Just Published - Debating the future of BBC’s Russian Service, Editors OpenDemocracy Russia
- 1914-18 today: how memory works, Dan Todman
- The next global agenda, Andre Wilkens
- After the change election , Godfrey Hodgson
- (Inter) national leadership, Grahame Thompson
- The SWISH Report (12) , Paul Rogers
- Russia and the west: a liberal view, Lilia Shevtsova
- Russia's economy model, Dmitri Travin
- Two visions of atheism, Tina Beattie
From the editors of openDemocracy Russia:
The BBC World Service argues that it has lost 40% of its Russian listeners in recent years, although the budget for its Russian service its second largest, at about £5 million a year.
The loss of listeners is partly due to the fact following the poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko, when relations between Britain and Russia were at a low ebb, the World Service lost its access to FM transmitters in Moscow and St Petersburg. However, the BBC... more »
1914-18 today: how memory works, Dan Todman
The annual commemoration of the fallen in the world wars and small wars Britain has been involved in takes place on the nearest Sunday to "Remembrance Day", 11 November. On that day in 1918, at 11 o'clock in the morning, the guns fell silent on the western front for the first time since August 1914. The fact that this year is the ninetieth anniversary of that event means that it is being marked with especial intensity. But in Britain at least, there is also something of the... more »
The next global agenda, Andre Wilkens
The global financial crisis has implications that go far beyond the financial and economic sectors. Below are nine thoughts in an attempt to see the opportunities in what currently looks like a pretty grim picture.
Andre Wilkens is the director of the Open Society Institute Brussels (OSI-Brussels) and a founding member of the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) Thought 1: The west is in trouble and has become a potential source of instability for the world
During the eight... more »
After the change election , Godfrey Hodgson
"Yes we can!"
With that rhythmically repeated trope, three of the simplest Anglo-Saxon monosyllables, Barack Hussein Obama greeted his victory in the United States presidential election. In the same breath he dedicated it to a future that can fulfil the audacity of his hope, and the dreams from his father, his mother and the grandmother who sadly died on the eve of his triumph.
Godfrey Hodgson was director of the Reuters' Foundation Programme at Oxford... more »
(Inter) national leadership, Grahame Thompson
Crises always expose the underlying character of situations and events. They are intriguing - even attractive - occasions since they provide a glimpse into the very structure of the system. Indeed, there is probably a subliminal desire for crises: they enable decisive actionto be taken, leadership to be exercised, hands to be rung, mistakes to be exposed, blame to be apportioned. They break the normal pattern of the mundane. Thus the media loves them; it chases them, constructs them, and revels... more »
The SWISH Report (12) , Paul Rogers
A ninth report from the South Waziristan Institute of Strategic Hermeneutics to the al-Qaida Strategic Planning Cell (SPC) on the progress of the campaign.
Thank you for inviting us to submit a further report on the progress of your movement. You will recall that our work for your planning cell began with an initial assessment in July 2004; continued with additional reports in January 2005, February 2006 and September 2006; and (in light of political developments in the United States)... more »
Russia and the west: a liberal view, Lilia Shevtsova
The Polit.ru and Open Democracy discussion of issues of international relations has inspired me to offer another view. I should like to consider the relations between Russia and the West, but in the context of civilisational norms and standards. It seems to me that outside this context and without considering the link between foreign and domestic policy, it is difficult, or even impossible, to explain the logic of Russia's behaviour on the international stage, and the state of her... more »
Russia's economy model, Dmitri Travin
Vladimir Putin remains the most important person in Russia even though he has moved from the post of president to prime minister. On 29 October he announced that no nationalisation should be expected. Why make such statements 17 years after Russia moved to a market economy?
The fact is that many people in Russia have indeed begun to wonder how committed the present leadership of the country is to the principles of the market economy. The growing economic crisis has once more posed the... more »
Two visions of atheism, Tina Beattie
"One wants to do this thing of just walking along the edge of the precipice." (Francis Bacon
An enterprising plan to display an atheist message on the side of sixty of London's red buses from January 2009 suggests that, if there is a God, she has a rather wicked sense of humour. The advertisement, which is sponsored by donors who include the British Humanist Association and Richard Dawkins, reads: "There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life."... more »
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