Global Politics

This week, King Abdullah of Jordan appealed to European parliamentarians to help root out both terrorism and ‘Islamophobia’. Setting aside this interesting conflation, the wholesale failure of Arab and majority Muslim countries to embody either mutual respect or inclusivity towards many of their ethno-religious minorities bespeaks of an imbalance in critical attention to how those […]

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Eastern and Central European states lined up at the NATO application window after the collapse of the Soviet Union.  And can anyone blame them after the events of the 20th century?  They were, after all, victimized by the Molotov-Ribbentrop treaty, the German Invasion, and then the subsequent Soviet “liberation” and forty- five year occupation. Yet […]

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John Donne famously reminded us that ‘no man is an island’. Likewise in today’s polycentric, ever-globalized, and interconnected world, no state can remain untouched by social, economic, or political influences from neighbouring states. As terrible as Islamic State has been for people living in Syria, Iraq and Libya, its effects on Europe are also increasingly being felt. […]

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Last year I criticized some of the hawk-like voices, including that of David Brooks of the NYT, which were calling for Barack Obama to increase the fear factor in dealing with Vladimir Putin over Ukraine. I should point out that I am decidedly not a fan of Putin, whose actions in Crimea and Ukraine have been reprehensible. However, we need […]

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With Greek debt negotiations reaching a critical point, it may be time for a reminder that there are more problems within the eurozone than just southern European debt. Austerity rightly remains firmly in the headlines, but looking beyond the struggles in Athens reveals that economic changes may be needed further north. Indeed, while the new […]

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It has been a tumultuous month in European politics. As Greek debt negotiations dominate the headlines, the resurgent left-wing in many European countries waits with baited breath in the realisation that the popularity of their movements may rest on what happens in Athens. It is interesting, however, that while the radical left has enjoyed a […]

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Procrastination report just goes to show how we view people as machines. Monday marked the launch of the ‘Great British Procrasti-nation’ report: the first ever in-depth look at the nation’s procrastination habits. I admit I admired the playful pun for a while. It didn’t last long. Based on a YouGov survey of over 2,000 adults, […]

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The tragedy of Charlie Hebdo has provoked an immense response from Muslims and non-Muslims all over the world. Almost all who have written about this issue have condemned the killings in Paris, equating them to other similar terrorist threats and attacks such as the Rushdie Affair and the 7/7 bombings in Britain, the 9/11 attacks, and […]

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The main source of hostility in the modern world is the widening gap between the most and least developed segments of human civilization. While some societies are exploring potential life on other planets, life has not changed much for others over the past millennium. Unlike in previous centuries, the permeation of modern day technologies makes […]

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I haven’t been wildly impressed by how Angela Merkel has handled the eurozone crisis, but this speech to the German people shows why (for my money) she’s easily the most impressive political leader in Europe, if not the world, right now. At a time when too many UK politicians have been pandering to extreme tendencies in a craven attempt […]

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Ronald Reagan did not bring the Berlin Wall down, not even close. How do I know? Because I was there. I remember his speech at the wall, right in front of the Brandenburg Gate. It was June 12, 1987 and despite the media reports to the contrary there were relatively few in attendance. We stood alone in […]

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I’m voting ‘No’ this Thursday. I’ve been leaning ‘Yes’ for a while, but as the referendum approaches I’ve found myself changing my mind. There are real potential benefits to a ‘Yes’ vote: I believe that a parliament based on proportional representation will give us better (though more boring) governance over the long term and more accurately […]

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Post by Better Together.   A friend of mine in St Andrews who owns a legendary bar in the town (as well as being a legend himself), and who is supporting independence, voiced what I regard as a very honourable position on Scotland’s right to self-determination, even though I disagree with it: How come every […]

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This piece was originally published in Huffington Post on 20 February 2014 Apart from 2014 being the 700th anniversary of the Battle of Bannockburn, the year Glasgow hosts the Commonwealth Games, and that Scotland plays host to the Ryder Cup, the vote on Scottish independence is also being held 100 years after the outbreak of […]

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It is widely believed that the most influential era ever to be blessed by the infinite capacities of the human brain was the Industrial Revolution. With the world revolving around the sudden purge of development, everything began to be constituted along the blueprint of the infrastructure of the Industrial Revolution. The process of standardizing all […]

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“It is reasonable to argue that but for the coup, Iran would be a mature democracy. So traumatic was the coup’s legacy that when the Shah finally departed in 1979, many Iranians feared a repetition of 1953, which was one of the motivations for the student seizure of the U.S. Embassy. The hostage crisis, in […]

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