Neo-Nazi terror and Germany’s racism problem

Michael Rothberg 16 December 2011
A failed bank robbery on November 4 this year, exposed a cell in eastern Germany calling itself the “National Socialist Underground”, apparently responsible for the murder of at least ten people, most of them immigrants, among other acts of violence over the last decade. Together with the murder of dozens last summer by a Norwegian right-wing extremist this case has focused a spotlight on the presence of a new right-wing terrorism. Until the media and the population at large start recognizing immigrants and others marked by ethnic or religious difference as belonging to Germany, a deep-seated, everyday racism will provide fertile soil from which such acts of extremism will continue to grow.

Britain's policing: Kettling 2.0 and the Olympic State of Exception

Dan Hancox 11 December 2011

Kettling, a controversial tactic used to contain protestors, now has an ugly sister: the steel police cordon, unveiled on the November 30 public sector strikes.

My evening with the London Met Police Commissioner

Zoe Stavri 9 December 2011

An activist, with her own vivid personal experiences of London policing, meets the man in charge: Bernard Hogan-Howe, the new Metropolitan Police Commissioner.

Keeping our spies under scrutiny

Peter Evans 6 December 2011

The British government is proposing to introduce controls over the security forces. Peter Evans, formerly an investigative journalist on The Times, questions whether they go deep enough to be effective.

Boosting the fight against international cybercrime

Neil Robinson 25 November 2011
Governments in Europe and beyond should consider enhancing cross-border intelligence co-operation, and joint training and education of police, prosecutors and judges.

Europe beyond Utøya: addressing a crisis

Umut Özkirimli 18 November 2011
The slaughter of citizens in Norway in July 2011 was more than the act of an individual: it emerged from a political and intellectual atmosphere that now pervades European public life. This deeper reality must be understood and addressed if Europe is to save itself by living up to its own ideals, says Umut Özkirimli.

The possibilities and impossibilities of being a neighbour

Daniel Zylbersztajn 4 November 2011

German-born Daniel Zylbersztajn has recently returned to Poland, two months after his father's passing away. In the son, this has prompted thoughts on neighbourly relations and the meaning of transformative dialogue in general, taking account of his experiences in Jewish - Palestinian dialogue and his upbringing in Germany.

In the backyard of Russia’s oil paradise

Roman Yushkov 27 October 2011

Pavlovo village was once a quiet backwater in the forest-steppe of Perm Region. In 1997, however, ecological disaster struck, with oil and chemicals entering the local river and food chain. The culprits of the catastrophe were both rich and obvious, but justice was a long while in coming, writes Roman Yushkov

Can Intervention Work? by Rory Stewart and Gerald Knaus: book review

Mary Kaldor 19 October 2011

It is possible to walk the tightrope between the horrors of over-intervention and non-intervention. Mary Kaldor agrees, while insisting on distinguishing between genuine humanitarian interventions and the War on Terror.

Shots across the ocean: joining the dots of modern violence

Ivan Briscoe 14 October 2011

Two bouts of gunfire on either side of the Atlantic gave the inspiration to this week’s series of articles. But if the statistics show that war is declining and criminal violence in most regions is flatlining, how should we read the redoubts of extreme insecurity? Are they holdovers from the past, or signs of the future?

Bolts from the blue: method and madness in the West

Jeffrey Stevenson Murer 12 October 2011
The Norwegian massacre and the gun attack on a US congresswoman were both dismissed as the work of deranged loners. But instead of signifying nothing, they were extraordinarily expressive of current political life. The author trawls through a host of supposedly pathological murders in the richest societies of the West to find deep and recurring patterns.

The national Us: the Norwegian idea of togetherness

Jena Habegger-Conti 21 September 2011
Ingen Utenfor is the very successful anti-bullying campaign run by Save the Children in Norway. In English it means “No one outside.”

'Fuck the police!' Working-class youth and the routine abuse of power

Justin Baidoo-Hackman 16 September 2011

For many, the 'boys in blue' are a brutal force who use their powers to punish and wreak revenge. England's riots began with an explosion of anger towards the police - so why is this issue not being addressed?

"The Game is Up": Unrest, Policing and the War on the Underclass

Aaron Peters 9 September 2011

Ten years after 9/11, the 'War on Terror' in Britain is being replaced by a 'War on the Underclass' as exceptional legal powers and the militarization of the police come to constitute the new normal.

The net of hatred: after Utøya

Thomas Hylland Eriksen 6 September 2011

The public debate in Norway following the massacre of 22 July 2011 is taking shape. A key focus is the obsessional and hate-filled language that pervades and dominates online discussion, says Thomas Hylland Eriksen.

Breivik: killing the left

Markha Valenta 31 August 2011
However nuanced, it is striking how little extant interpretations attend to the fact that Breivik’s most grotesque violence was not directed at Muslims or immigrants as such but at the youth members of the Norwegian Social Democrats.

Let's unite! a wake-up call from Norway

Dag Herbjornsrud 30 August 2011
The deadly attacks in Oslo are not only about Norway: they are about all of us. Ten years after the 9/11 terror, we face a common threat from extremism. Let's confront it together.

Criticism of EU-Libya migration policy is too little, too late

Polly Pallister-Wilkins 29 August 2011
An EU-Libya framework agreement signed in 2010 is only the tip of the iceberg of shameful EU extraterritorialised migration-management, argues Polly Pallister-Wilkins

Security challenges raise questions about Turkey’s regional power status

Radu Nikolaus Botez 24 August 2011
As Turkey flies air strikes against Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq and fails to play an important role in the Syrian crisis, its ambitions to become a regional power need to be questioned. Report highlights links between Islamist insurgents in northern Nigeria and al-Qaeda. In West Africa, piracy is on the rise, while a human rights commission reveals that thousands of unidentified bodies have been buried in mass graves in Kashmir. All this in today's security briefing.

Norway: terror and Islamophobia in the mirror

Sindre Bangstad 22 August 2011

As Norway ends its first month of mourning, media soundbites tell us that there is a desire to draw a line and move on. But there are lessons to be learned about the consequences of institutional ‘hate speech’ and prejudice in high places. Can Norway lead the way in learning these lessons?

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