Sergei Udaltsov, leader of Russia’s ‘Left Front’ movement, had barely been heard of before the recent elections, but his emotional speeches, hunger strike, imprisonment, not to mention an incident in a frozen fountain, have since turned him into a hero. Ilya Azar met Udaltsov in a Moscow coffee sh
Richard Branson's Virgin Group is lead sponsor of tomorrow's London Marathon. It's “a national institution” says Virgin. “The atmosphere and camaraderie is like nothing else.” One medical student running in the Marathon doesn't like what Virgin is doing to another much-loved national institution.
The scope and seriousness of communication about Europe, and concurrent growing demands for European democracy from civil society might even legitimize an argument about an emerging European public sphere like never before. Yet the euro crisis debate also reveals the weaknesses of Europe as a poli
Even if President Obama adopts a stronger-arm approach to domestic politics and demands legislative efficiency, the conflicts will simmer regardless, boiling over in some form or other by 2016.
Populist movements can bear a strong, but misleading, resemblance to more respectable cousins: movements for democratic accountability. It has now become fashionable even to argue that ‘some populism is good’ - because populism is seen as ‘speaking truth to power’. It’s important therefore for dem
Very many people inside (and outside) Russia would like to see a change in the current way the country is governed. The protest movements that were formed after the recent elections made this appear a real possibility, but that was then. What now? Vladimir Zvonovsky considers four scenarios.
Sports provide a rare space and North-South bridging opportunity for increased interaction between the Kurdish and Arab citizens of Iraq.
David Cameron has expressed a commitment to ”liberate” British business from “excessive” health and safety legislation. But does this ‘liberal’ rhetoric mask the relinquishing of one of the state’s vital roles? Geoffery Bindman QC challenges the ideology behind the government’s “compensation cultu
Anders Behring Breivik’s attacks are part of a worrying trend in Europe of the far right’s rise within mainstream politics. From the Netherlands and Germany to Britain and France, immigrant communities are on the defensive.
How far can the flourishing "participatory state feminism" in Brazil expand into the state apparatus in order to counter the absence of women in decision making positions and redefine women's place in society?
This is not just about including Saudi women in the London 2012. It’s much more far-reaching and serious than that. It is an issue of silence and concurrence from the international community regarding a nation’s outright breach of international agreements and conventions.
