New elections in Poland. And as the polls predicted, a big win again for the Law and Justice party (PiS) led by Jarosław Kaczyński. Although [BREAKING NEWS] as the final results come in it looks as if PiS have not won the Senate (upper house) as well as the Sejm […]
Football (English-style) has a new companion – the video assisted referee (VAR). The proliferation and tumbling price of video technology have made it possible for plays and incidents in a football match to be scrutinised from many different angles at great speed, so that a referee not on the pitch […]
Here is my latest DIPLOMAT magazine piece, on applying philosophy to current affairs: Plato posed questions that stay with us today. Is there an ideal way to organise society? How should a society take decisions? How best to ensure that those decisions are wise? For much of the next 2,000 […]
Here’s a question. What are some philosophical aspects of the increasingly bewildering ‘gender identity’ battlefield? Here is a transgender weight-lifter setting new records: The organization Save Women’s Sports also drew attention to Gregory on Facebook. “Mary was born a man and is very proud of this cool new trophy from […]
Here are my collected thoughts on Julian Assange and his exciting life and times. My DIPLOMAT piece on Assange and diplomatic protocol, from 2017: If someone runs into state B’s embassy to escape state A’s laws, s/he can sit there until s/he comes out. The embassy premises are inviolable, but […]
My second piece on diplomatic negotiating is now out, over at AP Insights. The first one was here. Thus: Russia and Poland for centuries have been negotiating through war and peace over their borders and cultures. Wary rivalry between England and France has been carrying on since the Battle of Hastings […]
+++ World Scoop +++ Here’s extended/edited extracts from a long piece I first sent to the FCO from faraway Harvard back in Spring 1998 as the NATO bombing campaign against Serbia concluded. It was revised after Milošević fell. It still reads rather well, if I say so myself. See my […]
Catch it while you can: an edition of BBC World Service radio programme The Real Story that looks at Poland’s current political escapades and features me trying to get a word in edgeways as three Polish experts slug it out on the rule of law and so on. The (very) […]
The furious noise over a new nomination by President Trump to the US Supreme Court (SCOTUS) is all about a subject familiar to readers here. Namely the two basic issues in politics or indeed wider life: Who decides? Who decides who decides? If X is tasked to Decide, the person […]
As the UK staggers deeper into the Brexit process swamp, things are again bubbling in the Eurozone. To the point of Project Syndicate opining at some length on the core issues. Harvard’s Dani Rodrik asks a pertinent question: How Democratic is the Euro? By joining the euro, Italy surrendered monetary […]
