As Colombia approaches presidential elections next year, the US decision to decertify the country in the war on drugs plays into the hands of its allies on the political right, writes NICK MacWILLIAM
Labour, elections and war: the case of 2001 and 2005
It’s not just ‘the Muslim vote’ but a general opposition to war from the whole electorate that Labour should be wary of — even the Lib Dems have come off better better in the past, writes KEITH FLETT
VOTING AGAINST WAR: Women on an anti-war protest in 2005 hold placards from the Respect party which managed to beat Labour and win an MP, George Galloway, in Bethnal Green and Bow that year
The move against alleged PKK members that sparked outrage as a community centre in north London was raided last year has now come to trial, writes TONY BURKE, but in the meantime, the peace process abroad has changed the situation almost entirely
A new report points a way to overcome complacent framing of climate issues, ‘by sparking a wider public reckoning with climate realities,’ and reconnecting with working-class people. IAN SINCLAIR reports
We cannot understand today’s world without understanding the rise of China – and we cannot understand China without understanding how it was shaped by the second world war, writes JENNY CLEGG
NICK WRIGHT reports from Italy, where 80 cities saw Gaza strikes as unions paralysed transport and massive crowds clashed with police in Milan — but France is also kicking off, and Westminster, in a very different way, is facing a crisis of legitimacy too
Escalating anti-China rhetoric from the West has a clear purpose – to manufacture consent for the new cold war, and potentially a hot one, argues CARLOS MARTINEZ
UNTIL recently, current events were held to pass into history at around the 30-year mark, which was when official government papers were released of that period.
In more recent times many documents have been opened up after 20 years, meaning that the early 2000s period of British history has now made its initial entry to the historical record.
In the 2001 general election, nearly a repeat of the result of 1997, Labour had a majority of 167. At the next election in 2005, Labour’s majority dropped to 66. Tony Blair was replaced by Gordon Brown as PM in 2006.
More from this author
In 1981, towering figure for the British left Tony Benn came a whisker away from victory, laying the way for a wave of left-wing Labour Party members, MPs and activism — all traces of which are now almost entirely purged by Starmer, writes KEITH FLETT
Who you ask and how you ask matter, as does why you are asking — the history of opinion polls shows they are as much about creating opinions as they are about recording them, writes socialist historian KEITH FLETT
KEITH FLETT revisits debates about the name and structure of proposed working-class parties in the past
The summer saw the co-founders of modern communism travelling from Ramsgate to Neuenahr to Scotland in search of good weather, good health and good newspapers in the reading rooms, writes KEITH FLETT
