Category: ‘Taking Control’
-
Ethnonationalism: Last Refuge of Globalism
Philip Cunliffe thinks we have no national interest in ethnonationalism. (Long read) Ethnonationalism has reared its head in British politics, sowing division on the Right and providing vindication once again for the Left’s perennial prophecy of a looming fascist menace. It is an unsurprising development. As the electorate has grown increasingly frustrated by the failure…
-
Britain Against the Yookay: Nation Against Empire
Philip Cunliffe identifies the source of the increasing fragmentation of British politics and society in the imperial structures of the state, and its long experience of relying on devolved government and sectarianism to frustrate the national self-determination of the colonised. We live in the Yookay. Everyone instantly recognises their lives and surroundings in the social…
-
Death Warmed Up
Peter Ramsay argues that the British right’s proposal for a Great Repeal Act only reveals the futility of its approach to the nation. An online Anglofuturist put out a video last week weaving together the words of the Tory politician Robert Jenrick, ex-Reform MP Rupert Lowe and conservative historian David Starkey, each promoting the proposal…
-
The Politics of Planning
Aaron Wells explains how Labour’s new Planning and Infrastructure Bill is unlikely to untangle the political problems in the planning process that plays such a large part in Britain’s building crisis. Housing Secretary Angela Rayner MP talks a big game about ‘taking on the blockers’ who stand in the way of development, but NIMBYism and…
-
Is Trump 2 the End of ‘Neoliberal Order Breakdown Syndrome’?
Lee Jones asks why the liberal expert class may be changing its tune in the wake of Trump’s re-election. Doesn’t this time feel different? Is it possible that the liberal establishment is finally winding down its eight-year temper tantrum and coming to terms with reality? While it may be too soon to tell, reactions to…
-
The Far-Right Excuse
Peter Ramsay argues that the official reaction to the recent riots in England is an ideological distortion that seeks to deflect responsibility for national disintegration. The riots and disorder that spread across Britain last week involved outright racial violence and intimidation, criminal damage and looting. They were widely condemned, and prosecutors are rightly taking action…
-
Why Britain needs PR+
In the wake of the general election, Peter Ramsay considers the strongest argument for Britain’s existing electoral system, and explains why it no longer works. He argues that we now need proportional representation, but that won’t be enough to reinvigorate democratic participation in government unless it is part of a larger reform to the electoral…
-
Rule of the Void
The UK’s general election result might seem like a restoration of the old pre-2016 political order. A bland technocrat has won a sweeping majority. However, Peter Ramsay and Philip Cunliffe argue that Labour’s massive victory is hollow and leaves the state in a weaker position than ever. The election results are a dramatic manifestation of…
-
The British Nation: What’s Its future?
Northern Star editor Peter Ramsay will be speaking about the future of the British nation together with David Edgerton, author of The Rise and Fall of the British Nation, and Tomiwa Owolade, author of This Is Not America: Why Black Lives in Britain Matter. The event is free and takes place: Thursday 2nd May 6.30pm London School of…
-
Burying Brexit to Save Stormont
Peter Ramsay on how Sunak’s deal with the DUP neutralises Brexit and confirms what we have previously argued on The Northern Star: that Britain’s national sovereignty needs Ireland’s reunification. Jeffrey Donaldson’s announcement that the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) will end its two-year boycott of the devolved power-sharing executive that governs Northern Ireland is bad news…
-
Save Us from National Saviours
Philip Cunliffe considers the current interest in ‘Anglo-Gaullism’ among some British conservatives, and asks whether there is any prospect of a national saviour on the French model coming to the rescue of an exhausted British nation. With the nation in the grip of palpable decay, our existing political system offers no prospect of change or…
-
Shuffling Between Populism and Technocracy
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s latest cabinet reshuffle exposes a crumbling government torn between mindless populism and deadend, unaccountable technocracy, argues Lizzie Finegan. Another day, another cabinet reshuffle. The primary victim was Home Secretary Suella Braverman, darling of the right-populist wing of Britain’s Conservative Party. The prime beneficiary was ex-prime minister David Cameron. Rising from…
The Northern Star 