UK - openDemocracy (Page 208)

Gender and destitution in the UK

The real migration scandal in the UK are the people forced to live without any recourse to public funds. Migrant women who leave violent husbands, and women who have been trafficked into the UK to work in the sex industry, face the additional trauma of destitution, says Jenny Phillimore

By Jenny Phillimore

/ 19 Mar 2012

Fallout of News Corp. Scandal in the US?

In the US, the deleterious effect of rampant commercialization is the real scandal.

By James Hamilton

/ 11 Mar 2012

Re-thinking detention without trial

Whatever the outcome in Abu Qatada’s case, there is an opportunity to learn from mistakes when dealing with terrorist suspects in the future. Whatever type or range of future terrorist threat the UK faces, there should be no need to resort to detentions without trial in the UK or to tacitly suppor

By Robert Lambert

/ 10 Mar 2012

Britain as a private security state: first they came for the asylum seeker ...

As an increasingly denigrated category of people who 'should not be here', asylum seekers are among the first to experience the privatisation of state security in the UK. They won't be the last.

By John Grayson

/ 9 Mar 2012

It is time for an inclusive politics

With Communities Secretary Eric Pickles pushing a tough new government approach to British Muslim organisations, the former head of the Muslim Council of Britain argues the time is ripe for rapprochement.

By Muhammad Abdul Bari

/ 8 Mar 2012

Reflections on Britain's student movement

This exchange revisits the student movement that erupted in Britain over the winter of 2010-2011. It produced a new cohort of young activists, fueling the anti-cuts movements and Occupy. But to what extent was the movement middle-class, a-historical, and shaped by neoliberalism?

By Guy Aitchison and Jeremy Gilbert

/ 2 Mar 2012

Margaret Hodge, the Mandarinate and the black hole of accountability at the heart of Whitehall

In a context of increasing tensions between Whitehall and Westminster, greater distinctions need to be made between the responsibilities of Ministers and officials. British democracy will suffer if we don't stop the culture of passing the buck.

By Nick Pearce

/ 1 Mar 2012

Living on borrowed time? The changing frontiers of the NHS debate

The author of 'The Plot Against the NHS' discusses the political struggle over England's national health service and considers what those determined to save it can still do.

By Colin Leys

/ 29 Feb 2012

Extraordinary rendition and secret prisons in the context of the Arab Spring

Would it be too naive to hope that the Arab Spring might have a positive impact on our ability to hold, and tenacity in holding, our government and its agents to account in their dealings with the Arab (and wider) world?

By Ellie Violet Bramley

/ 28 Feb 2012

Time to end exceptional security policies targeting Muslims: they don't work

Contemporary counter-terrorist policies often discriminate directly or indirectly against Muslims, as the recent case of Abu Qatada illustrate. This bias produces counter-productive effects.

By Robert Lambert

/ 28 Feb 2012

How did Michael Delaney die, Mr Murdoch?

In January 1987, a Murdoch delivery van mowed down a pedestrian. The case was soon dropped on 'insufficient evidence'. Now the cosy relationship between the media empire and the Met police is coming to light, it's time to re-examine the case.

By Mike Jempson

/ 27 Feb 2012

'An excess of democracy'

Occupy and the direct action movements of today have much in common with the radical movements of the 1960s/70s. Can the new generation move beyond the successes and failures of the past, to develop an alternative political economy?

By Hilary Wainwright

/ 24 Feb 2012