Setting The People Free – a meeting with the author

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I was delighted to spend a couple of hours today talking democracy with John Dunn, emeritus Professor of Political Theory at King’s College, Cambridge. Professor Dunn wrote the excellent “Setting the People Free“, a book that helped me nail down my thinking on the evolution of “democracy” since the Ancient Greeks coined a term for […]

Food and land: base camps for community building

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I wrote this blog entry for Stir magazine, which has a kickstarter campaign underway to raise funds for printing offline versions of the wonderful work it does already online. Have a think about the stuff you usually fritter your money away on, petrol for the Porsche, a Lear jet flight to Monaco, private banking advice […]

News to make the rich richer

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I wrote this comment in response to the following article by the World Association of Newspapers and Newspaper Publishers. Thomson Reuters can hire all the new journalists it wants but won’t change anything fundamental about its daily news file. Sorry about that. The agency deserves its reputation as providing a service that helps rich people […]

Ireland Yes, Ireland No – is that really the only option?

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(Photo by the Blue-haired lawyer) Irish voters have a chance to vote between paying more or less for their public debt today, according to their Prime Minister Enda Kenny. Put that way, I can imagine the temptation to vote “yes”. It’s a pretty rubbish choice. That Irish citizens have a formal right to express their […]

Stirring up mainstream media and politics

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I’ve just had a piece published by the bimonthly online Stir magazine, talking about the failings of mainstream media and conventional politics and what we can all do about both. I like the look of what they’re doing a great deal at Stir – there are tonnes of long-form articles I read all the way […]

Postcard from SW France

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It’s days to go before the first round in the 2012 French presidential elections. In Montbrun Bocage, a rural backwater south of Toulouse in the Pyrenean foothills, the atmosphere is hardly crackling with excitement. People here certainly know their politics but generally fail to find much passion for politicians. Given the bluntness of occasional votes […]