending party of the past. So said Jon Cruddas in his speech this week, setting out the building blocks of...
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What do Russians think of their ‘foreign agents’?
In Putin’s Russia, NGOs funded from abroad are now officially considered ‘foreign agents’. However a recent poll suggests that the Russian public’s attitude to them is rather less one-sided. Vladimir...
View ArticleThe survival of Syria
Reflecting on the future of the conflict in his country, poet Golan Haji says “Syrians want Syria to survive”. It is time for Western governments to look beyond their short-term interests in...
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How to be different together: Algerian lessons for the Tunisian crisis
In light of the crisis currently unfolding in Tunisia - particularly the increasingly strident and incendiary rhetoric of the main political poles - the echoes and parallels with Algeria's own...
View ArticleThis week's window on the Middle East - February 11, 2013
Arab Awakening's columnists offer their weekly perspective on what is happening on the ground in the Middle East. Leading the week: How to be different together: Algerian lessons for the Tunisian...
View ArticleWhere is Syria now?
A message to the openDemocracy conference Syria's peace: what, how, when? from Syrian writer and Arab Awakening blogger, Rita.Between thousands of things I want to say, the many great people I would be...
View ArticleViolence and democracy in Syria
Is it possible in such a situation to face the threat of foreign intervention and yet make internal democratic change with the peaceful civil movement which started from Dara’a? I repeat, and say for...
View ArticleWhat is behind the UK Government's drive to detain and deport more migrants...
The Government seems to be doing its best to detain and remove as many immigrants as it can. Usman Sheikh, a lawyer specialising in detention cases, asks why.The UK Government's own most recent figures...
View ArticleWho will decide the future of Spain ?
Accusations of corruption against members of the “Partido Popular” far outstrip previous corruption scandals involving Government members. Liz Cooper asks whether the technically independent Judiciary...
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Equality before the law: a principle abandoned by Britain
A Citizens Advice Bureau adviser describes how recent 'reforms' to legal aid and cuts to services are impacting on the ground. She has a question: At what point did Britain decide that legal rights...
View ArticleA revolution before daybreak: Coptic Orthodox Pope, Tawadros II
Pope Tawadros II has realised that the revolutionary spirit in Egypt cannot be suppressed. His answer has been to create a system in the Coptic Orthodox Church that is more open minded and accessible...
View ArticleIn short: Belkacem Belmekki on The Battle of Algiers
A 36-year old Algerian lecturer from the post-independence generation explains what Gillo Pontecorvo’s film means to him. I remember having watched Gillo Pontecorvo’s film La Bataille d’Alger a couple...
View ArticleThe Battle of Algiers transposed into a Palestinian key
Cinematic representations of the Palestinian struggle against Israeli occupation frequently invoke The Battle of Algiers as a point of reference. This reflects a long history of Palestinian...
View Article'Secure Communities' still destroying immigrant families
A young activist gets his father released from detention but many more will be deported breaking up families with children born in the US.Since 2008 the Obama Administration's 'Secure Communities'...
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A seasonal religion
As our author - clad in detritus - prepares himself for tomorrow's Mardis Gras and the forecast of huge lightning storms, he remembers striking a blow against a less than divine intervention predicting...
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Higher education under threat in Hungary
The drastic higher education reforms the Hungarian government has introduced in the last months of 2012 have sparked nationwide protests. But while the government continues to implement contradictory...
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The future of Russia's i-curtain
Hot on the heels of a new law establishing a register of forbidden sites, Russian authorities are now promoting a system of 'virtual' borders and international supervision. Their proposal has so far...
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Republican Youth and generational change in Northern Ireland
Young, post-conflict republicans, and the radical Óige Phoblactach, may hold the key to meaningful reconciliation across Ireland.Despite incremental progress towards an end to the violent protests over...
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Of myths, monsters and gods in modern Syria
Al-Khidr for the Alawis - as well as for many other religions and sects - is one of God's righteous men; capable of performing miracles. According to the Alawi creed, he never dies.In the spring of...
View ArticleIf not the EU, who will Britain blame for its democratic deficit?
Debating the ‘in-or-out’ question is only a smokescreen hiding the elephant in the room: the state of national democracy.‘Technocratic’, ‘Elitist’, ‘Unaccountable’ - these are some of the many...
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