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# Introducing Uneconomics: February 6 to 12 on openDemocracy
- URL: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/introducing-uneconomics-february-6-to-12-on-opendemocracy/
- Published: 2012-02-20T17:02:21.000Z
- Updated: 2026-04-23T00:53:24.000Z
- Description: The west’s financial crisis has exposed great failures of economic thinking as well as policy. This week, we launched “Uneconomics”. It challenges the dominance of orthodox economists. They have taken over the thinking and language of both policy-making and media coverage of business and finance.
- Author: openDemocracy Supporters
- Tags: The Week in 1 Minute, #Migrated, #en, #Import 2026-04-09 17:19, #appended-excerpt

In Russia, the economic fractures intensify the political pressures on Vladimir Putin - these are explored in oDRussia by [Vladimir Pastukhov](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/0f64d25a08&ref=opendemocracy.net), by [Fyodor Lukyanov](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/53f6cdfb11&ref=opendemocracy.net) who defends a BBC series on the Putin years from its critics, as well as by [Andrei Konchalovsky](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/4b32a054a5&ref=opendemocracy.net), who invokes history to advise Russia’s protesters to be cautious.

The protests in England against the government’s controversial health-service changes have reached a political pitch. But Our Kingdom’s stethoscope too is on England’s deep governance, with [Gavin Barker](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/e5711c2958&ref=opendemocracy.net) emphasising the net’s potential to reinvigorate local democracy, the 70-something [Trevor Smith](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/de222a8648&ref=opendemocracy.net) looking at the consequences of the role of prime minister being a “mid-career” job, and [James Butler](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/45fecab788&ref=opendemocracy.net) thinking the new network politics through the prism of [Paul Mason’s arguments](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/577a91923a&ref=opendemocracy.net).

The relaunched openSecurity features [Ahmed E Souaiaia](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/1e4ac223a0&ref=opendemocracy.net) on the chances of region-fuelled civil war in Syria, while [Vicken Cheterian](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/46da7ca4a6&ref=opendemocracy.net) assesses the balance of forces in a crucial period for Tunisia and[Volker Perthes](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/76abb90161&ref=opendemocracy.net) presents an overview of year two of the Arab revolution. [Giuliano Battiston](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/84381c7480&ref=opendemocracy.net) writes on the Afghan war’s legacy, which is also explored in [Paul Rogers’s](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/0001f0e608&ref=opendemocracy.net) column; and [Vidhya Ramalingam](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/09db95e3ae&ref=opendemocracy.net) on the rise of Europe’s radical right is also reflected in contrasting views of Hungary from [György Schöpflin](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/ae59c4e8a7&ref=opendemocracy.net) and [Anton Pelinka](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/3ca50862c5&ref=opendemocracy.net).

In 50:50, [Nazek Ramadan](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/db8955cc66&ref=opendemocracy.net) challenges anti-immigrant prejudice via a new newspaper written by migrants: *Migrant Voice*. From Africa’s east and west, stories of displacement: [Kathambi Kinoti](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/eecb2497f8&ref=opendemocracy.net) in 50:50 on the African Union’s silence on the continent’s “land grabs” and their damage to women’s livelihoods, and [Morten Bøås](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/1c92bfc9d5&ref=opendemocracy.net) on the roots and reinvention of the Nigerian Islamist movement Boko Haram. In Colombia too, local insecurities are at the heart of continued turbulence, as [Adam Isacson](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/730828a028&ref=opendemocracy.net) shows.

Our authors examine elections past ([Taiwan](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/93d259a024&ref=opendemocracy.net)) and future ([France](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/9c5a0d41a7&ref=opendemocracy.net)), the [case against](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/89d3b89968&ref=opendemocracy.net) campaigning Spanish judge Baltasar Garzón, the [linguistic trap](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/7991a03683&ref=opendemocracy.net) of China’s elite, and a [new Hollywood film](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/d31b8b603d&ref=opendemocracy.net) on Bosnia’s horrors. They find lessons too in a report on the [killing of a Pakistani journalist](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/b87ad1bd53&ref=opendemocracy.net), media coverage of [Japan’s tsunami](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/1c26ca80b1&ref=opendemocracy.net), and the [tortured history](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/09f98f754d&ref=opendemocracy.net) of Israel and the political left. And Rebecca Willis asks a 21st-century question: [what is energy for?](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/67db18d79f&ref=opendemocracy.net)

You won’t want to miss:

- [How Democracy Can Save Europe](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/38b127c0d5&ref=opendemocracy.net)
- [Friends disappear as vengeance still stalks across Libya](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/e92b8027bc&ref=opendemocracy.net)
- [The Eurovision Song Contest in Azerbaijan](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/fcfad44921&ref=opendemocracy.net)
- [On why journalists should have higher expectations of themselves](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/7c5738b24f&ref=opendemocracy.net)

**openDemocracy’s week in 400 words is emailed to Members and Friends to help pay for our great content. Please forward this to any contact you think might be interested and want to join; they should see** [**here**](http://cts.vresp.com/c/?openDemocracy/45425b82f4/b5696a98c8/fb9b480e1a&ref=opendemocracy.net) **or email**[**supporters@opendemocracy.net**](mailto:supporters@opendemocracy.net)**.**

The west’s financial crisis has exposed great failures of economic thinking as well as policy. This week, we launched “[Uneconomics](https://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/collections/uneconomics)”. It challenges the dominance of orthodox economists. They have taken over the thinking and language of both policy-making and media coverage of business and finance. Their wretched narrowness has reinforced the crisis. A quite different approach is needed, that is anthropological and social. The editor, and author of the [opening blast](https://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/william-davies/uneconomics-challenge-to-power-of-economics-profession), is [Will Davies](http://potlatch.typepad.com/about.html?ref=opendemocracy.net). If he is right, you won’t read a debate like this anywhere else.