oD Plugs

“The result is that Hezbollah emerges as a force in Lebanon that can deliver,” Amal Saad-Ghorayeb, a political analyst in Lebanon and an expert on Hezbollah, wrote on the openDemocracy Web site. “Thereby perpetuating an important political dynamic — of the nonstate actor which functions as the de facto state versus the state nonactor which merely enjoys the status of the de jure state.”

"The result is that Hizbullah emerges as the force in Lebanon that can deliver, thereby perpetuating an important political dynamic — of the non-state actor which functions as the de facto state versus the state non-actor which merely enjoys the status of de jure state," analyst Amal Saad-Ghorayeb wrote on the openDemocracy website.

Tony Curzon Price at Open Democracy sums up Zittrain’s position below:JZ's impassioned cry in the face of all these attempts to move problems into the realm of authority is to “give communities a chance.”….If at every turn we acquiesce and allow the top-down “solution'', the Internet will have demonstrated its “self-closing'' property: the open system that shut itself down.

Latest Key Resources on the Public Site Resources Database: HOME OFFICE UKBA: How changes to our immigration system affect your application to work here A page explaining how applications to come to work in the UK will be affected by the new points-based system. "The right and wrong fix: Afghan lessons for Zimbabwe" by Ashraf Ghani & Clare Lockhart (authors of "Fixing Failed States: A Framework for Rebuilding a Fractured World - Oxford University Press, 2008): "The guiding principle of the change that Zimbabwe needs to undergo,....is that stable political systems rest on the consent of the people.....generated through performance of core state functions on behalf of citizens... The challenges ..... in a post-Mugabe Zimbabwe will be immense...." (on 'opendemocracy.net') Also on 'opendemocracy', see Roger Southall on The politics of pressure: the world and Zimbabwe: "For too long the international community has been at odds with western demands for increased pressure upon the....Zanu-PF regime of Robert Mugabe being met with African (and notably South African) resistan

The problem is not the Irish and their vote. Frankly, I find many of the reasons for the Irish voting “No” quite ridiculous (bir-rispett kollu). The words “misinformation”, “spurious No campaigns” and “insular mentality” come to mind. Voters at the referendum booths declared to journalists that they were voting to keep out “abortion, being called up to the European army and homosexuality”. Ring a familiar bell? Referendums themselves are a subject of bitter debate as to whether they are the best tool for assessing democratic will. Jean Monnet Professor George Schopflin makes an interesting argument on Opendemocracy.org that discussions about referendums and their efficacy tend to confuse populism and democracy.In the 1960s there was a heated debate as to the role of referendums to assess the will of the people. One of the main protagonists of the debate, Lord Devlin, argued that referendums would be useful for ethical issues – a sound guide to the content of morality – but less so about practical procedural law. (I admit this is a very rough summary of the debate). There is much more to be said about the usefulness of referendums in today’s pluralist society but that would require a book, not a 2,000 word article.

Honesty about 1968 I was ten getting on for eleven in 1968 and the big event for me in May of that year was Cardiff City playing SV Hamburg in the European Cup-Winners Cup semi-final. So it's good to read some sober and honest analysis of that year from Fred Halliday rather than the over-rated nostalgia on offer from many of the superannuated ultras. Posted by Leighton Andrews on Thursday, June 19, 2008 0 comments

Here's my latest piece about the Von Hugel Institute report on church, government and social welfare. Penned for OpenDemocracy's 'Our Kingdom' conversation, to which I'm an occasional contributor, it is entitled Whose welfare, what provision? and begins to probe into some of the underlying public policy issues. Essentially, though, it's a short review of Moral, But No Compass. Also available via the UK Politics aggregator.

Subdue Iran, secure Iraq

Meanwhile, let's look at the evidence we have so far to understand what 42 days would mean. Anthony Barnett has done some of the detective work in a recent article on opendemocracy.net. He establishes that roughly half of those detained under existing limits (seven days under the 2000 Terrorism Act, 14 days since 2003, 28 days since 2006) were released without charge. Only six suspects were held right up to the 28th day, of whom three were then charged and three released without charge. Pressed by David Davis, the shadow home secretary, the police revealed that those released were not then placed under a control order or even under surveillance. "So they were innocent?" Davis asked. The police responded with what Barnett calls "a shrug of assent".

Democracy and new media Source: Charlie Beckett Date: 10 Jun, 2008

This is the first paragraph of an article I have written for the excellent Opendemocracy.net webiste. See the rest of it and some fine writing about international affairs here.

Big in Japan: a history of hairstyles and hair ornaments - Open DemocracyVERY HIGH: Ancient Japanese people believed that a thin stick had magical power. They used their hair ornaments as talismans to protect them from evil. But the origin of this style is from China. This was a hairstyle for the highest-ranking lady Source: www.opendemocracy.net

International There’s been a bit of comment box chat here at Troppo about the possibilities of war between the US and Iran in the runup to the Presidential election.  Paul Rogers canvasses the issues in depth at openDemocracy.

TroppoSphere, in case Missing Link email subscribers haven’t noticed, is now available as a convenient gateway to a world of news and expert opinion and analysis for those with feed reader phobia. It contains feeds to most of the blogs and other sources whose best/selected content we most regularly feature in Missing Link, as well as general news feeds and those from selected online magazines like openDemocracy, Reason, Slate, Spiked, New Matilda, Australian Opinion Online and Online Opinion.