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Extinction Rebellion: I’m an academic embracing direct action to stop climate change
Not heard of the “Extinction Rebellion” before? Then you heard it here first. Because soon, everyone is going to have heard of it. The Extinction Rebellion is a non-violent direct action movement challenging inaction over dangerous climate change and the mass extinction of species which, ultimately, threatens our own species. Saturday November 17 2018 is “Rebellion Day” – when people opposed to what they see as a government of “climate criminals” aim to gather together enough protesters to close down parts of the capital – by shutting down fossil-powered road traffic at key pinch-points in London. I’m a Reader in Philosophy at the University of East Anglia and I have…
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The ‘Progressive Alliance’ re-assessed, post-General-Election: a failed strategy
The think tank I chair, Green House published a report, in which I was a prominent author, in favour of the ‘Progressive Alliance’ concept, last year. A year on, and it is clear that we live in interesting times. This election may have gone relatively well for Corbyn – but we must be honest enough to accept that it has gone pretty disastrously wrong for g/Greens. Ecology was virtually entirely absent from the election campaign. The Conservatives, now governing once again, ‘won’ (sic) the election with a manifesto promising less than zero, eco-wise. Labour, the main beneficiaries of the election, promised “faster economic growth” as the linchpin of their manifesto: an idea…
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Ideas for a Radical Green Manifesto
Introduction: the big picture Green politics starts from the realities we now find ourselves in. Human beings are changing the planet in fundamental ways – altering the atmosphere and climate, reducing biodiversity and trashing ecosystems. This is the Anthropocene, and human impacts are going beyond the boundaries that have maintained the planet in a relatively stable state. At the centre of human pressures on the planet are two forms of growth – economic growth and population growth. Both are powerful and complex forces. Economic growth has lifted billions of people out of poverty and poor health conditions, but at the same time it is having devastating effects on the natural…
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General Election 2017: a Green realignment of British politics?
Theresa May has called an election allegedly to secure her ‘mandate’ for a hard Brexit – although in practice it is difficult not to see this as cynical party political maneuver to elect more Conservative MPs in the face of a weak opposition. Despite the slew of positive opinion polls for the Conservatives that have become a distressing feature of this year’s politics, the reality is that their ideology, Neoliberalism, is in deep crisis… The Financial crisis has been stark, is still ongoing, and is likely to get worse in this country due to the instability caused by Brexit. The Political crisis came searingly into view in 2016; with trust…
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After Brexit and Trump: don't demonise; localise!
The election of Donald Trump was a rude awakening from which many people in the US have still not recovered. Their shock is similar to that felt by UK progressives, Greens, and those on the Left following the Brexit referendum. In both cases, the visceral reaction was heightened by the barely-disguised racist and xenophobic messaging underpinning these campaigns. Before these sentiments grow even more extreme, it’s vital that we understand their root cause. If we simply react in horror and outrage, if we only protest and denounce, then we fail to grasp the deeper ramifications of their votes. For the defeat of both the Clinton campaign in the US and…
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'Progressive Alliance' is now the only alternative to the Tories
If we’ve learned anything from politics over the past year, it’s that the era of two party politics seems to have crashed into a long-overdue end. We are now faced with a crossroads: either we allow the UK to succumb to single party hegemony, or we pry open the door to pluralistic politics and allow a truly democratic multi-party politics to thrive. Failure to achieve proportional representation could leave us facing unending Conservative governments for the foreseeable future – something we desperately cannot afford at this time of poverty and climate crisis. However, this article isn’t written to make the case for proportional representation. That case has already been effectively…
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We must localise the EU and curb corporate power – but does that mean in or out?
Most voices in favour of Brexit seem to offer little more than narrow nationalism, xenophobia and racism. Such associations make it feel impossible for most Greens and progressive thinkers on the left to vote Leave in the upcoming UK referendum. And that settles it in the minds of some: one ‘has’ to vote Remain. Anything else feels ‘unprogressive’, reactionary, even downright dangerous. However, there are powerful arguments against the European Economic Union. In all five Nordic countries: Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Denmark, we have had a very powerful critique of the EU from an ecological, cultural, global solidarity and democratic perspective. A large proportion of the population realised that…
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BBC must give the Greens 2016 election broadcasts!
In the run-up to the General Election last year, it looked like the Green Party would be shut out of the televised debates. After a fantastic grassroots campaign online, both ITV and the BBC bowed to popular demand and made the decision to give Green Party Leader Natalie Bennett a place on the rostrum. The result was spectacular: the tag team of Bennett, the SNP’s Nicola Sturgeon and Plaid Cymru’s Leanne Wood were together seen by many as the winners of the debates (though Sturgeon was certainly the individual winner). The humanity of the three straight-talking women made Cameron, Clegg, Miliband and Farage seem even more alien and out of…
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A 'progressive pact' for a green and democratic future
Caroline Lucas has today issued a striking public call for a new politics of unity among ‘progressives’ – among those, that is, who seek at minimum to rein in the excesses of neoliberal ‘business as usual’, Tory-style. Caroline opens her article by praising Jeremy Corbyn, one of the Labour leadership contenders – and one whose view chime with the Greens on nuclear missiles, climate change and austerity. I second that praise. But let’s be honest. Corbyn’s chances of winning the leadership election are slim. But many Labour voters, members, candidates and Parliamentarians – and by no means just those who support Corbyn – share much in common with Greens. And…
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We need an alternative to neo-liberalism
With less than six months to go before the most wide-open General Election of our time, a true insurgent party is on the rise, and – despite what the media tell you – it’s not the one you are thinking of. The Green Party’s membership has been skyrocketing (growing proportionately faster in Scotland than has the SNP’s since the referendum), and the Greens have caught up or overtaken the governing Lib Dems in several polls. People are waking up to the reality that the old politics is dead. Ever since Tony Blair repositioned the Labour party towards “Thatcherism with a human face”, they, the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, have held…
