Global Political Insight

Hungarian Prime Minister visits London and delivers address to Chatham House think tank but fails to address concerns over rule of law which have dogged his international reputation Mention the names of European political leaders in Brussels right now and few elicit such a negative response as Viktor Orban, the Hungarian Prime Minister. Since being […]

The Taliban has tried to kill her; the UN has listened to her impassioned speech on the inviolable importance of equal education; she even nearly won the Nobel Peace Prize (but let’s face it – she’s better than that!) Malala Yousafzai has now cemented her image as the Joan of Arc of the modern era. […]

One could almost be forgiven for not realising that Azerbaijan has just had a presidential election. Yes, the BBC has run an article on it and the news of the vote has made it into Western media, whereas elections in Belarus often fail to do, but it was a brief report in forming readers of […]

Since 2010, the Department for International Development (DfID) has taken a controversial decision to pump foreign aid into low-cost private schools in developing countries (Nigeria, Ghana and Pakistan, to name a few) due to a need for investment in public education systems that, if anything, are growing exponentially. This move sparks a change in mentality for […]

A cataclysm occurred on the 14th of May; at least it was an upheaval for two postgraduate students at the Centre for Russian and East European Studies (CREES) at the University of Birmingham. Such a momentous occasion called for a morning of coffee at the Starbucks to debate the issue and its connotations for Russia. […]

In the past week there have been increasing calls to ban the Greek far right party, known as Golden Dawn. Since the party has achieved national representation by winning 18 seats in the Greek Parliament, it has been making headlines in Greece, Europe and the World in general. This attention has come in the form […]

In a recent interview with a Jesuit journal in Italy, Pope Francis declared that he wants to establish a “new balance” in the Catholic Church by encouraging more involvement from women in key decisions and a less perjorative focus on the LGBT community, divorce and abortion. The Pope called for the Catholic Church (and wider […]

Six days ago was Catalonia’s ‘national’ independence day, dedicated to the memory of the fall of Barcelona to Philip V during the Spanish war of succession in 1714. The past two years have seen a particular vehement demonstration of Catalan nationalism with 100,000 protesters last year protesting vociferously in the Placa de Catalunya. This year […]

The United Nations head chemical weapons inspector in Syria, Sweden’s Ake Sellström, responded to concerns over Syria’s alleged use of chemical weapons with a dazzling display of patient examination and prudent analysis in the tradition of fellow Swedish disarm-o-crats Rolf Ekéus and Hans Blix. As Sellström’s heroics have rekindled popular interest in Swedish weapons inspectors, […]

Barack Obama took office in 2008 as a moderate, an accomplished lawyer with enough grammatical tricks and a robust lexicon to weave his way through Congress and the rest of the political establishment. For many, if not all of us, Barack Obama became synonymous with fresh air. A much needed break from his conservative, trigger […]

In recent weeks, the Russian government has come under fire for a recent amendment to a law on child protection which prohibits the promotion of homosexuality to under 18’s in Russia. The punishment for breaching this law varies with the BBC saying an individual can risk a £78 fine while an organisation could be fined […]

This article is intended to be a short update as a first-hand witness in India scrutinising the various views of investment here. As I write from the Pai family home in the centre of Mumbai, I notice just how much inflation has affected the retail market, which I like to observe so closely (having bought […]

The Green Party of England and Wales is on a roll. They won their first seat in the House of Commons in 2010 in Brighton and took minority control of the city’s council in 2011.  They also have a good chance of a second seat in Norwich next time around. To this extent they are […]

Following the unverified claims that chemical weapons were used in Syria, British Prime Minister David Cameron was ready to take military action against the Syrian state within days of the incident. The media and the public were certain that Britain was about to embark on another military campaign, to add to the recent tallies of […]

Since the military coup that ousted President Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood from power in July, the West has been forced into a difficult position regarding events in Egypt. Whenever the military feels the need to intervene through a coup something must be going wrong in the state in question. This also raises the prospect […]