I have argued now and again for a left strategy comprising: (1) ‘permanent reform’ and (2) ‘alliance formation’. In other words, a strategy that (re-1) commends the left to start – as boldly as possible – with what is achievable, and then builds on these reforms towards socialism, and (re-2) acknowledges the essential salience of… Read More »
I have in front of me Peter Allen’s The Political Class, which I read a while ago and which is about optimum forms of ‘democratic’ representation and decision-making in politics. It is not my intenton here to summarise his analysis of different options. I will rather summarise his characterisation of the extant ‘political class’, then… Read More »
Guy Standing is an innovative thinker and contributor to policy formation. He is best known for his concept of the ‘precariat’ and for championing a universal basic income. In a recent chapter in Economics for the Many (edited by John McDonnell) he introduces a few more novel concepts, and these are the focus of this… Read More »
There has for some time, most particularly among French philosophers and commentators, been an interest in recovering the notion of communism: people like Badiou for example have espoused a ‘new communism’. The rationale for this is generally that throughout parliamentary or other forms of liberal/social democracies in the West the electoral choice is merely between… Read More »
Alan Badiou gave a lecture at Tufts University, Boston, two weeks after the election of Trump during which he attempted to come to terms with this enigmatic and painful happening. His observations have a wider relevance, not least to UK post-Brexit. Badiou rightly sees Trump as a symptom of financialised capitalism, which he characterises in… Read More »
It is sometimes difficult to get one’s voice heard above the background noise of today’s news outlets, whether TV or printed press. So I thought it might be timely to outline Labour’s ethos and plans even as another general election looms. The polls, always to be taken with a pinch of salt, suggest high rates… Read More »
A little over a week ago I asked a question on twitter, curious as to how people would respond. I gave people a week to respond. The question and responses were as follows: ‘If a sociologist set out to study whether those identifying as Jewish are under- or over-represented among British elites, would this be… Read More »
Surprisingly often ideas advance, theses refined, by serendipitous means. So it is in this case. I have just finished Michiko Kakutani’s excellent The Death of Truth, a discourse on our present era, one which has been understandably characterized as ‘post-truth’. In most of my publications, and blogs too, I have short-changed culture, so keen have… Read More »
Blogs to my mind allow for an interlude of ‘thinking out loud’, so it is perhaps not so surprising that the blog I intended to write when I turned on my laptop has already been superceded. The reason for this is sheer frustration at the level of ineptitude and, far more seriously, of corruption in… Read More »
DOES IT HAVE TO BE THIS WAY? Graham Scambler Introducing: Behind the Scenes This is a book of sociology that differs from many another. Most obviously it is not written with students of the discipline in mind. There already exists a plethora of textbooks within students’ reach and compass, many of which are excellent guides… Read More »